I never want to manage developers

It sounds like you didn't have any great managers so far, or didn't learn enough about their work.

The job of a good software manager is getting developers what they want (projects, technologies, career) and doing the things that the developers don't want to do, but still need to be done.

Being in meetings and playing politics is unfortunately sometimes necessary to keep developers' salaries being paid by the company. If you can get some time to code and learn after doing that, so much the better.

I don't see why managers need to exist

I agree with everything you are saying here except for this line. I would venture to say you have never worked with a good manager.

In my mind, a good manager gets out of your way and helps to get you what you need when you need it. Somebody like that who can play defense for your time is very valuable.

In other words, good managers help you do what you already do, but better. Also, these kinds of people are rare.

A good manager is at the service of their team. That means that they make sure everybody can do their job with the least amount of distraction.

This also implies that the manager needs to shield off all the corporate bullshit.

In my experience, you don't really notice a great manager. They are just there, and it's not obvious what they are doing (basically because everything runs smoothly)

However, you will notice a bad manager. Fires need to be extinguished, deadlines are never made and catastrophic, things need to go faster than they can, etc. PANIC!

Oh I love great managers, because they handle the shit that I don't want to be bothered with.

You're using the term "managers" pretty broadly here. There are a whole bunch of manager categories. If you are referencing Project Managers, then yeah I completely agree with your post.

But if we are talking about something like a product manager, then I don't think that it's as black and white anymore. Sure there can be bad product managers, but the best ones are quite invaluable to the team.

Engineers know how to deal with the fire, project managers can tell you where to put out the fire, but you need a product manager to understand why the fire happened in the first place, how to prevent the fire from happening and whether or not users want the warmth of the flame or not.

As you age, your coding skills will start to deteriorate, so If you are passionate about coding and software development, becoming a development manager is your best bet. And yes you can carry on development as a hobby :)

Have you tried being a manager?
If not, if you try, is it possible that your perspective changes?

It doesn't make sense for the best engineers to pull themselves off the keyword just to end end up managing other developers.

100% correct. It’s a very different skill set and to do it well requires dedication and effort to become great at.

I get that "Politics" part.
One coder can mess up complicating everything for the team. Simplicity is so scarce, plus the ego involved by people that really go deep to learn things that we can solve with libraries/wrappers.
I knew several coders that wanted to reinvent the wheel to extend the project time. The key is fast prototyping, I learned that at a Singularity University event.

Aahahah tell me about it! I have a fair few and it's a nightmare, I hate it!

everything takes soooo long

For example, devs dont like to communicate with clients and customers. Thats where managers come into play. If they dont bring that value (and of course others) into the team, they are in wrong place.

I am a manager and a developer myself. I focus on keeping devs happy, solve their technical and non-technical issues so they can focus on what they do best and like most - coding.

One day (working 18 hours a day to get something completed on time), I realized that I only have 24h in the day and if I want to achieve more and get further, I needed to achieve via other people.

Here are a few things I gained by making the move:

1 - I get stuff done whether I'm sick, sleeping or more importantly working on more critical parts of the business
2 - I can stay in control of the code/architecture by doing pull request reviews
3 - I get to work on what I want and like most without being a bottleneck to the organization
4 - Unless ego is bigger than life, it's possible to find developers better than oneself and/or has complementary knowledge in technologies/domains.
5 - I get to learn from them too
6 - Management is overrated, find people who can work well with you, give them context and be clear on priorities.
7 - It's very rewarding to help others grow and develop.

It's incredibly liberating and powerful, but it's not easy nor quick to let go and make the move.

"I never want to manage developers" is incredibly shortsighted. Never say never.

Being a manager is a people game.

I've been all around the block from engineer to manager, to being a team lead. Greatly prefer the latter. Not because I was bad at being a manager by any means, more so I am just far more interested in the technical stuff and less so the career development stuff and politics.

I've had bad managers that were poor engineers, bad managers that were good engineers, and great managers that were everywhere in between. The great managers had fantastic people skills. They were charismatic. They empowered their engineers and shielded them from the political nonsense. That was the common denominator.

