Comment by ashutoshstark

True 100 %

A lot of strong engineers move into EM roles expecting deeper technical impact, but end up spending most of their time on coordination, hiring, performance reviews, and cross-team alignment. That’s valuable work — just very different from building systems. More orgs should invest in strong IC tracks (Staff/Principal) so people can lead technically without managing people. Not everyone who’s good at engineering wants to optimize calendars and org charts.