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Can someone explain to me why titles like Engineer, Architect, and Developer are perceived as having less value than titles like Manager or Director? Managing

Can someone explain to me why titles like Engineer, Architect, and Developer are perceived as having less value than titles like Manager or Director? Managing products requires a completely different skill set from managing people. Both skills are vital to the success of a business and neither are trivially developed or easily replaced. If you ask me, the "demotion" in this article is not going from Director of Design to Software Developer. The demotion is going from a senior level position to an entry level one. But that's not how it's presented.

100011_100001 6y ago
In a lot of companies Managers and Directors make more money than being a Developer. On top of that the perception of status is higher from the outside if you are a Director vs a Developer. Smart tech companies have two paths, the management and the engineer path. Where they both have certain expectations but there is no pay ceiling. Bad tech companies tend to disregard this and there is a point that you can no longer get a raise unless you "move up" and become a manager.
- jedberg 6y ago
  > Smart tech companies have two paths, the management and the engineer path. In my 25 working years, I've learned this is mostly lip service. Yes, there are ICs who make as much as a VP. But look at Amazon. There are maybe ten people in that company that are IC level making what VPs make. And thousands of VPs. To be a VP, you have to be a really great manager. To get VP pay as an IC (ie. Distinguished Engineer), you have to be the best in the world in your field. So yeah, it's possible to have equivalent tracks, but the reality is that you will never make as much as an IC than if you switch to the management track.
  - 100011_100001 6y ago
    Absolutely true. Even non FAANG companies have that problem. For example in IBM you have to start producing new patents etc. In short the qualifications a VP vs an IC (as you called them) are in different stratospheres.
- throwawaygh 6y ago
  This is true within companies but at least in Software is often not true between companies. E.g., the 2nd/3rd-to-last rung of a FAANG IC ladder makes much more than managers and directors at most other companies in the USA. This is significant because it's much easier to become a senior IC at a FAANG than to become a Regional Director at the typical company in the USA.
ballenf 6y ago
Making a big mistake as a manager can cost the company a lot more than a big mistake as an individual Engineer, Architect or Developer, especially if you consider that the latter roles will catch many of each others' mistakes. The manager level can result in entire teams quitting, failing to support each other or an atmosphere where catching each others' mistakes is discouraged. Some jobs are paid based (roughly) on the value they bring and others are paid based on the threat/cost of large mistakes.
- CivBase 6y ago
  Why does potential for costly mistakes result in greater perceived value and higher pay?
  - ironmagma 6y ago
    Higher risk begets higher premiums.
    - CivBase 6y ago
      Why? The relationship between contribution and compensation is obvious. If you bring more value to the company, the company compensates you directly with a portion of that value. But why does a position with greater risk necessitate greater compensation? EDIT: Everything below here was in the original post. However, I re-read it and realized it had little to do with the relationship between risk and compensation. I don't buy the idea that managers are liable for the mistakes of their reports. That would cause a snowball effect in large organizations, resulting in extremely high turnover for leadership positions. Managers share some liability for their reports' mistakes, but they also share some reward for their reports' successes. Those liabilities and rewards are split across all of their reports, resulting in what are usually relatively stable positions within a company. A lazy manager can get along by just regularly pruning reports who produce more liability than reward.
      - ben509 6y ago
        > But why does a position with greater risk necessitate greater compensation? There are various methods to address risk: 1. Avoid the risk 2. Reduce the risk 3. Transfer the risk 4. Accept the risk When you buy insurance, you're doing #3. If you self-insure, you're doing #4. Either strategy requires putting some money towards premiums, the expected possible cost of the risk. It's much cheaper to pursue #1 or #2. You're then saving an amount exactly equal to the premiums don't have to pay under #3 or #4. Thus, you can pay a person to do #1/#2 a fraction of the equivalent cost of #3/#4 and still come out ahead. > A lazy manager can get along by just regularly pruning reports who produce more liability than reward. Yup, and the books will balance.
tyingq 6y ago
Because Leadership people make policy that rewards Leadership people. Consciously or not.
- username90 6y ago
  Yeah, managers higher up have a strong incentive to create compensation structures where managers are paid more the more people they manage. But like, being a manager doesn't say much at all about what you do. A non technical manager who managers engineers doesn't add much value and instead the engineers will be mostly self organizing, as such they are mostly there to provide administrative support. Your average office worker can do that, there is no reason such managers should be well compensated unless they also do other work like product management or similar.
stronglikedan 6y ago
Because, as a manager, you're responsible for the mistakes your people make, not them.
- eeZah7Ux 6y ago
  "Associates" are fired with no warning and no reason. Employees are the first to get fired when a company struggles. Managers are less likely to be fired, and when it happens they can have more savings as they salaries are higher. CEOs quit failing companies with multi-million exit bonuses. So no, salaries are based on power, and so is the ability to dodge risks and responsibilities.
TameAntelope 6y ago
When you make a decision as a manager or a director, the impact of that decision has a multiplicative force. As an individual contributor, the impact of your decisions may be broad, but however broad your individual impact is, your manager's impact on you is [broad * number of directs], so it's always "greater" (note: not better, just greater). So in that sense, the "value" of a manager/director is "higher". IMO it's all just a series of roles, and you need someone to do both. Someone has to be designing and building code while someone else attends meetings and understands the larger context of that code, making sure the code makes sense a week/month/year later. In fact, I prefer it when managers take on a much less "HR" role, and instead act as "go-fers" for their team, a la "how can I unblock you today?". Bonus points if they can mentor, but not necessary. Being an individual contributor isn't a "demotion", but it is a change in where your impact hits (people vs. things). You need both, and it's fundamentally a partnership, I wish more people realized that.
- CivBase 6y ago
  > So in that sense, the "value" of a manager/director is "higher". That depends on how high the multiplier is and how many direct reports a manager has. A manager with 5 direct reports and a multiplier of 110% is only producing as much net value as 0.5 of his/her reports. A manager with 20 direct reports and a multiplier of 106% produces a net value of 1.2 of his/her reports. It's not safe to say that managers in general produce more value. Some do, some don't. It depends on their ability and the abilities of those they share a management relationship with. But the same could be said about engineers/architects/devs.
  - throwawaygh 6y ago
    Much more importantly, it depends on the multiplicative effect that an engineer is positioned to have. It's 2002. Does a Kohls Director Of Whatever with tens of direct reports and thousands of people below those reports have more leverage than a single engineer at Amazon? It's 2021. Does a manager of hundreds of warehouse workers have more leverage/impact potential than a single engineer in a robotics R&D division?
  - TameAntelope 6y ago
cccc4all 6y ago
As companies get larger and larger, the need to manage people becomes even greater challenge. The C level people start to disassociate from "tech" people and start associating more with "management". Even guys that start out as engineers, Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates, etc. get swallowed up by management layer deep state. You'll start noticing when the "Star" employees of the late stage start up are more from HR, director groups, instead of product, tech, etc. A single developer developing an app vs large team building an enterprise SAAS application have exponential differences.

