I find it interesting that IC once meant, "integrated circuit" in the same culture which exists here now, but decades earlier. Having been on both sides of the false dichotomy that's drawn between management and individual contributors, my experience has been that great ICs don't necessarily need management and great management are often great precisely because of their individual contribution. It's paradoxical that perfection may emerge despite the fact that product, process, and people exist on a spectrum that produces so much conflict. One wonders whether product perfection is, in fact, emergent with respect to the conflict around people and process.

Yeah and I'm saying, from experience, people 'fall into' being a manager by nature of informal mentorship relationships that happen in person, but now you have to more aggressively 'opt-in' to be a manager.

If you're a high level IC you can have people temporarily assigned to you, though; it's assumed that you could be doing managing if you wanted to, and sometimes you just can't do your projects by yourself.