As for thinking they aren't necessary: I'm not sure where you're working at, but I've seen that experiment before. I've seen startups where you have classic C suite execs with just a team of developers. It is absolutely disastrous on numerous fronts.

Bad morale, serious communication issues, team infighting, trust issues, poor goal setting and focus. That's just the tip of the iceberg.

The funny thing is, one of the developers always emerges in a role where they're likely doing a manager's job. How about that, lol.

These are all things a good manager can fix.

Like it or not, anywhere you have people, you're gonna have politics. A good manager can navigate those politics and greatly improve their engineers' quality of life.

Honestly, it sounds to me like you might be stuck with a bad manager. You can't judge them on your perceived value of them from an engineering perspective. The service they generally provide is not a logical, rational one like that of a team lead. Their service is dealing with the irrational (people), and building an environment where their engineers can thrive.

Hello Indie Hackers 👋🏻

I apparently need 20 point to post link posts. Could you give me a leg up?

Kindest regards,
VM

Nobody wants "to be managed," but they will follow an inspiring leader. So, don't "manage people;" be a leader instead.

The best teams I've been on are self-managing. That usually means that people managers steer clear and ICs are empowered to make all decisions in a cohesive direction.

Why most people managers aren't great at the job is because they are responsible for coaching their people and yet most of them do not put in the time to coach themselves, read books, or understand that their role power comes with great responsibility.

I wrote more about this in a blog post: https://jondouglas.dev/self-managing/

I am an engineering manager that moved up from a developer position. I respectfully think you are seeing this wrong and probably have just had bad experiences.

I moved up to manager so that I could improve the work-life of my developers and have a bigger say in how the products we make and the way we make them are done to better match a developer's viewpoints and workflows, and not that of folks who have never held the position to understand the mindset.

I understand the points you are making, but I think having a background in development and the right attitude/skills to also manage, make for a good developer manager.

It is certainly not for everyone, and it is very true that being a good or great developer does not mean you will do the same as a manager. But that also suggests that it does not make for a good principle developer either since there is overlap with skills and decisions that managers have to make.

You are correct that managing developers is a VERY different job than being a developer. Whether you want to manage or not is a personal choice and knowing that you don't want to do it is really valuable. Too many great developers have mistakenly viewed management as "the next step" and you are correct that it was a waste of a great developer.

I've been a development manager for about 10 years now, after being a developer for 15 years. I made the transition for a few reasons:

1. I was a good programmer, but had the privilege of working with some truly great programmers so there was a bit of "respect the game and get off the court".

2. I was a really good developer in that I learned a lot about the development process like good branching strategy, continuous integration, performance analysis, and other things that make "programming" into a professional practice suitable for a team.

3. I discovered that I have a knack for software architecture, especially large distributed systems. I enjoy thinking through big problems, designing solutions, and producing proof-of-concept code, but I stopped enjoying production coding.

4. I figured out that if I can make everyone on the team 5% happier and more productive, that I would create a ton of value - both monetary and quality-of-life for those who worked with me. I stopped viewing meetings as an individual burden and started going in place of others as a "shield". I also embraced all of the paperwork, administration, budgeting, etc. that the great programmers don't want to be involved with.

It turns out that for me, it was a great choice. One of the best guys on my team took over my position when I left a company and later told me, "I had no idea how much you protected us from" when I met up with him later.

There is a chance that you'll never want to be a manager - and that's not only fine, but knowing that about yourself is really helpful in avoiding bad "opportunities". There's also a chance that you change your mind at some point, and that's fine too. I'm certainly not the same person I was 20 years ago when I was hitting my stride as a developer.

Thanks for your post, it was really thought provoking!

I think that most company can for sure do with less managers of things, and with more builders of things. For example, a lot of companies hire product managers too early. If you're a small team, it's better to have software developers with a good product sense, who enjoy also thinking about the product as part of their work, instead of a separte product manager.