Accepting that I was seen as a leader. I've never wanted a leadership position, I just wanted to build cool shit. I'm good at it.
At some point in my career (I've been doing software for 22+ years professionally) people started taking me really seriously. I could no longer make certain jokes and I had to be careful about my opinions because they were taken (in many cases) as "the right thing to do".
So I got in all sorts of trouble, because I didn't want the leadership at the time. At some point I finally embraced it and actively started figuring out what kind of leader I should be.
After that point, it has gotten a lot easier. I even started enjoying it.
Leaders lead even when they don't intend to. So if you're one (willing or not), you should take the responsibility do your best to make the team thrive.
I think it as: Company > Team > Self in terms of goals, if I cannot accept that, I'll move on to a different gig.
The jokes things is something I realized too. Not because I ever tell off-color jokes, but because I realized certain people felt compelled to laugh. And others would then quietly roll their eyes, not at me, but at the exaggerated reactions. It was causing small divisions on the team.
When I just had peers and made a stupid pun, my friends/coworkers would just groan and tell me not to quit my day job. But when people's annual reviews are in your hands, it's a different story. I think it's perfectly fine to open a meeting by lightening the mood with humor, but I feel compelled to generally reign it in.
As a person who finds the blatant tail wagging pretty annoying, I think a good way to address this from the boss's perspective would be to not being seen basking in the fake adulation and keep an even keel. That keeps the ass-lickers in check and sends the signal, to those who are not, that merit still trumps such shenanigans.
This kind of thing is why we don't do daily standups anymore. The gradual psychological grind of the same, forced interpersonal dynamics every 24 hours can get to be incredibly oppressive.
This is a really good point, the social dynamics change so much in a power position it's really hard to relate.
Keep the 'bad puns' though, that's more of an expression of humility than anything and it gives them an excuse to groan.
Everyone 'hates/resents their manager' just a tiny bit, and a little opportunity to groan but not get too serious about it is a nice valve.
And yes - the greater the power, the greater every little thing gets parsed and possibly taken out of context, I loathe that because it's the thing that stops us from being candid, and why even in the long-form podcast world, people are not truly forthcoming.
I’m similar, but my conclusion was to work for very small companies. I’m currently at a company with 3 devs, 100% remote, each in wildly different time zones (almost evenly distributed around the world), and with only one meeting per week. I’m quite happy.
I just never have managed to enjoy leadership in the official sense. Natural leadership, e.g. being looked to for advice, generally followed is one thing. Official leadership, e.g. meetings and planning is for the birds in my book.
This happened to me. It led to some problems though. People from other teams would contact me as the tech lead (was a midlevel dev acting as tech lead) and ask me to do stuff in PRD. I'd like to help, but only official tech leads are granted that access...
I don't want to be a manager (I don't care about dealing with salaries and such). I'm a tech lead.
I care mostly about the personal growth of my team, I firmly believe that if I help them be the best they can be, the world will be a better place (even if it means losing some of them because they realize they want to do something else, the world will still be a better place).
This means sometimes giving advice, sometimes teaching, and sometimes getting out of the way and let them do their thing (even let them fail, and help them learn from the failure).
The scope goes beyond technical advice, I help them frame problems, think about what they want and what they really care about, it's a mixture of counseling and a typical tech lead.
The trick is doing it without making it forced or weird. It took a lot of exploration of my own emotional state, being able to empathize a lot, and allow myself to be vulnerable. This helps building strong, honest connections that I truly think get the best out of people.
Thank you for taking the time to reply and share your knowledge.
I think I'm on the edge of becoming a manager of sorts in the next couple of years. I don't know if I'm ready or even willing but it's the only way to progress in my career.
I'm in similar boat as you, I'd rather be doing the coding. But at the same time I love working with others.
"Company > Team > Self in terms of goals, if I cannot accept that, I'll move on to a different gig." - This is a great lesson, however I would add Customer at the very top as that is whom the company exists to serve. Customer > Company > Team > Self. So many people I have seen who put themselves (I've been guilty of that myself) before Team or Company and then it leads to stress and work suffers.
At some point in my career (I've been doing software for 22+ years professionally) people started taking me really seriously. I could no longer make certain jokes and I had to be careful about my opinions because they were taken (in many cases) as "the right thing to do".
So I got in all sorts of trouble, because I didn't want the leadership at the time. At some point I finally embraced it and actively started figuring out what kind of leader I should be.
After that point, it has gotten a lot easier. I even started enjoying it.
Leaders lead even when they don't intend to. So if you're one (willing or not), you should take the responsibility do your best to make the team thrive.
I think it as: Company > Team > Self in terms of goals, if I cannot accept that, I'll move on to a different gig.