Today's career assumptions<注1> are you can get a lot of development, challenge and job satisfaction and not necessarily be in a management role.

　　A new malady is running rampantly in corporate America: management phobia.<注2> Many people don't want to be a manager--and many people who are managers are, frankly, itching to jump off the management track--or have already.

　　"I hated all the meetings," says a 10-year award-winning manager, "And I found the more you did for people who worked for you, the more they expected. I was a counselor, motivator, financial adviser and psychologist.<注3> "

　　With technology changing in a wink, you can never slack off<注4> these days if you're on the technical side. It's a rare person who can manage to keep up on the technical side and handle a management job, too.<注5>

　　In addition, the Dilbert factor is at work.<注6> With Scott Adams's popular cartoon character--as well as many television sitcoms<注7> --routinely portraying managers as morons<注8> or enemies, they just don't get much respect anymore.

　　Supervising others was always a tough task, but in the past that stress was offset by hopes for career mobility and financial rewards.<注9> Along with a sizable pay raise, people chosen as managers would begin a nearly automatic climb up the career ladder to lucrative executive perks: stock options, company cars, club memberships, plus the key to the executive washroom. <注10>

　　But in today's global, more competitive arena, a manager sits on an insecure perch.<注11> Restructuring have eliminated layer after layer of management as companies came to view their organizations as collections of competencies rather than hierarchies.<注12> There are far fewer rungs on the corporate ladder for managers to climb. In addition, managerial jobs demand more hours and headaches than ever before but offer slim, if any, financial paybacks and perks.

　　Furthermore, managers now must supervise many people who are spread over different locations, even over different continents. They must manage across functions with, say, design, finance, marketing and technical people reporting to them.

　　In an age of entrepreneurship, when the most praised people in business are those launching something new, management seems like an invisible, thankless role. Employers are looking for people who can do things, not for people who make other people do things.

　　Management layoffs<注13> have done much to erode<注14> interest in managerial jobs, of course. American Management Association surveys say three middle managers are laid off for every one being hired.

　　Moreover, it may not pay to be a manager--at least not the way it once did. Ms. Chmielewski says. "The emotional rewards can be great, and there were times I enjoyed management. But a 10-to-11-hour day and one weekend day a month is the norm."<注15>

　　With more people wary of<注16> joining management, are corporations being hurt or worrying about developing future leaders? Not many are. While employers have dismissed a lot of managers, they believe a surplus lingers on at many companies.<注17> Another reason companies aren't short of managers, contends Robert Kelley, a Carnegie Mellon University business professor, "is that so many workers today are self-managed, either individually or via teams, you don't need a manager."