Ask HN: Developers who became engineering managers, how was the experience?

- Training, training, training! Without exception, all the technical managers that I've worked with had arrived where they were at based on technical merits. However, being a manager, especially being a leader have nothing to do with technical knowledge. Therefore management and leadership training is a must. This doesn't necessarily need to be an organized class, but being coached and mentored would be an amazing start.

- Management and Leadership are different skills. This goes back to my #1. One needs to develop both.

- Ideally, you become a servant of the team. You're there to help them become highly productive. Your first job is not to solve the technical problems yourself, not to micromanage everyone, not to command and control. You're there to create a self-managing team that can, ironically, work without a manager.

- You are there to ensure that their motivation and engagement are at a high level. One can be motivated by not engaged. You need to know the differences and the ways to increase them.

- You need empathy to become a good leader.

- You need to be a good communicator. And transparency is a great tool.

- You have to ensure that your team members become good enough to be able to leave your company and find plenty of jobs anywhere else, but also ensure that they wouldn't want to leave.

It's definitely a different skill set. Being an engineer is more fun from a day to day perspective. You get to sit down at your desk and build something.

As a manager, you are in the middle of your boss's goals and trying to keep your direct reports happy. Those things don't always align.

You'll need to improve your soft skills. Learn to manage conflict, learn to lead others, and learn to trust your direct reports to do their work without micromanaging. More on that here: https://www.climbuptheladder.com/how-to-be-a-great-manager/.

But life as a manager isn't all bad. You get to learn more about the business. I find the most fulfilling part to be helping my direct reports improve their software skills (particularly the new hires from college).

It isn't clear exactly what your role entails, but in my opinion it is pretty much impossible to be a great manager and continue in a role as a technical contributor. To me that's more a technical lead than a manager, so if you still like writing code you need to think about that long and hard. Your #1 responsibility is the success of your team and they need to know you are there for them 100%, and not busy buried in code. There are times when you may be able to get your hands dirty but you can be nowhere near the critical path of the project.

You also have to remember you are not only managing your direct reports but who you report to and whomever is relying on your team. In my case, I reported to a VP but I also had to work laterally with other development managers, and in particular project managers that weren't always technical. Just like as an individual contributor you need to maintain a healthy relationship with those you work with directly because you need to balance what they need and want from your team with what your team needs and wants.

That being said, I lasted in management for a little over a year, mostly because the role evolved and due to some changes at the top where I didn't feel I was enabled to be an effective manager. Still, I found the experience invaluable as it gave me more insight into how to better work with people of all stripes. Like any role, technical or otherwise, you have to constantly evaluate what you are getting out of it, if you enjoy it, and if you want to continue bettering yourself in the craft.