Comment In my humble opinion... (Score 1) 434
In the OP's question, he wondered whether promoting great developers into a non-technical role was a good idea. It's the same age-old question about developers becoming managers. And the answer is? Almost always a horrible idea. Hire the skills. Find someone who wants to learn it. Don't do automatic promotions. In other words, THINK!
No pro sports player would try to play their sport without a coach, but developers try to pick up new techniques all the time by ourselves. Sometimes it works... sometimes, you need an expert to help you figure it out as quickly as possible. Team-wide (and company wide!) process changes are the times you always need a coach. Bring in an expert and solve these problems before you run into them.