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I'm an Engineering Manager, and I think I have a similar role just applied to people processes rather than code. One nuance though - a lot of the time I suspect it's deliberate complexity designed to obfuscate how little people actually do.

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Thats projection.

Well, maybe. It's projection, because I certainly don't make simple processes myself a lot of the time, but I do try to optimize them afterwards. I have a few decades of seeing people implement processes than I've had to use, and then had to simplify as I moved into more senior roles. I've had people push back quite forcefully when I've pointed out they do things like writing reports that no one reads or gathering data that teams ignore. People often fight for added complexity because their perception is that it's important, and that means they must be important because they're the one in control of it.

There is an element of projection because there is in most things people talk about; I'm speaking about this through my filters and biases after all. But it's grounded in a fair chunk of experience.

Maybe you are saying the same thing, but couldn't that be explained better by those people being afraid to be made obsolete? Or at least, afraid if having to retrain?

This isn't new. I've seen it for decades, including in situations where no one is at risk. I don't think it's often a fear thing.

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