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

Master the Art of the Product Manager 'No'

letsnotdothat.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 173 posts

Re: Master the Art of the Product Manager 'No'

#71

Post by unkulunkulu »

3vidence wrote: post #61
dyarosla wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, but rarely: Some engineer wants it bad enough that they just build it -or some version of it- and then some executive gives the go-ahead to invest more into it. At the end of the day, ideas are just ideas. Execution is everything.

I've learned the value of this. Some people don't realize the value of something unless you show it to them. It's a risk for sure but honestly it keeps me sane vs trying to get 10 people aligned before starting something and then running out of time. People will happily take credit for your work after it works.

yep, an engineer has the power to directly influence the code. This is a strong power. Sometimes just making a PR is enough and a good convincer in and of itself.

Use sparingly of course, weigh in time for making the argument, but this is an artifact just as a convincing research, text or a plot. code can be part of the argument.

Re: Master the Art of the Product Manager 'No'

#72

Post by caminante »

droopyEyelids wrote: post #64
caminante wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Re: climate change, what can the US and other actors do for "support" when China's still at Yes Minister step 1? China's the biggest emitter and doesn't care. [0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_greenhous...

As an aside, there is a bit of a disconnect in how the west interpret's China as "not caring" whenever China doesn't make a lot of noise about publicly fixing something. The party can care, but decide something gets less priority, and put it in their backlog, the same way a project manager can! Air quality and industrial pollutants are a good example. Right now, China is prioritizing industrial expansion and energy s…

Listen to yourself. There is no disconnect.

Deprioritizing is not caring. Saying otherwise is crazy!

Re: Master the Art of the Product Manager 'No'

#73

Post by caminante »

rat87 wrote: post #43
caminante wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Re: climate change, what can the US and other actors do for "support" when China's still at Yes Minister step 1? China's the biggest emitter and doesn't care. [0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_greenhous...

Start by not doing But China on global warming Second step do more as a country Third step try to shame or encourage China and other countries into doing more The US is still in the lead for total emissions historically and has a higher emissions per person. If it ignores it's responsibility it makes it very easy for China not to mention India or other lower total emissions countries to do the same. China is doing so…

Not working.

Do more? The US is buying pv panels produced on Chinese coal power. And no party is catching China's GHG productions.

Arguing cumulative historicals is playing into propaganda, and per capita? China is doing enough? They're building new coal plants! You can't be serious.

Re: Master the Art of the Product Manager 'No'

#74

Post by exodust »

> "Interesting idea, let's explore that next quarter"

Nothing wrong there, it's not "no". Sometimes we put ideas on ice until there's time, or other factors align.

If your role is long-term, you have the underrated power of long-term planning. Often in past I saw the desire to tear down and hastily build something amazing in a few weeks, rather than chip away long-term where "amazing" gradually fades into view.

This one time, I was asked to make a countdown timer for new website launch, back when I worked with PM's who thought users gave a shit about website launches.

Re: Master the Art of the Product Manager 'No'

#75

Post by [deleted] »

elevatedastalt wrote: post #37
p1necone wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my experience the more fine grained an organizations issue tracking/planning is the more this is a problem vs a reasonable process. If you have to convince someone of all of those things in order to build some reasonably large thing over the space of a few weeks, that's probably reasonable. If you have to convince someone of all of those things in order to allocate a few hours to fixing some tech debt or minor bug…

Usually most engineers have some slack time and can pick things up to fix. The problem is not in them doing that. The issues arrises in one of two things— [1] They either use the fact that they are fixing that thing as an excuse to not work on or deliver on time a different, more important task. If that happens, obvious questions about prioritization occur. [2] They want a substantial amount of credit or recognition…

[deleted]

Re: Master the Art of the Product Manager 'No'

#76

Post by jopicornell »

caminante wrote: post #42
JohnMakin wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On climate change, are we somewhere between step 3 and 4? It sure looks a lot that way to me. Maybe closer to 4 soon. That conversation is exhausting, or kind of the inverse of this, overwhelming confidence in the success of future technologies that do not really exist yet.

Re: climate change, what can the US and other actors do for "support" when China's still at Yes Minister step 1? China's the biggest emitter and doesn't care. [0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_greenhous...

Let's not forget that China is the producer of the world and we are also responsible of that.

Then there is the misconception that China doesn't care, but their cities are a lot greener and prepared for transitioning to green renewals than many west countries.

Re: Master the Art of the Product Manager 'No'

#78

Post by rat87 »

caminante wrote: post #73
rat87 wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Start by not doing But China on global warming Second step do more as a country Third step try to shame or encourage China and other countries into doing more The US is still in the lead for total emissions historically and has a higher emissions per person. If it ignores it's responsibility it makes it very easy for China not to mention India or other lower total emissions countries to do the same. China is doing so…

Not working. Do more? The US is buying pv panels produced on Chinese coal power. And no party is catching China's GHG productions. Arguing cumulative historicals is playing into propaganda, and per capita? China is doing enough? They're building new coal plants! You can't be serious.

We need to do much much much more. Starting with banning ICE cars by 2035 if not sooner

Did I say China was doing enough? No

Are they do enough?

Hell no

Is the US doing enough? Hell no

Arguing historicals and per capita plays into Chinese propaganda because there is some truth to it. There is also truth to the fact that China emits twice as much as the US and almost a third of the worlds emissions.

I don't like or trust the authorian dictatorship of China

But are you going to get China to emit less then they currently do by reversing the already inadequate measures the US is taking? No. We need to do much much more and get China and other countries to do more

If we use excuses of other countries to do less then so will they and we will all burn up together.

Re: Master the Art of the Product Manager 'No'

#79

Post by [deleted] »

davidgerard wrote: post #35
karaterobot wrote: post #27

I kind of wish the answer would just be "no, we're not doing that". The lines in this website all strike me as a way to toy with people's expectations. If I had an idea, and presented it, and a PM told me "let’s keep this in mind for future consideration" or anything like that, I'd either take them at their word, or not. If I take them at their word, I'll either keep believing my input was considered valuable, and th…

Are you in the US? In UK companies, everything from that bot is somewhere between "no" and "no, fuck off". The more qualifiers you add, the ruder you're intending to be.

[deleted]

Re: Master the Art of the Product Manager 'No'

#80

Post by skibz »

gorfian_robot wrote: post #21
gatkinso wrote: post #14

How about a "no" to having product managers?

Well, look, I already told you. I deal with the goddamn customers so the engineers don't have to!! I have people skills!! I am good at dealing with people!!! Can't you understand that?!? WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE?!!!!!!!

Somehow, I knew I'd run into an Office Space reference in this thread.

(Context: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hNuu9CpdjIo&t=56s)

Post reply on HN