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Balancing engineering cultures: Debate everything vs. just tell me what to build

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Re: Balancing engineering cultures: Debate everything vs. just tell me what to build

#121

Post by [deleted] »

jimberlage wrote: post #74
ListeningPie wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you evaluate whether someone wants to do a project? If a boss asks, "Do you want to do this project", seems like another way to ask "Do you want to remain employed?"

It’s important for your boss to frame that differently if it’s truly optional. They can’t leave it at “do you want to do this project?” They need to follow up with, “It really is optional, I won’t be hurt if you say no.” They also can’t do it with a big decision first. They have to frame small decisions that way sometimes, to build trust that when they say you have the ability to decline, they mean it. Then, they can…

[deleted]

Re: Balancing engineering cultures: Debate everything vs. just tell me what to build

#122

Post by lazide »

Aurornis wrote: post #13

This is the most common failure mode I’ve experienced: > A critical piece of avoiding endless debate is to know who makes the final decision and how it gets made. Consensus-seeking leads to endless debate. Every rapidly growing company I’ve worked for has reached a point where we have product managers and program managers and engineers and engineering managers and stakeholders and suddenly nobody can even identify wh…

Also modelable with Storming/Forming/Norming/Performing

Except every time you add someone new, it slips back to a prior state - and every time the group gets bigger, it takes longer to ‘settle’.

Eventually, roles/ownership/structure. needs to be codified, or the group never ends up actually performing - and if not done right, that won’t happen even with that.

Re: Balancing engineering cultures: Debate everything vs. just tell me what to build

#123

Post by fusslo »

symfoniq wrote: post #103
fusslo wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had a engineering lead who encouraged 'debate everything', but had the idea that 'good' meant 'his idea'. every new hire under him lasted about 8 months, then were burnt out and stopped being active in debate

I’ve worked (burned out) under this. Eventually I realized that “debate everything” just meant the boss really loved to debate, because he could always “win.”

I'm thinking about forming a support group

Re: Balancing engineering cultures: Debate everything vs. just tell me what to build

#124

Post by llamaLord »

tristor wrote: post #91
llamaLord wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a PM, I believe what you're describing is the torrent of people who used to work as "project managers" and "business analysts" who've transitioned into Product for the higher pay, without appreciating any of the differences between the roles. IMO, the fundamental role of a PM is to make the decisions nobody else wants to (and own the consequences of them). If my team is making progress and decisions are being made…

Hard agree with this take. Also, a good PM should be technical enough to really understand not just how customers use the product but how the product works. you should be able to be the designated person to answer a question from customers when nobody else knows the answer. In my role as a PM, I'm usually the person the buck stops with for Sales, Support, Solutions Engineering, et al. You can't do that if you don't a…

100% agree. This is the biggest debate I have with other PM's who say "you don't need to be technical"... Total bullshit.

You're expecting to be able to engage with your engineering team around the relative effort and complexities of different technical solutions... You're gonna need to have an understanding of the underlying technical details.

The way I see it, I don't necessarily need to know how to build the thing (as in, all the implementation details). But I absolutely need to know how the thing we're building works, what all the key moving parts are, and how they relate to each other.

Without that, there's no way I can develop any kind of intuition as to what is and isn't possible, which is CRITICAL when managing expections with customers or internal stakeholders.

Re: Balancing engineering cultures: Debate everything vs. just tell me what to build

#125

Post by llamaLord »

maxrecursion wrote: post #108
llamaLord wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a PM, I believe what you're describing is the torrent of people who used to work as "project managers" and "business analysts" who've transitioned into Product for the higher pay, without appreciating any of the differences between the roles. IMO, the fundamental role of a PM is to make the decisions nobody else wants to (and own the consequences of them). If my team is making progress and decisions are being made…

I'm not a PM, but you are exactly the kind of PM I love to work for. So many PMs are either over bearing or scared to make decisions; or, the worst, that do both, over bearing and micromanaging all the time and then blames the team when their decisions back fire.

If a PM has time to micromanage the engineers, something has gone seriously wrong in that organisation haha

Re: Balancing engineering cultures: Debate everything vs. just tell me what to build

#126

Post by moystard »

maxrecursion wrote: post #108
llamaLord wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a PM, I believe what you're describing is the torrent of people who used to work as "project managers" and "business analysts" who've transitioned into Product for the higher pay, without appreciating any of the differences between the roles. IMO, the fundamental role of a PM is to make the decisions nobody else wants to (and own the consequences of them). If my team is making progress and decisions are being made…

I'm not a PM, but you are exactly the kind of PM I love to work for. So many PMs are either over bearing or scared to make decisions; or, the worst, that do both, over bearing and micromanaging all the time and then blames the team when their decisions back fire.

Interesting that you mentioned working “for” a PM. I do believe a healthier relationship is driven by working “with”.

Re: Balancing engineering cultures: Debate everything vs. just tell me what to build

#127

Post by khaledtaha »

blitz_skull wrote: post #72
llamaLord wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a PM, I believe what you're describing is the torrent of people who used to work as "project managers" and "business analysts" who've transitioned into Product for the higher pay, without appreciating any of the differences between the roles. IMO, the fundamental role of a PM is to make the decisions nobody else wants to (and own the consequences of them). If my team is making progress and decisions are being made…

Damn I wish any PM I had ever worked with had this attitude. Honestly I don’t recognize any of this ownership in the last few companies I’ve worked with. PMs are just people that don’t talk with customers, review a product backlog, and cover their eyes and point at the Feature du jour. I wish more PMs had your ownership approach.

To jump in front of a bullet that no one wants to be struck by? As a PM, I want my eng team to be courageous and stand by their decisions rather than respecting me only once I offer my self in a sacrificial ritual.

Re: Balancing engineering cultures: Debate everything vs. just tell me what to build

#128

Post by llamaLord »

khaledtaha wrote: post #127
blitz_skull wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Damn I wish any PM I had ever worked with had this attitude. Honestly I don’t recognize any of this ownership in the last few companies I’ve worked with. PMs are just people that don’t talk with customers, review a product backlog, and cover their eyes and point at the Feature du jour. I wish more PMs had your ownership approach.

To jump in front of a bullet that no one wants to be struck by? As a PM, I want my eng team to be courageous and stand by their decisions rather than respecting me only once I offer my self in a sacrificial ritual.

Are they technical decisions? Yeah, sure, that's on them.

But a LOT of decisions in reality are ones where there is no clear "organic" owner. In that scenario, assuming nobody else is putting their hand up to own it, that's the PM's responsibility.

Nobody will ever tell you this in interviews, it's never part of the job description, but it is one of the most important parts of being an effective PM.

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