Thriving on the Technical Leadership Path • Hacker News Board

Re: Thriving on the Technical Leadership Path

#21

Post by aynyc » Mon, Oct 28, 2019, 2:37 PM UTC

dominotw wrote: post #3

This is bad advice. If you are hitting 40's, please do yourself a favor and go into management. Yes coding is fun but, 1. Not being able to change jobs because you can't invert a binary tree in 20 secs in leetcode hazing, is not fun. 2. Being managed by someone a decade younger than you with no family or responsibilities, is not fun. 3. Spending your weekends learning the latest JS framework because you don't want to…

I largely agree with you since I turned 40 not long ago. I still get a lot of offers for ICs, but the salary bump isn't there anymore (I make decent money). When I look for management positions, the salary bump is much higher. I'm starting to question my decision to be promoted to the highest level of IC my company offers instead of taking manager role when I had the chance.

Re: Thriving on the Technical Leadership Path

#22

Post by nilkn » Mon, Oct 28, 2019, 2:38 PM UTC

baron_harkonnen wrote: post #19

nilkn wrote: post #4

In my experience, many companies legitimately don't really know what to do with very senior engineering staff. And how many distinguished engineers or principal engineers or technical fellows do you really need for your relatively straightforward technical challenges anyway? The IC track often fails to work in practice for the simple reason that technical work at an extremely high level is just not needed at many com…

My experience has been that the value of very senior technical staff is not that they solve "extremely high level" technical problems but they are very easily able to see how what appears to be a complex problem is isomorphic to a much simpler, easy to solve problem. The difference between expert and advanced/intermediate technical staff is that the advanced engineer has an understanding of complex solution and mista…

The fact that folks can't even agree on what constitutes a very senior IC is definitely part of the problem. I would consider what you describe here -- reducing complexity as opposed to increasing it -- a requirement of any senior engineer. I don't see this as the hallmark of a principal or distinguished engineer but rather one of the basic differences between a developer and a senior developer.

Re: Thriving on the Technical Leadership Path

#23

Post by homonculus1 » Mon, Oct 28, 2019, 2:39 PM UTC

chrisweekly wrote: post #11

Ididntdothis wrote: post #2

In my company there is a technical path but it’s really really hard to advance on it compared to the managerial path. We have one guy who is really high on the technical path but he was director before and was a bad manager so they moved him to the technical path. Otherwise I haven’t seen anybody technical promoted beyond the same pay grade of the lowest ranked managers. So it seems to me that the manager path is bet…

IME (21-yr career), there's a huge range wrt culture, power structure, and growth oppty across different kinds of companies. The biggest / most relevant diff rel to technical path is btwn orgs that are engineering-driven vs product-driven (except when said product is in a highly technical domain). Maybe obvious, sharing in case it's not.

Are you paying your ISP per vowel or sth?

Re: Thriving on the Technical Leadership Path

#24

Post by marcinzm » Mon, Oct 28, 2019, 2:40 PM UTC

Being a technical leader is a set of skills that is distinct from being a great IC and those skills overlap management in many ways (meetings, dealing with people, diffusing conflict, getting buy in, etc.). Except you don't have resources to leverage directly except your own, now very limited, time so everything is 10x harder. I was in that boat, eventually I got tired and just got into management.

Re: Thriving on the Technical Leadership Path

#25

Post by arethuza » Mon, Oct 28, 2019, 2:40 PM UTC

jrochkind1 wrote: post #7

dominotw wrote: post #3

This is bad advice. If you are hitting 40's, please do yourself a favor and go into management. Yes coding is fun but, 1. Not being able to change jobs because you can't invert a binary tree in 20 secs in leetcode hazing, is not fun. 2. Being managed by someone a decade younger than you with no family or responsibilities, is not fun. 3. Spending your weekends learning the latest JS framework because you don't want to…

In my early 40s, I am starting to reluctantly wonder if this is true after all. I don't like it, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's not true. Another point is: In many/most actual organizations, it's the people managers making strategic technical decisions, not anyone on any other track.

"it's the people managers making strategic technical decisions"

I'm 54 and I'm pleased to say that I've never worked anywhere where that was the general rule - I've always been on the "technical leadership" side of things (CTO/Head of Architecture) since my 20s and I pretty much see my job as ensuring that "strategic technical decisions" get made in the right way.

Re: Thriving on the Technical Leadership Path

#26

Post by ed312 » Mon, Oct 28, 2019, 2:41 PM UTC

dominotw wrote: post #3

This is bad advice. If you are hitting 40's, please do yourself a favor and go into management. Yes coding is fun but, 1. Not being able to change jobs because you can't invert a binary tree in 20 secs in leetcode hazing, is not fun. 2. Being managed by someone a decade younger than you with no family or responsibilities, is not fun. 3. Spending your weekends learning the latest JS framework because you don't want to…

This is demonstrably true in my experience. You're going to be downvoted to hell because this isn't the 2019 "I want to be an IC forever and I should make the same $ as my CEO" mood. For what its worth, I think the career path is more focus on operations mgmt or focus on tech mgmt.

