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Why senior engineers let bad projects fail

lalitm.com

41–50 of 168 posts

Re: Why senior engineers let bad projects fail

#41
post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it's more ethical to stand up for what's right even at personal cost. Employment is a business transaction not a transaction based on ethics viewpoints

If you're not being ethical in your business transactions and decisions, you're bad at business. And life.

It seems there's a difference between unethical projects and projects that are just a bad idea. If someone wants to pay someone else to work on Uber for cat socks, but with AI, I don't think there's much of an ethical dimension.

Re: Why senior engineers let bad projects fail

#42
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

That seems like a good approach.

Re: Why senior engineers let bad projects fail

#43

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.

The entire post devolved into a treatise on playing politics and trading political capital in a specific corporate culture.

I’ve seen people who played the game well at Google or Amazon fall completely flat on their ass at a different company, thinking the game hasn’t changed (or that there even is a game), barely lasting a few months on the C suite before being softly moved along.

Re: Why senior engineers let bad projects fail

#44
post #35

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 w…

I can’t imagine holding a job where I had to do work that I expect will fail. Sounds absolutely depressing.

What keeps you motivated?

Re: Why senior engineers let bad projects fail

#47
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.

> Has it backfired?

You weren't asking me, but I'll chime in anyhow. If by "backfire" you mean have I suffered any adverse consequences, then no.

Interestingly, in several cases, I've had other engineers talk to me privately to express gratitude that I said something. They had the same concerns as I, but were too afraid to speak up for fear of consequences.

My attitude has always been that if I'm being punished for doing my job then I'm in the wrong job anyway, so I don't worry about it.

Re: Why senior engineers let bad projects fail

#48

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 someone shits on the floor, sometimes you have to let it sit and stink until someone else makes them clean it up.

If you clean it up, you're taking responsibility for it that might not be yours to take, and in an organization with many managers, that can permanently wreck your chances for advancement if those above you perceived your involvement as intruding on their territory, or trying to make them look bad, or trying to make the culprit look bad, and so on, and so forth.

Rarely is it "wow, there was a problem and they fixed it, without even being asked!"

Organizations that are rational and have good management let people take responsibility like that, and it's a good thing. Most organizations are not like that, and the bigger they get, the more likely it is you'll have an adversarial, territorial, hyper-political environment with saccharine smiles and backstabbing, and doing anything that even hints at negatively framing a manager, even just in their own minds, is sufficient reason to make it not your problem.

If you have good reasons to fix it, or if it's your problem for reasons that make management look good, you have the opportunity to fix an issue and be appreciated for it. Otherwise, it's just not worth jumping on other teams' grenades.

It'd be nice if everyone was rational and competent and secure and anti-fragile, but humans kinda suck in groups.

Re: Why senior engineers let bad projects fail

#49
> It’s important to point out that for much of the lifecycle of a project, whether it’s “bad” is highly subjective.

I can’t emphasize this part enough.

I’ve been part of some projects where someone external to the team went on a crusade to shut our work down because they disagreed with it. When we pushed through, shipped it, and it worked well they lost a lot of credibility.

Be careful about what you spend your reputational capital on.

Re: Why senior engineers let bad projects fail

#50
Definitely a big tech thing I don’t miss. At a startup everyone is trying to make the company succeed vs pet projects, so giving advice about architectural decisions or helping fellow engineers with areas you have more expertise in is often welcomed. There are always pros and cons, but that type of culture is so much more fun. Even on hard days I love working with people who want to help each other.
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