100011_100001 6y ago

In a lot of companies Managers and Directors make more money than being a Developer. On top of that the perception of status is higher from the outside if you are a Director vs a Developer. Smart tech companies have two paths, the management and the engineer path. Where they both have certain expectations but there is no pay ceiling. Bad tech companies tend to disregard this and there is a point that you can no longer get a raise unless you "move up" and become a manager.

jedberg 6y ago
> Smart tech companies have two paths, the management and the engineer path. In my 25 working years, I've learned this is mostly lip service. Yes, there are ICs who make as much as a VP. But look at Amazon. There are maybe ten people in that company that are IC level making what VPs make. And thousands of VPs. To be a VP, you have to be a really great manager. To get VP pay as an IC (ie. Distinguished Engineer), you have to be the best in the world in your field. So yeah, it's possible to have equivalent tracks, but the reality is that you will never make as much as an IC than if you switch to the management track.
- 100011_100001 6y ago
  Absolutely true. Even non FAANG companies have that problem. For example in IBM you have to start producing new patents etc. In short the qualifications a VP vs an IC (as you called them) are in different stratospheres.
throwawaygh 6y ago
This is true within companies but at least in Software is often not true between companies. E.g., the 2nd/3rd-to-last rung of a FAANG IC ladder makes much more than managers and directors at most other companies in the USA. This is significant because it's much easier to become a senior IC at a FAANG than to become a Regional Director at the typical company in the USA.

ballenf 6y ago

Making a big mistake as a manager can cost the company a lot more than a big mistake as an individual Engineer, Architect or Developer, especially if you consider that the latter roles will catch many of each others' mistakes. The manager level can result in entire teams quitting, failing to support each other or an atmosphere where catching each others' mistakes is discouraged. Some jobs are paid based (roughly) on the value they bring and others are paid based on the threat/cost of large mistakes.

