6 ms·

Not sure, they both seem to be saying the same thing to me. I inferred OP essentially saying: business is IT. They're synonymous - and I'd largely agree with t

by Rury 7y ago

Not sure, they both seem to be saying the same thing to me. I inferred OP essentially saying: business is IT. They're synonymous - and I'd largely agree with this. All businesses deal with managing information, be it storing financial records, IP info, or transmitting data amongst users or employees. The I in IT is "Information", and all businesses deal with information/data. Anyhow, the article starts out saying management often views geeks as being business challenged, which such a viewpoint is questionable given what IT is. Arguably, geeks are better at business (i.e. information handling and problem solving) than non-geeks. Hence, the point about respect in the article. IT Pro's won't simply respect someone because they're the boss. They respect those who are competent at solving business (IT) problems, regardless of demeanor or hierarchal rank. As so, this bottom-up respect speaks volumes as to success of a team (as the lack of it indicates the leaders are charlatans).

BigBubbleButt 7y ago
I feel like this is a much more subtle way of reframing what OP said. > Arguably, geeks are better at business (i.e. information handling and problem solving) than non-geeks. Do you believe there's something that geeks aren't better at than non-geeks (when it comes to being an employee)? Because OP's point, as I read it, was that geeks are superior and should be running everything and was incredibly dismissive of non-geeks being useful. I agree that respect is earned, not given. But if you just immediately dismiss what someone has to say because they aren't part of your geek tribe, you are beginning the relationship from a hostile standpoint. Why would non-geeks look at this as anything other than geeks being antagonistic? > Anyhow, the article starts out saying management often views geeks as being business challenged, which such a viewpoint is questionable given what IT is. I read the article differently. It was much less about geeks being business challenged and much more about geeks being elitist, such as OP's bellicose comment. If neither side is willing to work with the other side, the fault almost certainly lies with everyone.
- Rury 7y ago
  >I read the article differently. It was much less about geeks being business challenged and much more about geeks being elitist I think the article could have been about anyone being elitist, it just so happens to be about IT teams. Just remove geeks and non-geeks out for a moment. Think the nature of hierarchy in general. A stable hierarchy has the best people as its leaders, which is when society benefits the most and teams work together best. If however, the leaders are charlatans, then more competent underlings will stop respecting or listening to the leaders, and/or may challenge the leaders. Typically life is worse off (for society as a whole) under bad leaders than good leaders. This is why bottom up respect speaks volume to the success of a team. The article speaks a bit on this in the section about respect, and suggests favoring competency as a solution. Anyhow, I don't think OP's point necessarily is at odds with this as the 2nd poster pointed out. OP argues that IT folk act elitist, because perhaps they actually are but find themselves following “random authority figure of the week”, (rather than the best authority). Whether or not that’s true is subject to debate. I’m sure it is in some cases and others not, but I largely agree with the part of his argument about business being largely synonymous with IT. >Do you believe there's something that geeks aren't better at than non-geeks Sure, everyone is flawed. No one is fully aware of everything. As so, some may need help with understanding the scope of things, other people’s viewpoints, and problems. Some may have trouble communicating novel ideas, or solutions, and need help in deploying them. Think people skills. I think this is why technical people say it’s helpful to have a manager who acts as a sounding board.
  - perl4ever 7y ago
    "I think this is why technical people say it’s helpful to have a manager who acts as a sounding board." You are saying the usefulness of a manager is the same as, say, a stuffed octopus. I think this is illustrative of a cultural gap. Someone else might claim that all of the interesting and challenging problems in business are management problems that technical people as such don't even acknowledge.
    - loopz 7y ago
      Instead of using straw-men, assumptions about where/who argument is from or downmodding, other strategies would be more constructive.
- invalidOrTaken 7y ago
  >Do you believe there's something that geeks aren't better at than non-geeks (when it comes to being an employee)? I'll actually make a claim here: Over time, no. We've got to get away from this myth that learning a programming language makes you forever forget how to shower, makes you unpleasant, ignorant of the customer, etc. Now, that may actually happen to devs, but this is a) a not-unforeseeable consequence, and b) avoidable/fixable over time. What is not avoidable is that people who don't know how to program, and how software works, still don't know how to program, and end up making decisions while blind. This is an invisible problem, that customers, sales managers, and shareholders never see directly, but it manifests in unrealistic expectations being set, crunch time, and missed deadlines. Or sometimes they do see it---my brother is sole data scientist at a small company, and is regularly astonished at how little reps of the latest ML-in-a-box seem to know about what they're trying to sell him. There are unreasonable programmers, I don't mean to say there aren't. However, that can be fixed without making them forget how to program. Meanwhile, the process for helping a non-technical employee understand the rest of the business...probably involves having them be a line engineer for a few weeks, i. e. the most straightforward way to solve the problems associated with non-technical stakeholders is to make them technical.
  - BigBubbleButt 7y ago
    > We've got to get away from this myth that learning a programming language makes you forever forget how to shower, makes you unpleasant, ignorant of the customer, etc. This wasn't even implied, and seems like a projection of your internal biases. My point was geeks are good at some things, and bad at others. Nobody is better at everything, and that is a profoundly arrogant stance to take. > What is not avoidable is that people who don't know how to program, and how software works, still don't know how to program, and end up making decisions while blind. Sure, and most geeks have never made a sale in their life. Most geeks have never raised VC capital before. Most geeks have never had to make a presentation to shareholders before. Geeks have their strengths and weaknesses just like everybody else. However this "us vs them" mentality is just a setup for disaster. Sure, it would be better if more people had the knowledge to code like geeks as that lends them more perspective. Likewise, it would be better if more geeks had the knowledge to do sales, create partnerships, and everything else useful for running a business as it would lend them more perspective. But people can only do so many things with the hours in a day, which is why people specialize and collaborate. The obvious superficial example to bolster my argument is to look at the clusterfuck of product launches at Google, a fundamentally engineering-first company. They're the laughing stock even amongst geeks here on HN.

