71–80 of 117 posts
Once, at a Pizza Hut counter, I noticed that all the pens meant for signing credit card receipts had little flowers attached to their tops. Stuck together in a cup, the bunch of pens looked like a bouquet. I asked the cashier whether this was a new Pizza Hut policy. She said no – she had done it on her own. What would you pay to have her in your company? Maybe he missed the point? People typically attach things to th…
Turns out that there’s a strong correlation between a student’s grade and their assessment of the professor’s abilities. Very interesting. I don’t listen too carefully when a poor performer tells me how awful their previous manager was. Wait, what? Are we confusing correlation with causation here? Let's say, for example, that a manager tends to give female employees poor ratings (or whatever BigCo calls a grade). Do…
I didn't read the whole thing... After I realized how stuck on himself he was, I just skimmed it. Do quirky people really brag about how quirky they are? Do they write essays and call them farewell letters? I've never yet met a fun person who goes around telling people how much fun they are.
I read the whole thing, and thought it was valuable. For example, little snippets like: "Turns out that there’s a strong correlation between a student’s grade and their assessment of the professor’s abilities." were new ideas to me. I guess some of this comes from the management and leadership books he's read. I didn't think he talks particularly much about himself or how quirky he is either. Also interesting that th…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Facebook, behemoth that it is, is still a startup. We get a little carried away calling every little personal website project a startup and perhaps that's just right for the forum. But don't get tunnel vision. Facebook is a startup.
Then how do we categorize a startup if not by age (Facebook is already 5 years old) and size (hundreds of employees, billions in stock)?
It often happens that you need to do something negative such as giving bad review, not approving some large piece of code which the employee thinks is beautifully written. Or even just fire someone.
I've been on both sides, and now on the management side I see that employees usually don't realize the truth, and consequently have hard time getting a lesson out of the incident.
If you consistently deliver what the business needs most, and you do it well, it’s impossible not to get promoted. People tell me this isn’t true, that it’s all about the people you know and about “visibility.” I have no idea how to consistently deliver impactful business results without becoming visible as a side effect. I hate it when developers ask me how to become “more visible.” They hate it when I tell them to…
Unless you're at a non-profit, revenue/sales/profit are what drives the company. If you can duct tape a product that gets me $1B of yearly recurring revenue then I will take that over the cleanest architected product that no one wants to pay for. In one of my other comments from a different thread I made the point that a lot of developers don't realize that they should understand the business. When you do understand…
Actually, in my experience, developers understand the business quite well. It's the other business functions which doesn't understand development.
You WILL drive out (and keep out) good developers if you fail to treat developers as professionals whose inputs of how to develop software should be respected.
Turns out that there’s a strong correlation between a student’s grade and their assessment of the professor’s abilities. Very interesting. I don’t listen too carefully when a poor performer tells me how awful their previous manager was. Wait, what? Are we confusing correlation with causation here? Let's say, for example, that a manager tends to give female employees poor ratings (or whatever BigCo calls a grade). Do…
Really needs a TL;DR
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"What kind of startup employee will you be when the only professional environment you have known is Microsoft?" What do you think they do at MS and what do you think they do at startup companies? Ex-MS people have done places like Zillow, Valve, Fog Creek. And thousands have joined relatively large companies in their early phases, such as Google and Facebook. Do you honestly believe that devs at Microsoft sit around…
Do you honestly believe that devs at Microsoft sit around saying, "Hmm... how can we do nothing today?" What on earth gave you the idea I believed anything of the sort?
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Interesting data point for you. First, Break All The Rules found that average managers put most of their time into their worst performers. Great ones put most of their time into their star performers. The reason? Both groups can improve, and a 10% improvement in a star is worth a lot more than a 10% improvement in a dud.
I'd be interested in the study data. The data I've seen suggest that great managers put most of their time into manageable employees, the ones I called swing performers above. It could be that some stars swing between good and great, while some median employees swing between poor and good. If there are stars who have a 10% swing based on management investment, then yes there's a better ROI working with them. I agree…
excellent advice. Before going into mission, platoon leader should better shoot all his bad soldiers, so they wouldn't slow the team down.