The victim trap of engineering managers

One Thursday evening, my PM dropped this bomb in a big Slack channel:

I was absolutely furious.

There was no way we could fix everything without burning the entire weekend. And for what? The delays weren’t my fault - he kept increasing the scope with zero compromises.

And even worse - how could he promise such a thing without consulting me???

I’ve had enough. I started to write an angry message to my manager, the PM, and the VP of product.

And then I stopped for a second. I realized I’d fallen into the Dreaded Drama Triangle trap. Again.

Today, I’m going to cover:

• What is the drama triangle

• What does it look like in practice - 3 examples from the engineering management world

• How to stop being a victim

What is the drama triangle

The Drama Triangle is a model that explains how people fall into one of three roles during conflict or stressful situations - Victim, Villain, and Hero.

A nice visualization that sums it up, from this video:

1. Victim

The Victim feels powerless and believes that life is happening to them. They see themselves as at the mercy of external circumstances, people, or conditions, for example:

• Blaming external factors: "The economy is so bad, there’s no way I can find a job now."

• Feeling stuck: "I can’t do anything about this deadline because the PM keeps changing their mind and adding features."

The Victim often waits for someone (like the Hero) to rescue them, reinforcing their lack of power.

2. Villain

The Villain is what the victim is pointing fingers at, what they believe causes all their problems. For example:

• "I really messed up that presentation, I knew I should have prepared more." (self-blame)

• "We didn’t meet the deadline because the PM kept increasing the scope." (blaming others)

• "The management team is completely out of touch" (blaming groups)

3. Hero

The “Hero” provides relief to the victim, by offering temporary solutions. A hero can be another person or a behavior. For example:

• When you complain to your manager, and they tell you: “You are right, I don’t know what the PM thought. I’ll deal with it myself”.

• You might ‘hero’ yourself by completely ignoring the issue - mindlessly scrolling social media, binge-watching TV, or indulging in food or drinks.

What does it look like in practice?

3 examples from the engineering management world:

1. The overpromising PM

In the story that opened the article, I was the Victim, feeling powerless and angry by the PM’s decision to over-promise without consulting me. The PM became the Villain I blamed. My manager was the Hero, someone I wanted to validate my frustration and “shield” me from the Villain.

Result: This mindset prevented me from actually resolving the issue, and kept the team in an endless reactive loop.

2. Being told your team is not working hard enough

You sit down for a 1:1 with your manager, and they start by immediately telling you: “During the last executive meeting the CEO said he feels your department is not working hard enough”.

That’s one of the most frustrating experiences as a manager. It’s so easy to fall into the victim mindset, blaming the CEO.

When your wife asks you about work, you tell her: “Our CEO is so disconnected, it’s unbelievable! I’m so sick of being told we need to work harder”. She’ll of course reinforce your frustration (acting as your ‘hero’).

Result: your team will continue to be perceived as ‘slacking off’, hurting both you and the future prospects of your engineers.

3. An underperforming developer

You feel a developer on your team is not up to the required level. He takes very long to complete tasks, doesn’t show initiative, and doesn’t seem to improve. You had multiple conversations with him, telling him what you expect, but nothing changed.

You sit for lunch with one of your peers, and tell her: “I’m so tired with Sean, why didn’t the previous manager fire him? Now I’m stuck with him”.

Result: the root cause is never fixed, and everyone suffers - you, Sean, and the rest of the team.

How to stop being a victim

For me, getting out of that victim mindset boils down to 3 things:

Recognize you are in a victim mindset

This one took a while, but now I notice quite immediately. I try to understand not only who/what is the villain, but also who/what is the hero I’m going to turn to to get rid of my frustration.

Right before sending that Slack message to my manager and the VP Product, I recognized I’d fallen again into the victim trap.

Try VERY hard to see their side

The next step is even harder - try to imagine the “villain’s” point of view.

I started to think, why did my PM promise that it would be an impossible deadline? who put pressure on him?

Instead of sending that angry message to my manager and the VP Product, I gave the PM a phone call. I calmly asked about that message, what made him do it, and why he didn’t first talk with me.

He then shared how pressured he was in the last couple of weeks, with 3 different executives bugging him every day about that release, putting impossible demands and expecting him to solve it magically.

He apologized for not discussing it with me before the reply. When I told him it’s not easy fixes, he asked me what I think we should do now.

Put your attention on the outcome, not the problem

The more you focus on the problem, the bigger it becomes in your mind, and the more frustrated you become.

Sometimes if you just focus on the outcome you want, the problem disappears. The outcome I wanted was to reduce the pressure from my team and the PM.

I offered my PM to write a message in the channel myself. I wrote that after some investigation we understand that the changes are harder than we anticipated. I explained we want to release a high-quality solution, and we will do it by Wednesday next week. I took some of the heat myself, apologizing for the delay.

In the The Power of TED, they shared what a healthier model looks like. Instead of victim, villain and hero, you have creator, challenger, and coach:

I loved this quote from the book:

One of the fundamental differences between the Victim orientation and the Creator one is where you put the focus of your attention. For Victims, the focus is always on what they don’t want: the problems that seem constantly to multiply in their lives. They don’t want the person, condition, or circumstance they consider to be their villain.

Creators, on the other hand, place their focus on what they DO want. Doing this, Creators still face and solve problems in the course of creating the outcomes they want.

Final words

I first learned about the drama triangle from

Taha Hussain

. He led large engineering organizations at Microsoft and Yahoo, and now is a Engineering Leadership coach.

I really enjoyed the lessons in his course, especailly the first one, where he dove deeper into creating ownership by resolving the Drama Triangle. He is starting the next cohort on January 25th, but for now the first lesson is free! NOT sponsored/affiliated! Just a personal recommendation.

As a newly promoted engineering manager, I remember that I often said the phrase: “That’s important, I wish somebody would finally do something about it!”. I was talking about things outside of my classic responsibility.

Once I learned about the victim->creator transformation, I just started to do many of those things myself (or at least push them along). I complained A LOT less. Instead of being stuck in my own frustration, I try much harder to improve every part of the company - and in some cases, it actually worked!

That shift of mindset was critical in both of my promotions, and I’m sure will help me a lot for the rest of my career (and life).

What I enjoyed reading this week

1. The Engineering Leader of 2025 and Beyond by

   Mirek Stanek

2. Tiny Thoughts of 2024 by

   Michał Poczwardowski

3. Should you work in big tech as a software engineer? by

   Nicola Amadio