[arvindamirtaa]

By having no pure managers.

Everyone who is a manager actively makes independent contributions for a not-insignificant portion of their work-week.

So, when we have 1-on-1s with them, we can actually discuss improvement avenues from the same vantage point. Not some spreadsheet pushing manager who has no clue how to measure engineer-productivity or performance.

When they do code reviews, their comments serve as an important learning opportunity, pointing out good practices/conventions, etc.

And finally, when you disagree, it's backed by the validity of your points as 2 engineers, rather than their authority as a manager vs you, their direct report.

[mattbrewsbytes]

As a manager I typically let the employee lead the 1:1 discussion and we are agile so status of work isn't really useful since that's done at standup. What would your ideal frequency and topics be for a 1:1? Do you expect productivity or performance for software engineering to have measurements?

[arvindamirtaa]

My ideal 1:1 is about once a month. Especially in high-ownership teams, you could go days without actually talking to people aside from a 10-15 min check in call.

So, it's sometimes nice to have periodic validation that you're keeping true to the course / indication that you need to make a few minor adjustments, etc. That's on your side.

From your manager's side, if they find something isn't working, they don't need to wait 3/6 months to bring it up at which point there isn't much you can do to get back the lost productivity.

[flavianh]

This. I genuinely think this is one of the best comments in this thread!

[dpdpdp]

This 100%. Don't accept a manager position unless you get to continue being an engineer.