[otteromkram]

> "Where’s my dopamine?"

I'm not in management, but couldn't OP become a working manager? Might depend on the size of their team and demands of the new role, but I've worked with managers who wear their IC hat on occasion and thought it was a positive value-add for the group as a whole.

[98codes]

Every manager I've ever had that couldn't let go of their IC hat also had a pile of manager hat work that wasn't ever getting done.

[justsomeshmuck]

What sort of manager work was ignored?

[icedchai]

For small teams (like, 5 people max) that may make sense. It really depends on the organization. With some orgs, you're going to meetings all day and there's no time to focus.

[sumedh]

> With some orgs, you're going to meetings all day and there's no time to focus.

Let's be honest here, some of those meetings could have been done over chat conversation.

[icedchai]

Absolutely! But who is going to really admit this?

[dowager_dan99]

for these IC/leaders a big mistake is taking on critical path work, then blocking everyone else.

[starky]

This is generally a bad idea. I never know when I'm going to get pulled into something that will take my attention away from the task. The only times I really do that anymore is if the task is not time critical or if it is something that I know I could be picked up by others in any state without any issue.

[dowager_dan99]

For team leads, yes - to some degree. It is really hard to get the balance right, and even harder to step out of one of those worlds as your responsibilities grow.