[mooxie]

> I like sitting down and solving problems with code, getting a brief and build something cool.

It's a huge problem in tech that companies traditionally try to force engineers into management positions to allow their careers to keep growing. I have had more shitty managers who were just Individual Contributors who were told they needed to manage to succeed past a certain point.

> I tried telling myself that it's a childish and idealistic way of thinking and that it's all a part of career progression regardless of where you work at

The above, however, is no longer true. I work in a smallish tech company (~250ppl) that has gone through a major shift in the past few years to support the career advancement of Individual Contributors; the message being, "You don't need to be a shitty manager if you'd rather be a kick-ass engineer, and we will still provide paths for promotion and advancement."

As other comments have noted, it sounds like maybe your company is just not at a stage of their development that can support pure engineering career paths past a certain point. You do NOT have to be an unhappy manager to succeed in tech. And frankly during a time of economic contraction I feel safer as a valued IC than as a manager whose role could always be 'absorbed' by someone else's position during layoffs.