When Should a Programmer Become a Manager?

Does programming ever get tiring? Are you frustrated by being left out of key decisions by the company? You may begin to wonder if you should become a manager.

In this episode I'd like to share 5 important considerations before switching from being a programmer to management. It's common advice that "all programmers must become managers eventually", and I don't agree with this.

There are many ways to grow in our career, and management is just one path. However, for some people it may be the perfect next step. I hope this episode helps you know what you're walking into before you take the step to become a manager.

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CHAPTER MARKERS

0:00 Introduction
1:13 5 Signs It's Time to Switch to Management
1:32 1. You're More Concerned with People than Technology
3:42 2. You Want More Organizational Insight
5:37 3. You Hate The Technical Interview Process
9:39 4. You Want To Work Less Overtime
12:39 5. You're Tired of Learning New Technology

#programmer #manager #engineeringmanagement

[HealthyDev]

Are you starting to wonder if management is the next best step in your tech career? What's holding you back? Does this episode help you make a better decision?

[Blake]

I wish there was an alternative career path besides management in corporations. If you want to pass beyond senior/team-lead and continue to code there's nothing in modern organizations. I don't want to be pushed out of coding when I have 10+ years of experience, but I don't want to get stuck in the same salary bracket forever.

[marleenvos]

28 years of developing and still going strong. Never had the urge to do anything management related. I think I am good with people, but I just love the technical work more. I recently started into embedded development, which feels like coming home; I still enjoy diving into new things.

[DiogoMudo]

This episode has been a timely god send for me. Since last week I started considering returning to management positions after a year on a dev role.
Thanks lot!

[hobbesthetigger]

Thriving Technologist puts out "When Should a Programmer Become a Manager?" as I seriously ponder this. Must be a sign!
Thanks much!

[dkktse]

I am one of them programmers that became a manager, my IT career started in the mid-80's and I think after 20 years of various development roles as a programmer, analyst, tester, designer, data modeller, etc, I officially became a manager and got my PMP

Thinking back I think there were 2 key factors:

1) The technology is changing faster than I can keep up, although we generally know how things are put together, it takes good specific skills to function in the trenches, so this is more the "about me" factor

2) You find yourself making a bigger contribution to lead and give directions then producing artefacts, and you happen to have decent soft skills, then you either choose to be a manager, or the situation may just force you into it, so this more the "doing the right thing" factor

[PeterDrinnan]

I was a manager for about 10 years but returned to programming because I'd always have to fix the code anyway. I had to deal with developers who claimed this or that was impossible, and sales that would sell impossible stuff. Being a manager felt like being in the middle of a shit sandwich.

[luis_ct]

What holds me back are two things. First is the fear of not being a good manager and, after a couple of years, wanting to return to development but being too rusty. Second, as one friend told me once, there are always more software engineering positions than management positions. So, if things don’t go as expected in the new position it’s harder to find management positions compared to software engineering jobs.

[hirobnet]

I have been in IT career over 15 years with a multiple companies experiences. For the past 5 years, I started getting a demand from managers to go to people's leaders ladder, but I kept refusing it. The biggest reason is I was always the best technical among the team and the fastest to deliver without technical dept including solution architect. I now switched to a new job leading one team where developers skills are high and reliable, I am now relieved to step up my career to management position without much concern as I recently had the same feeling as this video mentioned.

[KamoriGoat]

I recently moved into a position of helping build out an incident management team at my company. And most of these points are the things I'm really loving in this new role. Specifically getting to help people I'm around and helping influence making their lives easier. It's cool.

[ld]

Great points to consider, as always. Thanks Jayme! To add a potential sixth point, are you already mentoring new engineers, leading projects, and taking on other managerial responsibilities, like being available to your team constantly, without that next level title or pay? Sounds obvious, but I've seen that sort of thing happen several times and I'd argue that means you're probably more than ready to become a manager officially. It might be cool to have a future video on that whole situation (i.e. taking on or being given extra duties without the commensurate title or pay, or something of that nature) 🤷

[Erik_The_Viking]

3. Yeah everyone started copying Google and now it's totally out of control. Calling it a treadmill is accurate - it's a silly gauntlet. It was a major reason I moved to management, as I decided that it wasn't worth it anymore. In a way it worked out because I now have a much better quality of life, more growth, I'm more engaged at work, and actually have a bigger impact on the business. As for OT, it's at a minimum for me at least - YMMV.

[andrearaimondi]

For me, the main reason to want to go into management is the sheer amount of incompetent managers both technical and non technical that I have found leading software teams. I have the skills to do it but getting into management is really hard. Cheers!

[emmanueladaja]

I transitioned into software development, so currently not so experienced but i already have strong people management skills and business management. And i realize that i tend to start operating as team lead and conversing more with management even without my software skills been at senior level yet. And it makes me realize that the experience requored to become even senior isn't only about software skills.

[TechLeadNotes]

Thank you for the perfect video!

I think the main reason developers aren't switching to management roles is the lack of time to learn all the necessary soft skills. Quite often, they were not mentored properly and ignored the importance of these skills.

One of the worst things is that bad management served as an example, reinforcing the idea that managers are not the best people on the team. It's hard to change your mindset to embrace a new way of thinking.

For 90% of developers, this switch will never happen.

[masterchief]

I think for me a few more years solid coding then I want to move into management I have been thinking about it for a bit now. Confirmed after this point @ 8:45 Thanks mate!

[shangothrax]

Yup. All of them. Now just waiting for openings in my department.

[MarianoGianni]

Hi, I'm in that place right now, been coding for like 6 years and I feel like I'm ready. Right now I'm doing an MBA (while I work) and I'm really enjoying it, learning a lot of stuff about business that I ddin't know about. Hopefully that will help my in a management position. Maybe not as a tech lead, but in the future. totally feel like I want more organizational insight.

[ianstallings]

The reason I got into management was that it had a bigger impact on the software I was delivering. I wanted to be able to control timelines, resources, and planning in a way that my teams would benefit from. I thought I could do it better.

I got all of that but I did underestimate how hard it was. It’s been one of the greatest challenges in my career. Running projects with 200+ direct reports is no walk in the park. I learn so much every day. And I still have to program and stay on top of the tech.

If you go that route, don’t think for a second it’s easier.

[dronicx]

From my POV, working on my own software consultancy agency is the only way to move to management in a way that makes sense and that can actually happen. I've been the managed dev and the manager within the same startup and I've learned some things. Employers usually promote people to managers without them evaluating the promoted's skills for the role. Furthermore, if you're actually smart, you'll notice many issues and when bringing them up, you'll usually get told your "overthinking." This is a huge red flag as 99% of the time you have a good reason for "overthinking" something and when they tell you you're "overthinking, " they never give you a logical reason as to why the issue should be ignored or why overthinking in that scenario is not ok. Understand that these people are not used to overthinking for important stuff, so when someone starts making them think, they literally stop themselves by convincing themselves that they shouldn't be thinking this hard and as such, they are overthinking... and supposedly overthinking is bad to these people. Stuff like rumination and deep critical thinking are types of overthinking and most people don't even know the difference, so how can they call my concerns overthinking when they can't distinguish between types of thinking? Anyhow, be confident in your opinions if you know you have the experience and logical reasons to question others above you