[metageek]

And are they also good engineers? That's the hard part; the kind of obsessive focus usually required to be a good geek tends to impair the social skills required to be a good manager. Not always, I admit, but usually.

I did work in Silicon Valley, but not for very long; and it was in the late 90s, at Netscape, so my experience was probably atypical.

[diego]

All great engineering managers I know were also great engineers. It's possible to use your geek focus to improve your social skills, I've done it :)