by Rury 7y ago

BigBubbleButt 7y ago

I feel like this is a much more subtle way of reframing what OP said. > Arguably, geeks are better at business (i.e. information handling and problem solving) than non-geeks. Do you believe there's something that geeks aren't better at than non-geeks (when it comes to being an employee)? Because OP's point, as I read it, was that geeks are superior and should be running everything and was incredibly dismissive of non-geeks being useful. I agree that respect is earned, not given. But if you just immediately dismiss what someone has to say because they aren't part of your geek tribe, you are beginning the relationship from a hostile standpoint. Why would non-geeks look at this as anything other than geeks being antagonistic? > Anyhow, the article starts out saying management often views geeks as being business challenged, which such a viewpoint is questionable given what IT is. I read the article differently. It was much less about geeks being business challenged and much more about geeks being elitist, such as OP's bellicose comment. If neither side is willing to work with the other side, the fault almost certainly lies with everyone.

Rury 7y ago
>I read the article differently. It was much less about geeks being business challenged and much more about geeks being elitist I think the article could have been about anyone being elitist, it just so happens to be about IT teams. Just remove geeks and non-geeks out for a moment. Think the nature of hierarchy in general. A stable hierarchy has the best people as its leaders, which is when society benefits the most and teams work together best. If however, the leaders are charlatans, then more competent underlings will stop respecting or listening to the leaders, and/or may challenge the leaders. Typically life is worse off (for society as a whole) under bad leaders than good leaders. This is why bottom up respect speaks volume to the success of a team. The article speaks a bit on this in the section about respect, and suggests favoring competency as a solution. Anyhow, I don't think OP's point necessarily is at odds with this as the 2nd poster pointed out. OP argues that IT folk act elitist, because perhaps they actually are but find themselves following “random authority figure of the week”, (rather than the best authority). Whether or not that’s true is subject to debate. I’m sure it is in some cases and others not, but I largely agree with the part of his argument about business being largely synonymous with IT. >Do you believe there's something that geeks aren't better at than non-geeks Sure, everyone is flawed. No one is fully aware of everything. As so, some may need help with understanding the scope of things, other people’s viewpoints, and problems. Some may have trouble communicating novel ideas, or solutions, and need help in deploying them. Think people skills. I think this is why technical people say it’s helpful to have a manager who acts as a sounding board.
- perl4ever 7y ago
  "I think this is why technical people say it’s helpful to have a manager who acts as a sounding board." You are saying the usefulness of a manager is the same as, say, a stuffed octopus. I think this is illustrative of a cultural gap. Someone else might claim that all of the interesting and challenging problems in business are management problems that technical people as such don't even acknowledge.
  - loopz 7y ago
    Instead of using straw-men, assumptions about where/who argument is from or downmodding, other strategies would be more constructive.
invalidOrTaken 7y ago
>Do you believe there's something that geeks aren't better at than non-geeks (when it comes to being an employee)? I'll actually make a claim here: Over time, no. We've got to get away from this myth that learning a programming language makes you forever forget how to shower, makes you unpleasant, ignorant of the customer, etc. Now, that may actually happen to devs, but this is a) a not-unforeseeable consequence, and b) avoidable/fixable over time. What is not avoidable is that people who don't know how to program, and how software works, still don't know how to program, and end up making decisions while blind. This is an invisible problem, that customers, sales managers, and shareholders never see directly, but it manifests in unrealistic expectations being set, crunch time, and missed deadlines. Or sometimes they do see it---my brother is sole data scientist at a small company, and is regularly astonished at how little reps of the latest ML-in-a-box seem to know about what they're trying to sell him. There are unreasonable programmers, I don't mean to say there aren't. However, that can be fixed without making them forget how to program. Meanwhile, the process for helping a non-technical employee understand the rest of the business...probably involves having them be a line engineer for a few weeks, i. e. the most straightforward way to solve the problems associated with non-technical stakeholders is to make them technical.
- BigBubbleButt 7y ago
  > We've got to get away from this myth that learning a programming language makes you forever forget how to shower, makes you unpleasant, ignorant of the customer, etc. This wasn't even implied, and seems like a projection of your internal biases. My point was geeks are good at some things, and bad at others. Nobody is better at everything, and that is a profoundly arrogant stance to take. > What is not avoidable is that people who don't know how to program, and how software works, still don't know how to program, and end up making decisions while blind. Sure, and most geeks have never made a sale in their life. Most geeks have never raised VC capital before. Most geeks have never had to make a presentation to shareholders before. Geeks have their strengths and weaknesses just like everybody else. However this "us vs them" mentality is just a setup for disaster. Sure, it would be better if more people had the knowledge to code like geeks as that lends them more perspective. Likewise, it would be better if more geeks had the knowledge to do sales, create partnerships, and everything else useful for running a business as it would lend them more perspective. But people can only do so many things with the hours in a day, which is why people specialize and collaborate. The obvious superficial example to bolster my argument is to look at the clusterfuck of product launches at Google, a fundamentally engineering-first company. They're the laughing stock even amongst geeks here on HN.