Rick needed leadership coaching and he never got it. So, he never learned to be a good leader. The problem wasn't documentation. The problem was, management never taught him about the value of delegation, ROI, opportunity cost and the ability to strategically eliminate certain features for a better outcome. Maybe he didn't want to learn these things, in which case, he should have been demoted to regular developer or if he's having a bad attitude about that, then fired.
You fired your top talent. I hope you’re happy
111–120 of 175 posts
Re: You fired your top talent. I hope you’re happy
#112There were a lot of failures in the Rick story "on all sides" as POTUS would say. This author seems to identify with Rick and frames this type of developer as gifted, but taken advantage of. At the end of the day, we all have to manage our own careers. And in this field that especially includes "managing your manager". Whatever process you find yourself in, you have to be able to push back and say: "I'm working on X,…
And in this field that especially includes "managing your manager". Managers get paid to have people skills. Programmers get paid to code. If you really are some genius, you may be able to write good code and also be more talented than your manager at people stuff such that you can manage your own boss with some seriously tricksy Machiavellian maneuvering. But, saying that is necessary is suggesting that all managers…
I'm really surprised how much pushback my comment about "managing your manager" has gotten here. I'll respond to your post in particular.
If you really are some genius, you may be able to write good code and also be more talented than your manager at people stuff such that you can manage your own boss with some seriously tricksy Machiavellian maneuvering.
Well, no, you aren't required to have better soft skills, or be decietful/conniving, to manage up as they say. Also as an aside, writing "good" code has very little to do with being a working programmer, sadly.
In my world view, managing up is better described as "standing up for oneself". Does your boss know the trouble you've had with the build, test, and deployment environments? Does your boss know that Senior Person X doesn't respond to emails or other queries in a timely manner? Does your boss remember they said to do task X before assigning you task Y? Does your boss intend for you to stay late every night for a week to accomplish X and Y or are you just assuming that? Do they remember you stayed late 3 nights last week? Managers are people, they forget things. I am advocating for keeping your activities and challenges front of mind for them. One must obviously must be engaged and delivering, for any of this to be effective.
Re: You fired your top talent. I hope you’re happy
#113Rick needed leadership coaching and he never got it. So, he never learned to be a good leader. The problem wasn't documentation. The problem was, management never taught him about the value of delegation, ROI, opportunity cost and the ability to strategically eliminate certain features for a better outcome. Maybe he didn't want to learn these things, in which case, he should have been demoted to regular developer or…
Management can't teach what they don't know ;)
Re: You fired your top talent. I hope you’re happy
#114There were a lot of failures in the Rick story "on all sides" as POTUS would say. This author seems to identify with Rick and frames this type of developer as gifted, but taken advantage of. At the end of the day, we all have to manage our own careers. And in this field that especially includes "managing your manager". Whatever process you find yourself in, you have to be able to push back and say: "I'm working on X,…
"managing your manager" is great in theory, but a lack of managing up doesn't absolve management of their primary responsibility to do that job themselves. Their direct reports already have primary responsibilities to do the work, expecting them to also do yours is a little bit much. Managers who want their reports to develop the skills to "manage up" have a responsibility to help them develop those skills and should…
Managing up is not a thing that managers expect. Managing up is something you learn in order to protect yourself from managers that can't manage. It's the skill of learning to enforce boundaries and stand up to bullies: a basic life skill for dealing with a hostile world. Your manager by definition is not in a position to teach you those skills when they are the one in need of being controlled.
Re: You fired your top talent. I hope you’re happy
#115Earlier quoted context omitted.
And in this field that especially includes "managing your manager". Managers get paid to have people skills. Programmers get paid to code. If you really are some genius, you may be able to write good code and also be more talented than your manager at people stuff such that you can manage your own boss with some seriously tricksy Machiavellian maneuvering. But, saying that is necessary is suggesting that all managers…
I'm really surprised how much pushback my comment about "managing your manager" has gotten here. I'll respond to your post in particular. If you really are some genius, you may be able to write good code and also be more talented than your manager at people stuff such that you can manage your own boss with some seriously tricksy Machiavellian maneuvering. Well, no, you aren't required to have better soft skills, or b…
I don't disagree with you that this is a good thing to do --if you know how to do it. I think you are getting pushback because your framing implicitly suggests it is Rick's fault he got fired and it does so in a way that implicitly absolves management of their role in this debacle.
