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Mental health in software engineering

vadimkravcenko.com

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Re: Mental health in software engineering

#81

Post by xyst »

giantg2 wrote: post #73
steve_gh wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And this is an organizational failure, because the organisation has just promoted, without training someone to be a leader. You wouldn't expect a manager (from a non-technical background) to just start coding, so why would you expect a coder to just start managing.

Most places that "train" just have some online courses, maybe an in-person or two. I don't know of anywhere that has some sort of real training like apprentice program.

lmao - this is what I have experienced as well. Somehow these online courses with no way to ask questions will magically contain everything you need to know!

Who knew? An MBA mindset contained inside a 1 hour mindset!1 Why did these MBA guys spend $250K!?

Re: Mental health in software engineering

#82

Post by [deleted] »

skrebbel wrote: post #66
xyst wrote: post #11

This is a person that should have never been in a leadership position. I have worked under these types of people that were great engineers themselves but couldn’t lead worth shit. No trust in the team. Always doing shit themselves. No discussion. Backdoor discussions. Always bending to the will of management. Everything is “important”/“critical”. It’s micromanaging to the worst degree. At the same time, I would likel…

> This is a person that should have never been in a leadership position This is the kind of crap that stops people writing blog posts about vulnerable topics like mental health. I mean really? Author opens up about a terrible shit show and their role in it, and your response is “yeah you suck at that, don’t do it.” I dont think that’s very constructive.

[deleted]

Re: Mental health in software engineering

#83

Post by eschneider »

coldtea wrote: post #68
arethuza wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At one point many years ago I was Director of Engineering for a company that was planning a major new version of their product. After I'd been there a few weeks I said to the CEO that I thought I had a pretty good understanding of the scope and challenges for the new release. The CEO said "no you don't" - which led me to ask why he thought this and he said he had thought up a new "must have" feature over the weekend…

The CEO tells the Director of Engineering how long a time a feature "could be built" in? A new one, they suddenly pulled out of their asses too? Why even have a Director of Engineering position then?

To take the blame, so, so obviously.

Re: Mental health in software engineering

#84

Post by jghn »

xyst wrote: post #11

This is a person that should have never been in a leadership position. I have worked under these types of people that were great engineers themselves but couldn’t lead worth shit. No trust in the team. Always doing shit themselves. No discussion. Backdoor discussions. Always bending to the will of management. Everything is “important”/“critical”. It’s micromanaging to the worst degree. At the same time, I would likel…

> No trust in the team. Always doing shit themselves.

This was one of the hardest lessons for me to learn. And when coaching other would-be leaders it often is a roadblock for them as well.

As one moves into a leadership role it becomes critical that you learn to be ok with people doing things not the way you'd do them. You need to learn to accept close/good enough from your underlings. And the "enough" in close/good enough is going to be a larger delta than you think going into this learning process.

Re: Mental health in software engineering

#85

Post by xyst »

skrebbel wrote: post #66
xyst wrote: post #11

This is a person that should have never been in a leadership position. I have worked under these types of people that were great engineers themselves but couldn’t lead worth shit. No trust in the team. Always doing shit themselves. No discussion. Backdoor discussions. Always bending to the will of management. Everything is “important”/“critical”. It’s micromanaging to the worst degree. At the same time, I would likel…

> This is a person that should have never been in a leadership position This is the kind of crap that stops people writing blog posts about vulnerable topics like mental health. I mean really? Author opens up about a terrible shit show and their role in it, and your response is “yeah you suck at that, don’t do it.” I dont think that’s very constructive.

Huh?

The toxic positivity about it is not helpful either.

