Comment by tflinton
2 years ago
Managers have to manage up, down and outward. Most ICs will generally see downward management, but not the hours put in reporting up to executives, aligning and planning initiatives, resource/ allocations/PI’s, budgeting, procurement, audits, client/product demos/presentations, hiring and sometimes firing.
Managing down tends to be the easy part, career planning, 1:1’s, performance/development and running rituals is a cake walk. The only real hard part of managing down is when you have an employee that’s poisoning the well or is on a PIP.
Oh, and some managers also have to still pick up cards and push code in some orgs.
Nailed it!
Most posts here are from those who have never walked in a manager's shoes so only know what they see (or hear/read).
Think about it, minus a few exceptions, most managers are paid better than the engineers they manage. Now why would exec/sr mgmt. do pay more unless they are getting their money's value?