One of the ways I see manager's having a very positive impact on a product is by managing the (sometimes) competing interest of users versus engineers.
As engineers, we can sometimes become obsessed with updates/refactors/optimizations that have zero meaningful impact on the user experience. A user doesn't care about your cobwebs and dirty laundry, but as an engineer it's so hard not to obsess over these optimizations. It's so easy to forget that users don't care about the same things as you.
At the same time it's maddening when you feel like you're working with a house of cards and your manager asks for a third story.
I see a lot of conflict here, and this imho is what separates good technical managers from bad ones. They understand the competing interests and are able to prioritize work in a way that works best for everyone.
> that have zero meaningful impact on the user experience.
The reason I want to refactor is to make the code easier to read and maintain and more likely to be bug free. It doesn't have any meaningful impact on the user experience, but it is making the software a lot better and keeps running costs lower and allows new features to be added more easily.
As engineers, we can sometimes become obsessed with updates/refactors/optimizations that have zero meaningful impact on the user experience. A user doesn't care about your cobwebs and dirty laundry, but as an engineer it's so hard not to obsess over these optimizations. It's so easy to forget that users don't care about the same things as you.
At the same time it's maddening when you feel like you're working with a house of cards and your manager asks for a third story.
I see a lot of conflict here, and this imho is what separates good technical managers from bad ones. They understand the competing interests and are able to prioritize work in a way that works best for everyone.