A study finds that bosses can be useful but also sneaky • Hacker News Board

Re: A study finds that bosses can be useful but also sneaky

#21

Post by mlthoughts2018 » Wed, Oct 23, 2019, 3:05 PM UTC

k__ wrote: post #2

People often talk about the extemes. Managers or no managers. Why can't we have something in-between? Like, instead of a manager, we have a team assistant. Someone who does burocracy and orga, but hasn't any power and the power is exercied in some way by all of the team members. This would remove the "if all do it no one does it" problem and still prevent single people decisions.

It’s such a false dilemma to say that the extremes are “manager” or “no manager.”

“Manager” is somewhere in the middle. “Insane bad manager” is the extreme, not the mere existence of a management structure.

Re: A study finds that bosses can be useful but also sneaky

#22

Post by Gimpei » Wed, Oct 23, 2019, 3:08 PM UTC

awillen wrote: post #10

Calling this a study of managers is quite a stretch... it's an arbitrarily designed game theory problem in which some people are labeled "managers" and others "workers" with no real relationship to those titles in the real world. But yeah, managers can be useful and/or sneaky. They can also be sleepy, hungry, boring, sociopathic and all of the other things humans can be.

Agreed. I'm all for experimental economics, but let's not exaggerate the generalizability of a result. Better to see it as a particular form of theory that needs to be backed up empirically in more real world contexts.

Re: A study finds that bosses can be useful but also sneaky

#23

Post by muzani » Wed, Oct 23, 2019, 3:08 PM UTC

goatinaboat wrote: post #5

Most companies could chop an entire layer of middle management, perhaps many layers, and get an instant boost in productivity and happiness. I wonder if there’s any mechanism for workers and senior management to make this happen and share the rewards.

To use a RPG analogy, managers tank for the team. They produce visibility little output. Their job is to keep the team focused on what they do.

Without a manager, team members need to justify a $5 expense to finance, deal with back and forth iterative design with product team, argue that the hardware partner isn't delivering what they promised, deal with security expectations from bigger partners. There's a lot of unnecessary meetings in there and you don't want the people doing the work to be in them.

Without a manager, the CEO sits next to your back end guy, rants about bugs that the guy is already fixing, and pokes him for update schedule progress every four hours.

It is possible for middle management to get bloated, but this is sort of a response like we have too many meetings, therefore we need more people to handle meetings.

Re: A study finds that bosses can be useful but also sneaky

#24

Post by Matticus_Rex » Wed, Oct 23, 2019, 3:11 PM UTC

k__ wrote: post #2

People often talk about the extemes. Managers or no managers. Why can't we have something in-between? Like, instead of a manager, we have a team assistant. Someone who does burocracy and orga, but hasn't any power and the power is exercied in some way by all of the team members. This would remove the "if all do it no one does it" problem and still prevent single people decisions.

This is actually a lot of what the Holacracy system does (though most business mags get it totally wrong in the US -- less so in the EU).

Unlike some of the fad "flat"/structureless stuff that just eliminates managers, Holacracy focuses on decentralizing those management functions that still need to exist (because management is needed, even if there are no managers) in roles and processes, and reducing the "Lead Link"/"Circle Lead" role in each team to something that takes ~10% of a person's time and is focused around the garbage collection for the team and helping the team get problems out of their way.

Re: A study finds that bosses can be useful but also sneaky

#25

Post by Kalium » Wed, Oct 23, 2019, 3:12 PM UTC

jnty wrote: post #9

segmondy wrote: post #8

"... when it is difficult to measure what managers do, it can be tricky to design incentives to reward them." Why would it be difficult to measure what managers do? Measure the total output of their team. That's it.

A lot of teams would say that their output is in spite of their manager, not because of it. What if the manager's contribution is net negative?

How do you postulate a team's output without their manager or with a different manager?

Re: A study finds that bosses can be useful but also sneaky

#26

Post by adrianmonk » Wed, Oct 23, 2019, 3:15 PM UTC

ebiester wrote: post #11

goatinaboat wrote: post #5

Most companies could chop an entire layer of middle management, perhaps many layers, and get an instant boost in productivity and happiness. I wonder if there’s any mechanism for workers and senior management to make this happen and share the rewards.

