Does anyone have the actual stack ranked list of important qualities?
Google’s Quest to Build a Better Boss
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Re: Google’s Quest to Build a Better Boss
#12I get to see companies of all sizes grapple with various problems and the most interesting thing I've noticed is that each company has a "culture" that influences everything it does. So if it's an insurance company, they're going to think in terms of risk and coverage. If it's a manufacturing company they're going to make decisions based on flow models and statistical process control. If it's an quasi-military organi…
Re: Google’s Quest to Build a Better Boss
#13I get to see companies of all sizes grapple with various problems and the most interesting thing I've noticed is that each company has a "culture" that influences everything it does. So if it's an insurance company, they're going to think in terms of risk and coverage. If it's a manufacturing company they're going to make decisions based on flow models and statistical process control. If it's an quasi-military organi…
"I can only imagine what it's like to work in a large-scale IT operation in the porn industry ;)"
I've heard it's about the most unsexy thing ever. The technical aspects are all about shipping massive quantities of data cheaply and reliably. The, erm, video-production aspects are about presenting a picture that will satisfy customers and leave them coming back for more.
In other words, it's pretty much like Google or any other big-data startup (and there're employees at Google who used to work in the porn industry). Not having been a part of it, I don't know what the culture is like, but I've heard it's pretty much all business, and they have significantly less fun than we do at Google.
Re: Google’s Quest to Build a Better Boss
#14"Once they had some working theories, they figured out a system for interviewing managers to gather more data, and to look for evidence that supported their notions." Oops. That's called confirmation bias. http://www.sciencedaily.com/articles/c/confirmation_bias.htm http://www.skepdic.com/confirmbias.html Did they also look for evidence that cast doubt on their notions? Looking for both kinds of evidence, and evaluat…
And yet, when its phrased like that, it (almost?) seems perfectly reasonable. It's easy to miss the "obvious" issue, and I've been following the skeptic scene for years!
Re: Google’s Quest to Build a Better Boss
#15So, apparently Google found that of their 8 characteristics-of-good-bosses, technical excellence was the least importance. Fair enough. But note that this is looking at a sample of technically excellent bosses ! So, e.g., Bock is quoted as saying: "In the Google context, we’d always believed that to be a manager, particularly on the engineering side, you need to be as deep or deeper a technical expert than the people…
Lack of technical excellence doesn't mean technical incompetence.
It could also mean that technical competence is not a management bottleneck at Google.
Re: Google’s Quest to Build a Better Boss
#16I feel this is particularly relevant: http://www.bobbemer.com/DAVINCI.HTM > One of the brighter students (by the name of L. da Vinci) was immediately promoted to the manager of the project, putting him in charge of procuring paints, canvases, and brushes for the rest of the organization. Everyone, except businesses (it seems), knows that technical skill != management skill, and the best workers will not necessarily b…
If the guy outta Venice knew his stuff, he'd have immediately delegated those tasks to others and got back to his own business, rather than do them all himself.
Such is the art of management.
Re: Google’s Quest to Build a Better Boss
#17Does anyone have the actual stack ranked list of important qualities?
http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2011/03/11/business/201103...
I notice they have no bullet points listed under "Help your employees with career development." I wonder if this means they feel obligated to mention it but don't really want to encourage it (because developing your career will often mean leaving) or if it just means they don't know how.
Or maybe it's supposed to be so obvious that it doesn't need explanation.
Re: Google’s Quest to Build a Better Boss
#18"Once they had some working theories, they figured out a system for interviewing managers to gather more data, and to look for evidence that supported their notions." Oops. That's called confirmation bias. http://www.sciencedaily.com/articles/c/confirmation_bias.htm http://www.skepdic.com/confirmbias.html Did they also look for evidence that cast doubt on their notions? Looking for both kinds of evidence, and evaluat…
Given that we're discussing one of the most sophisticated data analysis companies around they probably did attempt to test their theories to destruction. Or, otherwise stated, after forming an initial hypothesis they tried different interpretations of the same data to see which ones made distinguishable testable propositions.
Re: Google’s Quest to Build a Better Boss
#19So, apparently Google found that of their 8 characteristics-of-good-bosses, technical excellence was the least importance. Fair enough. But note that this is looking at a sample of technically excellent bosses ! So, e.g., Bock is quoted as saying: "In the Google context, we’d always believed that to be a manager, particularly on the engineering side, you need to be as deep or deeper a technical expert than the people…
In my ideal world technical managers would have very broad technical experience in everything their reports work on.
It is not realistic to hope that they would be experts in every different area their staff are working on.
Re: Google’s Quest to Build a Better Boss
#20"Once they had some working theories, they figured out a system for interviewing managers to gather more data, and to look for evidence that supported their notions." Oops. That's called confirmation bias. http://www.sciencedaily.com/articles/c/confirmation_bias.htm http://www.skepdic.com/confirmbias.html Did they also look for evidence that cast doubt on their notions? Looking for both kinds of evidence, and evaluat…
I don't want to disparage your comment because I do agree to some extent.
However, I think you might be getting voted up because you gave links to some interesting content instead of because people think you are necessarily correct.
I'd like to provide a little balance.
It's routine practice in statistical analysis of situations to form a hypothesis which goes against the grain of accepted belief and then to test it using analytical techniques [1]. In fact, this is how the scientific process works.