Re: Mental health in software engineering

#86

Post by cmrdporcupine »

paulcole wrote: post #20
xyst wrote: post #11

This is a person that should have never been in a leadership position. I have worked under these types of people that were great engineers themselves but couldn’t lead worth shit. No trust in the team. Always doing shit themselves. No discussion. Backdoor discussions. Always bending to the will of management. Everything is “important”/“critical”. It’s micromanaging to the worst degree. At the same time, I would likel…

> Always doing shit themselves This is one of the most counterintuitive things about leadership roles IMO. If you get promoted there, it’s often because you got a lot of things done yourself in an IC role. And then the fewer things you do yourself, the better off you, the company, and your reports are once you’re in a leadership role. So you have to learn that feeling idle compared to what you used to feel like isn’t…

The best advice I heard about the switch from regular engineer to mgmt role was this: A software engineer works to build harmonious productive stable software systems. An engineering manager works to build harmonious productive stable people systems. The product is different.

So many people who move into management don't make this mental shift and keep their hands on the steering wheel because that's how they got there in the first place. But if you don't let others drive, you won't be able to keep the car on the road for long. If you go into that role your job is to mostly get your hands off the nuts and bolts of the software system and create people systems of motivation, trust, and organization to get your team members working well on them instead.

I've never made the transition myself but have increasingly thought about it.

Re: Mental health in software engineering

#87

Post by skeeter2020 »

giantg2 wrote: post #73
steve_gh wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And this is an organizational failure, because the organisation has just promoted, without training someone to be a leader. You wouldn't expect a manager (from a non-technical background) to just start coding, so why would you expect a coder to just start managing.

Most places that "train" just have some online courses, maybe an in-person or two. I don't know of anywhere that has some sort of real training like apprentice program.

I'll post this only because this is an area where I'm really passionate, and you're right and that the current state most places sucks. I've tried to address it as a manager who strongly believes that engineering management needs to be viewed as a discipline. I've implemented a Lead Mentorship Program at two places; one very successfully and the other with some progress (still hustling for engagement/commitment):

https://www.codeleadmanage.com/articles/20230919-lead_mentor...

Re: Mental health in software engineering

#88

Post by AlexandrB »

lioeters wrote: post #29
cjk2 wrote: post #10

I'll dump this one here as it's still annoying me a bit. So one afternoon I'm sitting there and our sales guy John came in (you know who you are if you're reading this) and described what he'd managed to sell a client. I sat there and I scribbled on bits of paper for hours, did some research and went back to him with the point that it wasn't possible from an algorithmic perspective. Basically he'd assumed that if it…

Sadly, a lot of people are too nice to do this, and instead have a mental breakdown trying to solve an impossible situation. Despite the popular expression, "Never give up," sometimes it's important to know when to say fuck it and quit.

I wonder if this hits self-taught or "code boot camp" developers harder because they may not have the theoretical background to notice "oh this is the halting problem" or "oh this is TSP" before getting too far into the weeds.

Re: Mental health in software engineering

#89

Post by dblohm7 »

jongjong wrote: post #43
lenerdenator wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The phenomenon of showing up at Stanford and telling some 21-year-old that he's Jesus Christ and that you're going to give him millions of dollars is a wen on the American business culture matched only by corporate raiding. It's the nerd version of college football/basketball recruiting.

It's so weird. I started to think that maybe this is intentional. It looks as though investors want to invest only in over-optimistic people who believe that we're living in some kind of utopian paradise; at the same time they avoid investing in anyone who has had so much of a faint whiff of how the sausage gets made. It's like the entire system is desperate to keep optimists optimistic and pessimists pessimistic. Wh…

It's because the emperor has no clothes. Most of the VCs I've met have been complete airheads.

Re: Mental health in software engineering

#90

Post by tossandthrow »

kortilla wrote: post #47
arnonejoe wrote: post #42

The way to get around some of this is to work on contract. I have found I am most free being a contractor. I go in to the gig knowing it has a definite end and do not care about any of the internal politics. It’s not a perfect solution but much better than being an employee where I have granted a company a monopoly on my time.

How do you find gigs that actually pay like FTEs?

at least where I am at, the contractor rate is more than double the FTE rate.
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