How do I figure out how managerial my career path should be?

Question

I have a couple years of experience, so I'm thinking if it makes sense to go down the engineering manager path. I'm well-positioned to start this journey at my current company as well; I'm a very early engineer on my team, and I have the ability to build up the team and mentor those new people. However, I'm unsure if this is the right way for my career to go and how much of my job I want to be people management - How can I figure this out?

Lee McKeeman · Accepted Answer

Do you want to manage out poor performers? Tell people they didn’t get promoted? Tell your team a project they really believe in is canceled? Tell stakeholders an important feature isn’t landing?

The good parts exist too, of course. Promoting someone, celebrating a successful release and such, but my experience was that difficult things happened with higher frequency (but lower magnitude).

Why do you want to manage? Do you love writing documents, reporting/defending status in meetings, and want to step back from code and design? What type of leading do you want to do as a people manager that you can’t do as a more senior IC?

Would you have strong support and an ability to switch back if it doesn’t work out? Can you take on more management responsibilities without official title change to see if you like it? Can you talk in depth with existing managers about what they love and hate about their job?

How do I figure out how managerial my career path should be?

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