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1. Don't promote based on ranking in current role. The new roles that you are promoting into aren't the current role. Being a good X doesn't mean that you will

• saiya-jin 8y ago
  > Ranking systems reward being good at the ranking system. This is how most of the banking works, anywhere (in fact I think most big oldish corporations). Most people go to the work just for the money, the mission is usually pretty pathetic and/or amoral (get rich guys richer, take as many fees from customers as possible, rob other players on the market etc). Tons of semi-competent folks, usually various managers playing their games of perception - how do I look to the guy/lady who will be distributing bonuses/promotions. I don't blame them, this is how whole system is set from C-level all the way to the bottom. That's how the top of the pyramid got there, why would they change the game they excel at. Just pure excellence at your work is possible, but a very ineffective way of getting rewards.
• bartread 8y ago
  > 1. Don't promote based on ranking in current role. The new roles that you are promoting into aren't the current role. Being a good X doesn't mean that you will be a good Y. Definitely some truth in this but one needs to be careful. I think the way to view it might be that being good at X is necessary but not sufficient to being good at Y (assuming Y is a promotion, more responsibility, etc.). If you're not performing well with the level of responsibility you have at X nobody should promote you to Y. For one thing, if you perform poorly at Y you're going to do a lot more damage than at X and the only real evidence anyone has for promoting you to Y is how you've done at X. Possibly you can (or you might think you can) test for proficiency at Y but you may well be overestimating your ability to do this, and you open yourself up to all kinds of accusations about artificiality. Not only this but high performing employees can and should legitimately question why you as a manager are unable to accurately assess their suitability based on their performance. Finally, skills are learned. Python is a learned skill; systems architecture is a learned skill; management is a learned skill. Even bad managers can learn to be good managers, and almost everybody starts out being bad at it. The key is engagement: do you want to get better at it? Are you going to invest the time in learning the skills you need to be better? If you do then, whilst it might take a while, you'll do just fine. The point with high performing employees, and why you promote them, is that they've already demonstrated the engagement and the willingness to learn that they're going to need in order to successfully take the next step. Not to say there won't be any mess on the way, and success is obviously not to be taken for granted. Also worth pointing out that even great managers encounter serious difficulties - it's somewhat in the nature of dealing with people.
  • naasking 8y ago
    > For one thing, if you perform poorly at Y you're going to do a lot more damage than at X and the only real evidence anyone has for promoting you to Y is how you've done at X But X is not indicative of performance at Y, so that's irrelevant. Project management and software development aren't overlapping skill sets, so a poor developer might make a great manager. > Finally, skills are learned. Python is a learned skill; systems architecture is a learned skill; management is a learned skill. But like any skill, some people will need a lot more work before mastering it than others. Doubtful that this investment is always worth it. > The point with high performing employees, and why you promote them, is that they've already demonstrated the engagement and the willingness to learn that they're going to need in order to successfully take the next step. Or they've just demonstrated tremendous skill at their current job which may or may not reflect "engagement", drive, ambition, whatever you think it's measuring. Some mathematical studies have actually demonstrated the truth of the Peter principle, and how many hierarchical organizations would actually improve efficiency if a certain subset of promotions were randomly selected.
• lazerwalker 8y ago
  The tricky bit for #4 is if you're, say, a high-performing engineer on a team that's being poorly mis-managed so as to create little business value, getting a disappointing performance review is far more likely to cause you to leave the organization entirely than to switch to a different team. Creating a company culture that engenders that sort of trust and loyalty is not impossible, but still non-trivial.
  • tomrod 8y ago
    That seems by design. Good skills poorly applied are t helpful in orgs that need total restructuring, I reckon? Curious for your thoughts.
    • lazerwalker 8y ago
      The parent seemed to be describing a situation where there was a market whereby good talent will inherently flow from bad projects to good projects within an organization. I think my point is they usually don't migrate to a new project within the company, they migrate to another company. It's true that good IC-level work is often a waste in an organization whose management is too dysfunctional to be focusing on the right things, but an org where all the good people leave is going to find itself in trouble.