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Meta to ask many managers to become individual contributors or leave

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Re: Meta to ask many managers to become individual contributors or leave

#481

Post by Izkata »

the_af wrote: post #201
Izkata wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> this is the usual name I dunno if it's just me, but it seems like the term came out of nowhere just a couple years ago.

True! I meant the usual name now . For me it's the same as Engineer Manager: it seems to have come out of nowhere but it's the standard now. Before we called them simply "managers" (or sometimes "team leaders" of the non-technical variety). PS: are you by any chance the same Izkata as the one in scifi.se?

Yep I am. Haven't been very active there for a while though, usually just end up there from Hot Questions when procrastinating.

Re: Meta to ask many managers to become individual contributors or leave

#482

Post by brookst »

likeabbas wrote: post #463
brookst wrote: post #459

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's an interesting thought, but I don't know how you "normalize" it if companies find that they are more profitable paying managers more.

The same way anything is normalized. One person/company does something, posts the outcomes of it, then other people follow. I don't think many companies have tested this logic out, as management style in tech is inherited from older corps. I think this could have great benefits. If a manager's job salary is directly capped to the average of their ICs, then it's their benefit to make the best engineers and show that t…

I still don't see how you beat the market-driven salary. Don't you have to pay market rate for good managers, and market rate for good IC's?

If a company unilaterally cuts manager pay, they presumably won't get great managers, or at least not good managers who also want to be paid fairly.

It also means managers will only want to manage more senior IC's, so as to benefit from the higher salary, while it's the junior IC's who need more capable management.

Re: Meta to ask many managers to become individual contributors or leave

#483

Post by ugh123 »

lelanthran wrote: post #313
ugh123 wrote: post #160

This is good. We're finally pulling back on the "HRBP-sponsored" people-management hype train thats rolled through much of SV startups and FAANG over the last 5-10 years: "Focus on your people, give them the support and mentorship they need to grow. Also 1-on-1s every week." - and all that bullshit.

> "Focus on your people, give them the support and mentorship they need to grow. Also 1-on-1s every week." - and all that bullshit. Taking the cynical view, that BS is there for a reason. It makes it easier to performance manage people out very very quickly . The optimistic view is that that BS enables people to never let their productivity drop below a certain level. The extreme cynical view is to wonder why you are…

Well said! I think my experience with this was combined with a cover-your-ass HR team that was very hesitant about putting anyone on performance review (PIP, etc) without loads of documentation and 2nd/3rd chances.

It seemed like we, as managers, were expected to turn a low performing IC into something magical with an indefinite timeline where we should have just pulled the plug after 6 months and moved on.

Re: Meta to ask many managers to become individual contributors or leave

#484

Post by solarmist »

bradlys wrote: post #469
solarmist wrote: post #419

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The distinguishing factor I've seen is servant leadership [1]. They believe that supporting and developing their people is their main job. Execution is just a prerequisite to being able to do the rest. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Servant_leadership

The problem is that what makes a good manager for an IC does not make a good manager for the manager’s manager. They are fundamentally at odds unless you have servant leadership from the top down. (Which is nearly unheard of)

I disagree. What are you thinking of that’s at odds with it?

The only thing I can think of is MBA disease. But that’s rent seeking not productive management techniques.

Re: Meta to ask many managers to become individual contributors or leave

#485

Post by dilyevsky »

dekhn wrote: post #64

I've been a manager once- only because of necessity while working at a rapidly growing startup- and it's not a role for me. I loved being an IC at Google and other employers, and no matter how much I tried, I couldn't convince myself that by being a manager I'd have more impact, or achieve more of my goals, or be happier. I'd like to see more people-managers who aren't also product-managers and tech-leads: people who…

> I'd like to see more people-managers who aren't also product-managers and tech-leads: people whose job is to manage people, not work on the technical side of what the managed people work on. Some people are really good at this and should focus on it, to the exclusion of coding.

I’ve worked with managers like this but they were pretty rare ime. Most of the time it’s either a product person or someone who is subpar engineer grabbing the power seat bc that’s the only way they ever going to have any say in anything

Re: Meta to ask many managers to become individual contributors or leave

#486

Post by NonEUCitizen »

smeagull wrote: post #274

Should've just kept more of the ICs and asked the managers to leave. I'd take a less experienced person who has been doing something for the past two years over a more experienced person who hasn't.

You're implying here that ICs are less experienced than managers, which is not the case.

Re: Meta to ask many managers to become individual contributors or leave

#487

Post by khazhoux »

ncann wrote: post #458
likeabbas wrote: post #427

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IMO the easiest way to solve this issue would be to normalize ICs making more than their managers. That way, only the people who really want to be managers are managing.

I agree. Too often people feel becoming manager is the easiest way to advance their career (which most of the time equates to making more money). In many cases becoming manager is the only way to advance their career in the current org.

Management track is usually the only way to be in the room where decisions get made. Sure, the top engineers will be consulted and kept in the loop, but 99% of the strategy discussions and planning happens without them.

So for people with an innate need to join in the steering of the ship, there’s only one career path.

Re: Meta to ask many managers to become individual contributors or leave

#488

Post by operatingthetan »

lelanthran wrote: post #282
com2kid wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It has been in common use for at least 15, if not 20 years. Very common phrase in the tech industry.

> It has been in common use for at least 15, if not 20 years. I've been in the industry since 1998. The first time I saw it was on HN a few years ago (maybe 3 or 4).

I just searched HN and found references 12 years ago.

Re: Meta to ask many managers to become individual contributors or leave

#489

Post by vonnik »

karaterobot wrote: post #386

It's too bad, because the best managers I've worked with were not good ICs, but they did multiply the effectiveness of the ICs they worked with, and so were absolutely invaluable to the company in a way that may not have shown up on paper. If those people exist in FB, as I'm sure they must, then they'd presumably get jettisoned as a result of this choice. That would be bad long term. I used to despise managers, until…

What the leading indicators of a good manager? How would you recognize one in a hiring process?

Re: Meta to ask many managers to become individual contributors or leave

#490

Post by backtoyoujim »

csense wrote: post #462
_9omd wrote: post #446

Chamath talked about manager bloat on a recent All-in podcast in a way that seemed to make sense. Basically there is pressure to grow your career by moving from being an IC to a manager and once a manager there are incentives to grow your number of reports. The organizational efficiency suffers when you have top tier ICs start managing teams of average people. You might get a team of 6 engineers that’s only doing 2x…

If the reward for competence is promotion, in the steady-state equilibrium everybody's incompetent at their current job: If they were competent, they would have been promoted into a different job. It's called the Peter Principle [1] and it's pretty well-known. I suppose Facebook's realized it's in a Peter Principle situation, and the remedy for it would, in theory, be to send some of the people back to previous jobs…

The Gervais Principle

https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-...

... illustrates the fallacy of the Peter Principle.

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