Moving into Management

[LiE]

I'm looking for a bit of insight from people who have moved into management. I've been doing technical work now for 14 years and always steered away from management roles purely because I really enjoyed what I do. I have the opportunity to become the manager of the team I work in as my boss is changing roles but I am hesitant. Has anyone moved into management who wasn't sure about it and how did it turn out?

If I turn this down I would still need to move roles in the next 18 months into more of an SA type position. This is because I am already at the top of my team with no where else to go except manager or move to a different department.

Part of me feels that a manager position is more "generic" and I'd be better off staying highly skilled within my niche development role.

 

[mid_gen]

What really matters is do you enjoy doing it? That will depend a lot on the organisation you're in mind.

Once you're managing at least 4 people, continuing to do any meaningful technical work is pretty much out the window. I've been in management roles for 15+ years now, and my technical skills aren't a patch on where they would be if I had just been doing engineering work for that time....but....I'm a good, experienced manager, which is something you can't just learn from reading a book, and I enjoy it.

I have had a couple of short stints in non-management roles, to keep my eye in, as it were.

I think you just need to be honest with yourself about what you enjoy doing. Management is without a doubt another level of stress over just being responsible for yourself.

 

[HangTime]

I've previously moved into management from being a member of that team. I had never really had a target of wanting to be in 'management' but it seemed like a fairly obvious opportunity.

The big advantage was because I was coming from within the team it was a somewhat easier segue - not only did I know the people I'd be managing (and hence a bit about how to handle/motivate them) but also a lot of domain knowledge. I don't know if I would have jumped from my previous role to a management position in a different company for example, that might have been a step too far. I know others think differently on this, they consider a promotion harder because you have to manage the transition from being a peer to a manager, you have to maybe make decisions your friends don't like, you maybe have to deal with the team going out for beers without you etc. But for me it was a positive.

When it comes to 'generic' it is partially down to you what you make of the position, unless it is being heavily constrained by senior management. My position wasn't really generic, I was still regarded as an SME and key person to provide direction on my subject matter on large programmes etc.

Keep in mind that different organisations treat seniority differently. In some places moving up the ladder basically means moving into management, even within IT. In other orgs, they will try to carve out routes for technical specialists via roles such as Principal Engineer/Architect which admittedly do still have a chunk of management activity and less hands-on work but are less of a leap than a 'generic' management role. Those "Principal" roles are equivalent in seniority to "Head of" / "VP" type roles in some other orgs but with more of a focus on setting technical direction than budgeting, line management etc.

 

[Semple]

Have you had a chance to do any reasonably long-ish interim management cover?

I find it's one thing watching/learning from a manager doing the job, and then actually having to act as a manger.

If you've never done any management cover, that's quite a blind jump into a role that you may completely hate.

 

[Josh]

I just moved into a technical management position as I had taken my technical engineer role (IT) as far as I could/wanted to.

Interesting to see the company from a different viewpoint, enjoying it so far but much busier now than I was last year on the tech projects. I still get to play with some tech stuff which is nice but I was never a hyper technical person.

Going to do my ITIL this year and see where that leads me.

 

[Worthy]

Do you still enjoy the tech or are you bored of pushing the buttons and want to take a step back? There are lots of options mate, doesn’t have to mean a move into management. I did it a little earlier in my career and hated it, I found it boring and moved back into the tech side as soon as I could. Like you say, the next step up really if you don’t want to do management is move into architecture. Which could also mean one of a few things depending on the company and how hands on you want to be.

 

[Worthy]

I've been in management roles for 15+ years now, and my technical skills aren't a patch on where they would be if I had just been doing engineering work for that time....but....I'm a good, experienced manager, which is something you can't just learn from reading a book, and I enjoy it.

Didn’t I see you post in another thread recently that you’re a senior game developer?

 

[LiE]

What really matters is do you enjoy doing it? That will depend a lot on the organisation you're in mind.

I've never really had the desire to be a manager to be honest.

When it comes to 'generic' it is partially down to you what you make of the position, unless it is being heavily constrained by senior management. My position wasn't really generic, I was still regarded as an SME and key person to provide direction on my subject matter on large programmes etc.

