The Problem with Non-Coding Managers

I know we’re all experts in a dying field these days. Software developers are reaching the end of their shelf-life in respect of paid work.

This means that the rush to become senior is being replaced by a rush into management. After all, you can’t easily automate those important people tasks like approving holidays and listening to your “personal” issues.

That doesn’t make any sense. If there are no coders, who are you going to manage?

The issue

Many technical managers are not coding managers. That is, they don’t know about the technical detail of the work and the people they are managing. 

My current situation

My manager doesn’t seem to do anything. They’re a ghost. I think this might be because they don’t have confidence in their code. It’s a real shame for them, but also a real shame for our development team.

Slow of Mind

They don’t understand the technical challenges that their staff face. My current manager says that they were the best coder at their previous office.

Sure

They don’t participate in any code reviews and so do not know the detail of the technical work that takes place in the codebase. As time goes on, they become increasingly disassociated with any sort of technical work. Worse, it will take an increasingly long amount of time to get back to a competent level.

It kind of doesn’t matter. Not looking at the codebase because nobody cares about the technical details is giving the lead in a way nobody should. It’s a race to the bottom when you start doing this.

Your leadership is leading us in the wrong direction

They still have some negative elements of the coder's outlook

This relates to my current manager, but it might strike a chord with many of you.

They are judgemental. They don’t listen to other opinions, in this case, the idea is to automate everything. During my hour-long one on one session, we took 30 minutes to “give time back”. 

I’d have been happy talking about the code, if nothing else

I’m not saying non-coding managers have an inattention to detail. In this case, the non-coding manager simply doesn’t care about people. It doesn’t work well for a people manager.

Your lack of people skills means something when you’re a people manager

Improper alignment with developers

Developers generally want to develop code, to complete their work and produce a great end product. Maintainable. Clean code base.

A non-coding manager will have other considerations. Generally, they are more interested in politicking in the office and getting releases out of the door and forgetting their main function.

That main function?

To support staff, and to remove blockers from the coders.

How can you remove a block, when you lack the understanding of it?

Your goals differ when you don’t do the same job as your staff

Faulty hiring processes

If you no longer code and are at arm's length from the codebase, how can you decide what sort of employees are required for the business?

It’s even worse to set up the process for employing colleagues

If you’re not in a position to analyze the code due to your distance from it, you are also not in a position to hire for that code.

Fact

You need to know what you’re looking for in order to find it

Failure to advocate for code quality

If you don’t care about the code how can you fight for good code quality? It simply can’t happen.

We’ll pick it up in code review anyways

You need to know your code to understand the quality required

Lack of Mentoring

The manager could get another member of the team to mentor. Which member of staff should be paired with which?

Probably pair the strongest with the weakest. What do you mean “odd number of people”?

You would need technical chops to know

Slow of Wit

They don’t get our programmer jokes. Lighten the mood? You’ll struggle, and here are a couple of jokes that your non-coding manager will just fail to understand.

That is, you might never get arrays (a raise) with a non-coding manager

To know code jokes, you need to code

Conclusion

That joke is just too dreadful. Sorry.

Something else which is dreadful is the non-coding manager. It’s just not great.