What 3 Fatal Mistakes Do New Tech Leaders Make? Lessons from a Startup Disaster

In this article, the author shares a real story about a technical leader (referred to as A) who took over a 15‑person development team at a gaming startup and quickly saw massive turnover.

A first introduced an agile process he knew from a large company, but the team lacked the necessary skills and infrastructure, causing two resignations.

Second, after a serious bug caused a two‑hour outage, A fined the responsible developer 3000 CNY without any prior policy, sparking further discontent and two more resignations.

Third, under pressure to deliver a critical feature in three days, A forced the team into excessive overtime, released a buggy product, and publicly berated teammates, leading to another two departures.

These events illustrate three common pitfalls for engineers moving into management:

Applying past experience to unsuitable contexts – blindly transplanting agile methods without considering team capability.

Implementing reward‑and‑punishment systems without prior definition – penalties must be transparent and pre‑announced.

Weak upward management – failing to influence superiors and instead venting frustration on subordinates.

The author concludes that effective managers must balance empathy, clear policies, and the ability to negotiate realistic expectations with leadership.