Confused about career path

It's easier for earlier career enginners to focus on creativity and ideas: the understanding of the world is smaller, so the view of paths forward are more short-sighted. If you can only see 100 meters ahead, how can you immediately tell the cliff ends in 500 meters?

The first step to understanding if software engineering is not for you is to get more experience. Get more software engineering experience, but also see if you can incorporate learning about other roles along the way. Build up a strong track record so that people in the roles you're interested in are more willing to invest their time in you (either letting you take on some of their responsibilities or properly engaging with you during conversations). People are generally nice, but that doesn't necessarily mean they're going to properly spend their time for you.

As an experienced frontend engineer, I've worn many hats to get something done (frontend, backend, data analysis, product/project management, etc.). I just see the world as using my time and skills to solve whatever problem. If you anchor your view on the world based on the limits of your role, often times you miss the opportunties to grow and change standing there right in front of your face. And that's often why most junior engineers who have the same mentality often fail with zero progress: they only see the destination and never see the steps towards that destination.

I think sound like a Technical Product Manager, and it's a much easier switch from SWE than the other way around.

For me, I tend to pattern match against at TPM because I've had a previous career before tech and other roles, but I find it less fulfilling if I don't individually contribute myself in terms of code, and not all TPMs or PMs at a tech company where it is highly technical aptitude expected (ex. major tech startups that are VC backed or FAANGMULA tech companies) do code, and some do. I think it's worth exploring other roles while you are still young and trying out things as an intern, then you can decide. It's not like you're locked in this young and are locked in forever. I would ask, "what do you find most fulfilling?"

Example: if I had done 3 hackathons and I ended up PMing the team and they all win first place (it's happened before) with cash prizes, either I'm coaching someone to pitch, spec'ing out product features, and figuring out the UI or other things that typically SWEs don't like building, it's 'cool,' but is it really fun and do I gain the most optimal fulfillment to demonstrate my skills, knowledge, abilities (KSAs), proficiency for a portfolio, or is this how I want to see my day-to-day? The answer is no, so even though I have those other TPM soft skills (business strategy, psychology of how products work) and am stronger at that than most other SWEs, it doesn't mean that's where I want to spend ALL of my time (unless say it's a company I own as a venture backed founder or a VC/investor myself where I just manage people). There's also the role of EM, but they can be less business oriented than a product role, but more of a people person.

So you have to ask yourself "what do I enjoy doing?" Do you like talking to people and getting them to build stuff but you're leading (can be EM, Tech Lead also), but if the emphasis is mere psychology and business you want to optimize for that then you can PM. The other thing for me is I want to be published like all my other friends who are professors/PhDs to the bar for that (in AI) is being a software engineer, and typically the elite of the elite, creme de la creme of this crop all say they don't even like TPMs getting credit on papers (cringe to some, but also understandable as some TPMs don't even code, which doesn't make sense to me at all, and any time I didn't code much, I felt like I felt or had very very little to show for it). So you have to do a self-examination of "what do I enjoy," (how do I see me in fulfillment) "what am I good at" "what does the market say about my role" (perception how others see me) - sorta a trifecta ikigai. I hope that helps somewhat.