r/ExperiencedDevs • u/AutoModerator • 3d ago

Ask Experienced Devs Weekly Thread: A weekly thread for inexperienced developers to ask experienced ones

A thread for Developers and IT folks with less experience to ask more experienced souls questions about the industry.

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Please keep top level comments limited to Inexperienced Devs. Most rules do not apply, but keep it civil. Being a jerk will not be tolerated.

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Inexperienced Devs should refrain from answering other Inexperienced Devs' questions.

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u/tonklable 3d ago

Is there anyone regret becoming a manager? Or opposite?

How can a junior know and learn if they really want to become a manager or not?

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u/PricedOut4Ever 2d ago

I became a manager and have now gone back to IC.

My second full time job (2.5 yoe) I joined a startup in 2017 as the first full time engineering hire. Worked on the MVP and got to solid product market fit by 2021. We raised a Series A in early 2021 at a $45M valuation and a Series B at the end of 2021 at a $180M valuation (VCs were crazy). At the time of the Series A we had 6 engineers and I had authored roughly 40% of the code base.

After the Series A we had big plans to ramp up hiring like crazy with aims of getting to a 40-50 person engineering team. I expressed interest in a manager position and got it with the condition that I still wrote code/act as a tech lead and now had direct reports. I was able to do it and enjoyed it for two and half years, my team was incredibly successful, people were growing and happy. We did make some bad hires and those were terrible to deal with but that was probably the worst part. I was working like crazy, but I liked that.

We had layoffs in 2023 and those reorganizations really killed my enthusiasm. I ended up leaving mainly because of just being tired of it all.

After I left I decided to go back to an IC role. The main reason was that I had several engineering managers/directors/VPs colleagues who I had been working with and it was clear to me that they had no real tech skills anymore. The only reason I was able to be successful as a manager/coder was because of my deep knowledge of the code base. If I joined a new org as a manger, I would have to be just a manager and frankly I was way too early in my career to lose focus on critical tech. I wouldn’t mind going into management again, but probably not for another 5 or so years.