Ask HN: What made your favorite manager/supervisor/CEO so great? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: What made your favorite manager/supervisor/CEO so great?

#101

Post by MaxBarraclough » Wed, Sep 19, 2018, 8:42 AM UTC

JepZ wrote: post #98

TimTheTinker wrote: post #48

I'll name the best manager I ever had, since she unexpectedly passed away nearly three years ago to our team's (and company's) great sadness. Margaret Thielemann was a QA manager for nearly 10 years at Esri (she previously headed up QA at PeopleSoft before its acquisition by Oracle), and I reported to her for all of those 10 years, during which I learned and mastered web development by scoping, designing, and buildin…

Most of what you say are qualities I like managers to have too, but 'someone tried to ask us for help with someone else's project without asking her first--she was furious.' is a quality I do not value. I mean, protecting your people is one thing (an essential quality), but being furious because someone in need of help asked in the wrong order doesn't foster cooperation beyond the borders of the own team (causing sil…

> protecting your people is one thing (an essential quality), but being furious because someone in need of help asked in the wrong order doesn't foster cooperation

This depends entirely on intent, no? If they simply got it wrong, that's one thing. If they were intentionally subverting the 'chain of command', that's quite another.

Re: Ask HN: What made your favorite manager/supervisor/CEO so great?

#102

Post by ratsimihah » Wed, Sep 19, 2018, 8:44 AM UTC

My first boss ever was someone I could rely on. As a technical CEO and founder, he's both knowledgeable and has great leaderdership skills. He's trustful and gave me a lot of freedom in my work, and was able to put me back into place when I wasn't on point. He even helped me when I got in trouble outside of work!

As a sidenote, I've had stubborn managers since who can't see the big picture and/or can't think critically, which made me appreciate the good ones even more.

Re: Ask HN: What made your favorite manager/supervisor/CEO so great?

#103

Post by mcny » Wed, Sep 19, 2018, 8:50 AM UTC

JepZ wrote: post #98

TimTheTinker wrote: post #48

I'll name the best manager I ever had, since she unexpectedly passed away nearly three years ago to our team's (and company's) great sadness. Margaret Thielemann was a QA manager for nearly 10 years at Esri (she previously headed up QA at PeopleSoft before its acquisition by Oracle), and I reported to her for all of those 10 years, during which I learned and mastered web development by scoping, designing, and buildin…

Most of what you say are qualities I like managers to have too, but 'someone tried to ask us for help with someone else's project without asking her first--she was furious.' is a quality I do not value. I mean, protecting your people is one thing (an essential quality), but being furious because someone in need of help asked in the wrong order doesn't foster cooperation beyond the borders of the own team (causing sil…

Yeah, what's the point of having Microsoft Lync or whatever chat thing on every computer if I have to escalate up to our common report? A place I worked at, the investors had bought two different American companies and joined them at the top. So, when I needed a service I was supposed to consume to fix something (pretty obvious if I remember), the person at my level and his manager didn't respond to me or my manager at all. My manager said he had to escalate it like three levels above him and turns out the engineer simply forwarded my messages and emails to his boss, who did the same to his boss, who was on vacation. Took almost a week to resolve something so simple.

It was just outright bizarre that someone would not even write one line back to say "dude, hold on. I can't do anything without my manager's sign off". Like anyone not in their immediate team was an outsider they wouldn't talk to.

Re: Ask HN: What made your favorite manager/supervisor/CEO so great?

#104

Post by arethuza » Wed, Sep 19, 2018, 8:52 AM UTC

the_clarence wrote: post #96

TimTheTinker wrote: post #48

I'll name the best manager I ever had, since she unexpectedly passed away nearly three years ago to our team's (and company's) great sadness. Margaret Thielemann was a QA manager for nearly 10 years at Esri (she previously headed up QA at PeopleSoft before its acquisition by Oracle), and I reported to her for all of those 10 years, during which I learned and mastered web development by scoping, designing, and buildin…

I see some qualities from past manager: - push you to your limits (public speaking) - shield you from management/bigcorp bullshit - hire better people than themselves - don’t take credit from you

"shield you from management/bigcorp bullshit"

I've heard that memorably described as managers either being "shit umbrellas" or "shit funnels".

Re: Ask HN: What made your favorite manager/supervisor/CEO so great?

#105

Post by ramblerman » Wed, Sep 19, 2018, 8:52 AM UTC

I read about 3 metrics that make a good manager 10 years ago in HBR or some similar publication. Since then I have run the list against my good managers, and the bad ones, and it always holds up.

A good manager must:

1) be Competent

She doesn't have to be the best coder, or even able to code, but she needs to be competent in her area of expertise. Nobody can stand working for an incompetent for too long

2) be Consistent

If he is not there next week the team should reasonably be able to continue and predict his decisions. Nothing is worse than having someone constantly flip flop on their decisions, or worse just blowing in the wind to please his superiors.

3) Care about you - genuinely.

You have to believe they care about you, genuinely. This person has your best interest, and your career advancement in mind.

Re: Ask HN: What made your favorite manager/supervisor/CEO so great?

