5 ms·

I can't find the exact quote, but I think it was Aristotle who said (something along the lines of) "we haven't mastered the art of teaching, except to those for

I can't find the exact quote, but I think it was Aristotle who said (something along the lines of) "we haven't mastered the art of teaching, except to those for whom it is superfluous". This is still true today, and, I think, true of each and every single management fad. Things like deadlines, status reports, daily standups, open offices, tickets, and retrospectives are designed around the assumption of a reluctant workforce who have to be clubbed into line. If you assume that's what you're dealing with, you're going to gravitate toward heavy-handed means of control and conversely, if you gravitate toward brutal overseer managerial tactics, you're sending the signal to the workforce that you expect them to push the envelope and accomplish as little as possible within the narrow parameters of your dictatorial cruelty. If you assume that we're all on the same team, you'll get good results as long as we are. If you assume that we're not, there's no level of threatening or punishment you can dish out that will.

vlehto 8y ago
I've noticed that thing too. People are incredibly sensitive to assumptions. If you order someone to do X, they might, if you ask, the might. But assume that they will do X and you do it aloud, they more likely to do X than in any other case. I have stolen because it was assumed that I would. And that's totally not my normal style of operation.
everdev 8y ago
> the assumption of a reluctant workforce From interviewing hundreds and managing dozens, I'd say that this is unfortunately largely accurate and not through anyone's malicious intent, but just human nature. A good salary helps to mask the reluctance, but deep down most people aren't living their lifelong dream at their day job. There are many other things we'd rather be doing with our time and I think good managers understand and accept that. Some people are just off the charts innately consistently productive, but most aren't and need motivation to stay focused. Deadlines are a tool that works for some people. Others need praise, others need purpose, others need creative freedom. But deep down I think most of us need some external motivation to stay focused for 6-8 hours a day. But when you do find that person that can consistently self-motivate, hire them and keep them. It makes everything so much easier.
- kodz4 8y ago
  Agree. Also more than human nature, it's a highly competitive world. If a manager in the org, is producing results using a heavy handed approach, you can be sure your boss is going to be knocking on your door to have a little chat about "improving things" in your teams. It's not a bad thing. Pushes good managers to evolve their own systems.
- bamboozled 8y ago
  I'd agree and also like to add that after seeing many teams without any imposed deadlines or pressure, I can tell you those teams who are "free to roam" also end up even more frustrated and unhappy because they often feel less part of a success story and ultimately that they're wasting their time. Time boxing projects teaches people to innovate and become more resourceful. I've seen endless scope creep since starting at my latest company where people aren't help to any type of deadline. I think the best approach is to have deadlines but allow teams to workout how they manage their time during that window.
- munk-a 8y ago
  I know that some people do find their dream job but most people cannot - trying to demand that people love their occupation is too extreme for me. Make working a positive experience, fairly share the fruits of their labour with them (allowing them that pride and connection with their production) and you'll find most people respond positively. Some people may legitimately just love working but that isn't a reasonable expectation. All that said, I think deadlines are terrible, they create a sense of cram and ease which works people out of a habit of working while at work. It's better to hide deadlines at the management level and make sure everything is comfortably budgeted, then just transition from one project or task to the next smoothly, without rushing pressure or the "months" scale of doing a thing that can cause it to never be done. I worked in a job where overtime[1] was the norm for a while, I hated it, put on stress weight, and don't wish that lifestyle of zombie living on anyone. It builds up extreme resentment and lowers productivity so, as a manager, realize that if your project is pushing a deadline you, the manager, have failed utterly. Then seek help from your employees and try and get it done on time, be open about your mistake, make it clear how you'll address it and, seriously, keep overtime and deadline press to the exceptional case rather than the regular. [1] Oh hey, for bonus points... where I work in BC overtime for tech workers is, by default, uncompensated... and we have nobody but EA and a compliant local Liberal[2] party to thank for that stupidity. [2] Not liberal as in leftist, "Liberal"... in fact "BC Liberal" is a term up here as they are the most conservative of the parties.
