[KnobbleMcKnees]

I'm an experienced engineer that's been a manager for three years. I'm now returning to an engineering role.

Having been a manager and having learned what it means to scale your ability to have impact and to land impact purely through leveraging others, I feel far more equipped to be the kind of engineer that I would like to manage.

More than that, one of the best experiences I've had as a manager is to be able to dissuade myself of many of the misconceptions and stereotypes that are rife in this thread.

I'd strongly advise non-managers in the thread to read Charity's other blog posts such as the Engineer/Manager Pendulum too.

[fatnoah]

I made the move to full-time management after about 16 years as a hands-on Engineer & tech lead. As a high-level Engineer, I was very much into mentorship, influence, architecture, and process, so it felt natural to go into management. After a few years, I moved back to being an IC because it was very hard to not "control my own destiny" through hands-on contributions.

As it turns out, going back to being hands-on made me realize that I'd kinda been-there, done that in terms of the things I wanted to get done myself. I really missed a) playing an integral role in the career growth of others and b) the strategic level thinking of being an upper-level manager, so I went back to full-time management. There are times where I still think the grass is greener on the other side of the fence, but then I have those moments where someone on my team or in my org will thank me for supporting them or how that X that I've done has reduced the hassle of their day.