How to be a Manager – A step-by-step guide to leading a team • Hacker News Board

Re: How to be a Manager – A step-by-step guide to leading a team

#151

Post by bb88 » Wed, Jun 06, 2018, 4:59 AM UTC

Pyxl101 wrote: post #106

bb88 wrote: post #81

A better title would be "How Management Works in 2018." Half of being a manager is managing other's behaviors to produce a great product. The other half is managing your own behaviors -- i.e. being consistent with your communications and consistent in your behaviors. Both of those topics have been left out of this piece.

> Half of being a manager is managing other's behaviors to produce a great product This part has not been left out. All of the content about establishing culture, vision, expectations, responsibilities, and so on, is a direct part of managing others' behaviors to produce a great product. What am I missing? > The other half is managing your own behaviors -- i.e. being consistent with your communications and consistent…

If it was really as simple as the author has posited, then anyone can be a manager, but this just isn't the case. Many companies have this framework in place, yet the management and the culture is terrible. (Amazon, HP, Microsoft to name a few)

In a number of companies I worked at the number one reason people left was a conflict with their supervisor.

I think a much better introduction to management is the manager tools podcast. And after listening to about 10 or 20 episodes, you'll see how hard management really is, especially if you want to do it right.

https://www.manager-tools.com/all-podcasts

Re: How to be a Manager – A step-by-step guide to leading a team

#152

Post by spyckie2 » Wed, Jun 06, 2018, 5:00 AM UTC

hanniabu wrote: post #139

marcus_holmes wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Asians have massive respect for authority. This, in effect, mean that they won't ever say no to, or disagree with, their boss. I had to learn to ask open questions, because if they could say yes they would. They would still guess at what I wanted to hear and tell me that. I got told different things than other members of the management team, not because anyone was trying to deceive, but purely as a show of respect. M…

Curious why the servant leadership style didn't work for you and why you think that is because this is the approach I prefer as well but I'm young in my career.

It doesn't work in Asia because of cultural reasons.

Independent thinking and enabling others is a very American way of thinking. People don't realize how much culture is derived off of core principles within major founding documents (declaration of independence, constitution).

In Asia, Confucian philosophy dominates the cultural landscape in terms of what values they have. One of the big principles of it is how to maintain order in society. A "perfectly ordered" society is one where the hierarchy is maintained and everyone functions in their proper place.

If it sounds like dystopia to you I'd encourage you to read more about it to understand what about it makes sense and what tradeoffs you get from a society like that.

Long story short, your leadership style needs to fit the people you're leading, not yourself. You can be the best servant leader but if everyone wants to be your servant, you're going to have a bad time.

Re: How to be a Manager – A step-by-step guide to leading a team

#153

Post by thisisit » Wed, Jun 06, 2018, 5:02 AM UTC

partiallypro wrote: post #138

paulmooreparks wrote: post #122

This has nothing to do with the topic at hand. Rather, it's a call to action to stop something I really, really hate about the web these days: popups over content, begging me to sign up for an email subscription. Whenever I'm reading a web page and one of these rude popups appears, I immediately close the browser tab and move on. If the authors are rude enough to interrupt me with an invitation to clutter my inbox, t…

It's because analytics say this gets more lead captures, but they rarely measure if the leads are fake just to make the things go away. In the end they are just looking at "conversion" metrics and the cost it took to drive that traffic. Longer term effects are hard to measure, and ad agencies and internal ad teams are measured for this month, not the future.

I might be wrong but I read somewhere that more leads are captured during a conscious action by the reader. So prompting for email when reader is closing the window is much better than disrupting the flow while reading the blog.

Re: How to be a Manager – A step-by-step guide to leading a team

#154

Post by hazz99 » Wed, Jun 06, 2018, 5:15 AM UTC

quantsNightmare wrote: post #147

partiallypro wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's because analytics say this gets more lead captures, but they rarely measure if the leads are fake just to make the things go away. In the end they are just looking at "conversion" metrics and the cost it took to drive that traffic. Longer term effects are hard to measure, and ad agencies and internal ad teams are measured for this month, not the future.

I work at a place where I am a fly on the wall, listening to these ad teams, and let me tell you, they honestly believe this kind of bullshit honestly works and matters. They hotly debate the virtues of deceptive dark patterns, and, man, are they assholes to boot. They also blow cash on retarded shit like juiceros, and bro-compare their juicero-type schlock and tchotchke collections unironically, and sometimes with t…

Gonna state a counterpoint, saying that most marketers & advertisers I've spoken with have been pretty on the ball. They understand that people don't "like" adverts and try to get leads through different ways.

People who embrace these irritating practices are not necessarily the minority, but I wouldn't say they're the majority either. It's definitely not an accepted best practice.