doitLP 8y ago
> Things like deadlines, status reports, daily standups, open offices, tickets, and retrospectives are designed around the assumption of a reluctant workforce who have to be clubbed into line. Certainly true in some cases but needing data from the areas and people you manage is an essential need of all management, no matter its style. Tickets, stand ups, daily reports, they’re all ways to make the employee or their work _legible_ from the outside. How that legibility is used is another matter.
alexpetralia 8y ago
I seriously can't believe how many businesses think their employees are stupid, or that they can trick their employees. Word spreads, and people will hate you forever if they find out. It's just not worth it.
hinkley 8y ago
At least some of the people 'responsible' for this current state of affairs didn't want things to be this way. In responsible hands, the graphs and metrics from Scrum or Kanban can be used to demonstrate how policies are actively hurting the development team. The information contained in them can tell more tales than just how we could have gotten slightly more done this week. There may be a lack of responsible hands. It could be that it always has been that case, and you have to promote processes that don't presume an adequate and consistent supply of such hands. I don't know. But I do know that marching fast to a drumbeat with no clear destination is road to disaster. That Scrum as it is, and even as it was described, is a giant dumpster fire and I lay an over-large portion of that blame at Schwaber's feet.
sporkologist 8y ago
> we haven't mastered the art of teaching, except to those for whom it is superfluous To put it another way... We haven't mastered the art of teaching, except to those who have mastered the art of learning
empath75 8y ago
If you think that’s what stand ups are for, you’re doing it wrong. Ours are five minutes long and usually about sharing what we’re all working on and talking about roadblocks.
branchless 8y ago
The reason is because most managers became managers because they didn't mind leaving tech behind. They didn't really like it. So they assume everyone else is the same as them.
perilunar 8y ago
Did you mean this quote?: "The power of instruction is seldom of much efficacy, except in those happy dispositions where it is almost superfluous." It's from Gibbon's The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (Vol. 1, 1776) https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/The_History_of_the_Decline_and_Fall_of_the_Roman_Empire https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/The_History_of_the_Decline_and...
JohnBooty 8y ago
deadlines [...] are designed around the assumption of a reluctant workforce who have to be clubbed into line Er, no. Sometimes it's the opposite of reluctance. Lots of enthusiastic coders will code away endlessly, never shipping, unless there's some sort of deadline even if it's a self-imposed one. We can see this in many creative and/or engineering pursuits. A passionate writer may revise their work for all eternity without deadlines. Etc.
CapricornNoble 8y ago
"Things like deadlines, status reports, daily standups, open offices, tickets, and retrospectives are designed around the assumption of a reluctant workforce who have to be clubbed into line." I recently read a RAND Corporation research paper from the early 90's about command and control, and it gave me new insight into how a C2 system supports a commander (or in a business case, the CEO). The things that you mentioned (status reports, daily standups, tickets) are not for "clubbing the workforce", they are for feeding information to the CEO/commander about 3 things: -does the organization understand the plan the way the CEO does? -is the organization executing the plan correctly? -is there information that requires the CEO to change the plan? It's not about "the beatings will continue until morale improves".
- dano 8y ago
  Do you have a link to the paper as I'd be interested in reading it.
  - CapricornNoble 8y ago
    Sure, here ya go: https://www.rand.org/pubs/reports/R3761-1.html https://www.rand.org/pubs/reports/R3761-1.html

