How do people become managers, should I just tell my manager that I want to be a manager now. Would he be thratntened that I want his job ?
I've always told myself that I'll code until I can't keep up. So far that hasn't happened. Once it does, I will happily transition to more of a management role to be of the greatest value that I can. Along the way (and even now), though, I've had a good number of management-like responsibilities which will help a lot. So, I encourage you to take advantage of those opportunities as they come along. There isn't a bright, hard line between management and individual contribution. There is a space between.
A good manager will look out for your career path and help you get to management, if that's what you want.
Join a rapidly growing organisation and help other people to do their jobs better. You will be a manager before you know it.
Alternatively move company and apply to be a manager and probably say you had more management experience than you really do. I'm sure at 35 you've had to coach some people to be better and do interviews, these can be highlighted.
Do not tell your boss you want his job/to be a manager because anything you ever do that makes her feel threatened from then on will be noted and used against you. People move companies to gain good promotions for a reason.
That's not great advice. Don't lie to get a job.
> Do not tell your boss you want his job/to be a manager
Every company I've worked at has needed more great engineering managers. There's more than enough work, and anyone who says "I want to help" is my hero.
Where I work, when engineers say they want to become managers, we give them gently escalating management responsibilities, enroll them in management training, and give them a mentor for guidance. And later we check to make sure it's still something they want -- it's truly a different job, so they should be able to say "not for me" and go back to being an IC.
It wasn't advice. I was saying it is one of the ways I've seen people transition into management. Interestingly, the way you said management training happens at your company, I've never seen that happen anywhere, so it sounds like a fantastic place to work. How many people who have been through the management program now have a team?
My current employer is more like what you describe, however, and I'm thankful for it.
Has every company you've worked at been successful or at least rapidly growing? There's plenty of cake to go around in a company doubling in size every year, but the daggers come out when there are layoffs twice a year, particularly when the people being laid off aren't SV software engineers with tons of other options.
I don't entirely think that piece of advice applies if your manager/boss is ambitious. If they're ambitious, then they're most certainly looking for their own replacement. Heck, someone that can in the interim do their tasks while they focus on "moving up".
Don't tell your boss you want their job. Tell them you'd like to have an opportunity to contribute in a greater capacity and how you can do that. If there's something specific that thrills you, ask to do that. Put 100% into making sure that thing gets done well.
I think it's normal and professional to have a conversation along the lines of "I'd like to start getting experience managing people, do you think there'd be a chance for me to do that?". If they're threatened by that conversation, I wouldn't want to work for them frankly.
The reality is there's a lot of older coders out there, I think it matters more what you _want_ to do.