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Recently I’ve found myself wondering about the average stress levels of managers versus senior engineers. I’m at a big tech company that has roughly parallel tr

Recently I’ve found myself wondering about the average stress levels of managers versus senior engineers. I’m at a big tech company that has roughly parallel tracks up to a quite high level, so I’m not hurting for income, but I see a lot of VPs/directors taking vacations, generally seeming well balanced in work/life. Meanwhile, I haven’t taken a legit vacation in 2.5 years (ok, the pandemic and small kids are partially to blame) and am constantly a ball of anxiety over whether my technical ideas are up to snuff, whether we’re on the right track implementing them, etc. I wonder what stresses I’d find on the management track.

greymalik 5y ago
Have you considered that this may be a problem with your workplace culture or your own mindset and not inherent to the job track?
- bertr4nd 5y ago
  Oh sure, I mean, there are tons of contributing factors to human happiness and one’s specific job function in a specific company isn’t a complete determinant. A lot of my anxiety is directly attributable to a tendency towards intense self-criticism, which is going to follow me anywhere.
FlyingAvatar 5y ago
I am curious what prevents you from taking a vacation? People on my team are actively encouraged to use their PTO on an on-going basis.
- astura 5y ago
  Right? At my company you're actually required to use at least specific amount of PTO every year, like around 15 days I think.
drunkpotato 5y ago
Take a vacation! The company will be okay without you for a while. Disclaimer: I’m about to say stuff that are just my impressions, without a lot of “I think” or “I believe.” Take those as implied. Generally the stress of management is in coordinating various personalities and balancing competing priorities, while being on the hook for delivering results without having any direct impact on whether a project gets done to a high degree of quality. They rely on others’ expertise, some of whine may not be that reliable, and it’s stressful! Directors and VPs have that stress plus they are more directly accountable to financial results. However, they have to be cheerful and optimistic and never show weakness or worry to an almost psychopathic degree. This may look like a good work/life balance externally but internally “work brain” and the weight of stress are relentless. The bad ones sublimate stress and occasionally explode and yell at their subordinates. To engineers none of this looks like “work” because none of it produces concrete results. (I haven’t mentioned the endless word docs to read and write, and the spreadsheets, oh god the endless spreadsheets.) But it does accumulate a lot of stress and anxiety. On the vacation side of things, seriously, take a vacation! It will be okay!
- bertr4nd 5y ago
  This makes a huge amount of sense. I hadn’t considered how high level managers really can’t afford to project their stress publicly (bad for morale!) so I’m probably seeing an extremely airbrushed picture of their lives.
  - Mezzie 5y ago
    Yes, + they have to make impossible choices. There's a product right now at work we're debating killing and the decision literally comes down to evaluating whether losing an important organizational partnership or taking a reputation hit would be worse for the company. There's not a right answer; that's just fortune telling and having to own the results.
- cdavid 5y ago
  As a manager of managers, I can confirm this is a fairly accurate of my job, in some aspects at least. The lack of concrete results is maybe the most frustrating as a former engineer (it is like your compilation cycles takes months if not quarters).
jghn 5y ago
Fwiw I’ve spent the past few years pondering going back to being an IC to reduce stress. There’s probably a grass is greener effect here. It’s interesting though. I do put in fewer hours as a manager. At the same time as I’ve progressed up the management ladder my anxiety levels have followed. Quality of life has suffered. I’ve learned to live with near constant stress headaches, frequent jaw pain, and a host of other issues.
- danrocks 5y ago
  > Fwiw I’ve spent the past few years pondering going back to being an IC to reduce stress. There’s probably a grass is greener effect here. If you are a good manager now, you will let it transpire in your IC work and you will eventually be asked to step back into a manager role, because the team asked so.
BikiniPrince 5y ago
It’s different depending on the company. I’ve seen companies that can have very technical managers and this is good. I’ve also seen companies where managers like to play engineer, but badly. They don’t relegate until it’s a problem and may or may not focus on correcting design issues. I have had to say in a meeting. Stop engineering the product and have the engineers handle the development life cycle. Regardless, life won’t change just because the duties do. You have to make time off happen. The market is so starved for talent you can go somewhere else over night.
danrocks 5y ago
I am a manager of managers. Haven't taken any vacations of more than 5 days since 2011. Constantly worry about my technical skills becoming obsolete - hence I have to do coding on the side. Constantly worry about whether my managers will practice what I preach (kindness, coaching, caring, etc.) with their team. Constantly worry about multiple deadlines for multiple projects, all under my responsibility but not direct control (I'm not a direct manager). Hire 10-15 people at a time, campaign for some of them, they disappoint, become a burden for others and risk destroying the team - have to worry about that as well. Get an e-mail at 10pm on a Friday that your best developer has been hired by Google at 2x the pay and there's nothing I can do about it. Another e-mail at Monday 11am saying that your worst developer has ALSO been hired by Google at 2x the pay. Spend 24/7/365 on how to prevent your entire team from jumping ship because of pay I cannot match. Worry about managing up, sideways, down, and in the fourth dimension as well. Kill to just be a developer, step back into IC role. Do well, less stress, gets asked to become a manager again because the previous 3 have been a disaster and the team elected you. Go back to #1, rinse, repeat.
- ipnon 5y ago
  The corollary is it's easy to earn favor with your manager by borrowing tasks from them. They always have too much to do.
  - danrocks 5y ago
    In general, yes. I sleep a tiny bit better when someone takes something over from me. If they complete that well, I will go to bat for them to get them recognized.
- dennis_jeeves 5y ago
  If you think of it, a large part of the stress is really need not needed ( some of it will be always there) if there is a collective will of the management. It's largely the management to blame, not the role.
- baskethead 5y ago
  You should also join Google as an IC. Sounds like you would be much happier.
jollybean 5y ago
Most middle management work is brutal. Director level is probably the worst - all of the grind but none of the glory. VP at least you have some power and a lot more money, it 'feels' like something. I think companies should pay technical people the same as managers up to at least director and there should be at least some parrallel technical tracks right up to the top i.e. Directors have Architects, VP's have Systems/Strategy Architects etc..
- jcadam 5y ago
  Some companies have a technical track culminating in "Technical Fellow." Supposedly equivalent to a VP level executive. I worked at Boeing many years ago, back before the engineering culture had been fully snuffed out, and technical fellows commanded a huge amount of respect.

