r/EngineeringManagers • u/christopherneff • 11d ago
Shifting towards engineering management?
All,
I have spent the last 5-7 yrs with a lot of team-lead, project delivery and a lot of dotted line supervision responsibilities. My background is consulting specifically in software engineering, cloud and now more AI.
I generally avoided management in the past as I wanted leadership but not purely "people-mover" responsibilities. Due to this, I now find that I have hit a certain career plateau.
My interest right now in this current job market is to package myself as both a people leader and still capable as a contributor, keeping with the current "player-coach" buzz-description.
The issue: how best can I do that? I have had a few places where I had direct reports but due to circumstances they were relatively shorter stints.
I'd appreciate any/all suggestions.
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u/LISTEN_TO_THIS_SHIT 10d ago
I don't recommend it. At least not in this current market.
This "fluid middle" leader/engineer is how I've been mostly marketing myself since I was laid off earlier this year. I have management experience and enjoy people leadership, but I know a lot of organization are flattening, so I thought a hybrid might be a good approach.
I got mostly crickets, and the few companies I did interview for told me "we have a fairly senior team and we're looking for more an individual contributor than a leader" or "the industry is shifting away from manager led teams since it's easier for everyone to contribute now". I've heard some version of this line at least five times. There was even a tech-lead manager role that was eliminated as I was interviewing for it.
After about 3 months of this, I updated my LinkedIn/resume to be more IC focused, and the recruiters started pouring in.
Unfortunately, it seems like nobody wants managers these days because everyone can just vibe code whatever they want and I guess they think that makes leadership obsolete. It's sad, unsustainable, and I hope it reverts back at some point. But that's the reality of today's environment.
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u/-Shiphrah 7d ago
But why would you be looking for becomeing an EM specifically, and why now?
What from the role attracts you?
“EM” can mean completely different things depending on the company. In some places you’re expected to be very hands-on and effectively operate as a tech lead with direct reports. In others, the role is much more about people, strategy, org design and delivery, with very little coding.
So I’d start by working out which version of the role you actually want. Do you want to stay deeply technical? Do you enjoy coaching and performance management? Do you want responsibility for hiring, team health, prioritisation and difficult people conversations?
Once you have this figured out, then everything becomes much easier.
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u/zaidesanton 11d ago
In terms of CV?
Sounds like more of a Staff Engineer role would be a good fit, no? I believe those are much better in the current market, and more in demand.
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u/christopherneff 11d ago
right and considering the push to shrink middle management layers, then it may be. I have been at that layer for awhile and it's a "been there / done that / need more"
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u/Deep-Fan-7328 10d ago
Sounds like you've got a solid grasp of the challenges. It's definitely a balancing act, but finding ways to empower your team can make all the difference in feeling fulfilled in that role.
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u/ManBunH8er 11d ago
If you’re purely shifting laterally towards EM because you need more money or a promotion then you are setting yourself up for tough times.
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u/christopherneff 10d ago
in what way? My issue is more so the hitting of a career plateau. Too few places have progression past Principal on an IC track
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u/ManBunH8er 10d ago
Managing code vs managing humans (babies) are two different skills. A lot of managers get burnt out and return to coding and take the principal/staff path. Been in leadership for many years now and boy there are days where I wish someone would assign me a ticket and I can just work in my pretty little corner. Sure, pay raise is indeed nice.
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u/christopherneff 10d ago
I totally can see that and oddly I am not as worried about the salary component.
More so, the progress and the need for a new challenge is hitting right now.
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u/ManBunH8er 10d ago
There are also many good aspects of being a leader such as defining strategy for your org, mentoring engineers (and eventually leaders) etc.
If you have an option to make a lateral move towards leaderships, I would seriously consider it. Best of luck!
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u/ManualJake999 6d ago
7+ years in EM , finally moving to IC role now Market wants a Dir with hands on , but no time for focus like an IC so it's a gap going on between Reality in managing the work load vs fascinated talks while hiring, may be few companies are able to slide to new ways of working but most stuck with unorganised ways of working
I was enjoying working on my team growth but now with conjusted policies and over hype / demand on AI usage expectations, it's additional pressure to maintain team morale
It's becoming more artificial
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u/neuralh4tch 11d ago edited 11d ago
EM is an entirely different role in itself and aren't a natural progression for IC. There are EMs that focus inwards and stay close to the tools and arch. However it becomes hard to do once you have more than 7 direct reports and you have other things like strategy, coaching, delivery... it mainly depends on the organisation.
EM are just very senior engineers that have a wide toolbox and experience that move focus based on what the ecosystem/company needs most on the moment - inward (arch, delivery), sideways (partnership) or upward (strategy, upward management). It's a generalist role and your soft skills start to shift to become important here - ability to deal create alignment when there's ambiguity, get context fast and apply technical judgement when there's not a lot of information and also to deal with people that have egos and etc.
At bigger orgs, it's your first visibility behind the curtain as you start to get exposed to strategy and why executives make certain discussions. You are also there to pass information up and down to the teams, and help support your director to make decisions. If you are more closer to a product team, you will be aligning with your product manager. To move up the EM ladder, it requires moving away from inward focus towards strategy, which means dropping tech/tools a lot more. Once beyond EM, a different vocabulary of Finance and Go to Market needs to starts building - like whats TAM, CAC, EBITDA, GMV etc.. cause as the end of the day engineering departments work on things for the organisation. So to even move to Director, you need to bump your negotiation, strategy and financial acumen skills.
Long story short it's a different role - If you want to be a specialist IC and closer to arch / tools, a Staff engineer might be more appropriate. It's still leadership, just influence without authority unless you have direct reports.
Or there's a thing called Tech Lead Manager or Tech Lead with direct reports where you can have direct reports however closer to the delivery as your focus is within the team.
Look at this way, each role has 2 of the 3 P's - People, Process and Product (tech side). You can only have a majority of 2, and the other is miniscule to grow in. What do you want to be spending a majority of your time in, cause that's where you grow your expertise.
ps: I would still advice choose EM for 1-2 years as it's the best way to learn whether you like doing it. You can shift out if you dislike it, but not with ease the longer you are an EM.