Team Lead vs Software Engineer -- The Multitasking Reality

In theory, the distinction between a software engineer and a team lead is straightforward. A software engineer is expected to focus 80% of their time on writing code, 10% on reviewing peers’ code, and the remaining 10% in meetings. The role is relatively focused, with productivity measured largely by feature delivery and code quality.

Team leads, however, occupy a very different space—at least on paper. Ideally, they spend about 30% of their time coding—often for proof-of-concept (POC) work or investigating technical spikes—while the remaining 70% is dedicated to code reviews, mentoring, architecture decisions, and sprint planning.

But in reality, it’s not that clean.

The Invisible Load of a Team Lead

Most of a team lead’s non-coding responsibilities are crammed into meetings. And not just meetings directly related to the product or sprint.

Many of us attend:

• Reporting meetings (weekly/bi-weekly updates to upper management)
• Department-wide meetings
• All-hands meetings
• Project planning syncs
• Cross-team coordination calls
• Incident review and post-mortems
• Resource planning sessions
• HR check-ins or team health reviews

Often, these meetings don’t require technical input but demand presence—because managers need visibility or representation from every team.

Context Switching: The Silent Productivity Killer

What makes the team lead role uniquely challenging is the need to juggle these “management-facing” meetings while staying available for the team.

During any given day, a team lead might be:

• Helping assign tickets to the right people
• Clarifying vague requirements from business or product owners
• Handling escalations from QA, support, or stakeholders
• Monitoring or preparing for production operations

In practice, that means doing team lead work during meetings that don’t need active participation. You become a multitasking machine.

A Real-Life Example

During a recent department-wide all-hands meeting, I found myself:

• Replying to an escalation ticket to support
• Clarifying a ticket with a team member so they could proceed with their work
• Preparing a production operation to release a hotfix—scheduled immediately after the meeting

All of this while listening to broad strategic updates. It was exhausting, mentally taxing—and yet, it all got done. The member unblocked, support got a timely response, and the hotfix was successfully deployed.

This isn’t an exception. It’s the norm.

The Skillset Behind the Role

Being a team lead isn’t just about technical expertise or people skills. It’s about mastering a particular set of soft and meta-skills:

• Multitasking: Handling 3–4 types of tasks simultaneously, often under pressure.
• Context Switching: Efficiently switching between architecture discussion, production monitoring, mentoring, and management calls.
• Task Management: Knowing how to triage what needs attention now vs. later.
• Time Management: Finding coding time in the cracks of a meeting-heavy calendar.
• Emotional Intelligence: Staying calm, composed, and helpful even when overloaded.

Final Thoughts

The transition from engineer to team lead is not just a shift in title—it’s a shift in mindset and capability. Success is no longer measured just by what you code, but by how you enable, guide, and shield your team while navigating a never-ending stream of responsibilities.

Being a team lead means your productivity is no longer just about output—it’s about impact, adaptability, and the ability to handle chaos without letting it touch your team.