vlehto 8y ago

I've noticed that thing too. People are incredibly sensitive to assumptions. If you order someone to do X, they might, if you ask, the might. But assume that they will do X and you do it aloud, they more likely to do X than in any other case. I have stolen because it was assumed that I would. And that's totally not my normal style of operation.

everdev 8y ago

> the assumption of a reluctant workforce From interviewing hundreds and managing dozens, I'd say that this is unfortunately largely accurate and not through anyone's malicious intent, but just human nature. A good salary helps to mask the reluctance, but deep down most people aren't living their lifelong dream at their day job. There are many other things we'd rather be doing with our time and I think good managers understand and accept that. Some people are just off the charts innately consistently productive, but most aren't and need motivation to stay focused. Deadlines are a tool that works for some people. Others need praise, others need purpose, others need creative freedom. But deep down I think most of us need some external motivation to stay focused for 6-8 hours a day. But when you do find that person that can consistently self-motivate, hire them and keep them. It makes everything so much easier.

kodz4 8y ago
Agree. Also more than human nature, it's a highly competitive world. If a manager in the org, is producing results using a heavy handed approach, you can be sure your boss is going to be knocking on your door to have a little chat about "improving things" in your teams. It's not a bad thing. Pushes good managers to evolve their own systems.
bamboozled 8y ago
I'd agree and also like to add that after seeing many teams without any imposed deadlines or pressure, I can tell you those teams who are "free to roam" also end up even more frustrated and unhappy because they often feel less part of a success story and ultimately that they're wasting their time. Time boxing projects teaches people to innovate and become more resourceful. I've seen endless scope creep since starting at my latest company where people aren't help to any type of deadline. I think the best approach is to have deadlines but allow teams to workout how they manage their time during that window.
munk-a 8y ago
I know that some people do find their dream job but most people cannot - trying to demand that people love their occupation is too extreme for me. Make working a positive experience, fairly share the fruits of their labour with them (allowing them that pride and connection with their production) and you'll find most people respond positively. Some people may legitimately just love working but that isn't a reasonable expectation. All that said, I think deadlines are terrible, they create a sense of cram and ease which works people out of a habit of working while at work. It's better to hide deadlines at the management level and make sure everything is comfortably budgeted, then just transition from one project or task to the next smoothly, without rushing pressure or the "months" scale of doing a thing that can cause it to never be done. I worked in a job where overtime[1] was the norm for a while, I hated it, put on stress weight, and don't wish that lifestyle of zombie living on anyone. It builds up extreme resentment and lowers productivity so, as a manager, realize that if your project is pushing a deadline you, the manager, have failed utterly. Then seek help from your employees and try and get it done on time, be open about your mistake, make it clear how you'll address it and, seriously, keep overtime and deadline press to the exceptional case rather than the regular. [1] Oh hey, for bonus points... where I work in BC overtime for tech workers is, by default, uncompensated... and we have nobody but EA and a compliant local Liberal[2] party to thank for that stupidity. [2] Not liberal as in leftist, "Liberal"... in fact "BC Liberal" is a term up here as they are the most conservative of the parties.

doitLP 8y ago

> Things like deadlines, status reports, daily standups, open offices, tickets, and retrospectives are designed around the assumption of a reluctant workforce who have to be clubbed into line. Certainly true in some cases but needing data from the areas and people you manage is an essential need of all management, no matter its style. Tickets, stand ups, daily reports, they’re all ways to make the employee or their work _legible_ from the outside. How that legibility is used is another matter.

alexpetralia 8y ago

I seriously can't believe how many businesses think their employees are stupid, or that they can trick their employees. Word spreads, and people will hate you forever if they find out. It's just not worth it.

hinkley 8y ago

At least some of the people 'responsible' for this current state of affairs didn't want things to be this way. In responsible hands, the graphs and metrics from Scrum or Kanban can be used to demonstrate how policies are actively hurting the development team. The information contained in them can tell more tales than just how we could have gotten slightly more done this week. There may be a lack of responsible hands. It could be that it always has been that case, and you have to promote processes that don't presume an adequate and consistent supply of such hands. I don't know. But I do know that marching fast to a drumbeat with no clear destination is road to disaster. That Scrum as it is, and even as it was described, is a giant dumpster fire and I lay an over-large portion of that blame at Schwaber's feet.

sporkologist 8y ago

> we haven't mastered the art of teaching, except to those for whom it is superfluous To put it another way... We haven't mastered the art of teaching, except to those who have mastered the art of learning

empath75 8y ago

If you think that’s what stand ups are for, you’re doing it wrong. Ours are five minutes long and usually about sharing what we’re all working on and talking about roadblocks.

branchless 8y ago

The reason is because most managers became managers because they didn't mind leaving tech behind. They didn't really like it. So they assume everyone else is the same as them.

perilunar 8y ago

Did you mean this quote?: "The power of instruction is seldom of much efficacy, except in those happy dispositions where it is almost superfluous." It's from Gibbon's The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (Vol. 1, 1776) https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/The_History_of_the_Decline_and_Fall_of_the_Roman_Empire https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/The_History_of_the_Decline_and...

JohnBooty 8y ago

deadlines [...] are designed around the assumption of a reluctant workforce who have to be clubbed into line Er, no. Sometimes it's the opposite of reluctance. Lots of enthusiastic coders will code away endlessly, never shipping, unless there's some sort of deadline even if it's a self-imposed one. We can see this in many creative and/or engineering pursuits. A passionate writer may revise their work for all eternity without deadlines. Etc.

CapricornNoble 8y ago

"Things like deadlines, status reports, daily standups, open offices, tickets, and retrospectives are designed around the assumption of a reluctant workforce who have to be clubbed into line." I recently read a RAND Corporation research paper from the early 90's about command and control, and it gave me new insight into how a C2 system supports a commander (or in a business case, the CEO). The things that you mentioned (status reports, daily standups, tickets) are not for "clubbing the workforce", they are for feeding information to the CEO/commander about 3 things: -does the organization understand the plan the way the CEO does? -is the organization executing the plan correctly? -is there information that requires the CEO to change the plan? It's not about "the beatings will continue until morale improves".

dano 8y ago
Do you have a link to the paper as I'd be interested in reading it.
- CapricornNoble 8y ago
  Sure, here ya go: https://www.rand.org/pubs/reports/R3761-1.html https://www.rand.org/pubs/reports/R3761-1.html