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Why do business analysts and PMs get higher salaries than programmers?

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Re: Why do business analysts and PMs get higher salaries than programmers?

#141

Post by slurgfest »

vacri wrote: post #107
systems wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Programming is the most important part of making software, programmers are right ... I am systems analyst

In today's economically rationalised world, almost every position in a company is important. If it wasn't, they wouldn't pay for it. Saying who is more important to the process is somewhat meaningless - wages are generally aligned to how difficult it is to replace a person's skillset.

The core activity of a band is making music. The bottom line can be helped a lot by marketing. Other roles may be very important to allow the musicians to focus. Sometimes musicians need to be kept sober or made to practice more, with which others can help. So other people can make value in a band and deserve to get paid. But take away the musicians, and you have absolutely nothing. Plenty of people have made good music without lots of managers over them. In that specific sense, musicians are the most important part of a band.

Re: Why do business analysts and PMs get higher salaries than programmers?

#142

Post by slurgfest »

robmay wrote: post #69

There is a great book called "Management by Baseball." The author of the book points out that baseball managers are typically former players, and they usually believe that the most important position on the team is whatever position they used to play. I doubt PMs regularly make more than engineers across all levels at all companies, but in general the outcry you are seeing about this isn't limited to engineers. In my…

You can form a baseball team entirely out of players. They might even play pretty well. You just can't form a baseball team entirely out of managers.

If the upper levels are in more uncertain and ambiguous situations, that makes it even harder to judge performance, which will give even greater weight to wild heuristic guesses in hiring, and more cover for things like nepotism.

Re: Why do business analysts and PMs get higher salaries than programmers?

#143

Post by slurgfest »

lnanek2 wrote: post #115

I'm a programmer and I think they are worth more too. It's a disaster when you have a bad business person and lose investors because there is no one to meet them, or it takes several months longer than expected to hire a desperately needed graphics designer, etc.. I've heard managers of mine mention getting 1400 emails a day, and I bet a lot of it is bitching they have to put up with about budgets and timelines, and…

If importance were gauged by doing dirty work without which things would fail, then the janitor is also more valuable. But janitors are cheap because they are easy to get.

If good* PMs are paid more, it is because they are harder to get. That doesn't mean they are more important, just that the company believes them to be worth it and does not believe it can get a better deal without paying unreasonably for it.

* good means whatever the person hiring thinks it means. If the hiring manager believes in auras or psychoanalysis or nepotism, then those things will determine the hire.

Re: Why do business analysts and PMs get higher salaries than programmers?

#144

Post by codeonfire »

Business analysts and PMs stay at corporations longer and build salary through promotions. Programmers leave every couple of years and build salary by going to more elite and richer corporations. So a new programmer may be working at a low programmer-pay corporation early at which PMs are paid more than programmers. Eventually programmers will end up at a place where they are paid more than PMs and BAs. Even the most die hard programmer-hating director or VP can't justify paying $150k for 'people skills'.

Re: Why do business analysts and PMs get higher salaries than programmers?

#145

Post by dekz »

demian wrote: post #130
jrockway wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Asking a room of programmers about the value of business analysts is going to result in feedback that is heavily biased. We need not rely upon opinions here, we can be objective instead. Let's ask how many business analysts without programming skills have made working software. Similarly, let's ask the same of the managers. And finally, let's ask programmers without any managerial or business skills how many pieces o…

But working software does not mean successful software. If it wasn't used, if it didn't helped people or solved a problem, how can it be considered successful?. ALL of those products/projects you list did required managment and business skills to be successful.

What management and business skills does Emacs require?

Re: Why do business analysts and PMs get higher salaries than programmers?

#146

Post by vacri »

slurgfest wrote: post #141
vacri wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In today's economically rationalised world, almost every position in a company is important. If it wasn't, they wouldn't pay for it. Saying who is more important to the process is somewhat meaningless - wages are generally aligned to how difficult it is to replace a person's skillset.

The core activity of a band is making music. The bottom line can be helped a lot by marketing. Other roles may be very important to allow the musicians to focus. Sometimes musicians need to be kept sober or made to practice more, with which others can help. So other people can make value in a band and deserve to get paid. But take away the musicians, and you have absolutely nothing. Plenty of people have made good mu…

I think that's a flawed analogy, because the band is set up to sell the specific art of the musicians. Software companies are set up to provide a product using the craft of the programmers. It's a lot easier to keep the same flavour in your product if you have to replace a lead programmer instead of a lead singer. Programmers in companies don't do the equivalent of "I'm going to change tack and do a blues album this time".

Re: Why do business analysts and PMs get higher salaries than programmers?

#147

Post by Morg »

Swizec wrote: post #102
mgkimsal wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Programmers tend to think that programming is the most important part of making software. However, managers think that managing is the most important part of making software, and business analysts think that defining business requirements is the most important part of making software. Asking a room of programmers about the value of business analysts is going to result in feedback that is heavily biased. As you say,…

I've had projects fail because we couldn't get the core algorithms working ... Hell, most of my interesting failures so far have been "Okay, so computers can't do X (yet), or I'm too stupid to figure it out and don't know anyone smart enough to solve X" A lot of my projects would sell like hotcakes, once someone figures out a practical implementation, or at least an impractical one.

Sounds good to me, when do we start ?

Re: Why do business analysts and PMs get higher salaries than programmers?

#148

Post by sparknlaunch »

scotty79 wrote: post #86
mprovost wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

...but not on schedule.

Nothing ever get's built on schedule or within budget.

>> Nothing ever get's built on schedule or within budget.

If anything, things always deliver on schedule and within budget. This is due to massive scope creep (scope reduction) and reduced quality.

Re: Why do business analysts and PMs get higher salaries than programmers?

#149

Post by Swizec »

mgkimsal wrote: post #104
Swizec wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've had projects fail because we couldn't get the core algorithms working ... Hell, most of my interesting failures so far have been "Okay, so computers can't do X (yet), or I'm too stupid to figure it out and don't know anyone smart enough to solve X" A lot of my projects would sell like hotcakes, once someone figures out a practical implementation, or at least an impractical one.

I'd thought about that angle, and I've known a couple of those myself over the years (mostly second hand). But even in the cases I've seen, things might have gone much smoother had there been stronger communication about the specifics and what was (and was not) possible much earlier. As soon as things look to be not possible, tell someone. If you're able to pull a rabbit out of a hat later on, great, but let people k…

That depends. Most of the projects I'm thinking about had Solve A Hard Problem at their core.

Granted, there might be a better way to solve it than devise some technology to do so that I never thought of.

Re: Why do business analysts and PMs get higher salaries than programmers?

#150

Post by sandGorgon »

photon137 wrote: post #95
brazzy wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Think about it, a programmer can very well exist without BAs/PMS etc but BAs/PMs can't exist without programmers. That's exactly the same kind of self-bullshitting your parent comment was arguing against. NONE of the parts of a business can really work effectively without the others. A bunch of super-smart skilled programmers with attitudes, no leaders and no clear requirements is going to produce a lot of efficien…

I'll counter that - even not-so smart programmers with enormous egos would be able to ship something clunky, partly broken, not feature-perfect etc. (case in point: Linux - do you think they required full-time BAs to manage this very nicely working, feature-rich product? They did the BA/PM work themselves with Linus and others as anchors). A team of super-smart skilled BA/PMs will produce zero, zilch, nada if there a…

About Linux: Linus is the brilliant manager there. He invented git to be able to drive his development methodology. He pushes back and brutally steamrolls rogue features into submission.

Linux is actually a good example of how a manager who is technically adept can do wonders for a project. It is NOT an example of how you do not need PMs.

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