Marketing extends much further than just annoying popups and advertising, and is an extremely important field -- something I feel us engineers sometimes forget about, because the benefits aren't immediately measurable.

Re: How to be a Manager – A step-by-step guide to leading a team

#155

Post by ttflee » Wed, Jun 06, 2018, 5:22 AM UTC

bb88 wrote: post #81

A better title would be "How Management Works in 2018." Half of being a manager is managing other's behaviors to produce a great product. The other half is managing your own behaviors -- i.e. being consistent with your communications and consistent in your behaviors. Both of those topics have been left out of this piece.

It would be easier to learn from the comics at dilbert.com to avoid bad management.

Re: How to be a Manager – A step-by-step guide to leading a team

#156

Post by haser_au » Wed, Jun 06, 2018, 5:24 AM UTC

paulmooreparks wrote: post #122

This has nothing to do with the topic at hand. Rather, it's a call to action to stop something I really, really hate about the web these days: popups over content, begging me to sign up for an email subscription. Whenever I'm reading a web page and one of these rude popups appears, I immediately close the browser tab and move on. If the authors are rude enough to interrupt me with an invitation to clutter my inbox, t…

The ones that only appear when your mouse tracks towards the tab close button are impressive, but also super annoying.

Re: How to be a Manager – A step-by-step guide to leading a team

#157

Post by deepGem » Wed, Jun 06, 2018, 5:26 AM UTC

paulmooreparks wrote: post #122

This has nothing to do with the topic at hand. Rather, it's a call to action to stop something I really, really hate about the web these days: popups over content, begging me to sign up for an email subscription. Whenever I'm reading a web page and one of these rude popups appears, I immediately close the browser tab and move on. If the authors are rude enough to interrupt me with an invitation to clutter my inbox, t…

Coupled with website notifications, it's all hell break loose. Can someone tell me if it is possible to write a chrome plugin that will close any such websites. I mean within 30 seconds of opening if there is any permission/sign up popup - just close that website.

Re: How to be a Manager – A step-by-step guide to leading a team

#158

Post by fergie » Wed, Jun 06, 2018, 6:03 AM UTC

drblast wrote: post #100

w_t_payne wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Following the links, I stumbled upon this amazing seeming resource: http://leadership.au.af.mil/sls-skil.htm The military are really very very good at man-management ...

This seems to be the impression in the business world, which has what I can only describe as a fetish for stories about the military, but Marines in particular have a very tough time adapting to life and careers outside the military. It's fun to think of our businesses as just like a Seal team and try to glean lessons from stories of heroism, but the reality is if the military were in the business of making a profit,…

> the reality is if the military were in the business of making a profit, retaining employees, or pleasing customers, it would fail miserably

You could argue that this has in fact been the reality of late...

Re: How to be a Manager – A step-by-step guide to leading a team

#159

Post by Bahamut » Wed, Jun 06, 2018, 6:31 AM UTC

drblast wrote: post #100

w_t_payne wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Following the links, I stumbled upon this amazing seeming resource: http://leadership.au.af.mil/sls-skil.htm The military are really very very good at man-management ...

This seems to be the impression in the business world, which has what I can only describe as a fetish for stories about the military, but Marines in particular have a very tough time adapting to life and careers outside the military. It's fun to think of our businesses as just like a Seal team and try to glean lessons from stories of heroism, but the reality is if the military were in the business of making a profit,…

The US military is efficient at what it does, generally speaking - it is the product of a can't fail fighting force, and all the implications that come out of that.

As an enlisted infantry Marine who transitioned very easily into software engineering, I find my leadership training in the Marine Corps a distinct advantage I have over my peers. I have been called the best manager other engineers have ever had by multiple people, as well as called the best engineer many have worked with.

The only thing I wish is more people understood what true leadership looked like, and that is one thing I generally have missed from my time in the Marine Corps. The principles are probably some of the best set of general leadership principles you can find out there and they prove their worth day in, day out.

Re: How to be a Manager – A step-by-step guide to leading a team

#160

Post by gowld » Wed, Jun 06, 2018, 6:39 AM UTC

darkerside wrote: post #123

bb88 wrote: post #81

A better title would be "How Management Works in 2018." Half of being a manager is managing other's behaviors to produce a great product. The other half is managing your own behaviors -- i.e. being consistent with your communications and consistent in your behaviors. Both of those topics have been left out of this piece.

I tend to agree. This piece reads more like, how to be a director or VP. Setting the culture is not a front line manager's job any moreso than individual contributors. A manager just needs to keep his folks productive in a way that's aligned with the company goals.

Why?

ICs don't pay so much attention to the CEO of the company. An IC is CEO of themself. A manager is CEO of the team.

> needs to keep his folks productive in a way that's aligned with the company goals

How is that different from "Setting the culture" ?