Microsoft reorganizes • Hacker News Board

Re: Microsoft reorganizes

#31

Post by kyllo » Thu, Jul 11, 2013, 2:11 PM UTC

venomsnake wrote: post #4

Is there a reason CEOs cannot use normal English but have to dilute the language so much? For me the TL:DR after struggling to read it was - full steam ahead to the biggest walled garden on earth. We are still the Borg. Someone correct me if I am wrong.

No, the TL;DR is that they are currently organized into (almost) self-sufficient business units by product category, but now they are going to switch to being organized into interdependent departments by job function category.

This is a huge shift for MS.

Re: Microsoft reorganizes

#32

Post by kvb » Thu, Jul 11, 2013, 2:13 PM UTC

bornhuetter wrote: post #24

michaelochurch wrote: post #17

What look like complex failures in organizations are often rooted in simple causes. In Microsoft, it's stack-ranking and Enron-style (that is, visible in transfer packet) performance reviews. When you have stack-ranking, you never get harmonious teams and "all-star" sub-organizations are out of the question. When performance reviews are part of the transfer process, people become largely immobile and teams become per…

Stack ranking seems, to me, to be an incredibly bad idea for Microsoft as a whole. Do you know if they are considering moving away from it? I think Stack Ranking can work in some situations, like mechanical (ie. non-heuristic) work, but for Engineers? I've never understood why they even considered that it would work.

How do you ensure that performance is rewarded fairly and consistently across an organization with tens of thousands of engineers? I'm not wild about the concept of stack ranking but I don't see any alternatives that don't have serious drawbacks of their own.

Re: Microsoft reorganizes

#33

Post by YuriNiyazov » Thu, Jul 11, 2013, 2:14 PM UTC

http://taffywilliams.blogspot.com/2011/07/write-3-letters-yo...

A new CEO was hired to replace an outgoing CEO. The outgoing CEO met with the incoming CEO for an exit interview. During the discussion, the departing CEO stated he had placed 3 very important letters in his drawer just as his predecessor had done for him. He explained that the new CEO would find opening the letters in order most useful when a serious event took place. He also stated the letters left for him had really helped him over his tenure.

Several months passed before a major event came up. The new CEO now remembered the letters and noticed they were numbered 1, 2, and 3. The former CEO had instructed they be opened in order for maximal benefit. The new CEO opened letter #1 and the paper inside had the words “blame it on your predecessor.” The new CEO did as the letter stated and amazingly he was able to avert serious problems and keep his job.

Several months passed before the next serious event took place. This one was growing in magnitude and things were starting to get ugly at the company. There were even calls for the CEO to step down. In desperation, the CEO opened the drawer and pulled out letter #2. With great fear he, opened it carefully to read the word “reorganize.” He followed the instructions and just as before he was saved. The whole company quieted down and went back to business as usual.

After about a year, a third serious event took place and it was much worse than the rest. The CEO knew how to get out of the mess because he had a third letter left to open. With a smile he reached for the letter #3 and opened it to read “write 3 letters.”

Re: Microsoft reorganizes

#34

Post by venomsnake » Thu, Jul 11, 2013, 2:15 PM UTC

bornhuetter wrote: post #16

bryanlarsen wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think the OP was arguing that Windows is currently a walled garden, but is arguing that Windows is moving in that direction.

If OP had said criticized Microsoft for moving toward being more closed, I would have completely agreed with him (to the extent that it is relevant to the link, which it isn't really). But he said "full steam ahead to the biggest walled garden on earth. We are still the Borg", and so his comment loses all credibility.

Number of time desktop/workstation is used in the memo - 0, number of times PC - 4 , 3 of them about the past. Number of times devices is used 20+, experience - 10+ - microsoft from today officialy desires to be looked as a device/experience company when dealing with end users.

That is full steam ahead to appleland for me. And it will be closed and walled future. WP8 and W8 demonstrated the MS attitude good enough.

The borg came from the one goal, one vision, one direction etc.

Re: Microsoft reorganizes

#35

Post by ethomson » Thu, Jul 11, 2013, 2:19 PM UTC

consultutah wrote: post #25

Interesting that the guy that said, "Developers, developers, developers, developers, developers, developers, developers, developers, developers, developers, developers, developers, developers", didn't mention where the developer tools end up in the re-org...

It's easy to miss specific units when they enumerated so many of the organizations of such a large company. We haven't really moved:

> Cloud and Enterprise Engineering Group. Satya Nadella will lead development of our back-end technologies like datacenter, database and our specific technologies for enterprise IT scenarios and development tools...

(Emphasis mine)

Re: Microsoft reorganizes

#36

Post by jabits » Thu, Jul 11, 2013, 2:22 PM UTC

AndrewDucker wrote: post #23

bornhuetter wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is Windows Phone more of a walled garden than than iOS? Is the Xbox more of a walled garden than the Wii U? The argument is still complete hyperbole.

Windows Phone is more of a walled garden than Android.

Um, what was the question?

Re: Microsoft reorganizes

#37

Post by astrodust » Thu, Jul 11, 2013, 2:23 PM UTC

bornhuetter wrote: post #6

I think this is a positive move for Microsoft. In particular, having all OS development work (including desktop, phone and XBox) looks like a good idea, as I've heard there have been a lot of problems with Windows Phone being managed on the periphery.

I'm not sure this is such a great idea. Doesn't the OS for the XBox have entirely different concerns than Windows for Enterprise? You cannot make an OS that works just as well for Billy the 10 year old gamer, and Mega Co. with 400,000 employees.

Apple's recognized this and decided to pretty much abandon enterprise. Linux has fragmented into different distributions (server, desktop, mobile) each with a different focus.

Microsoft, instead, has doubled down. They all even look the same.

Re: Microsoft reorganizes

#38

Post by xradionut » Thu, Jul 11, 2013, 2:24 PM UTC

Looks like the Devices and Studios Engineering Group is doomed...

Re: Microsoft reorganizes

#39

Post by astrodust » Thu, Jul 11, 2013, 2:25 PM UTC

czr80 wrote: post #7

Wow, re-organising the company by function. They're going all in on copying Apple. Who knows if it will work, but it's a fascinating experiment.

I wonder if they can still preserve the "culture" of having as many as fourteen superiors in one long, risk-averse chain.

Re: Microsoft reorganizes

#40

Post by jt2190 » Thu, Jul 11, 2013, 2:25 PM UTC

venomsnake wrote: post #4

Is there a reason CEOs cannot use normal English but have to dilute the language so much? For me the TL:DR after struggling to read it was - full steam ahead to the biggest walled garden on earth. We are still the Borg. Someone correct me if I am wrong.

  > Is there a reason CEOs cannot use normal English but 
  > have to dilute the language so much?

Just look at this message board to see how much people will (naively or willfully) twist the meaning of what they read. pg has written about this as well [1] ... How he finds himself being extra careful about what he writes, trying to anticipate the ways that people will misunderstand what he's trying to say.

[1] Can't find the citation right now... Perhaps someone can provide the link in a reply.