Why I Don’t Want to Manage (At Least for Now)

Have you ever turned down a management role to stay focused on tech? I’ve been approached a few times during my career about moving into management, and while I always reflect on it, I ultimately decide it’s not for me.

Here’s why:

• I run towards tech problems and away from people problems 😅 That’s a big sign by itself. The idea of spending my time in one-on-ones, salary reviews, and development conversations doesn’t fill me with excitement - quite the opposite!
• Looking at the calendars of people in leadership... I’m very happy with the space I have in mine 😄 One fixed meeting on Mondays from 9:30-9:45. Not many meetings added on top of that. This is more time for deep work.
• Traditional career ladders (junior → senior → manager) are so 90's. We’re at a point where some companies are starting to recognize that experienced tech people can sometimes have as much impact as managers.
• I still have sooooooo much to learn, try, build, and share - and I’m really excited to do just that.

There are, of course, benefits to management - like focusing on higher-level technical problems without needing to dive into every detail. I also find that hiring is interesting and probably one of the highest leverage activities in small tech teams. Good managers are fantastic for a team but promoting top software engineers to managers can easily hurt both engineering and leadership functions by losing great engineers and gaining ineffective leaders. It is just not for me right now.

What about you? Have you ever turned down management to stay on the IC path? How did it turn out for you? I’d love to hear your thoughts on this.

(A great cartoon by Kendra Allenby has the line: "At this point in your career, your only possible promotion is to management, where you will stop doing the work you love and use a skill set you don’t have and we don’t teach." which puts a facet of this beautifully into a single sentence)