Devs need managers who... code. This is the only way they can understand the underlying work. Otherwise their usefulness is significantly diminished.

The fact that the OP thinks you move the needle primarily by having great meetings together, and leaves out the engineering aspect completely makes it seem like he's the out of touch "ideas" manager, and for this archetype, the office is indeed a more comfortable environment - you can have coffee with everyone whenever you like.

As I've said, I'm coding and I understood perfectly the code of the devs I was working with, and yet, what OP said correspond to what I have observed sometimes.

This demonstrates that your logic "OP reaches this conclusion, so it's the proof that he does not understand the code, which is the problem" is wrong. If this logic was true, who do you explain that someone like me, who clearly understands the code (I've reviewed it, I've modified it, I've put stuffs in production integrating with their system, ...), agrees with some of OP's considerations?

When reading your comment, it is difficult to not be drawn to the idea that you are one of those persons I was mentioning, who are not understanding other employees needs and point-of-view and who interpret systematically any communication failing as "the other person's fault".

Engineering is so much more than code. Yes, managers need to have some part of their work in the trenches but it really is the case that many serious engineering problems are best tackled through meetings and documents rather than sitting down and sending PRs.

You might say that, but someone who doesn't know the principles will consistently produce misguided designs, and won't understand why certain options are better.

Meetings with such a person will cause the engineers to work around them instead of being lead by them. There's also no reason such meetings have to happen everyday at the office.

Most serious advancements are produced by single contributors tackling parts of the problem. Commitees are a place of power struggle, not technical progress.

Not sure why you are talking about "someone who doesn't know the principles" to a message that explicitly says "Yes, managers need to have some part of their work in the trenches".

I've been in meetings that were power struggle without any progress, I've also been in meetings that were really useful to solve the problem, way faster than the contributors shooting in the dark because they think they too smart to dialogue. The direction of the meeting depends way more of the mentality of the participants and on their skill to solve problems smartly than of the manager. If you go to the meeting with in mind the idea that the meeting is useless, obviously, you will stir it in the wrong direction (and apparently, you are prone to jump to the first cliché conclusion, I can imagine that you will interpret any contribution in the worst way possible). It does not mean that with participants with a better mentality, the meeting would not have been 10x faster than with single contributors tackling parts of the problem.

Don't get me wrong, shitty meetings happen. But if all the meeting you've been were shitty, maybe the problem is on your side. And if you always end up with the bad manager, it may also be that, with your attitude, you are not worth the time of a good one (or not, but at least do not exclude this possibility just because you dislike it)