I have seen a number of managers go back to being an IC at an equivalent title. I think it's pretty common. And not particularly penalized. I was a manager fo

I have seen a number of managers go back to being an IC at an equivalent title. I think it's pretty common. And not particularly penalized. I was a manager for 5 years and am now building my own company. I do way more coding than as a manager but I also do everything else. If I were to go back to full time employment I think it would be easy to go back as an IC or as a manager depending on what I wanted and how I spin my time. Basically, you always have a story and always have control of how you tell it. So as long as you're average or above average as an employee you'll always have options.