In a large tech company not really. The Product Manager or Staff engineers build things using other engineers. The Engineering Manager uses their blood and sweat to lubricate the corporate cogs to make that process a bit more efficient.

It really depends on the company. Google and Meta are horrible places to be an EM/ED (apart from the cash obviously)

I already have daydreams about doing carpeting, as that would be something I'd actually do with my bare hands, so being a manager is 1 level even further removed from doing something with your hands. Manager building things is like saying politicians build countries. Technically not wrong, but not the kind of building I'm interested in doing.

I assume you mean carpentry, as installing carpet seems like a rough career, especially on the knees!

But even carpentry is hard on the body. Endless sawdust in your lungs, nonstop splinters, and of course spinning blades everywhere. We are very lucky that the biggest physical risk in software development is sitting down too long.

Carpentry yes, my bad! Oh yeah, it's less about carpentry in particular, more about the desire to do something tangible, with hands. Something that actually gets finished at one point. But yeah, software development is a very safe job, and we're lucky to get to do this.

What do you think the guy doing carpeting daydreams about doing? It’s not digging ditches, I’ll guarantee you that.

You can start carpentry any day! It doesn't have to be your job, and you might enjoy it less if it was. A hammer, a saw, some scrap wood, some nails, and pretty soon you've got yourself a birdhouse!