7 ms·
> Ultimately you can't make any judgement of the developer without detailed understanding of the specifics of the work. You've nailed it. This is why I would
by ScottBurson 10y ago
> Ultimately you can't make any judgement of the developer without detailed understanding of the specifics of the work.
You've nailed it. This is why I would go so far as to say that someone with no programming experience can't effectively manage developers.
- pc86 10y agoYou can manage them, you just can't judge their work. I'm a team lead and I'm lucky in that my direct supervisor was a programmer for a long time, still runs a SaaS in his spare time, etc, so he gets it. But he has colleagues who are CPAs, management consultants, etc before they were managing their current dev teams. They rely a lot more on their technical leads to tell them how the other devs are doing at a technical level. They're perfectly capable of managing their professional development without having an in-depth knowledge of enterprise architecture or C#.
- ScottBurson 10y ago> They rely a lot more on their technical leads to tell them how the other devs are doing at a technical level. So the leads are de facto managers in that they're assisting the manager in managing the other developers. I think this can work, but I don't think it contradicts what I said. It just means the leads wind up doing some managing even though that's not what their titles say.
- paulgrimes1 10y agoBingo. Well said
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- crdoconnor 10y agoThis is also why remote working isn't more popular.
- jjude 10y agoCan you say how this is related? I am trying to get into remote development (after 20 years of software experience). How are the other two points mentioned earlier related to remote working? I am curious.
- bryanrasmussen 10y agowell remote working does make checking on the remote worker harder so more difficult to know what they are actually doing, but knowing if their tasks are difficult or similar things should be achievable just over chat.
- Singletoned 10y agoSadly you are right. In person, an unskilled manager can tell if it looks like you are working hard, even if they don't understand what you are doing. Remotely, they can't even tell that, and are effectively blind.
- bertil 10y agoI have noticed that people who review your code have no issue with remote work, and can easily assess your state of mind, personality traits without much more help like video and visits. It makes it harder for the people not reviewing your work.
- crdoconnor 10y agoIf you can't accurately assess the productivity of the developers by monitoring their output, you will default to metrics you can understand - usually that means monitoring the time spent in their seat. From what I've seen coding managers seem much more open to remote work than non-coding managers.
- passiveincomelg 10y agoI like this blogpost on the subject: https://www.pandastrike.com/posts/20150622-remote-assess-dev-productivity https://www.pandastrike.com/posts/20150622-remote-assess-dev...
- rubidium 10y agoI've meet one programming manager with 0 programming experience (but he was a Mech Engr). His team loved him, they got real work done, he prioritized things for them effectively, and he helped insulate them from the b.s. So, while it's rare there are certainly managers out there who can.
- vog 10y ago> and he helped insulate them from the b.s. This reminds me strongly on yesterday's Dilbert: http://dilbert.com/strip/2017-02-09 http://dilbert.com/strip/2017-02-09