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Why senior engineers let bad projects fail

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Re: Why senior engineers let bad projects fail

#31

Post by dpkirchner »

BikiniPrince wrote: post #9

Reminds me of one of my managers who said, “Sometimes, you have to let people fail.” It does take a lot of energy to keep some people afloat. My hope has always been they learn to swim as it were, but sometimes it’s just effort better spent elsewhere. I know one project did not have my involvement and couldn’t have succeeded without my knowledge. They were so bad they would work in questions casually to their actual…

> Reminds me of one of my managers who said, “Sometimes, you have to let people fail.”

Yup -- I've learned a lot from my failures. Far be it for me to deny others that experience. Assuming their failures won't result in the company imploding or other serious harm, of course.

Re: Why senior engineers let bad projects fail

#32

Post by tyleo »

dwaltrip wrote: post #22
tyleo wrote: post #2

I disagree, and I think this advice can be actively harmful. You shouldn’t ignore a problem when you’re in a position to help. At the same time, you also shouldn’t take on the emotional burden of other people’s projects. If I see something heading toward failure, I let people know they may want to consider a different approach. That’s it. There’s no need to be harsh or belabor the point but it’s better to speak up th…

How well has that worked? Has it backfired? I think you both are right in different ways.

I’ve generally had more good outcomes than bad, as long as I don’t take on the emotional burden myself.

Some people don’t actually want advice. In those cases, the issue isn’t technical, it’s interpersonal. In my experience, engineers who refuse to hear advice tend to struggle the most for obvious reasons.

Where I’ve gone wrong is taking on the emotional weight of other people’s projects. When I do that, the balance shifts toward more bad outcomes than good ones.

Re: Why senior engineers let bad projects fail

#33

Post by whattheheckheck »

ajkjk wrote: post #4

Letting it die is the self-serving, career-optimizing, amoral take. But it's more ethical to stand up for what's right even at personal cost. A bunch of people wasting years of their life, not to mention all the resources, is a tragedy worth avoiding. Of course, the wisdom of taking the person risk is a continuum. In some cases it is and in some it isn't. But.. To omit the ethical angle entirely seems like a bad take…

How do you know it's right? You can't run the same experiment of life twice so you only get one shot

Re: Why senior engineers let bad projects fail

#34

Post by darth_avocado »

DetroitThrow wrote: post #12
tyleo wrote: post #2

I disagree, and I think this advice can be actively harmful. You shouldn’t ignore a problem when you’re in a position to help. At the same time, you also shouldn’t take on the emotional burden of other people’s projects. If I see something heading toward failure, I let people know they may want to consider a different approach. That’s it. There’s no need to be harsh or belabor the point but it’s better to speak up th…

>If I see something heading toward failure, I let people know they may want to consider a different approach. That’s it. There’s no need to be harsh or belabor the point but it’s better to speak up than to quietly watch a train wreck unfold. Yes, it seems cruel and also counter to ensuring the org succeeds. Your perceived ability as an engineer might go up if your colleagues fail, but your colleagues failing when you…

> Yes, it seems cruel and also counter to ensuring the org succeeds. Your perceived ability as an engineer might go up if your colleagues fail, but your colleagues failing when you knew a possible way for things to go better is harmful to your org's goals and culture

In hypothetical situations where every single person has good intentions, sure. Human beings are complex and sometimes, this doesn’t sit well with others. I personally know of someone who when did this, ended up with a manager escalation and eventually losing their job. Because someone else felt their competence being questioned and took it as an opportunity to get someone who tried to help, get fired.

Sometime a good deed doesn’t go unpunished. Corporate culture mostly dictates that only help when asked, when it will come back to bite you, or if the you know the people who are being helped closely. Everything else, don’t get involved.

Re: Why senior engineers let bad projects fail

#35

Post by BeetleB »

BikiniPrince wrote: post #9

Reminds me of one of my managers who said, “Sometimes, you have to let people fail.” It does take a lot of energy to keep some people afloat. My hope has always been they learn to swim as it were, but sometimes it’s just effort better spent elsewhere. I know one project did not have my involvement and couldn’t have succeeded without my knowledge. They were so bad they would work in questions casually to their actual…

> Reminds me of one of my managers who said, “Sometimes, you have to let people fail.”

I often say "Sometimes, you have to let the manager fail."

Some managers don't like being told their ideas won't work. If you refuse or argue, you are seen as the reason his idea failed. I've found what works best with them is to proceed with the work, but keep them informed very frequently, so they can see how things evolve, and will be able to see the failure you had anticipated a long time ago before it is too late.

Then you're seen in a positive light, and he'll separate you from the project failure.

Re: Why senior engineers let bad projects fail

#36

Post by stavros »

dzink wrote: post #13

If one person thinks this way, many more do. This is typical in large organizations, especially government institutions, because expense of running entire teams at massive costs for no reason is not born by the team but by someone with a much larger budget that has more money than care or completely wrong incentives (the more people I manage, the more important I am, type of orgs). This is organizational gangrene des…

Humans think this way. This isn't a cultural thing, it's human nature. We like positive people and dislike negative people. Ignoring the fact that political capital is a thing won't make it go away.

Re: Why senior engineers let bad projects fail

#37

Post by recursive »

ajkjk wrote: post #4

Letting it die is the self-serving, career-optimizing, amoral take. But it's more ethical to stand up for what's right even at personal cost. A bunch of people wasting years of their life, not to mention all the resources, is a tragedy worth avoiding. Of course, the wisdom of taking the person risk is a continuum. In some cases it is and in some it isn't. But.. To omit the ethical angle entirely seems like a bad take…

I don't understand this point of view. Most of the people aren't wasting their time. They're getting paid for the effort. The business is taking a risk, and pays people to realize their vision. Some visions are bad.

Getting personally attached and emotionally invested in work you get paid for is a risk too. There's nothing wrong with that. But there's also nothing wrong putting your time in and churning out requirements if that's what you want.

Re: Why senior engineers let bad projects fail

#38

Post by cidd »

aaronbrethorst wrote: post #17

I have to question the judgment of the manager talking shit about another team and its leader to a junior engineer. Going and looking at the author's LinkedIn history (it's available via his About page) makes it pretty clear that this was happening within Google. I think it speaks poorly of their manager's professionalism, and what sort of behavior they consider to be acceptable with regard to colleagues.

If you read his article he said he is from Google.

Re: Why senior engineers let bad projects fail

#39

Post by rgmerk »

ajkjk wrote: post #4

Letting it die is the self-serving, career-optimizing, amoral take. But it's more ethical to stand up for what's right even at personal cost. A bunch of people wasting years of their life, not to mention all the resources, is a tragedy worth avoiding. Of course, the wisdom of taking the person risk is a continuum. In some cases it is and in some it isn't. But.. To omit the ethical angle entirely seems like a bad take…

There’s also the possibility that you’re not omniscient and the project succeeds.

Re: Why senior engineers let bad projects fail

#40

Post by chc4 »

alphazard wrote: post #27

Companies need ways for individuals to bet against projects and people that are likely to fail. So much of the overhead in a large organization is from bad decisions, or people who usually make bad decisions remaining in positions of power. Imagine if instead of having to speak up, and risk political capital, you could simply place a bet, and carry on with your work. Leadership can see that people are betting against…

brb taking out a 10:1 bet on a new project which will print money and then rm -rf'ing all the code so i get a payout
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