I would have no scope to be technical in this role, the team is 11 people and we have over 30 customers.

Have you had a chance to do any reasonably long-ish interim management cover?

I've covered for 5 weeks previous but I was still doing my day job and just dealing with critical things from a management perspective.

Do you still enjoy the tech or are you bored of pushing the buttons and want to take a step back? There are lots of options mate, doesn’t have to mean a move into management. I did it a little earlier in my career and hated it, I found it boring and moved back into the tech side as soon as I could. Like you say, the next step up really if you don’t want to do management is move into architecture. Which could also mean one of a few things depending on the company and how hands on you want to be.

I still enjoy the technical work, but my excitement to keep up with the constant versions and processes isn't what it used to be. Prior to COVID I did speak to the head of UK delivery about moving into his practice and he was happy to have me. It would be more of an SA/Principle Consultant position.

 

[HangTime]

I would have no scope to be technical in this role, the team is 11 people and we have over 30 customers

Even if not technical, it doesn't necessarily have to be generic. As for the team size, are those 11 people all going to be direct reports or is there a hierarchy in place, are some contractors etc? My team was bigger than that, but as we brought more perms on board I implemented a hierarchy given once you start getting more than about half a dozen direct reports it is difficult to do it justice.

 

[NotAGolf]

I had almost the exact situation as HangTime. Senior member within the team and an opportunity to move into managing the team arose. I was unsure at the time as I didn't want to lose the technical aspect, so the role was offered at 50/50 hands on/management. As expected, management swallowed way more than 50% of the time. And this was with a team and domain I knew, so I learnt that's it's definitely a tech role OR management role in my area.

In the end I dropped back to senior and have since moved on to other companies at a senior tech level. The opportunity to move to a management cropped up again in my current place and I was basically offered it on a plate, but I turned it down.

Maybe I'd rethink in another 10 years or so, but for now I definitely prefer the hands on side without the stress of managing others, even if the pay isn't quite as good.

 

[mid_gen]

Didn’t I see you post in another thread recently that you’re a senior game developer?

Yeah, been in games a while now. Lead level atm, although in the process of changing jobs.

 

[HangTime]

I definitely prefer the hands on side without the stress of managing others, even if the pay isn't quite as good.

Sometimes in IT the pay for managers isn't much more (in some cases less) than the senior techies anyway.

One of the issues I had as we transitioned our team over from being contract-heavy to perm-heavy was that I effectively had to bestow management responsibilities onto some of my leads to avoid having too many direct reports. In some cases this was desirable to them, in other cases it was more of a "I'll do it because it makes sense". It never really manifested itself as a problem, but traditional management hierarchies don't really work that well in terms of ratios for large technical teams (you need more managers than you have people with the skills and desire to be managers), you almost need some sort of matrix structure where the managers embedded in those can focus on strategy, budgeting, stakeholder management etc but then have the people management side done by someone else. A bit like is done at some consultancies. This would pose a significant challenge however in terms of the people managers not really being close enough to the day-to-day to properly appraise and support the workers.

 

[jaybee]

Been there, got the t-shirt, went "back" to technical in a new role with significant pay rise. I find it very hard to be motivated to manage people and projects. Boring. Stressful. Felt like nothing was ever delivered. Constantly trying to motivate others to do work. Having to lead boring cringe fest meetings. All the objective/performance related stuff. Taking responsibility for the team that you probably didn't pick, and has rotten apples in...

I find it very old fashioned that people still typically pay more for managers than some technical roles. A lot of the contracted PMs I worked with were utterly useless but had day rates of 1k. Then you get techs that constantly keep themselves up to date with a multitude of tools and languages and exams, and some companies want to pay them half the rate of their manager who has no skills but "knows the business" and people and has been there years. Trouble with that is try getting a brand new management job... Not always easy.

My boss is no doubt paid more than me by a fair bit. Great guy but...he's easily replaceable with anyone really that can do basic management and objectives/appraisal guff and attend meetings, after meeting, after meeting and likes the sound of their own voice. I find it Mickey mouse stuff and totally uninspiring.

