Google has eliminated 35% of managers overseeing small teams in past year

I think this is a good thing. Every time I've seen people in dual tech/management roles at any company, they've always been incredibly stressed about their job, and always have way too much to do.

I've also never really liked the idea of engineering managers who are technical enough to approve/veto tech decisions that team members make, since there's a power imbalance there. Even if your TLM is pushing a bad technology choice, you might not want to push back too hard because they're also responsible for your performance review and comp changes and whatnot.

>always been incredibly stressed about their job, and always have way too much to do.

So, no different from any other dedicate IC or manager at these companies?

>I've also never really liked the idea of engineering managers who are technical enough to approve/veto tech decisions that team members make, since there's a power imbalance there.

How is this different from any other manager or higher up making decisions? If your boss or boss's boss really wants something and you're not in a good market, it's never a good time to poke your head out.

>How is this different from any other manager or higher up making decisions?

Non-technical managers usually don't have strong opinions about which framework or database to use. Among engineers these decisions are usually made in a meritocratic way (weighted by who is the loudest sadly), but if your manager says "let's use X" it has a different weight than if your peer does.

I was in such a role and am now being pushed out of it (promoted to PE).

What I really love about it is the leverage. In a technical domain with a good core team it is almost like running your small company.