4 ms·

I tried to go without assigning bosses on my R&D engineering team, a group of about 8 people, and I did this for about six months. I thought these are creative

I tried to go without assigning bosses on my R&D engineering team, a group of about 8 people, and I did this for about six months. I thought these are creative smart types and don't really need a boss. But after time I found, without bosses, people do crazy stuff, like sit at their desk for two days without internet/email access and just not tell anyone about it or ask for help to fix their issue. Now, all teams have a report and that just works better.

ritchiea 11y ago
That sounds like an entirely different problem. You shouldn't need a boss to speak up and communicate to someone that your work environment is broken.
- michaelt 11y ago
  OK, there's an entirely different problem. Who is responsible for fixing the problem if not the guy's boss?
  - UK-AL 11y ago
    The infrastructure team?
    - michaelt 11y ago
      If a guy has sat at their desk for two days without internet/email access and didn't tell anyone about it or ask for help, you can hardly blame the infrastructure team for not fixing a problem they weren't told about. The problem is either a cultural one within the team (if he was scared to ask colleagues for help) or an induction one (if he didn't know how to ask for help, or didn't know he had to) or a communication one (if he had no way to contact infrastructure or anyone on his team) or a motivation/expectation setting one (if he felt like taking an in-office vacation, or that nobody would notice or mind if he did nothing) or a hiring one (if he didn't know what a computer was, or he was being intentionally uncooperative as some sort of protest against his own job) All those problems are things I'd expect a competent line manager to address.
      - jonlucc 11y ago
        On the communication one: I work for a large pharma company that switched from physical phones to VOIP through Lync. Well they sent an email a week in advance and updated Lync, but the update required a user to sign in again. I had many people ask me what to do, but the other wisdom floating around was to call our IT help line. Without Lync, we can't make calls to fix Lync.
      - jonlucc 11y ago
        On the communication one: I work for a large pharma company that switched from physical phones to VOIP through Lync. Well they sent an email a week in advance and updated Lync, but the update required a user to sign in again. I had many people ask me what to do, but the other wisdom floating around was to call our IT help line. Without Lync, we can't make calls to fix Lync.

ritchiea 11y ago

That sounds like an entirely different problem. You shouldn't need a boss to speak up and communicate to someone that your work environment is broken.

michaelt 11y ago
OK, there's an entirely different problem. Who is responsible for fixing the problem if not the guy's boss?
- UK-AL 11y ago
  The infrastructure team?
  - michaelt 11y ago
    If a guy has sat at their desk for two days without internet/email access and didn't tell anyone about it or ask for help, you can hardly blame the infrastructure team for not fixing a problem they weren't told about. The problem is either a cultural one within the team (if he was scared to ask colleagues for help) or an induction one (if he didn't know how to ask for help, or didn't know he had to) or a communication one (if he had no way to contact infrastructure or anyone on his team) or a motivation/expectation setting one (if he felt like taking an in-office vacation, or that nobody would notice or mind if he did nothing) or a hiring one (if he didn't know what a computer was, or he was being intentionally uncooperative as some sort of protest against his own job) All those problems are things I'd expect a competent line manager to address.
    - jonlucc 11y ago
      On the communication one: I work for a large pharma company that switched from physical phones to VOIP through Lync. Well they sent an email a week in advance and updated Lync, but the update required a user to sign in again. I had many people ask me what to do, but the other wisdom floating around was to call our IT help line. Without Lync, we can't make calls to fix Lync.
    - jonlucc 11y ago
      On the communication one: I work for a large pharma company that switched from physical phones to VOIP through Lync. Well they sent an email a week in advance and updated Lync, but the update required a user to sign in again. I had many people ask me what to do, but the other wisdom floating around was to call our IT help line. Without Lync, we can't make calls to fix Lync.