 

[LiE]

Even if not technical, it doesn't necessarily have to be generic. As for the team size, are those 11 people all going to be direct reports or is there a hierarchy in place, are some contractors etc? My team was bigger than that, but as we brought more perms on board I implemented a hierarchy given once you start getting more than about half a dozen direct reports it is difficult to do it justice.

There's no hierarchy in place. The 6 team members from the polish office I do believe report to a local manager for some things.

I had almost the exact situation as HangTime. Senior member within the team and an opportunity to move into managing the team arose. I was unsure at the time as I didn't want to lose the technical aspect, so the role was offered at 50/50 hands on/management. As expected, management swallowed way more than 50% of the time. And this was with a team and domain I knew, so I learnt that's it's definitely a tech role OR management role in my area.

In the end I dropped back to senior and have since moved on to other companies at a senior tech level. The opportunity to move to a management cropped up again in my current place and I was basically offered it on a plate, but I turned it down.

Maybe I'd rethink in another 10 years or so, but for now I definitely prefer the hands on side without the stress of managing others, even if the pay isn't quite as good.

Before my current manager came along I was offered the position and I turned it down to stay technical. The pay is very good, at least in my position, I get the sense than my manager isn't on much more than me.

Sometimes in IT the pay for managers isn't much more (in some cases less) than the senior techies anyway.

Yea when I looked at going into delivery practice before COVID I was told that they could easily bump me from £65k to £75k. I'm now on £68k and looking at the manager type jobs in the market place that salary exceeds a lot of them.

Been there, got the t-shirt, went "back" to technical in a new role with significant pay rise. I find it very hard to be motivated to manage people and projects. Boring. Stressful. Felt like nothing was ever delivered. Constantly trying to motivate others to do work. Having to lead boring cringe fest meetings. All the objective/performance related stuff. Taking responsibility for the team that you probably didn't pick, and has rotten apples in...

I find it very old fashioned that people still typically pay more for managers than some technical roles. A lot of the contracted PMs I worked with were utterly useless but had day rates of 1k. Then you get techs that constantly keep themselves up to date with a multitude of tools and languages and exams, and some companies want to pay them half the rate of their manager who has no skills but "knows the business" and people and has been there years. Trouble with that is try getting a brand new management job... Not always easy.

My boss is no doubt paid more than me by a fair bit. Great guy but...he's easily replaceable with anyone really that can do basic management and objectives/appraisal guff and attend meetings, after meeting, after meeting and likes the sound of their own voice. I find it Mickey mouse stuff and totally uninspiring.

I don't think my manager is on much more than me, if at all. The market place is very competitive for people trained in the area I work. Managers I'm sure they could find plenty of those. This is the big reason why I don't think this makes sense.

I've pretty much decided to turn it down. I may compromise and help the transition but I would have to move into the delivery practice in the next 18 months for sure.

 

[HangTime]

I find it very hard to be motivated to manage people and projects. Boring. Stressful. Felt like nothing was ever delivered. Constantly trying to motivate others to do work. Having to lead boring cringe fest meetings. All the objective/performance related stuff. Taking responsibility for the team that you probably didn't pick, and has rotten apples in...

I find it very old fashioned that people still typically pay more for managers than some technical roles.

You've kind of answered your own question/statement there - one of the reasons it pays more in some cases might be that it is "very hard", "Boring", "Stressful" and just generally needs people leadership skills/focus coupled with responsibility. Traits like that might dissuade people from wanting such jobs, as this thread illustrates.

There are some people that are very good at these things, they have personalities that thrive on interaction with people, that just naturally understand how to motivate their team. The issue in tech is often people have ended up in tech roles because they are wired slightly differently, and find themselves like a duck out of water when transitioning to management. Finding people with a balance of both tech understanding (so they can make good decisions, strategise appropriately, maintain credibility with their team) and people leadership / stakeholder management / vendor management etc skills isn't straightforward and the pool of people with those skills who actually want the role against the backdrop of the pain points you illustrated is even smaller.

