I got in trouble for telling a senior manager that he was wrong on a technical issue. He sought expert advice on a control system but when the answer came back it didn’t fit his conception of reality and he didn’t want to hear it.
Turns out being good at management and being good at solving technical problems are skill sets that very rarely coincide in one person.
ime it usually goes the other way, someone is such a great engineer that they end up in a leadership position that they absolutely lack the soft skills for and either end up making everyone on the team resent them or burning themselves out by trying to take on work they’re having trouble delegating
I got in trouble for telling a senior manager that he was wrong on a technical issue. He sought expert advice on a control system but when the answer came back it didn’t fit his conception of reality and he didn’t want to hear it.
Turns out being good at management and being good at solving technical problems are skill sets that very rarely coincide in one person.
The Peter principle in effect
ime it usually goes the other way, someone is such a great engineer that they end up in a leadership position that they absolutely lack the soft skills for and either end up making everyone on the team resent them or burning themselves out by trying to take on work they’re having trouble delegating
And then the organization doesn’t bother to train them how to be a better manager.