Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

No management needed: anti-patterns in early-stage engineering teams

ablg.io

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 361 posts

Re: No management needed: anti-patterns in early-stage engineering teams

#21

Post by Swizec »

> at 15 engineers, it is very doable for a single person to keep track of everyone's work and ensure alignment.

All my past experience disagrees. Sure you have 15 engineers, but you're supporting a business of 150 people. This is a pretty common ratio.

The noise gets very loud at that scale and it becomes almost impossible for self-managed engineers to make forward progress. At the very least you need super clearly defined ownership boundaries. That means business process and workstream ownership, not code ownership.

Re: No management needed: anti-patterns in early-stage engineering teams

#22

Post by cmrdporcupine »

This is all a bit messy to read, but seems TFA recommends against 1:1s and any kind of ticket management or any eng. management all when you have 5-6 engineers and this ... insane.

People need to get on the same page. You don't need to be (shouldn't be) process insane or go SCRUM or whatever to do that. But having regular organized interactions and task definitions is absolutely imperative even early on when you don't know for sure what you'll be doing.

Re: No management needed: anti-patterns in early-stage engineering teams

#24

Post by yfw »

I used to be very motivated to do the right thing but the culture at my company doesnt reward it and actually actively seems to be promoting bad practices e.g. not documenting. Now I also dgaf.

You dont necessarily need managers but you do need someone to set expectations and keep the team accountable. Otherwise its a race to the bottom. There's no way for me as a single engineer to undo slop faster than its generated.

Re: No management needed: anti-patterns in early-stage engineering teams

#25

Post by 1121redblackgo »

dcastm wrote: post #19
systemtest wrote: post #10

When I read about 996-style culture I am happy to be European. That would not work here. 40 hours per week max and most engineers prefer to not work more than 32 hours a week. So you have a good work/life balance. I currently work 4 hours a week.

Which is why fewer and fewer companies are hiring in Europe.

And why people are jumping out of buildings, actually and metaphorically, in 996 cultures.

Re: No management needed: anti-patterns in early-stage engineering teams

#26

Post by OhMeadhbh »

jayd16 wrote: post #15

I think its clearly false that motivation is an inherent trait. That would imply that demotivation is also inherent, which I think is even more obviously wrong.

it's not hard to de-motivate people. but here's the thing... not everyone is motivated by the same thing. the trick of motivating people as a manager is spending the time to figure out what motivates them.

and if you could only de-motivate people, eventually everyone in your team would be de-motivated.

Re: No management needed: anti-patterns in early-stage engineering teams

#27

Post by pyrale »

> I know several top 1% engineers in the Valley who disengage from recruiting processes when 996 or something similar is mentioned.

A few years back, on this board, 996 was something people made fun of when it was reported that some Chinese companies did it [1].

And now, the strongest claim this blog can make is that some engineers in the US would disengage from recruiting? That the issue with working on saturdays is daily standup? What happened in these years for such a change to happen?!

[1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19507620

Re: No management needed: anti-patterns in early-stage engineering teams

#28

Post by cmrdporcupine »

burnto wrote: post #18

> Motivation is a hired trait. The only place where managers motivate people is in management books Initial motivation is the hired trait. It’s very easy to demotivate people. The trick is to not do that.

Yep people have all sorts of sources of motivations. One of the key ones is a sense of ownership. Many people join startups instead of BigCorp because they want voice and influence that they don't get in a larger company. I've seen so many founders, managers, leaders, etc kill that by not recognizing this fundamental fact.

Of course there's also the problem that you can find and hire people who are motivated people but there's absolutely no guarantee people are going to be motivated for your specific problem.

Re: No management needed: anti-patterns in early-stage engineering teams

#29

Post by crazygringo »

> do not adopt all the "Scrum rituals" like standups, retros, etc. wholesale, and if you do, keep them asynchronous. There is little added value to a voiced update

I couldn't disagree more. I know it's an unpopular opinion, but when standups are done synchronously, everyone actually pays attention, notices blocks and helps with them. Things get surfaced and quickly addressed that simply wouldn't otherwise, which is the purpose of standups. When it's async, people just put in what they're working on and mostly ignore everyone else. Standups need to be about 2-way communication, not 1-way.

And retrospectives are about improving how the team works. Every team has challenges of every kind. Retrospectives are for surfacing those and addressing them. They take up a couple hours a week, but the idea is that after several months the team is more productive and it pays for itself in time.

> Organic 1:1s (as opposed to recurring ones): keep them topic-heavy and ad-hoc, as opposed to relationship maintenance like in the corporate world.

Also disagree. 1-1's aren't about "relationship maintenance", again they're about surfacing issues that wouldn't arise organically -- all the little things that aren't worth scheduling a conversation over, but which need to be addressed for smooth functioning.

At the end of the day, managing a team is managing a team. In terms of managing people, it's not fundamentally that different if you're a 10-engineer startup or a team of 10 engineers at a megacorp. These things aren't "anti-patterns" or "rituals". When done correctly, they work. (Obviously, if done badly, they don't -- so if you're managing a team, do them correctly.)

Re: No management needed: anti-patterns in early-stage engineering teams

#30

Post by Nextgrid »

alephnerd wrote: post #12
systemtest wrote: post #10

When I read about 996-style culture I am happy to be European. That would not work here. 40 hours per week max and most engineers prefer to not work more than 32 hours a week. So you have a good work/life balance. I currently work 4 hours a week.

You don't have to work at an early stage startup - in fact most people don't. But some people do wish to participate in an early stage startup, and plenty do in Europe as well. > So you have a good work/life balance. I currently work 4 hours a week. And this is why when I was a PM, we shut down our Amsterdam office and shifted it to Praha, Bucharest, and Warsaw. You won't find as many people who will complain about a…

As usual, the problem is not 996 itself but comp. You can get 996, you just have to pay for it.

The reason Europeans don't want to do 996 is because the extra effort isn't fairly compensated.

Post reply on HN