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We need motivation (good managers)

ethanalter.com

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Re: We need motivation (good managers)

#31

Post by rdelpret »

I agree with most of the commenters that only the executives and companies can provide the needs at the bottom of the pyramid and in the current climate they are not doing so. If you keep using MHON to make the case that middle managers have to fill in the gap Maslow would say you have to at least partially fulfill the needs at the bottom of the pyramid first before the higher needs have any effect and a middle manager simply does not have the power to do so.

I love that you equated company culture to motivation at scale. That hit the nail on the head.

Re: We need motivation (good managers)

#32

Post by BobaFloutist »

paulcole wrote: post #27
JohnFen wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Nobody can make someone else motivated. This is certainly true. But people can easily demotivate others.

Also false. Would you bet your life that you could demotivate me and prevent me from sweeping my apartment floors tomorrow morning? What about demotivating me and keeping me from eating dinner tonight? You can create a situation where I can become demotivated but ultimately I set my own level of motivation.

That's like saying nobody can ever steal from anyone else because I wouldn't be willing to bet my life that I could steal your wallet from you. Just because things aren't 100% reliable, doesn't mean they're not possible.

Re: We need motivation (good managers)

#33

Post by betenoire »

paulcole wrote: post #27
JohnFen wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Nobody can make someone else motivated. This is certainly true. But people can easily demotivate others.

Also false. Would you bet your life that you could demotivate me and prevent me from sweeping my apartment floors tomorrow morning? What about demotivating me and keeping me from eating dinner tonight? You can create a situation where I can become demotivated but ultimately I set my own level of motivation.

I mean, I get what you are saying I think... but was is the practical difference between "you can put me in a place where I become demotivated" and "you can't demotivate me"?

The whole industry of coaching seemingly contradicts this take. I can become motivated from someone sharing a vision of what is possible that I didn't understand or believe in, and I can become unmotivated from eating dinner from watching a documentary on the food industry.

Re: We need motivation (good managers)

#34

Post by shermantanktop »

yellow_postit wrote: post #3

Largely agree that middle or rather direct managers are often the linchpin to motivation and happiness. What can be terrible as a middle manager is the inability to address the who gets promoted dynamic. Many the immediate tools are unsatisfying or medium term detrimental.

What can be terrible for everyone else is seeing a manager force through a promotion of a bad or weak employee, who now makes even bigger messes that everyone else gets to deal with.

This appears at times to be a perverse status game - “I have so much pull I even got Joe promoted.”

Re: We need motivation (good managers)

#35

Post by uoaei »

JohnFen wrote: post #16
ozim wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think most programmers code for fun in their free time. I do and know quite some who also do code for fun but still…. Story points and sprints are there to save you from people who would otherwise come to you and ask for changes or shift priorities on daily basis. You don’t care about story points but with them you can say “I am busy with this 8 pt story will pick next when I am done” instead of having some p…

> I don’t think most programmers code for fun in their free time. Maybe not, I haven't done a study. But literally every dev that I personally know (well enough to know what they do in their free time) does this. > save you from people who would otherwise come to you and ask for changes or shift priorities on daily basis. The problem is that one of the jobs of a manager is to shield devs from this. A manager who is b…

> But literally every dev that I personally know

Your bubble is absurdly tiny. I assure you this is not the norm across software engineering as a whole.

Re: We need motivation (good managers)

#36

Post by uoaei »

nextos wrote: post #8
mvdtnz wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my experience a miniscule proportion of programmers code for fun.

Maybe the parent post is exaggerating a bit, but I think that at least it is fair to say that most good programmers began programming just for fun. And when managed well and presented with interesting problems, they will become highly productive and self-driven.

Again, inaccurate. There is a self-selection process at work here in certain roles and domains, maybe, but to boldly claim that your bubble is a representative sample of the entire industry is naive.

Re: We need motivation (good managers)

#37

Post by 23B1 »

ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #17

I was a [pretty damn good] manager, for over 25 years. I kept employees for decades, under conditions of significantly less pay and perks, than many other companies. But I also managed a small, high-performing group of mature, experienced C++ programmers, for a corporation that actually believed in retaining talent for years. It was also one of the top imaging companies in the world, and they demanded a lot from us.…

So tell us more about your management style!

Re: We need motivation (good managers)

#38

Post by JohnFen »

uoaei wrote: post #35
JohnFen wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don’t think most programmers code for fun in their free time. Maybe not, I haven't done a study. But literally every dev that I personally know (well enough to know what they do in their free time) does this. > save you from people who would otherwise come to you and ask for changes or shift priorities on daily basis. The problem is that one of the jobs of a manager is to shield devs from this. A manager who is b…

> But literally every dev that I personally know Your bubble is absurdly tiny. I assure you this is not the norm across software engineering as a whole.

You have no clue how large or small my professional circle is.

Since you claim to have knowledge about what is the norm across the entire field of software engineering rather than just the people in your own bubble, I assume that you have a study that informs your belief?

Re: We need motivation (good managers)

#39

Post by saagarjha »

ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #28
saagarjha wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s not clear to me whether this is a “I kept wages down” story or “people stayed with the company because they liked me even though they had offers with larger numbers on them”.

Whatevs. I won't get into it. I've been called all sorts of evil names, here, because of my experience. I won't bother giving it much bandwidth. [Edit] > If you think there's more to life than money, then why are you so proud of underpaying your team members? HN has a rather ... predictable ... zeitgeist.

I mean this is like when people recount working with Steve Jobs: “he yelled at us a bunch but he also had a real eye for perfection that was really important in making sure we were doing the right thing”. Was he a good manager? Obviously the part where he knew what was good and what wasn’t could be part of that argument. But was the yelling necessary? Could things have been done without it? Should a good manager make the most of what they have or should they advocate for changes to that? I think that’s a relevant question. If you want to feel good about the way you went about something I’m not going to stop you but it seems like a relevant question to ask since a lot of people who do say this end up being absolutely awful managers. You could approach this with, say, “I focused on my employees’ job satisfaction” or “I made sure they felt their voices were heard” or whatever but just going “my employees were paid less” and expecting a different response is kind of naive on your part.

Re: We need motivation (good managers)

#40

Post by phantomathkg »

JohnFen wrote: post #38
uoaei wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But literally every dev that I personally know Your bubble is absurdly tiny. I assure you this is not the norm across software engineering as a whole.

You have no clue how large or small my professional circle is. Since you claim to have knowledge about what is the norm across the entire field of software engineering rather than just the people in your own bubble, I assume that you have a study that informs your belief?

Maybe it is fair to say, probably 50% people develop for fun outside work, and another 50% don't?
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