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> Job titles squash the peculiar strengths and differences into a label and make organizations treat people as fungible units of work. I'd think having clear j

> Job titles squash the peculiar strengths and differences into a label and make organizations treat people as fungible units of work. I'd think having clear job titles and differentiation would have the opposite effect of treating people as fungible units of work. I'm sorta with you on job titles, but my experience is that they enable organizational clarity, and people tend to like to show this reflected on their resumes/CVs. I'm curious to hear more about your thoughts on this.

DVassallo 8y ago
The fact that organizations rely on job titles to measure/understand their capabilities is the problem. Sure, it’s simpler to think in labels/titles, but the strength is in the individuals. Look at team sports as a counter example where the thinking is in terms of the individuals, not labels.
- ticmasta 8y ago
  What size company do you work at? how many distinct product lines? A sports team is 12-50 people, plus an immense supporting team, many with very specialized roles but all aligned towards a very well understood goal and pretty stratified options for success. A company could be hundreds or thousands of people with very diverse or even conflicting goals, spread over countless geographies and sub-teams. Should the technical lead know their team mates by individual traits? absolutely but the VP can't possibly maintain that cognitive load and needs titles & positions to guide there actions. Your counter example basically says every team owner knows everything the coach or sub-team coordinator knows, which is not true.
  - DVassallo 8y ago
    I worked at Amazon for 8 years; just left last month. Although the company has ~50K engineers, teams were made up of 8-10 people and orgs generally of around 200 people. The size of the company didn’t matter. Amazon could function just fine without job levels, and IMO it would function better. The VP doesn’t need to know the individuals. They can let the org leaders to deal with those details.
    - joshuamorton 8y ago
      How does one determine who is VP or org leader without either de facto job levels?
      - DVassallo 8y ago
        Those are different roles. I meant job levels when I said titles.
- tkxxx7 8y ago
  > Look at team sports as a counter example where the thinking is in terms of the individuals, not labels. You still have your best players starting and a number on the bench. This is analogous to specific software teams (front-end, back-end, etc.).

DVassallo 8y ago

The fact that organizations rely on job titles to measure/understand their capabilities is the problem. Sure, it’s simpler to think in labels/titles, but the strength is in the individuals. Look at team sports as a counter example where the thinking is in terms of the individuals, not labels.

ticmasta 8y ago
What size company do you work at? how many distinct product lines? A sports team is 12-50 people, plus an immense supporting team, many with very specialized roles but all aligned towards a very well understood goal and pretty stratified options for success. A company could be hundreds or thousands of people with very diverse or even conflicting goals, spread over countless geographies and sub-teams. Should the technical lead know their team mates by individual traits? absolutely but the VP can't possibly maintain that cognitive load and needs titles & positions to guide there actions. Your counter example basically says every team owner knows everything the coach or sub-team coordinator knows, which is not true.
- DVassallo 8y ago
  I worked at Amazon for 8 years; just left last month. Although the company has ~50K engineers, teams were made up of 8-10 people and orgs generally of around 200 people. The size of the company didn’t matter. Amazon could function just fine without job levels, and IMO it would function better. The VP doesn’t need to know the individuals. They can let the org leaders to deal with those details.
  - joshuamorton 8y ago
    How does one determine who is VP or org leader without either de facto job levels?
    - DVassallo 8y ago
      Those are different roles. I meant job levels when I said titles.
tkxxx7 8y ago
> Look at team sports as a counter example where the thinking is in terms of the individuals, not labels. You still have your best players starting and a number on the bench. This is analogous to specific software teams (front-end, back-end, etc.).