Maybe your intent is more "Oh, gosh, if you find yourself in Rick's shoes, don't just let bad management crap on you like this and then railroad and scapegoat you." But that isn't what it sounds like you are saying.
Re: You fired your top talent. I hope you’re happy
#116Earlier quoted context omitted.
Personality is not a thing as such. What matter is the environment. People adapt to their environment. Most character issues are a response to the work environment.
I'm not sure I follow, maybe I'm not understanding you correctly. Are you actually saying personality is only a result of environment? Take for instance introverts vs extraverts. Introverts might be forced to be more social in an open office, but they would still work better in a private space and management has the ability prioritise their worker's personality and provide both open and private spaces for them.
The way you behave at work is in great part a result of the environment.
Let's say that every time you have a meeting, the manager and the client blame you for the project being late. Soon, enough, you probably gonna avoid them as much as you can or kill yourself in overtime, maybe both. It shouldn't take long before you get the reputation for being a dickhead and maybe someone will write a blog post about it.
None of this is really about you personally, it's simply the social dynamics in your work place.
I can give you a much simpler example. Put 10 people in an arena and give them a sword, gladiator style. The last standing gets to stay alive.
Congratulations, you just discovered that any human can be turned into a murderer in 10 minutes! They adapted to their environment.
Re: You fired your top talent. I hope you’re happy
#117Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm really surprised how much pushback my comment about "managing your manager" has gotten here. I'll respond to your post in particular. If you really are some genius, you may be able to write good code and also be more talented than your manager at people stuff such that you can manage your own boss with some seriously tricksy Machiavellian maneuvering. Well, no, you aren't required to have better soft skills, or b…
I don't disagree with you that this is a good thing to do -- if you know how to do it . I think you are getting pushback because your framing implicitly suggests it is Rick's fault he got fired and it does so in a way that implicitly absolves management of their role in this debacle. Maybe your intent is more "Oh, gosh, if you find yourself in Rick's shoes, don't just let bad management crap on you like this and then…
[deleted]
Re: You fired your top talent. I hope you’re happy
#118Earlier quoted context omitted.
You're missing the point. The way it all happened was essentially "yeah so we beat the guy with a baseball bat and he had the nerve to swing back at us while we did so"
Eh, no it’s not like that at all. Again this is more like a dog that’s been abused over the years and then mauls a kid. No ones surprised that the dog is aggressive, and the owners are obviously guilty of abusing an animal - a horrible thing for the owners to have done. That doesn’t change that the dog’s aggressive now, though, and should be put down.
Correction: A dog that's been abused for years by a kid and then mauls the kid while he is himself beating the dog
Re: You fired your top talent. I hope you’re happy
#119Thank you for writing this. The culture of one software developer deriding on other software developer work by badmouthing his/her work and bragging about how firing the developer solved the problem might have a place in politics but should not be celebrated/encouraged in the technical world.
Re: You fired your top talent. I hope you’re happy
#120I really liked both articles because they're starting to get at a fundamental issue that is at the core of a lot of the management vs engineering conflicts that tend to arise.
Personally I've been in Rick's shoes where I've been overburdened with tasks simply because product management (not necessarily direct managers) committed to accelerated timelines without consulting with the engineers. Although I brought up distributing my load to my peers, it was always deemed that there "wasn't enough time" to train them and the cycle repeated. I was always sympathetic to my direct managers because they were given an unreasonable task and had no mechanism of providing "upward" feedback or adjusting the schedule. At the end of the day I was just putting more pressure on myself. After a few years I had enough and left the company in the interest of my own well being.
At a conceptual level I think the issue is centered around making software a business. On one hand designing and implemented quality software is an iterative process and scales exponentially in terms of decision making (e.g. one week of technical debt can lead to months of problems). On the other hand businesses are deadline driven and function on a linear scale of time.