WRITTEN BY: Amanda Macdougall & Tim Windsor

So, you’re a high performer, a technical expert in your field, killing it day after day. Then, boom—you’re offered the chance to step into management. Maybe you’ve always thought, “Management? That’s a promotion, right?” A bump in salary, a shiny new title, more vacation days. What’s not to love?

But here’s the twist: What if that “fantastic promotion” is less about climbing the corporate ladder and more about jumping onto an entirely different one? Becoming a manager is not just about more authority or a higher paycheck—it’s a fundamental identity shift, one that comes with a whole new set of challenges, responsibilities, and, let’s be honest, headaches.

The brutal truth, that many people and organizations overlook is that promoting someone to a management role isn’t just an upward move—it’s a career change. If you don’t grasp this, it could break not just you, but your entire team. Let’s take a closer look.

The Illusion of the Promotion

Here’s a scenario that might sound familiar: You’re a technical expert, a guru in your field. You’re excellent at what you do. Naturally, the next step in the corporate hierarchy is to lead others doing what you once did so well.

Seems logical, right? If you’re the best at something, you should move up the ladder. Except, the reality can hit you like a freight train. Your day-to-day shifts from getting your hands dirty and solving technical problems to sitting in meetings, navigating politics, and managing people’s emotions. Spoiler alert: you might just hate it, and you may want to ask for your old job back.

The Fundamental Career Shift No One Talks About

Let’s call it what it is. When you move from a technical or individual contributor role into management, you’re not just moving up. You’re moving into a completely different career.

We think of management as this hierarchical promotion, but it’s really a career change. Your daily focus, your skill set, your entire work identity shifts.

Yet, here’s the problem: Companies, for some reason, don’t frame it this way. They frame it as an exciting promotion, a logical next step, with all the shiny perks. But they don’t tell you that you’re signing up to manage people now—not machines, not code, not processes, but living, breathing, often unpredictable people.

Here’s why that’s a problem. If organizations and individuals don’t treat this transition as a career change, people get thrown into the deep end, often without the required training to swim. The skill set that made you great at your job before isn’t the skill set that’s going to make you a successful manager. And if you don’t realize that from day one, you’re headed for a rude awakening.

The Identity Crisis: From Expert to Apprentice

Let’s talk identity. When you’re a technical expert, your sense of worth, contribution, and pride come from your ability to solve problems and be the go-to person in your field. But when you become a manager, that expertise takes a back seat. Now, your job is to manage those who are still doing the technical work you once excelled at.

That’s where the crisis hits. You’ve spent years becoming the best at something, and now you have to let go of that. You have to become an apprentice again—this time in people management. And managing people, now that’s a whole different beast.

In people management, success isn’t only measured by how fast you can fix a problem or how efficiently you can complete a task. It’s about how well you can navigate the messy, complex web of human emotions, personalities, and team dynamics. You have to manage workloads, expectations, and the delicate balance of motivating your team while also encouraging accountability.

Here’s the hard truth: many new managers struggle with this shift. They get promoted based on their technical skills, but those skills aren’t what will make them successful in management. The skills they need now—communication, empathy, conflict resolution—aren’t ones they’ve necessarily developed.

The Real Cost of Failing to See Management as a Career Change

Companies should promote from within. But if they’re not preparing people for the reality of management—if they’re treating it as just another rung on the ladder—they’re setting people up to fail.

And failure isn’t just personal—it’s organizational. The Peter Principle tells us that people are often promoted to the point of their incompetence. If someone is great at their technical job, they’ll get promoted. But if they fail at the management level, they’re stuck there, underperforming, unhappy and possibly fired.

What’s the cost of that? It’s massive. Think about it: you lose productivity, morale drops, and you may have to spend time and resources rehiring, retraining, and rebuilding. The cost of one bad managerial hire doesn’t just affect the manager—it affects the entire team they lead. If you’ve ever worked under a bad manager, you know what we’re talking about. The whole department suffers.

And it’s not just the organization that suffers—it’s the individual. That technical expert who used to love their job? Now they hate it. They hate coming to work. They’re not thriving. And in many cases, they leave the organization altogether, taking their valuable expertise with them.

So, What Should You Do?

If you’re reading this and thinking, you might want to move into management, or you’re a leader looking at promoting someone to management, here’s a checklist for you to think through:

1. Do you love working with people? No, seriously. Do you enjoy managing people’s emotions, workloads, and conflicts? Because that’s 90% of the job.
2. Are you ready to stop being seen as the technical expert? Can you let go of your old identity and take on the role of a coach, mentor, and people leader?
3. Do you have strong communication skills? And if not, are you willing to learn? Warren Buffet famously said that improving your communication skills can make you 50% more effective instantly. In management, that’s not just a nice-to-have—it’s essential.
4. Are you comfortable with tracking, measuring, and monitoring? A big part of management is reporting on performance and ensuring that your team is meeting goals. If you find that tedious or boring, you might want to rethink the role.
5. Can you handle being the “corporate” voice? Once you cross over into management, you’re no longer just “one of the gang.” You represent the company’s interests, and that can create tension with your former peers.
6. Do you have a support system in place? Does your organization offer the training and development you need to succeed in management, or are they throwing you to the wolves?

Final Thoughts

If you’re stepping into management—or thinking about it—don’t get seduced by the title, the salary, or the perks. Take a hard look at what the job really entails. Ask yourself if you’re ready for a career change, because that’s exactly what it is.

And if you’re a leader offering someone the opportunity to move into management, be clear about what they’re signing up for. Prepare them, train them, and support them. Because the cost of getting it wrong is far greater than the cost of investing in their success.

So, is a management opportunity a fantastic promotion or a fundamental career change? It may be both. But if you only see it as a promotion, you—and your organization—are in for a rough ride.