greymalik 5y ago

Have you considered that this may be a problem with your workplace culture or your own mindset and not inherent to the job track?

bertr4nd 5y ago
Oh sure, I mean, there are tons of contributing factors to human happiness and one’s specific job function in a specific company isn’t a complete determinant. A lot of my anxiety is directly attributable to a tendency towards intense self-criticism, which is going to follow me anywhere.

FlyingAvatar 5y ago

I am curious what prevents you from taking a vacation? People on my team are actively encouraged to use their PTO on an on-going basis.

astura 5y ago
Right? At my company you're actually required to use at least specific amount of PTO every year, like around 15 days I think.

drunkpotato 5y ago

Take a vacation! The company will be okay without you for a while. Disclaimer: I’m about to say stuff that are just my impressions, without a lot of “I think” or “I believe.” Take those as implied. Generally the stress of management is in coordinating various personalities and balancing competing priorities, while being on the hook for delivering results without having any direct impact on whether a project gets done to a high degree of quality. They rely on others’ expertise, some of whine may not be that reliable, and it’s stressful! Directors and VPs have that stress plus they are more directly accountable to financial results. However, they have to be cheerful and optimistic and never show weakness or worry to an almost psychopathic degree. This may look like a good work/life balance externally but internally “work brain” and the weight of stress are relentless. The bad ones sublimate stress and occasionally explode and yell at their subordinates. To engineers none of this looks like “work” because none of it produces concrete results. (I haven’t mentioned the endless word docs to read and write, and the spreadsheets, oh god the endless spreadsheets.) But it does accumulate a lot of stress and anxiety. On the vacation side of things, seriously, take a vacation! It will be okay!

