That's a very good indicator of a bloated institution. People have to compete for work instead of pushing it away or avoiding it because they already have their hands full.
But I don't believe there is a general rule that applies here.
Most great managers I had were deeply technical and involved in the nitty gritty of the projects, including coding the very spiky aspects of a project.
Most mediocre managers I had were very focused on relationship building. The kind of manager that would need a hobby project to keep current, instead of being the most knowledgeable person in the room.
> I think that there is a big difference between being in the code and writing code. All managers should be in the code, but not all managers should be writing code.
I think it's not possible to be in the code without writing code. People can pay lip service to being in the code as the author indicates, but as we all know there is no substitute for actually sitting down and writing the code yourself in terms of understanding the actual pains and struggles.
And my anecdotal experience says that if you aren't writing at least some of the code, more often than not the disconnect between the manager and what the team is doing grows and grows.
That's a very good indicator of a bloated institution. People have to compete for work instead of pushing it away or avoiding it because they already have their hands full.
But I don't believe there is a general rule that applies here.
Most great managers I had were deeply technical and involved in the nitty gritty of the projects, including coding the very spiky aspects of a project.
Most mediocre managers I had were very focused on relationship building. The kind of manager that would need a hobby project to keep current, instead of being the most knowledgeable person in the room.