Jim Amos on Human-Centric Engineering

Yes but...managers should keep coding in order to maintain an interest in what their reports are working on and in order to empathize, but the manager doesn't need to be working on the same project side-by-side with their team. If you think the answer is to roll up your sleeves and get into the trenches with them, you'll likely get in their way, unconsciously start micromanaging the project or asserting too many of your own biases which could be detrimental to team morale and individual autonomy. You also won't be very accessible to team members as a leader or coach because you won't be able to provide that elevated view of the team and the work that only comes from stepping back. Finally I'll say this: tech has an over abundance of managers who are so obsessed with being the smartest 10x developer in the room and who never learn to let go one iota: these managers are toxic and if you work for one as a software developer you will always be competing with this manager and being told that you are wrong and must do things their way. We need to move away from that approach and stop normalizing it. Stay curious and learn new frameworks on the side as a manager, and glance at your team's code from time to time, absolutely. Be there to provide architectural guidance or help them see the benefit of using a certain methodology or design pattern, but stay out of the critical path because you'll only undermine or intimidate them and they won't ever achieve their full potential or exercise their full human agency.