[Clubber]

In all fairness, a bad programmer can do a lot of damage. They can create attack vectors, destroy data and cause production outages. None of that is good. There are things in place to prevent that, but if those also fail, it'll be a busy week. Ask Crowdstrike.

https://ezo.io/blog/crowdstrike-outage-and-the-blue-screen-o...

Bad managers can also lead to a lot of bad programmers because all the good ones left. I reckon a bad manager is a multiplier of bad programmers. Bad is just bad no matter what level you are in.

[bialpio]

I think the main difference is that programmers have (or should have) more transparent processes that they go through (code reviews, design doc reviews / signoffs, CI/CD to catch mistakes) compared to managers. Granted, I'm an IC so I know more about those - maybe managerial roles have similar ways to ensure you catch the "bad" early enough.

[steveBK123]

I think its genuinely harder to measure the squishy productivity / collaboration / delivery output stuff that managers are supposed to own, but also .. managers aren't as incentivized to create processes to measure managers ..

[protocolture]

Fair, however if a bad programmer isnt subject to code review, thats sort of a management issue.