This morning, I met a colleague I hadn't seen in a while for a joint project. He's the same age as me, has been working in the same place for over 10 years, and has advanced in his career. When he put his hands on a keyboard and a server, he smiled. He looked at me and explained that now that he has moved up, he no longer touches servers or systems, and he misses it a lot. In the end, he found it less stressful to be a technician than a manager. He had to accept this to avoid career stagnation, but he was much happier before - stopping would have meant giving a bad impression to his superiors.
For me, this is something I would struggle to accept. I do my job because I enjoy it. I have direct contact with clients and work with servers. I wouldn’t want to “advance” by stopping being a technician. I believe this system makes many unhappy. In this case, the person is also a skilled manager, but that’s not always the case. Often, excellent technicians become poor managers.
In a way, I still dream of the time when the entrepreneur was the technician or craftsman (or at least someone who directly understood the field) and continued to engage with those working directly, even after building significant enterprises. I think of Adriano Olivetti or, in a different field, Leonardo Del Vecchio. Or the various Enzo Ferrari and Vincenzo Lancia, Ferruccio Lamborghini.
@stefano There should not be two tracks, 'management' OR 'technical' and I find the culture very irritating. The best people keep their hand in, how else do they know what is going on?