"Engineering managers and product designers have nightmares about people who work this way." - exactly. but OP described his managers as opposite, either OP is

"Engineering managers and product designers have nightmares about people who work this way." - exactly. but OP described his managers as opposite, either OP is not so smart and couldnt understand what and how they are building product or his engineering managers are not smart. In case of dummy managers, they have 2 options: (1)either they listen their engineers and talk with higher management about product and make it better (not the case with OP) or (2) their engineers create shit and fail product, then engineering managers will pay for it with their career. radical way, but someone should be blamed.