I usually get this with team leads. But team leads are usually also programmers, who work with the rest of the team closely every day and know our issues intimately. Managers are always very far removed from that, more concerned with the C levels wants and needs, with who the team lead always has to fight with to not let the product turn into a big pile of garbage because refactors never get priority, architectural plannings never get priority.

> I, for one, hate working on projects where there is no clear leader. One thing that managers do is be the clear leader for the people under them.

In my experience, the one thing managers don't like to do is take responsibility for projects. They are extremely averse to technical stuff.