Re: Thriving on the Technical Leadership Path

#27

Post by leghifla » Mon, Oct 28, 2019, 2:43 PM UTC

virgilp wrote: post #13

dominotw wrote: post #3

This is bad advice. If you are hitting 40's, please do yourself a favor and go into management. Yes coding is fun but, 1. Not being able to change jobs because you can't invert a binary tree in 20 secs in leetcode hazing, is not fun. 2. Being managed by someone a decade younger than you with no family or responsibilities, is not fun. 3. Spending your weekends learning the latest JS framework because you don't want to…

> Spending your weekends learning the latest JS framework because you don't want to be someone "who doesn't keep up", is not fun. It's not about JS frameworks, but if you don't keep up with technology _because it's fun_; and you also what to be promoted very high on the ladder (aren't happy with "just" an average job with average pay that lets you have a decent life outside work) by all means do yourself a favor and…

>> What exactly are you bringing to the table.

> In general, knowing what NOT to do. Finding out & solving the right problem, not the one that was given to me.

So true.

I would add the ability to look farther ahead at potential problems. I have seen so many young people blocked by some issues that should have been spotted way earlier.

Re: Thriving on the Technical Leadership Path

#28

Post by tannerc » Mon, Oct 28, 2019, 2:45 PM UTC

nilkn wrote: post #14

sunaurus wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I always take it as a red flag when a manager wants to be responsible for technical decisions. The best managers I've worked with have always made it their mission to serve technical teams by removing obstacles and making sure that the specialists have everything they need in order to create a high quality product. Managers who try to babysit developers and tell them how to do their jobs tend to just slow things down…

I think that being involved in the technical side and "babysitting developers" are two very different ideas that have little to nothing to do with each other. > The best managers I've worked with have always made it their mission to serve technical teams by removing obstacles and making sure that the specialists have everything they need in order to create a high quality product. I think you're underestimating the de…

Isn't what you're describing precisely what senior ICs should be doing more of?

I agree with OP, the purpose of a manager isn't to manage the technical side of things but rather the people side. It's why they have direct rapports: to manage the people.

A better use of the IC's time is to unblock them so they can meet with stakeholders and develop a rich understanding of the work in order to do it most effectively.

In trying to "shield" the IC from developing an understanding of the landscape they'll be working on, the manager may accidentally be preventing the IC from getting the information they actually need to do their job well.

Re: Thriving on the Technical Leadership Path

#29

Post by dominotw » Mon, Oct 28, 2019, 2:46 PM UTC

virgilp wrote: post #13

dominotw wrote: post #3

This is bad advice. If you are hitting 40's, please do yourself a favor and go into management. Yes coding is fun but, 1. Not being able to change jobs because you can't invert a binary tree in 20 secs in leetcode hazing, is not fun. 2. Being managed by someone a decade younger than you with no family or responsibilities, is not fun. 3. Spending your weekends learning the latest JS framework because you don't want to…

> Spending your weekends learning the latest JS framework because you don't want to be someone "who doesn't keep up", is not fun. It's not about JS frameworks, but if you don't keep up with technology _because it's fun_; and you also what to be promoted very high on the ladder (aren't happy with "just" an average job with average pay that lets you have a decent life outside work) by all means do yourself a favor and…

> It's a simple recursion. why wouldn't I be able to do it? I fully expect to solve algorithms & data structures questions into my 60s faster than the average 20yo can (because of my background. Point is, it doesn't correlate with age, if you can't do it at 40 you probably weren't great at it at 20).

ok. I was being facetious with that (particularly famous) example.

you are able to breeze through hard leetcodes in your 40's in a tech interview setting?

Why would you be faster at 60's vs 20's , not sure i follow the line of reasoning.

> So don't write CRUD apps if you're better than that.

Can you give me some examples of better things that actually require 20yrs of experience ?

Re: Thriving on the Technical Leadership Path

#30

Post by dfxm12 » Mon, Oct 28, 2019, 2:47 PM UTC

shantly wrote: post #15

dominotw wrote: post #3

This is bad advice. If you are hitting 40's, please do yourself a favor and go into management. Yes coding is fun but, 1. Not being able to change jobs because you can't invert a binary tree in 20 secs in leetcode hazing, is not fun. 2. Being managed by someone a decade younger than you with no family or responsibilities, is not fun. 3. Spending your weekends learning the latest JS framework because you don't want to…

I'm trying but at 35 haven't formally held a title that meant I was leading others. Every posting even for a team lead wants 3 years or 5 years or whatever of leadership already, and that's not even really a management position most places. An MBA and re-entering at the bottom would be very expensive, in direct costs and lost wages. What's the way in? Hope you find yourself in a job where there are leadership positio…

What's the way in? Hope you find yourself in a job where there are leadership positions open and the stars align and you're promoted into one?

In corporate jobs, this is rarely the way in. Most likely, you'll have to convince your current manager (and maybe theirs) that you're ready to be a manager and look for a manager opening elsewhere in the company. If you think you're ready and your current employer does not, you'll have to look outside.

Years of leadership seems like a purposefully vague credential. It's not about a title; if you don't think you've been a leader at work, you probably weren't (or maybe you were and your talent just wasn't managed properly ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ ).