[kaspm]

I think one thing that's missing from this article is what engineers at higher levels of IC status (up to VP) do. When a Sr. Engineer is choosing between a Manager and a "Principal Engineer" type role, I have to remind them that PEs also don't do much depth coding. They write proposals, discuss architecture, sit in meetings. Ultimately, the same mechanisms that Managers use.

There's certainly SOME PEs that go deep in some areas but the majority I've worked with are broad owners of technology in large organizations. The difference between the two roles often has to do with what balance of time you want to spend influencing others for broad goals vs. building up jr. folks to accomplish your team's goal.

In either case your authority is derived from whether people "under" you want to work with you. People who can't get a set of people to go a certain direction won't last long in either role.

[ses1984]

This article was on HN yesterday and I like the way that four different types of staff engineers are described:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24437715

[sciurus]

On the same topic, https://staffeng.com/guides/staff-archetypes