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Employees are happier when led by people with deep expertise (2016)

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Re: Employees are happier when led by people with deep expertise (2016)

#61

Post by random314 »

skohan wrote: post #43
skeeter2020 wrote: post #24

I think the conclusions miss the mark slightly and focus on a symptom of good bosses: they care about tasks from a state of understanding what is required to do them well, they have empathy for the challenges, and respect for the talent in completing them. Obviously the easiest way to get to this perspective is to experience it first-hand, hence the correlation between those who could do the job and being good manage…

> probably not top 5-10%, because they also cared about the non-technical requirements that a good manager needs to cover It sounds like you're saying that top-tier engineers are not generally qualified in terms of non-technical requirements, and I don't know that this assertion is justified. From my perspective, as a relatively new technical manager who also spent years as an engineer working with technical managers…

Very often when folks describe the ideal manager, they are describing themselves.

Re: Employees are happier when led by people with deep expertise (2016)

#62

Post by random314 »

geoduck14 wrote: post #38
skeeter2020 wrote: post #24

I think the conclusions miss the mark slightly and focus on a symptom of good bosses: they care about tasks from a state of understanding what is required to do them well, they have empathy for the challenges, and respect for the talent in completing them. Obviously the easiest way to get to this perspective is to experience it first-hand, hence the correlation between those who could do the job and being good manage…

I like what you wrote because it makes me feel better about my own short comings. But is it actually true?

Very often when folks describe the ideal manager, they are describing themselves.

Re: Employees are happier when led by people with deep expertise (2016)

#64

Post by Wistar »

PaulHoule wrote: post #2

I was personally taught by the store manager of a supermarket how to sweep the floor and of course that built respect for him and the organization. (e.g. he knew how to do every little task like sweep the floor, cut meat in the deli, bake bread, etc.) The (now retied) director of the art museum at Cornell could be seen out in his suit passing out pamphlets for an exhibition together with students promoting clubs and…

One day a few years ago as I was walking into the Kirkland, WA Costco, I noticed a familiar-looking older guy pushing a line of shopping carts in from the parking lot. It was James Sinegal, then CEO of Costco.

Re: Employees are happier when led by people with deep expertise (2016)

#65

Post by skohan »

varjag wrote: post #45
skohan wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> probably not top 5-10%, because they also cared about the non-technical requirements that a good manager needs to cover It sounds like you're saying that top-tier engineers are not generally qualified in terms of non-technical requirements, and I don't know that this assertion is justified. From my perspective, as a relatively new technical manager who also spent years as an engineer working with technical managers…

Essentially a manifestation of bikeshedding. Yep, very common.

Yes and it can go especially poorly when you have a "problem oriented" person on the team:

1. Manager proposes low quality requirements

2. Problem oriented team member points out a flaw in the requirements which is orthogonal to the actual goal of the feature/team/organization

3. Endless discussion around this one detail

4a. Manager changes the requirements just to end the debate, in a way which sacrifices the core goal and weakens the product/team/organization when there is a simpler solution available to reach the core goal

OR

4b. Manager accepts an extremely complicated solution which maintains the specific requirement which was not required to reach the core goal in the first place, thereby risking the timeline

Re: Employees are happier when led by people with deep expertise (2016)

#67

Post by skohan »

sokoloff wrote: post #30

The more junior you are, the more likely it is that not only can your boss do your job, they can do it better than you can. The more senior you become, the less likely that is to be the case. How many CEOs could do all of the CFO, COO, CTO, and General Counsel's jobs? Zero. How many programming team leads can do the junior programmer's job? Basically/hopefully all of them.

I think the point is not "your boss should be able to do your job better than you can", but "in a pinch, your boss would be able to step in and fill your role if needed".

Even in the case you gave, a good CEO might be able to do that. When you are at the C level, whatever the role is, you're probably going to mostly have to be good at stakeholder management, strategic thinking, listening to your peers and the people working under you and taking good decisions based on the inputs available. A good CEO should be able to step in and apply those skills outside of their domain of expertise, even if they are not going to be the best CFO/CTO in the world.

Re: Employees are happier when led by people with deep expertise (2016)

#68

Post by danielscrubs »

skohan wrote: post #43
skeeter2020 wrote: post #24

I think the conclusions miss the mark slightly and focus on a symptom of good bosses: they care about tasks from a state of understanding what is required to do them well, they have empathy for the challenges, and respect for the talent in completing them. Obviously the easiest way to get to this perspective is to experience it first-hand, hence the correlation between those who could do the job and being good manage…

> probably not top 5-10%, because they also cared about the non-technical requirements that a good manager needs to cover It sounds like you're saying that top-tier engineers are not generally qualified in terms of non-technical requirements, and I don't know that this assertion is justified. From my perspective, as a relatively new technical manager who also spent years as an engineer working with technical managers…

I agree, when I was working with small companies this kind of thinking was all too common: Can we make a Twitter clone in a week? “Yes it’s just a backend and a frontend.” Vs “with support for 187 million active users? Which level of accessibility? Will we have a cloud provider? Media upload support? Redundancy? What kind of login functionality? Do we have support if they loose their email account? Why are you looking at me like that? You know what: no we can’t do it. No I don’t care that your grandson thought anyone can do it”.

Re: Employees are happier when led by people with deep expertise (2016)

#69

Post by Retric »

random314 wrote: post #61
skohan wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> probably not top 5-10%, because they also cared about the non-technical requirements that a good manager needs to cover It sounds like you're saying that top-tier engineers are not generally qualified in terms of non-technical requirements, and I don't know that this assertion is justified. From my perspective, as a relatively new technical manager who also spent years as an engineer working with technical managers…

Very often when folks describe the ideal manager, they are describing themselves.

That’s an interesting idea.

Arguably my best manager had a graphic design and UI background. Where they excelled was having worked directly with software developers and non technical people for a decade they could understand the relevant tradeoffs without getting into the weeds.

However, former software developers where generally much better the deeper and more relevant their technical background. Seemingly because they understand what to prioritize, but perhaps it’s was simply easier to communicate with them.

Re: Employees are happier when led by people with deep expertise (2016)

#70

Post by yeswecatan »

vsgzusnex wrote: post #59
yeswecatan wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was actually looking forward to giving up some control as I became a manager. Unfortunately, we haven't hired anybody to fill the day to day void I left so I'm still doing my old job + now managing a small team.

Then maybe your job right now should be hiring?

It should be. Our recruiters haven't found any good for months.
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