
The Engineer/Manager pendulum (2017) - falcor84
https://charity.wtf/2017/05/11/the-engineer-manager-pendulum/
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mvpu
Engineering Manager (or Director/VP) is about building a "machine that builds
product". Engineer (or Architect/CTO) is about "building the product".
Switching between the two as described in the article is perfectly OK and a
good career path - but if you really want to be good at one you'll have to
give up the other. Management (or building the machine that builds the
product) is a skill that requires a lot of experimentation, studying, mistakes
- just like any new programming language or stack. If you want to become good
at it, you'll need to focus on it full-time for several years.

~~~
captain_perl
You would think you could become good at eng. mgmt., but reality says
otherwise.

Most of the VP Eng's I've met are washed-up ex-engineers with no mgmt. ability
either. They're just cogs in a machine or the apex of an org chart.

And why do we expect them to be good at something they never studied? Like
doctors, they can bury their mistakes (ie. fire malcontents.)

