Customized HBS-style case studies
Your own EM business school. We write Harvard Business School-style case studies around the challenges your engineering managers actually face, and lead a peer discussion every two weeks.
Who it is for
- New engineering managers who want to practice the hard calls before they have to make them for real.
- You, the engineering leader they report to, if you want them to build a shared way of handling those calls, and to learn from each other while they do.
How it works
- 01
We find the recurring challenges
A PlayerCoach coach works with you to find the situations your managers keep running into: an underperformer, tech debt against the roadmap, a disagreement with senior leadership. If your managers are also in 1:1 coaching, those sessions inform the themes too, never in a way that can be traced back to anyone.
- 02
We write the case
Each case runs 2–3 pages: a fictional manager in a realistic situation, the artifacts you'd recognize (Slack threads, pull requests, sprint metrics) and a decision that is still open.
- 03
Your managers prepare
They receive the case and a few questions 48 hours ahead, and work through the trade-offs on their own.
- 04
We lead the discussion
An experienced coach runs a Socratic discussion in which everyone takes a position and defends it. Your managers test their reasoning against each other.
What you get
Practice before it's real
Your managers make the hard calls in a room first, and leave with mental models they use in their next 1:1.
Candid discussion
The cases are fictional, so your managers can speak openly without discussing a colleague.
A case library you keep
Every case stays with you, ready for onboarding the next managers you promote.