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I agree. Too often people feel becoming manager is the easiest way to advance their career (which most of the time equates to making more money). In many cases
by ncann 4y ago
I agree. Too often people feel becoming manager is the easiest way to advance their career (which most of the time equates to making more money). In many cases becoming manager is the only way to advance their career in the current org.
- knert 4y agoI interviewed for FB once and I don’t believe this is the case there. I was told the comp levels ran parallel for ICs and Managers. They do value their ICs it seems. This was one of the main reasons I was interested in working for them. You can see it on levels.fyi
- loeg 4y agoThe levels are parallel but it’s easier to get promoted to level 6+ on the management track.
- donkey-hotei 4y agoThere is M1 and there is M2, and then there's Director. There's no level 6+ on the management track. I'll disagree with this statement by saying that I think the step function in skills between managing people and managing people who manage people is huge. There are larger gaps between M1 -> M2 -> D than IC6 -> IC7 -> IC8... but, I think the answer depends. If you are a really strong individual contributor, I presume getting an IC promotion is easier. If you are just decent, getting an IC7+ promotion seems incredibly challenging because IC7 requires an very high level of competence. If you are just decent as a manager, you can get luckier.
- loeg 4y ago> There is M1 and there is M2, and then there's Director. There's no level 6+ on the management track. M1 corresponds to the same pay band as IC6 and M2 corresponds to IC7. D1 corresponds to IC8. (By level 6, I am referring to IC6 / M1.)
- jonathankoren 4y agoI think you’re off by one. M1 is not an IC6.
- zdyn5 4y agoM1 is indeed the same level as IC6 at Meta
- runnr_az 4y agoIt me. I’m a good Dev but was never going to be one of the greats. Making the jump to manager seemed like the next logical step… and in sone ways it has been, but it’s a very different job. (Now that I evaluate other people’s dev work, I was actually a lot better than I thought I was)
- grogenaut 4y agoI've noticed that many of the best devs are constantly worried about their output and quality and the worst not worried at all. This is as a Sr. IC who gets pulled in to other teams on the regular.
- msikora 4y agoThis is the case in my company. My boss reluctantly went to the manager track as it was quite difficult to move up on the SDE track (from the level he was on) but much easier on the manager track.
- khazhoux 4y agoManagement track is usually the only way to be in the room where decisions get made. Sure, the top engineers will be consulted and kept in the loop, but 99% of the strategy discussions and planning happens without them. So for people with an innate need to join in the steering of the ship, there’s only one career path.
- antipaul 4y agoIs it possible to do both? I hear senior VPs like Craig Federighi, Jeff Dean, and others, still write code (maybe 1 day a week but still), but also call the big shots
- khazhoux 4y agoI don't know about Jeff, but Craig runs an org with tens of thousands of engineers. If he were writing code, it'd be a waste of time. (and Craig doesn't waste his time)
- sidibe 4y agoJeff Dean also eventually managed a huge org (Sanjay Ghemawat managed to avoid this) It's not a waste of time if it makes them more effective at making decisions, gives them ideas, or keeps them abreast of what is actually going on.
- khazhoux 4y agoIdeas, staying sharp, keeping up with swift and pytorch etc… sure, absolutely useful to code on weekends or a bit here and there. What I meant what that there’s literal zero way someone can be an SVP and still perform any actual IC work.
- vdchuyen 4y ago[dead]
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]