bertr4nd 5y ago
This makes a huge amount of sense. I hadn’t considered how high level managers really can’t afford to project their stress publicly (bad for morale!) so I’m probably seeing an extremely airbrushed picture of their lives.
- Mezzie 5y ago
  Yes, + they have to make impossible choices. There's a product right now at work we're debating killing and the decision literally comes down to evaluating whether losing an important organizational partnership or taking a reputation hit would be worse for the company. There's not a right answer; that's just fortune telling and having to own the results.
cdavid 5y ago
As a manager of managers, I can confirm this is a fairly accurate of my job, in some aspects at least. The lack of concrete results is maybe the most frustrating as a former engineer (it is like your compilation cycles takes months if not quarters).

jghn 5y ago

Fwiw I’ve spent the past few years pondering going back to being an IC to reduce stress. There’s probably a grass is greener effect here. It’s interesting though. I do put in fewer hours as a manager. At the same time as I’ve progressed up the management ladder my anxiety levels have followed. Quality of life has suffered. I’ve learned to live with near constant stress headaches, frequent jaw pain, and a host of other issues.

danrocks 5y ago
> Fwiw I’ve spent the past few years pondering going back to being an IC to reduce stress. There’s probably a grass is greener effect here. If you are a good manager now, you will let it transpire in your IC work and you will eventually be asked to step back into a manager role, because the team asked so.

BikiniPrince 5y ago

It’s different depending on the company. I’ve seen companies that can have very technical managers and this is good. I’ve also seen companies where managers like to play engineer, but badly. They don’t relegate until it’s a problem and may or may not focus on correcting design issues. I have had to say in a meeting. Stop engineering the product and have the engineers handle the development life cycle. Regardless, life won’t change just because the duties do. You have to make time off happen. The market is so starved for talent you can go somewhere else over night.

danrocks 5y ago

I am a manager of managers. Haven't taken any vacations of more than 5 days since 2011. Constantly worry about my technical skills becoming obsolete - hence I have to do coding on the side. Constantly worry about whether my managers will practice what I preach (kindness, coaching, caring, etc.) with their team. Constantly worry about multiple deadlines for multiple projects, all under my responsibility but not direct control (I'm not a direct manager). Hire 10-15 people at a time, campaign for some of them, they disappoint, become a burden for others and risk destroying the team - have to worry about that as well. Get an e-mail at 10pm on a Friday that your best developer has been hired by Google at 2x the pay and there's nothing I can do about it. Another e-mail at Monday 11am saying that your worst developer has ALSO been hired by Google at 2x the pay. Spend 24/7/365 on how to prevent your entire team from jumping ship because of pay I cannot match. Worry about managing up, sideways, down, and in the fourth dimension as well. Kill to just be a developer, step back into IC role. Do well, less stress, gets asked to become a manager again because the previous 3 have been a disaster and the team elected you. Go back to #1, rinse, repeat.

ipnon 5y ago
The corollary is it's easy to earn favor with your manager by borrowing tasks from them. They always have too much to do.
- danrocks 5y ago
  In general, yes. I sleep a tiny bit better when someone takes something over from me. If they complete that well, I will go to bat for them to get them recognized.
dennis_jeeves 5y ago
If you think of it, a large part of the stress is really need not needed ( some of it will be always there) if there is a collective will of the management. It's largely the management to blame, not the role.
baskethead 5y ago
You should also join Google as an IC. Sounds like you would be much happier.

jollybean 5y ago

Most middle management work is brutal. Director level is probably the worst - all of the grind but none of the glory. VP at least you have some power and a lot more money, it 'feels' like something. I think companies should pay technical people the same as managers up to at least director and there should be at least some parrallel technical tracks right up to the top i.e. Directors have Architects, VP's have Systems/Strategy Architects etc..

jcadam 5y ago
Some companies have a technical track culminating in "Technical Fellow." Supposedly equivalent to a VP level executive. I worked at Boeing many years ago, back before the engineering culture had been fully snuffed out, and technical fellows commanded a huge amount of respect.