#106

Post by ddebernardy » Wed, Sep 19, 2018, 8:56 AM UTC

messit wrote: post #35

zorked wrote: post #28

At a previous company, I joined a team that had to deliver something a year before I joined. All previous teams assembled to deliver that had failed and had been fired. That the company didn't have that feature was deeply embarrassing, the competition mentioned having it in the first line of their marketing materials. The most influential engineers on the team didn't give a damn about deadlines and thought that being…

> She told us she didn't care about any of us. Revoked everybody's little privileges, would literally come see if everybody was on their keyboard and typing all the time. Didn't force overtime on anyone but was adamant against people arriving late or leaving early or missing meetings. Started openly taking notes of everybody's failures so she would have ample documentation of who failed what. That sounds pretty horre…

Why? It sounds like she was giving direction to her directs and holding them to account. Every manager who gets stuff done does the same thing in their own style.

There arguably are less blunt ways to do it - but for that team, it seems like it was the right approach. Also, OP is presumably overstating the need to be typing all the time since that's not how programming works.

Re: Ask HN: What made your favorite manager/supervisor/CEO so great?

#107

Post by dmos62 » Wed, Sep 19, 2018, 9:00 AM UTC

mattm wrote: post #66

messit wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> She told us she didn't care about any of us. Revoked everybody's little privileges, would literally come see if everybody was on their keyboard and typing all the time. Didn't force overtime on anyone but was adamant against people arriving late or leaving early or missing meetings. Started openly taking notes of everybody's failures so she would have ample documentation of who failed what. That sounds pretty horre…

This is the wartime/peacetime leader conundrum. The tactics she used worked well because the situation was dire. They probably wouldn't have worked well in a company with a good culture. Winston Churchill is the most famous example of this. He was a great leader during wartime but terrible during peacetime.

This book A First-Rate Madness by Nassir Ghaemi [0] is about that. He looks at various historical leaders and how one half of them make good wartime leaders, but bad peacetime leaders, and the other half -- the opposite. Some of his case studies are, as far as I can remember (couldn't find a summary online): generals in US civil war (Lee and the scortched-earth-guy), Chamberlaine, Churchill, Hitler, JFK, Lincoln, Napoleon, Nixon, Bush. US centric, but still pertaining to anyone.

[0] https://www.amazon.com/First-Rate-Madness-Uncovering-Between...

Re: Ask HN: What made your favorite manager/supervisor/CEO so great?

#108

Post by JepZ » Wed, Sep 19, 2018, 9:07 AM UTC

MaxBarraclough wrote: post #101

JepZ wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most of what you say are qualities I like managers to have too, but 'someone tried to ask us for help with someone else's project without asking her first--she was furious.' is a quality I do not value. I mean, protecting your people is one thing (an essential quality), but being furious because someone in need of help asked in the wrong order doesn't foster cooperation beyond the borders of the own team (causing sil…

> protecting your people is one thing (an essential quality), but being furious because someone in need of help asked in the wrong order doesn't foster cooperation This depends entirely on intent, no? If they simply got it wrong, that's one thing. If they were intentionally subverting the 'chain of command', that's quite another.

Sure, the intention is relevant.

Re: Ask HN: What made your favorite manager/supervisor/CEO so great?

#109

Post by diminoten » Wed, Sep 19, 2018, 9:13 AM UTC

kerng wrote: post #30

scarface74 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would think that’s the worse kind of manager. One of a manager’s job is to manage resources. There are always trade offs between doing things “right” and delivering. If you look at the old Joel quadrant of smart / gets things done (delivers value to the business), someone who “doesn’t care how long it takes” runs the risk of gold plating features instead of delivering. A deadline is a great focusing mechanism. And…

One big demotivating factor is forcing people to deliver mediocre stuff. That's the way to loose the best. Many folks are motivated by delivering high quality, higher even then the market wants/desires. No need to push or force them - just letting them build the best does a lot of good. There is a book called Peopleware, that discusses that aspect.

I don't believe this, but I am curious what your thoughts are (or others) on the questioning of the premise that this job (or any job) needs "the best".

Re: Ask HN: What made your favorite manager/supervisor/CEO so great?

#110

Post by Gustomaximus » Wed, Sep 19, 2018, 9:16 AM UTC

messit wrote: post #35

zorked wrote: post #28

At a previous company, I joined a team that had to deliver something a year before I joined. All previous teams assembled to deliver that had failed and had been fired. That the company didn't have that feature was deeply embarrassing, the competition mentioned having it in the first line of their marketing materials. The most influential engineers on the team didn't give a damn about deadlines and thought that being…

> She told us she didn't care about any of us. Revoked everybody's little privileges, would literally come see if everybody was on their keyboard and typing all the time. Didn't force overtime on anyone but was adamant against people arriving late or leaving early or missing meetings. Started openly taking notes of everybody's failures so she would have ample documentation of who failed what. That sounds pretty horre…

In context of a toxic enviroment this may be more like a reset. See who has substance and who doesn't. If you do this in a clear and fair way it doesn't seem unreasonable for a non-performing enviroment. The benifits and flexibility can return when earned and the bad eggs are discovered and removed.