I've said this before, but a manager's work is split into thirds: 1/3 is in service of the team. Some of this is bureaucratic (approving expense reports, hiring/firing/promoting), and some of this is being a team facilitator. In meetings, watching that everyone is talking and that one person isn't dominating. Helping with conflict management. Pulling together people from three teams for a meeting and leading it. Agai…

I like the way you've broken this down, and I realize you're just giving examples, but your first third (service of the team) doesn't include any long-term development of employees. (Probably just because your purpose here isn't to make an exhaustive list, but it got me thinking about this.)

I mention this because I think one thing that separates mediocre managers from really good ones is that the good ones understand each employee's strengths and weaknesses and try to help them chart a course for success. That means finding their place on the team and it also means growth. It's to everyone's benefit if, 6 months or a year from now, that employee is a better employee. A manager is in a unique position to coach and mentor, and to create the conditions for growth and encourage it. A self-starter employee will do some of this on their own, but they usually need the manager to participate too by doing stuff like recognizing realistic opportunities for an employee to take on more responsibility and taking a chance by trusting them with it. A lot of managers don't seem to even attempt to do any of this or aren't even aware that it's a thing, and then their team languishes and stagnates and they wonder why they aren't getting anything out of their people.

Re: A study finds that bosses can be useful but also sneaky

#27

Post by TulliusCicero » Wed, Oct 23, 2019, 3:19 PM UTC

k__ wrote: post #2

People often talk about the extemes. Managers or no managers. Why can't we have something in-between? Like, instead of a manager, we have a team assistant. Someone who does burocracy and orga, but hasn't any power and the power is exercied in some way by all of the team members. This would remove the "if all do it no one does it" problem and still prevent single people decisions.

This sounds similar to a program or project manager role.

Re: A study finds that bosses can be useful but also sneaky

#28

Post by marcoseliziario » Wed, Oct 23, 2019, 3:28 PM UTC

goatinaboat wrote: post #5

Most companies could chop an entire layer of middle management, perhaps many layers, and get an instant boost in productivity and happiness. I wonder if there’s any mechanism for workers and senior management to make this happen and share the rewards.

get rid of the scrum masters and agile coaches first, please.

Re: A study finds that bosses can be useful but also sneaky

#29

Post by ebiester » Wed, Oct 23, 2019, 3:41 PM UTC

adrianmonk wrote: post #26

ebiester wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've said this before, but a manager's work is split into thirds: 1/3 is in service of the team. Some of this is bureaucratic (approving expense reports, hiring/firing/promoting), and some of this is being a team facilitator. In meetings, watching that everyone is talking and that one person isn't dominating. Helping with conflict management. Pulling together people from three teams for a meeting and leading it. Agai…

I like the way you've broken this down, and I realize you're just giving examples, but your first third (service of the team) doesn't include any long-term development of employees. (Probably just because your purpose here isn't to make an exhaustive list, but it got me thinking about this.) I mention this because I think one thing that separates mediocre managers from really good ones is that the good ones understan…

Certainly, long term development of employees is part of that third, and a significant one at that. But much of growth is subtle - it's about looking at projects and going, "Person A can get it done quickly but Person B would grow and appreciate the task, and Person C feels a bit of ownership over a part of it, and will grab due to an assertive personality if I let them sort it out themselves. So I'm going to have to massage a few egos here.) That doesn't take a lot of time but it is definitely emotional labor.

Emotional labor can be hard to quantify, and so outside of 1:1s and ad-hoc goal setting meetings and reviews, it's both important and hard to quantify in terms of time. Further, it's another task that can be a peer task - that is, it's something that technical leads can do for their teams and management can reassign the rest.

The original comment was talking about taking out most of management, so it's probably something they wouldn't consider as a key management priority that couldn't be done by developers.

Re: A study finds that bosses can be useful but also sneaky

#30

Post by k__ » Wed, Oct 23, 2019, 3:41 PM UTC

mlthoughts2018 wrote: post #21

k__ wrote: post #2

People often talk about the extemes. Managers or no managers. Why can't we have something in-between? Like, instead of a manager, we have a team assistant. Someone who does burocracy and orga, but hasn't any power and the power is exercied in some way by all of the team members. This would remove the "if all do it no one does it" problem and still prevent single people decisions.

It’s such a false dilemma to say that the extremes are “manager” or “no manager.” “Manager” is somewhere in the middle. “Insane bad manager” is the extreme, not the mere existence of a management structure.

I think the quality of performed management tasks is another dimension.