On reflection my biggest gripe with being a manager was really the breadth of what I needed to cover, it felt like I was doing two jobs (and my team told me as much) and basically just having a day driven by meetings (typically about 6hrs/day) and then trying to catchup on emails etc in the rare moments not in meetings. Constantly task-switching between many different verticals/horizontals and very little time to actually do the value add activities such as looking to the future and strategising.

 

[Mr^B]

I moved from a technical software developer role into a tech lead/management role in 2014, after 6 years of being a senior developer at my current company (probably what would be called a Staff developer these days).

I had a decent amount of managerial training through the company, in terms of running a team - and I'd been de facto manager for a while since the previous manager was pretty ineffective.

Since then I've dipped in and out of management - which I find far more stressful than writing code, I dipped out last time at the end of 2017 after 2 years of hard work, long hours, lots of stress and running a team/project that was on its knees due to mis-management, time pressures and personnel issues. I vowed never to return unless I could hand-pick the team and that we wouldn't be held to anyone's deadlines but the ones which I set.

I had 2 years of doing something more developer related in a different area of the company, then in 2020 I went back to run a team to build a large new group-wide trading platform, where I chose the team, had final say on the tech, and architecture, etc.

Which I have been hugely enjoying for 2 years now.

Salary-wise I haven't found it makes a difference. I got a salary/package raise moving back to develop stuff in 2018, and another salary/package raise to move back to run this team and project. So I haven't really found a difference between the two - although I appreciate that elsewhere managerial style roles do tend to attract a higher package.

 

[paradigm]

I have, twice now, moved into a management role as opposed to a purely technical one. Both times I ended up with a good mix of both people management and technical involvement, both times I ended up loathing the management side as it got in the way of achieving things that made the business better or peoples jobs more efficient, i.e. making a difference. “Succeeding” at my managerial tasks always seemed like a box ticking exercise rather than a meaningful achievement.

In terms of salary, I’m currently back into a purely technical role and earning 14% more than I was as the manager of a similar team previously. There have also been times in the past whereby I had been earning more as a technical member of the team than my manager was above me.

I can’t see myself making the jump back to management now, its clearly not where I desire to be. I guess consultancy or architect is the next logical step from here, and the only real way to earn considerably more than I do now.

 

[CaptainRAVE]

It depends entirely on your team. I’m really lucky that mine are professional and do a decent job, but some others in my position that I know have a nightmare job. That said, I’m done climbing up the ladder, I’m at a sweet point with my salary vs free time and now want to focus on me. I had aspirations of becoming the CEO, but things change.

 

[Freefaller]

It depends also on what you want to achieve. Do you prefer technical stuff? Or are you happy to still be technical (but less so) and be more people-oriented, strategically driven?

I've been managing teams for about 15 years now, and whilst in some instances there is a high level of technical expertise required, I lean on people that know more than me and use my inter-personal skills to get the best output for my projects / company. I personally love interacting with people and working as a team to solve problems, and deliver for our stakeholders.

That said, depending on structure, environment or type of work, some people are better at just being the subject matter expert and given specific tasks to solve/do and not have to worry about P&L, budgets and personnel management.

I know you a little (it's been ages since we've met up!) and I think you'd do well in management as you're generally good with people and definitely highly technical which would give you the credibility for speaking with authority on something, but also you need to think, is this what you want to do, and will your team take to you well changing roles? Only you can answer that.

I also agree with comments here, I brought in a consultant/expert into my team for a 12 month piece of work who was paid more than me - and that's absolutely fine, a manager doesn't need to necessarily earn more than a technical expert. However, the argument for more pay is the level of responsibility and accountability you inherit with the role - that does become more "stressful". I personally find invigorating and interesting, but many find it less rewarding.

Happy to have a chat offline @LiE

 

[HangTime]

I guess consultancy or architect is the next logical step from here, and the only real way to earn considerably more than I do now.

Consultancy is where I've landed, in my sector there aren't many perm non-management roles paying 6 figures unless you are a techie with specific in-demand modern tech skills (which I'm not).