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Is engineering management bullshit?

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Re: Is engineering management bullshit?

#191

Post by linuxftw »

aniforprez wrote: post #143
linuxftw wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The 'average' manager may indeed be a net-negative, much like the average car crash. > frankly just don’t have any idea what the job is for We know what the job is for, but maybe there's no actual value there. Do doctors have managers? Do lawyers have managers? No, they might report to some administrative body, but they mostly work on contract or in teams. The 'communicate with customers' nonsense is delegated to low…

> Do doctors have managers? Yes. If a doctor is working in a hospital, there are most certainly managers. Obviously not "technical" managers in that they're doctors themselves or the doctor's "boss" but in that there are managers who are co-ordinating workforce, priorities, staffing, supplies etc etc. This is very much a thing and is more broad than engineering managers but is an incredibly important task so the dail…

> Yes. If a doctor is working in a hospital, there are most certainly managers.

Maybe some places. In the US, most doctors are independent providers for hospitals, they don't have a traditional 'manager'. Outside of a hospital setting, this is also true.

> This is not simply "admin work". This is critical, life saving stuff

It may be, but it's lower skill work delegated to people that are subordinate to doctors, not their managers.

Re: Is engineering management bullshit?

#192

Post by lr4444lr »

It's a simple test for me: does my manager protect me from bullshit so that I can get high caliber work done, or do I have to deal with bullshit myself because he can't?

The former are worth their salt. The latter can get back to coding or go pound sand for all I care.

Re: Is engineering management bullshit?

#193

Post by royaltheartist »

aniforprez wrote: post #168
jevgeni wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you assume that anyone notices yours?

Even as an engineer, I hope FFS no one notices my vacations. It means everything is running smoothly and I actually get to have a little down time and not think about work

Every job I've worked at, when a co-worker goes on vacation, it's up to the other engineers and laborers to compensate. When the manager goes on vacation there's no extra work leftover

Re: Is engineering management bullshit?

#194

Post by linuxftw »

tayo42 wrote: post #186
linuxftw wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't want the janitor's role either, but that person isn't in charge of me. Engineering managers are glorified secretaries. We should replace them with actual secretaries that are subordinate to engineers.

My best experiences with managers were ones that did that. Just let me work and help me if I need it. I'll reach out if I do.

That's not a manager, that's a secretary, which is my point. Engineering groups don't need managers, they need lead engineers and clerical staff, similar to a group of lawyers or doctors.

Re: Is engineering management bullshit?

#195

Post by compiler-guy »

tayo42 wrote: post #161
aniforprez wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Do doctors have managers? Yes. If a doctor is working in a hospital, there are most certainly managers. Obviously not "technical" managers in that they're doctors themselves or the doctor's "boss" but in that there are managers who are co-ordinating workforce, priorities, staffing, supplies etc etc. This is very much a thing and is more broad than engineering managers but is an incredibly important task so the dail…

Are managers of doctors saying ridiculous things like you need to only seem patients 30 and up this week, or your not diagnosing enough strep throat.

I have plenty of friends in the medical field and yes you hear stuff like this all the time. “Thirty and up” because maybe there is an underserved community. “Not diagnosing enough strep throat” because maybe there is a recently discovered epidemic and doctors hadn’t been testing for that.

People who have a high level view can direct the folks down in the trenches quite productively.

Re: Is engineering management bullshit?

#196

Post by Victerius »

andsoitis wrote: post #174
fezfight wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you're being as disingenuous as TFA. There are just as many useless managers as there are useless reports. The reason you see so many 'managers suck' posts is because they're in a position of authority over the talent they manage. That's all. Management shouldn't mean authority, it should be like HR or IT, a support role.

Who should be held responsible for engineering projects or initiatives that require more than one engineer? Who should be tasked with originating and prioritizing and staffing such projects?

"I should be paid 300k for only 3 years of experience, be able to work remotely without location-based pay, work 25 hours a week. Oh, and my managers should support me, not wield authority over me"

I'm gobsmacked by the entitlement of these people.

Re: Is engineering management bullshit?

#197

Post by usgroup »

I mean doesn’t heaving salaries and a sellers market imply that engineering management jobs are not bullshit?

Are there any jobs which command big salaries and which companies hire for directly that are bullshit?

Re: Is engineering management bullshit?

#198

Post by ElevenLathe »

> As someone who cares (you do, right?!), it’s your job to run towards accountability and responsibility. It’s also your duty to be aware of the methods and strategies of sociopaths, along with their strategies for influence and blame.

As an individual contributor with no desire to move to management and a deficit of skill in bullshitting and manipulating, I feel this advice ("run towards accountability") is really just self-preservation. I know I can't out-maneuver all the little Machiavellis around me, but if I can be legitimately useful to some of them (my boss, for example), then hopefully I can ride the coat-tails of the skilled Machiavellis for long enough to pay off my mortgage.

In other words, no I don't "care" about the goals of the company as a whole, but I still view it as rational to try and produce real value ("results" in the context of this article).

Re: Is engineering management bullshit?

#199

Post by AlwaysRock »

Thursday24 wrote: post #97

I'd say: No, not at all! Read about Admiral Rickover. He built the first practical nuclear submarine in the world, for the US navy, in record time of 3 years. He cleared bureaucratic hurdles, played the politics when needed, kept tight control, delved deep into the technicalities of the project, recruited and trained a large number of people into the program, and ultimately made the project successful. Dig deeper int…

I think there is a huge difference between managers who can get a project over the finish line and ones who can get multiple large projects over the finish line. I'm not saying that Admiral Rickover didn't/couldnt do that but many managers are effective at cracking the whip and making X happen but at the expense of their teams health which leads to burnout and turnover.

I'd also say military management is significantly different than civilian. If my manager tells me to jump I'm not going to say how high. I'm going to say why are you asking me to move its early and i havnt had coffee yet.

Re: Is engineering management bullshit?

#200

Post by awillen »

halfmatthalfcat wrote: post #13
bonecrusher2102 wrote: post #6

This is such a tired take. It's part of a steady stream of commentary that reads something like "non-engineering-role X is bullshit." Here, we see engineers reduce the contributions of such common roles as: Product Manger, Program/Project Manager, Scrum Master, Marketer, CEO, etc., as fungible or run by the biggest boogeyman of all, the dreaded MBA. These arguments most typically result from not an inability, but an…

Oh please, there's a reason why those comments exist - because more terrible managers exist than those "good ones" that you allude do. I would posit a guess that most, if not all, engineers on HN have had to live through at least one terrible manager that has soured/tainted the position. Speaking for myself, I've lived through many and it's a miserable experience to be under these people. Nobody is saying that the fu…

I'm a PM, and I've had to live through a fair number of god awful engineers. It's miserable to work with them, too.

I don't malign the profession because I've had bad experiences. Engineers should be smart enough to know that experiencing a bad manager, or even a few bad managers doesn't mean that " people who live in these roles are overall bad, don't know how to effectively execute these tasks and present an aura of superiority over the technical roles when they're providing very little value at all."

That's just being irrational and salty.

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