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Should managers still code?

theengineeringmanager.substack.com

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Re: Should managers still code?

#11

Post by nobleach »

zusammen wrote: post #2

Generally, no. There’s a risk of unfair competition for work (they can delegate the stuff they don’t want because they have political power) and their code often becomes “untouchable” because few will call it out if the code is bad. A hobby project to keep current isn’t a bad idea, though.

While that is possible, I think a good manager recognizes these pitfalls. My philosophy is "everyone has to scrub toilets once in awhile - that includes me". You'd have to ask my direct reports but, I'd like to say I lean more toward taking the "grunt tasks" that I don't think are super helpful for my folks' career growth.

Then again, I've been called a bad manager on Hacker News so...

Re: Should managers still code?

#13

Post by mandelbrotwurst »

evidencetamper wrote: post #7
zusammen wrote: post #2

Generally, no. There’s a risk of unfair competition for work (they can delegate the stuff they don’t want because they have political power) and their code often becomes “untouchable” because few will call it out if the code is bad. A hobby project to keep current isn’t a bad idea, though.

> unfair competition for work That's a very good indicator of a bloated institution. People have to compete for work instead of pushing it away or avoiding it because they already have their hands full. But I don't believe there is a general rule that applies here. Most great managers I had were deeply technical and involved in the nitty gritty of the projects, including coding the very spiky aspects of a project. Mo…

People might compete for the work they view as relatively more attractive for a variety of reasons even when they are quite busy.

Re: Should managers still code?

#14

Post by righthand »

I was a manager for about 9 months before being laid off. The goal was to attain power but also work on the huge backlog of work we had. I wanted to use the power to block outside forces that would push my engineers in the wrong direction or remove their focus for investigating things like platform bugs.

What ended up happening was that the project work even though completed was used to gaslight me for 6 months as breaking the platform and causing bugs. Issues that infra team promised to “fix later”.

Go ahead code when you’re a manager it can be effective, but be careful when working with outside ineffective teams they will put blame on you if they can. Management is political and once you start making moves that outshine other teams, opposition will come out of the wood work to bring you back to their level of unhappiness.

The trick to identifying this is when people start naming you at meetings you aren’t in. It might be good things they are saying but that may shift as the good things well dries up.

Re: Should managers still code?

#15

Post by lkrubner »

"But what does this mean for frontline engineering managers? Is the new normal just about writing more code and doing less of the other things that peacetime managers would normally do?"

"Should they be able to do code reviews? Yes."

There is no standard answer here. At many companies it is the Head Of Product who also oversees the tech team. They may not know how to write code, and will not know how to do code reviews. Some project managers lead engineering teams without knowing how to code. That's especially true outside of the tech industry.

For anyone interested in specific numbers, I interviewed Eric Garside about his experience scaling Freshly from 3 engineers to almost 80 engineers, see here:

https://respectfulleadership.substack.com/p/eric-garside-as-...

I also surveyed several of the CTOs who I know in New York City, about team size and scale and responsibilities, they gave their answers here:

https://respectfulleadership.substack.com/p/a-survey-of-ctos...

Re: Should managers still code?

#16

Post by giantg2 »

I've never seen a dual role manager that is actually good. It's usually a senior dev that gets stuck with management duties. They are usually good technically but then lack finesse and knowledge about most managerial issues (budget, employment law, team dynamics, etc). You're now at a disadvantage because the stuff they are supposed to protect you from or have power to help further your career is not developed. If your managers don't have enough management work, then flatten your org and expand their reach so they do.

Re: Should managers still code?

#17

Post by hermitShell »

devmor wrote: post #3

This is a good article, and I find myself agreeing with it almost entirely. My current manager is one of the most effective development managers I've ever had in my career, and I think a good part of that is because he is involved in the codebase, but not directly responsible for new features in whole. I have had managers with no concept of what's going on the codebase, and those were dysfunctional development teams…

I agree with this sentiment! One way to set up teams is with a squad leader who acts as shit shield first, and developer if the company is running smoothly. That way if the boss manager is a full time shit shield with little time to understand product, the team still has a local product owner to guide the team’s vision and concept of the product, but the power imbalance is also less as the team lead could fairly easily be deposed by accessing the manager.

Re: Should managers still code?

#18

Post by robotsquidward »

My best managers were ex-engineers who didn't touch the codebase. They understood how things worked, and could talk architecture & concepts, but they didn't expect to be able to sit down and write code at our level. Maybe they wished they would have the time/opportunity still, but realistically they were focused on leading.

Re: Should managers still code?

#19

Post by bitwize »

Maybe?

Managers should not be evaluated based on code output -- it's not their job. However, writing code here and there -- to evaluate new technologies, make a rough prototype, or demonstrate a technique to be adopted by individual contributors -- may aid them in their management responsibilities and should be embraced when it does.

I've seen what happens when a manager is also responsible for individual coding duties. He ended up with roughly twice the work, shifting between two mutually incompatible mental modalities all the time, cranky with his subordinates and making a lot of sad phone calls to his fiancée explaining that he'd be late home from work, again. Not a good fate for any worker, even if the pay and prestige are better.

Re: Should managers still code?

#20

Post by kevinventullo »

One important distinction to make is the difference between a manager who started out as an IC on the project (esp. the case when they actually built the thing from the ground up) versus a manager brought in from the outside. I think the former is more likely to be hands-on and generally speaking the expert in the room. But, sometimes you need the latter. It can be challenging (even counterproductive) for the latter person to try to be technically relevant, when they are often the least technically knowledgeable person in the room when they join.

I say this as someone who has been in both roles!

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