Hahah, indeed. So have you seen a law department in a company headed by someone who doesn't come from law background? How about a finance department headed by some schmuck who doesn't know anything about finance?

I've seen plenty of departments managed by people who don't come from the background of the department. My current boss is extremely good and came from a different discipline.

Although I don't deny it can help to have the background, it is not necessary to be a good manager of something. Also seen plenty of good techies promoted to management and failing badly.

This is a lie, and you know it. Even a mere idea about lawyers being managed by a non-lawyer would be laughed at. Same with finance, nobody would be stupid enough to even try it

It's ok to disagree, we don't have to accuse each other of mendacity.

I stand by what I said, although my experience is in the technical domain, not finance or law. Maybe those departments are different, I don't know.

I disagree with you. You are stating it, but you are not giving reasons. Managers who weren’t developers tend to not be able to manage the team. They can’t help with or understand the technical decisions made. The non-technical managers tend to be project managers just focused on dates.

We may be talking about different levels of management here. A manager should not be making technical decisions, they should have team leads and architects who do that. It's their job to manage the team, interface with the business, prioritise work and give cover to the team so they can get on with it.

I guess if you have a manager who is making technical decisions, they are really a hybrid manager/contributor role. Maybe that works better in smaller organisations.

Then what exactly is the non technical manager's added value?

He has no experience to lead the team in high pressure situations. Like production being down.

He can't truly have a first person understanding of the work of the people who he manages. He has to rely upon others to tell him who's good and who's bad. That sets up a pecking order.

He can't help or mentor engineers with design decisions, or provide a historical context.

He doesn't understand the technology so there's an immediate communication and knowledge barrier that has to be overcome between him and his directs.

He doesn't feel the pain of a bad decision, because he's not coding it, and he can't emphasize with them since he doesn't code.

He tends to push feature development without fixing technical debt. Again that's pain he personally doesn't feel.

To me, the role you are describing is a principal engineer or team lead, not a manager.

Simply not true however that a good manager can't lead the team in a high pressure situation. I'd say that exactly what a good manager could do well. Obviously they won't be making overtly technical decisions, that's what you are for. They can make business decisions, provide cover, get resources, communicate to other stakeholders... All the bits that need doing but would be a huge hassle for the techies who are trying to fix the issue.

I don’t see much value added by a manager that you described. What you are describing is more of a product manager role.

Not everything of value is technical. That you don't see the value is either because you have great managers shielding from having to deal with all that, or you have always worked in a place that combines management and technical responsibilities (which I never have except for very small companies).

I wouldn't call what I'm describing as product management, although it's possible they could do general management too.

Sure, but I feel it's easier to teach management skills to technical person, than it is to teach tech to someone that's only been in management.

The head of surgery should be a surgeon, not an accounting manager.

The head of accounting should be an accountant, not a surgeon.

And even at the executive level of a hospital, you would want people who have spent their careers in healthcare, rather than, say, architecture.