Comment by einsteinx2

> We both knew the reality: you can't be an effective Engineering Manager and spend 50% of your time in the codebase. The role demands full attention to your people, to strategy, to communication.

I take issue with the way this is posited as being obviously true…

Personal experience N=1 and all that, by my previous manager stepped up from engineer to manager and kept doing about 50% coding. Not only was it completely viable, but he did an even better job than our previous (also great) manager who was doing 0% coding.

Though it sounds like your company is even worse with meetings than ours was, so may legitimately not viable for you there. I still would have gone for Staff though as another commenter explained in detail.