> because it's not the responsibility of an individual contributor to attempt to divine the organisation's priorities: that's a core management function
The trope that ICs are incapable of understanding and balancing business interests against their wishlist of work items is just a cope that incompetent management chains tell themselves, because they need to believe that there’s something that they’re providing to the team that it won’t get elsewhere. The fact of the matter is that understanding your project in depth does not cause myopia. Big tech is fat with managers who provide absolutely nothing to their teams, other than filling a management req which was conjured up out of thin air. The best teams have technical leadership and work relatively autonomously.
The trope that ICs are incapable of understanding and balancing business interests against their wishlist of work items is just a cope that incompetent management chains tell themselves, because they need to believe that there’s something that they’re providing to the team that it won’t get elsewhere. The fact of the matter is that understanding your project in depth does not cause myopia. Big tech is fat with managers who provide absolutely nothing to their teams, other than filling a management req which was conjured up out of thin air. The best teams have technical leadership and work relatively autonomously.