Comment by Apteris | Hacker News Reader

Comment by Apteris | Hacker News Reader

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I have to disagree with that. I've met many people, especially in larger enterprises, who started in development but then became more abstract over time. They weren't bad people, in fact, they were excellent at their job.

This neither confirms nor infirms Paul Graham's thesis. In fact, while PG's assertion was a bit too specific--pointy-haired boss means in general "bad manager", not "programmer turned manager"--I don't think you can deny that people want promotions, and in some places the only way to get promoted is to go into management. PG is of course correct in suggesting that if you want to keep programming, don't accept a promotion to a non-programming role. However, if you find this stunts your career growth, you can either look for a job in a company that will allow you to grow as a programmer, or you can choose to go into management. That many programmers are averse to this doesn't make it a bad choice. You just have to know what you're getting into, and hopefully how to do it well.

Programming to me has never been something that has to be continually pursued in order to stay fluent or able, but merely something that reflects your more basic skills and talents.

Depends on what your goal is. It's perfectly possible to build a good career without keeping up with the bleeding edge of research. You don't have to know what monads are to be well compensated (at least in a Western country). However, neither will you be the next Peter Norvig. If you want to make money, there's many ways to do that. If you want to eventually get a Turing Award... there's fewer ways to do that.

And the traits that make you a good programmer help you in other fields, even management. Yes, large corporations have structures, but we need structure to manage them. And we need managers. And a manager who was a distinguished developer will be much better suited for leading a team of developers -- even if he doesn't program any longer. This is a valid career path, and an interesting one at that.

A manager who is a good programmer will be golden at interview time. Whether he will also be a good lead is unclear. Like iand said, they should get out of the way and enable programmers to work optimally. As an aside, the structure of corporations and how it affects programming is an interesting topic worthy of its own discussion thread.

PG is of course correct in suggesting that if you want to keep programming, don't accept a promotion to a non-programming role.

That's not what he is suggesting though: His statement doesn't include "if you want". He formulates it as an at-all-costs mantra -- stay in programming, for the worst could happen. It can be absolutely horrid advice to a number of people who would excel even more at other IT roles or management roles (see interesting comment from robertk [1]). I myself was long not considering applying to non-development roles, because many of those great opportunities are more and more looked down upon as "not programming". I know some people who've come as far as "Be Mark Zuckerberg or die trying", completely rejecting any business model that isn't two guys coding in a garage. I didn't actually read PG's comment like that -- I have the utmost respect for PG; but this is the background for why I authored such an opposing comment. I don't actually think the RAQs we are discussing were designed to be put under lawyer-like scrutiny ;)

Depends on what your goal is

Completely agree. Casual focus will rarely lead to greatness.

they should get out of the way and enable programmers to work optimally

For someone to get out of the way, he first has to be in the way. You make the general assumption that a manager is bad unless he actively changes his style. I cannot challenge this assumption for I have no data or ideas on where to find some concerning if managers are universally good or bad. And even then employee satisfaction might not be the only metric to measure success. Although I do think that having fun at work is one of the most, if not the most important metric. Many things would be better if everyone enjoyed their work.

[1] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3012765

I know some people who've come as far as "Be Mark Zuckerberg or die trying", completely rejecting any business model that isn't two guys coding in a garage.

I believe the idea behind that perspective is that the aggressive startup model will lead to either failure or fabulous success, whereas a more traditional career will lead to only incremental improvements to your lot in life. Some people are attracted to that.

For someone to get out of the way, he first has to be in the way. You make the general assumption that a manager is bad unless he actively changes his style. I cannot challenge this assumption for I have no data or ideas on where to find some concerning if managers are universally good or bad. And even then employee satisfaction might not be the only metric to measure success. Although I do think that having fun at work is one of the most, if not the most important metric. Many things would be better if everyone enjoyed their work.

No no, that was merely short-hand. To say "they should get out of the way" is to say the manager should create a good working environment for the programmers, while not micro-managing. So yes on the nice office with few distractions, yes on the manager being the sole gateway between the team and the rest of the company, no on the manager dictating what sorting algorithm to use. See for instance this article by Joel Spolsky: http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2009/03/09.html

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