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What are common mistakes that new or inexperienced managers make?

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Re: What are common mistakes that new or inexperienced managers make?

#81

Post by robterrell »

jeroen wrote: post #48
IgorPartola wrote: post #27

So at one point I took on a management job, stepping up from a (lead) developer. I felt like the whole thing was kind of a train wreck and I am still slowly analyzing the black box recordings from it. This was my first time having direct reports that were not one or two interns and managing a team of seven other highly intelligent people was quite a chore in itself. What bugged me is that I could never tell if the pr…

You had your dev team do data entry. No wonder they resented you. Wouldn't it be cheaper and better for morale to hire a couple of temps to do the data entry?

Even better for morale, if temps truly could not be found, would be to advocate for everyone including the management above you to do the data entry. None of you are there to enter data, after all, so it's not like it's more appropriate for engineers to do it on weekends. The upper management would have maybe more incentive to get the proper temps located. And you go from goat to hero.

Re: What are common mistakes that new or inexperienced managers make?

#82

Post by IgorPartola »

robterrell wrote: post #81
jeroen wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You had your dev team do data entry. No wonder they resented you. Wouldn't it be cheaper and better for morale to hire a couple of temps to do the data entry?

Even better for morale, if temps truly could not be found, would be to advocate for everyone including the management above you to do the data entry. None of you are there to enter data, after all, so it's not like it's more appropriate for engineers to do it on weekends. The upper management would have maybe more incentive to get the proper temps located. And you go from goat to hero.

As I mentioned in another reply, this particular data entry job involved doing math at about college linear algebra level and writing SQL among other things. We got to this point by relying on one of the founders to do all the data entry. Suddenly three things happened: our system got more complex so the old tools no longer helped, we signed on a lot more customers, and the founder stepped away for a well deserved break. Thus, we were up a shit creek without a paddle. If the creation of the data entry tools was a highest priority, this would not have happened. However, being strapped for cash, we had to instead add customers, and also launch the more complex system to get paid on one of the bigger contracts. The price to pay was stalling of all development for a period of over a month to do data entry. Everybody that could, did help out but in the end only the dev team could do it all and do it properly. The high level lesson is to not take on this kind of technical debt. What I could have done to avoid it from where I was standing is still something I am figuring out.

Re: What are common mistakes that new or inexperienced managers make?

#83

Post by alien3d »

Software development. 1. Don't have experience programming(medium is okay for fast debug). 2. Don't have experince in meeting room.Altitude E.g don't play with your phone in meeting room don't voice opinion.. It you don't talk how people would knew it ? 3. Follow Up Client And Vendor .Some new born or over experience take think as simple.(Serious Issue). 4. No Money Manager.Just wanted to request people work for them without money(Serious issue).

There's a lot to write here.. but above seem important to me dealing with problematic manager.

Re: What are common mistakes that new or inexperienced managers make?

#84

Post by mantrax5 »

IgorPartola wrote: post #77
polemic wrote: post #50

Those answers are great, but they're also very high level and general. One of the best pieces of advice, badly paraphrased below, I've heard from a military context. "Any time you instruct a subordinate, you must be prepared to deliver the same instruction every single time they perform that action, and expect it to be performed in that way until otherwise instructed." This is a warning about micromanagement, flippan…

I am reading Dune and this is very similar to the advice Leto gave to Paul. Which came first, I wonder?

Can you please quote which part you refer to?

Re: What are common mistakes that new or inexperienced managers make?

#85

Post by mgkimsal »

nostrademons wrote: post #30
lugg wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Piecemeal advice, even if you know the answer to all job interview questions answering a straight up "no haven't dealt with that before but I'd tackle it by learning x y z." Will set you apart from pretty much everyone. Being able to confidently tell someone you politely have no fucking clue is pretty rare in my experience. Example I interviewed for a job I know I was qualified for, they kept asking questions about t…

I used to interview people for Google, and "I don't know but here's how I would go about finding out" almost never counted against candidates. What would count against a candidate is if they made a wrong assumption and then blindly proceeded as if that assumption was correct.

What if they said they'd bing for the answer? Would that count against them?

Re: What are common mistakes that new or inexperienced managers make?

#86

Post by brc »

lugg wrote: post #28
ryanburk wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"share praise, take blame" has worked really well for me in the past. folks who fail at learning this tend not to last long or at least don't advance since no one will want to work for them.

Does anyone know more about this particular fun fact of humans? Is it some kind of defense mechanism? Insecurity? Those are the only plausible reasons I can come up with. I guess its all office politics (something else I despise.)

It's usually the way someone was brought up.

Lots of parents spend their days blaming other people for their lot in life, and taking no responsibility themselves. They do this loudly to each other while the kids are there.

Little kids have big ears and learn by imitating.

Once the pattern is set, it's like kiln-fired concrete. When that kid makes it into management - everything good that happens is their doing, everything bad is somebody else's fault. It's unlikely that person will ever change unless they have some sort of epiphany.

Personally I hold myself responsible for all outcomes assigned to me. In the cases where it could be plausibly not be my fault, I still allocate blame for not having foresight to avoid the situation. This is my hack to prevent development of a blame reflex, and to enforce learning from every poor outcome.

Re: What are common mistakes that new or inexperienced managers make?

#87

Post by emilioolivares »

Mistake #1: It's not about you, it's about them. Mistake #2: Not having frequent one-on-one meetings with your direct reports. For this I recommend you listen to: http://www.manager-tools.com/manager-tools-basics. One-on-ones are considered the core of the management trinity. Mistake #3: Not giving timely, frequent feedback. Mistake #4: Not coaching your team to help them grow. Mistake #5: Not wanting to let go of your individual contributor responsibilities.

Cheers!

Re: What are common mistakes that new or inexperienced managers make?

#88

Post by eshvk »

robterrell wrote: post #81
jeroen wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You had your dev team do data entry. No wonder they resented you. Wouldn't it be cheaper and better for morale to hire a couple of temps to do the data entry?

Even better for morale, if temps truly could not be found, would be to advocate for everyone including the management above you to do the data entry. None of you are there to enter data, after all, so it's not like it's more appropriate for engineers to do it on weekends. The upper management would have maybe more incentive to get the proper temps located. And you go from goat to hero.

> Even better for morale, if temps truly could not be found, would be to advocate for everyone including the management above you to do the data entry.

As an employee, this strategy has always felt fake and look like make believe work. For example, a long time ago, during a previous firm's crunch time, we had the CTO sit and write code. The guy could write code but he was also not as familiar with the code base and it seemed like there were better things he could do with his time than make it seem like he was out there doing his best with the troops.

Re: What are common mistakes that new or inexperienced managers make?

#89

Post by blrgeek »

mantrax5 wrote: post #84
IgorPartola wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am reading Dune and this is very similar to the advice Leto gave to Paul. Which came first, I wonder?

Can you please quote which part you refer to?

Comes up just before Paul does his sandworm trial.

Re: What are common mistakes that new or inexperienced managers make?

#90

Post by nostrademons »

mgkimsal wrote: post #85
nostrademons wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to interview people for Google, and "I don't know but here's how I would go about finding out" almost never counted against candidates. What would count against a candidate is if they made a wrong assumption and then blindly proceeded as if that assumption was correct.

What if they said they'd bing for the answer? Would that count against them?

I think that's happened before, not for one of my interviews but for one a friend gave. I don't think it counted against them, but they weren't good enough to meet the bar anyway. (That happens a lot - I've never had a non-intern candidate get through, and I've had friends go for 50 interviews without a single candidate getting hired.) We had a good laugh afterwards.
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