What exactly did your manager say? Do they think the project is actually going fine or do they think you don't need to worry about being held responsible?

@mattfreake, I've edited a bit. It's difficult for me to say what his reply was.

Communicate in email, in cordial tone, outlining issues with you doing your PM's job. If you are responsible, you also need authority. Are you able to fire / reallocate the PM? If not, then you're not really responsible, but only a scapegoat.

how senior are we talking? and how does the rest of your team look like? Does your team have a team lead, or are you the defacto team lead?

Why not just look for a different employer? There is always a good chance he will appreciate your experience and skills. And probably you will receive more money too.

@Anon, because all of them are like that and I can't switch jobs every several months.

@User284372 To be blunt; if you think all of them are like this, then you might want to look inwards some here. I say this as someone with the same issue sometimes... unless you're spectacularly bad at picking employers, odds are most of the jobs are with competent people for the most part. If you're always doing the PM's job, then that suggests you might want to stop doing it - perhaps the job won't fail, and the PM's posted a question somewhere "How do I get a programmer to stop doing my job". I've done the "programmer doing the pm job", and sometimes it really is better to let them.

"I am considered the most senior team member, so the leadership frequently stresses that I'm responsible for the project success." - this is a false assumption. You are responsible for what YOU do and you can be responsible to help others do things right, but the success of this project is not in your hands. That's what project managers are meant for. A good worker can't help when (project) management and other workers spoil things. You should emphasize this every time to everyone who tells you about your responsibility.

"How to make sure I'm not blamed when I'm the most senior" I'm tempted to jokingly answer "pin the blame on someone more junior than you first".

Have you communicated your concerns with the Project Manager. They should be the ones who go back to the other team members and address the issues.

"Tech Lead" has vastly different definitions based on who's saying it, in my experience. Many assume it means a team lead with technical background, rather than the technical design/implementation leader of a technical area/project. Could you define how you see it? And are you sure that everyone else around you is using that same definition?

If you figure this out, let me know. I've been blamed as a mid and junior for project failures, including things I had no influence on. It seems as some people just look for "scapegoats" to avoid blame for their own failures rather than anything else.

@Fattie I think I just cut myself on the "edginess" of this comment. If you are in fact a top pay programmer then maybe burning your candle at both ends and sacrificing your health amd well being in a thankless way is the right thing to do, but I would lay my money that most of us are not truly that important and the projects not that dire or important either. These kinds of projects should be a rare occurrence, like 2 or 3 times a career. Otherwise you are probably killing yourself for nothing. The professional thing to do is step up within reason but allow it to fail if needed.

team members don't come to sprint meetings If they are supposed to come and they don't then management is simply not using their own system to fix problems (and it would) and letting it all slide. The engineering solution is simple : get out of dodge - it's a poorly managed mess. Secure a new job elsewhere and then give notice.

cheers @maple_shaft , you may drastically misunderstand me: if you click around, notice pretty much the ONLYthing I say on this site is "never ever ever work more than 35 hours a week - ever - ever - for any reason" {This is incredibly against the spirit of this site which is an "anti-workers-rights" leaning site, so such sentiments are constantly downvoted or just removed.} So, point 1, to simply cut and paste what I said, "Everyone in the universe knows that PMs, planners, assistants, etc are just figureheads" - that's that. Anyone in the business more than one afternoon should...

... know that! Point 2, the reason senior programmers are paid like running backs is - they have to just make shit happen. (Note that nowhere in that do I say anyone should work more than 35 hours a week. Just do it at your own pace. What are they gonna go, fire you?) Point 3! As always, never ever ever work more than 35 hours a week - ever - ever - for any reason. Ever. Never, ever, ever, ever! Thanks for the opportunity to reiterate that!!

@Fattie thanks for clarifying. I agree with your sentiment about hours worked, but I would say the spirit of this sentiment is really about autonomy and agency. It is crazy to me that so many people take employment as if it were military service. We are all adults here, you should only give what you agreed to in your employment contract. If you want to do more thats fine. If you want to submit to psychopathic manager and allow him/her to beat you down and blame you and play mental tricks on you to guilt you then so be it but its your choice.

"We are all adults here, you should only give what you agreed to in your employment contract" I surely agree, awesome