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In about 90% of companies I’ve seen they expect you to do all the manager things and be an engineer too. It’s not so much a mistake individuals make as that it’

In about 90% of companies I’ve seen they expect you to do all the manager things and be an engineer too. It’s not so much a mistake individuals make as that it’s an explicit expectation that you’ll be wearing multiple hats. Folks generally get bombarded to manager because there’s no career ladder and this is what people think they have to do next to be able to continue to grow. And once you become a manager it doesn’t suddenly create a head count to backfill the “loss” of an engineer so there is continued pressure on you to do both. Once career ladders start to get better defined this starts to change too, and as the size of the company increases manager and IC responsibilities end up being different people. But companies seem to only figure this out at the 500-1000+ employee threshold.

mynegation 6y ago
> And once you become a manager it doesn’t suddenly create a head count to backfill the “loss” of an engineer so there is continued pressure on you to do both. That must be on the top of your “new engineering manager” TODO list.
- daenney 6y ago
  It usually is. But the fact that it’s on the top of the list doesn’t mean there’s head count available. Most organisations do this through planning phases and depending on how often these happen it can be a while. Then add the time it actually takes to hire someone.
alistairSH 6y ago
Folks generally get bombarded to manager because there’s no career ladder That's a pretty serious organizational flaw. At my employer, we have a well-define architect path that ends with "Technical Fellow" which on the job matrix is parallel with director-level management. As a developer, I see 4 basic career tracks. Developer-track - caps out at principal developer, thought most people in this role are capable of architectural work within their product/tech-stack. Architect-track - high-level strategic technical decision making, caps out at Technical Fellow. Business-track - eventual move into a BA or Product Management role. Management-track - typically moves in scrum master or project management role, then into full-time personal management. I started down the architect track, then hopped over to management because I wanted to challenge myself (at the time, leading people was WAY WAY WAY outside my comfort zone), not because I was forced into it due to lack of career growth.
- ghaff 6y ago
  >That's a pretty serious organizational flaw. I agree that "no career ladder" is a serious flaw. That said, it's not uncommon that, in terms of money anyway, IC tracks tend to cap out at lower levels than management tracks even if there is a well-defined IC track.
  - alistairSH 6y ago
    Yup. And it's not limited to software/tech. The local police department has the same problem with patrol/beat officers - many of the good ones were promoting into desk jobs because their salaries capped out. IIRC, they ended up creating a new tier of patrol roles on top that corresponded, income-wise, with the first or second level management.
  - ska 6y ago
    > t's not uncommon that, in terms of money anyway, IC tracks tend to cap out at lower levels than management This is pretty natural, at least in a big organization. At some point your IC tracks almost always have less impact. There are weird corner cases sure, but not enough that you can't deal with individually. But that's ok; Almost every manager isn't going to eventually be C-level either. What's important is that there is some career track that makes sense for IC focused technical people to stay in throughout a normal career.
    - alistairSH 6y ago
      There are weird corner cases sure, but not enough that you can't deal with individually. I think that's where a lot of organizations fail. Take the "Technical Fellow" I mentioned earlier. This is the "weird corner case" - a technical IC who is capable of contributing strategically but has no interest in management. The people in this role generally have ~20 years in industry and most have advanced degrees. They're some of the smartest people I know. They have the people skills to manage, but little interest (or rather, prefer to stay purely technical). Without the technical fellow role, they would have likely moved into management after 10-15 years and moved into director positions, at a loss to the company. Or, they'd dead end as senior devs at a lower salary and not have a voice with senior management. My employer has 3500 employees (across all BUs). There are fewer than 10 technical fellows.
halfmatthalfcat 6y ago
Is it pressure if that's what you want? I explicitly took my managing role because I was going to still be able to code, not in spite of it.
- daenney 6y ago
  I did the exact same thing, I liked the idea of being able to code still. And then three months in I took stock and I didn’t like what I saw. I wasn’t able to devote the time I needed to help people with career development and truly enable them to shine. I was also slowing my team down because the time I could spend in code and crucially code review was much lower. PRs languished and folks had to go in and fix things after me. So I dropped the code bits, aside from really small code fixes here and there across our code base and focussed on doing the management thing. I was happier and so was my team. I hope it works out for you though!

mynegation 6y ago

> And once you become a manager it doesn’t suddenly create a head count to backfill the “loss” of an engineer so there is continued pressure on you to do both. That must be on the top of your “new engineering manager” TODO list.

daenney 6y ago
It usually is. But the fact that it’s on the top of the list doesn’t mean there’s head count available. Most organisations do this through planning phases and depending on how often these happen it can be a while. Then add the time it actually takes to hire someone.

alistairSH 6y ago

Folks generally get bombarded to manager because there’s no career ladder That's a pretty serious organizational flaw. At my employer, we have a well-define architect path that ends with "Technical Fellow" which on the job matrix is parallel with director-level management. As a developer, I see 4 basic career tracks. Developer-track - caps out at principal developer, thought most people in this role are capable of architectural work within their product/tech-stack. Architect-track - high-level strategic technical decision making, caps out at Technical Fellow. Business-track - eventual move into a BA or Product Management role. Management-track - typically moves in scrum master or project management role, then into full-time personal management. I started down the architect track, then hopped over to management because I wanted to challenge myself (at the time, leading people was WAY WAY WAY outside my comfort zone), not because I was forced into it due to lack of career growth.

ghaff 6y ago
>That's a pretty serious organizational flaw. I agree that "no career ladder" is a serious flaw. That said, it's not uncommon that, in terms of money anyway, IC tracks tend to cap out at lower levels than management tracks even if there is a well-defined IC track.
- alistairSH 6y ago
  Yup. And it's not limited to software/tech. The local police department has the same problem with patrol/beat officers - many of the good ones were promoting into desk jobs because their salaries capped out. IIRC, they ended up creating a new tier of patrol roles on top that corresponded, income-wise, with the first or second level management.
- ska 6y ago
  > t's not uncommon that, in terms of money anyway, IC tracks tend to cap out at lower levels than management This is pretty natural, at least in a big organization. At some point your IC tracks almost always have less impact. There are weird corner cases sure, but not enough that you can't deal with individually. But that's ok; Almost every manager isn't going to eventually be C-level either. What's important is that there is some career track that makes sense for IC focused technical people to stay in throughout a normal career.
  - alistairSH 6y ago
    There are weird corner cases sure, but not enough that you can't deal with individually. I think that's where a lot of organizations fail. Take the "Technical Fellow" I mentioned earlier. This is the "weird corner case" - a technical IC who is capable of contributing strategically but has no interest in management. The people in this role generally have ~20 years in industry and most have advanced degrees. They're some of the smartest people I know. They have the people skills to manage, but little interest (or rather, prefer to stay purely technical). Without the technical fellow role, they would have likely moved into management after 10-15 years and moved into director positions, at a loss to the company. Or, they'd dead end as senior devs at a lower salary and not have a voice with senior management. My employer has 3500 employees (across all BUs). There are fewer than 10 technical fellows.

halfmatthalfcat 6y ago

Is it pressure if that's what you want? I explicitly took my managing role because I was going to still be able to code, not in spite of it.

daenney 6y ago
I did the exact same thing, I liked the idea of being able to code still. And then three months in I took stock and I didn’t like what I saw. I wasn’t able to devote the time I needed to help people with career development and truly enable them to shine. I was also slowing my team down because the time I could spend in code and crucially code review was much lower. PRs languished and folks had to go in and fix things after me. So I dropped the code bits, aside from really small code fixes here and there across our code base and focussed on doing the management thing. I was happier and so was my team. I hope it works out for you though!