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Conscious unbossing

robertwalters.co.uk

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Re: Conscious unbossing

#81

Post by datavirtue »

WantonQuantum wrote: post #13
jrmg wrote: post #3

This is presented as revolutionary, but it’s not clear to me that the results would’ve been any different if they’d surveyed the older generations at the same age.

I started as a developer at the age of 21 and in the next few years moved up a few levels until I wasn't developing any more. I decided I didn't like it and so left the company for a dev role somewhere else. Same thing happened again until I realised that I just want to be a dev. I'm 52 now and loving being a dev.

Getting some level of management and learning there is no authority of responsibility given to the role. It's just another type of task handler. The disillusionment is common when people crave responsibility and realize it isn't forthcoming.

Had you been granted the authority to oversee a critical responsibility/project/initiative you might have been imbued.

It's very exciting, like a drug, to be given responsibility for which you know that you are immediately shit canned (by your friends no less) if it doesn't go well or rewarded handsomely if you get it over the finish line. You have to hold key peoples' (founders/investors/executives) trust to get those roles because your success/failure ripples into them right quick.

Re: Conscious unbossing

#82

Post by floydnoel »

SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #68
klodolph wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I get the feeling the best practices you're complaining about are TPS reports, I’m talking about the actual term “best practices”, and not the actual practices themselves. The term is an ineffective way to communicate something. Managers and engineers alike should be able to explain what they do in terms that can be connected with concrete actions / concerns and understandable business goals. Terms like “best pract…

> “Best practices” also implies some kind of independence of situation which is fictitious. If you, say, have 30 teams whose projects come together into a product with a 99.9% SLA, you can’t have each team make completely independent judgments of what practices are best for their situation. You can try to, and many growing companies do. What you inevitably find is that the aggregate set of problems is too large, even…

the word best is highly problematic. best in every possible situation? impossible. only an idiot would believe something so stupid. so it must be best under certain circumstances which means others are best under different circumstances.

Re: Conscious unbossing

#83

Post by datavirtue »

brightball wrote: post #11

Nobody wants to be a middle manager. I’d be concerned if anyone ever wanted to be a middle manager. If you’re not C level and somebody reports to you, you’re a middle manager though.

As a middle manager you are listening to inane complaints from arrested development cases (ICs) all day. It is very difficult to be polite. 90% of the job is holding your tongue.

Re: Conscious unbossing

#84

Post by Seattle3503 »

This requires age period cohort analysis. The article asserts cohort is responsible, but it is just as likely that gen z will age into an appetite for managing.

Gen Z might just have a accurate self assessment of their management abilities.

Re: Conscious unbossing

#85

Post by anovikov »

It's easy to see why. Middle managers are kicked around by so many forces outside of their control, are not respected by anyone anymore, and are badly underpaid. A half-decent engineer always makes more and does a lot more fulfilling work with a lot less bullshit factor in it.

Re: Conscious unbossing

#87

Post by dylan604 »

Imnimo wrote: post #30

This doesn't really relate to the question of middle management, but it's interesting to compare the Canadian and British versions of this article: https://www.robert-walters.ca/insights/news/blog/Concious-un... https://www.robertwalters.co.uk/insights/news/blog/conscious... They both have comments ostensibly from "Lucy Bisset, Director of Robert Walters North" and "Martin Fox, Managing Director of Robert Walters Can…

It's funny when the comedy shows to superedits of a media company's affiliates all reading from the same script. You also see it on edits from CNN and FOX where all of the "hosts" (I refuse to call them anchors) all use the exact same lines.

The "party line" is very obvious as long as you're willing to see it. If party line is too political, then the sports version is that the playbook has been well studied.

Re: Conscious unbossing

#88

Post by mensetmanusman »

Middle managers are information nodes for large scale human decision making mechanisms.

If it were possible to interact individually with everyone in zero time, everyone could report to the king. Until then…

Re: Conscious unbossing

#89

Post by SpicyLemonZest »

floydnoel wrote: post #82
SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> “Best practices” also implies some kind of independence of situation which is fictitious. If you, say, have 30 teams whose projects come together into a product with a 99.9% SLA, you can’t have each team make completely independent judgments of what practices are best for their situation. You can try to, and many growing companies do. What you inevitably find is that the aggregate set of problems is too large, even…

the word best is highly problematic. best in every possible situation? impossible. only an idiot would believe something so stupid. so it must be best under certain circumstances which means others are best under different circumstances.

Would you say that only an idiot believes in speed limits? Again, the point isn’t that some practices are ontologically best, but that you must limit the freedom of individual teams to decide what’s best in order to achieve organization-wide standards.

Re: Conscious unbossing

#90

Post by apetresc »

tehjoker wrote: post #77
asielen wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, over my career I've seen multiple c-suite bounce from company to company getting gently pushed out each time but still collecting massive packages (with the vacation houses and yachts to prove it). Once you reach a certain level, you get treated with kid gloves. Even with the sword hanging over you, they don't out right fire you, they work out a deal where you "wanted to spend more time with family".

It's because at a certain level you have valuable relationships people want to protect, enough wealth to make decisions without it personally affecting you in a real way (i.e. homelessness, loss of medical care, etc), and information about how the company "really works" that could be valuable to the competition or a tell-all story for the media. Basically, if you're rich, you're a "real person" and if you're not you'…

I think you might be watching too much Succession.
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