CivBase 6y ago
Why does potential for costly mistakes result in greater perceived value and higher pay?
- ironmagma 6y ago
  Higher risk begets higher premiums.
  - CivBase 6y ago
    Why? The relationship between contribution and compensation is obvious. If you bring more value to the company, the company compensates you directly with a portion of that value. But why does a position with greater risk necessitate greater compensation? EDIT: Everything below here was in the original post. However, I re-read it and realized it had little to do with the relationship between risk and compensation. I don't buy the idea that managers are liable for the mistakes of their reports. That would cause a snowball effect in large organizations, resulting in extremely high turnover for leadership positions. Managers share some liability for their reports' mistakes, but they also share some reward for their reports' successes. Those liabilities and rewards are split across all of their reports, resulting in what are usually relatively stable positions within a company. A lazy manager can get along by just regularly pruning reports who produce more liability than reward.
    - ben509 6y ago
      > But why does a position with greater risk necessitate greater compensation? There are various methods to address risk: 1. Avoid the risk 2. Reduce the risk 3. Transfer the risk 4. Accept the risk When you buy insurance, you're doing #3. If you self-insure, you're doing #4. Either strategy requires putting some money towards premiums, the expected possible cost of the risk. It's much cheaper to pursue #1 or #2. You're then saving an amount exactly equal to the premiums don't have to pay under #3 or #4. Thus, you can pay a person to do #1/#2 a fraction of the equivalent cost of #3/#4 and still come out ahead. > A lazy manager can get along by just regularly pruning reports who produce more liability than reward. Yup, and the books will balance.

tyingq 6y ago

Because Leadership people make policy that rewards Leadership people. Consciously or not.

username90 6y ago
Yeah, managers higher up have a strong incentive to create compensation structures where managers are paid more the more people they manage. But like, being a manager doesn't say much at all about what you do. A non technical manager who managers engineers doesn't add much value and instead the engineers will be mostly self organizing, as such they are mostly there to provide administrative support. Your average office worker can do that, there is no reason such managers should be well compensated unless they also do other work like product management or similar.

stronglikedan 6y ago

Because, as a manager, you're responsible for the mistakes your people make, not them.

eeZah7Ux 6y ago
"Associates" are fired with no warning and no reason. Employees are the first to get fired when a company struggles. Managers are less likely to be fired, and when it happens they can have more savings as they salaries are higher. CEOs quit failing companies with multi-million exit bonuses. So no, salaries are based on power, and so is the ability to dodge risks and responsibilities.

TameAntelope 6y ago

When you make a decision as a manager or a director, the impact of that decision has a multiplicative force. As an individual contributor, the impact of your decisions may be broad, but however broad your individual impact is, your manager's impact on you is [broad * number of directs], so it's always "greater" (note: not better, just greater). So in that sense, the "value" of a manager/director is "higher". IMO it's all just a series of roles, and you need someone to do both. Someone has to be designing and building code while someone else attends meetings and understands the larger context of that code, making sure the code makes sense a week/month/year later. In fact, I prefer it when managers take on a much less "HR" role, and instead act as "go-fers" for their team, a la "how can I unblock you today?". Bonus points if they can mentor, but not necessary. Being an individual contributor isn't a "demotion", but it is a change in where your impact hits (people vs. things). You need both, and it's fundamentally a partnership, I wish more people realized that.

CivBase 6y ago
> So in that sense, the "value" of a manager/director is "higher". That depends on how high the multiplier is and how many direct reports a manager has. A manager with 5 direct reports and a multiplier of 110% is only producing as much net value as 0.5 of his/her reports. A manager with 20 direct reports and a multiplier of 106% produces a net value of 1.2 of his/her reports. It's not safe to say that managers in general produce more value. Some do, some don't. It depends on their ability and the abilities of those they share a management relationship with. But the same could be said about engineers/architects/devs.
- throwawaygh 6y ago
  Much more importantly, it depends on the multiplicative effect that an engineer is positioned to have. It's 2002. Does a Kohls Director Of Whatever with tens of direct reports and thousands of people below those reports have more leverage than a single engineer at Amazon? It's 2021. Does a manager of hundreds of warehouse workers have more leverage/impact potential than a single engineer in a robotics R&D division?
- TameAntelope 6y ago

cccc4all 6y ago

As companies get larger and larger, the need to manage people becomes even greater challenge. The C level people start to disassociate from "tech" people and start associating more with "management". Even guys that start out as engineers, Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates, etc. get swallowed up by management layer deep state. You'll start noticing when the "Star" employees of the late stage start up are more from HR, director groups, instead of product, tech, etc. A single developer developing an app vs large team building an enterprise SAAS application have exponential differences.