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I have found that the best engineers gain the ear of senior management (generally far above their manager) and can push through their radical ideas from above.

I have found that the best engineers gain the ear of senior management (generally far above their manager) and can push through their radical ideas from above. You really have to also be able to do the work and show that it is going to work. Thinking and acting strategically or as I like to put it "act as founder".

lifeisstillgood 5y ago
But that's not being an engineer. That's being a senior manager. That is great for the one individual with that reach, but does not solve the problem from an organisation perspective. If we took that advice to heart, then the CEO would have a line outside his door of all the engineers in the company, doing what they feel is best for the company. He would then say, Jeez, I think I need to have some managers to group these people together like in a hierarchy. Plus the guy(s) you know, everyone else, including their managers, knew they had the boss' ear. And in my experience that person just becomes another manager, 'cos everyone reaches out to them to get their project unstuck.
- fsloth 5y ago
  I think you are complecting peoples with processes. There is absolutely no reason an engineer could not influence the decision making process of a manager. The manager is the one taking the responsibility for a decision, but it is a poor manager that fails to listen to their top experts and leverage their knowhow. That's what it means to be a great engineer that gets the manager ear. It's not the engineer's job to manage, but is his job to be part of the team, and do what feels right for the team, including to tell their opinion on the matters they are a subject expert. Processes are just scaffolding and general guidelines on top of a functional engineering organization. An engineering organization is not a car factory.
  - lifeisstillgood 5y ago
    The whole reason for hierarchies (and democracies) is to avoid this "listening" crap anyhow. No matter how brilliant, or well intentioned, no CEO can listen to all views from all experts - at a certain scale this goes from 'has other work to do' and flips into 'physically impossible'. So, yes there is a reason "an engineer could not influence the decision making process of a manager. " At some scales it is impossible. And if you mean why cant he influence the manager above him - yes thats fine. But that manager has f all chance of reaching the CEO as well. At certain points companies stop acting like autonomus agents and become, some kind of lava like process - predictable and impossible to stop. maybe large firms are the problem overall
    - nicoburns 5y ago
      That's why they're not listening to everyone. They're listening to those who have managed to get their ear.
      - andrekandre 5y ago
        that can lead to a lot of toxic situations and is not sustainable long term; it breaks expectations all across the board of fair arbitration that a manager/leader is supposed to do
    - dv_dt 5y ago
      Well that’s a ceo culture responsibility to not make themselves a bottleneck. Generally this is done by delegating more decision making expectations downward.
  - mtberatwork 5y ago
    It sounds like you are describing a tech/project lead, which, depending on the context, can be a thankless task. The organization gets free project management/strategy out of you without any increase in compensation, title change or added authority and with the expectation to still perform all programming work of a senior engineer. It's a line that engineers need to walk carefully, otherwise you will find yourself doing two full time jobs and burnout will hit you rather quickly.
    - rjsw 5y ago
      Another danger is that the senior management can change without passing on the knowledge of the informal networks that were in place.
- balabaster 5y ago
  A savvy engineer, like a spy, knows how to gain the confidence of the CEO long before they put a plan of "Gee, I think you should do this" in the CEOs ear. I've spent months ingratiating myself with the political circle before someone says "Hey Ben, what do you think?" and from there, it's game on. Read Never Split the Difference by Chris Voss, or watch his Masterclass, which isn't really so much a masterclass in negotiation, although that was its intent on the surface. It's more a masterclass on empathy and understanding other peoples needs and how to leverage helping them succeed for your own benefit. [Statement of my understanding of the situation] "Well, from my perspective of understanding our mission statement and raison d'etre, our company's strategy for success is [describe the strategy from your perspective]. Is that accurate?" [Await validation] "Yes, that's pretty accurate." [Empathize with their needs = instant connection] "It's gotta be pretty frustrating for you to see these things that are happening down the food chain every day that are not only hindering that strategy, but actively competing against it. How do you deal with that?" [Now just listen to them talk and ask questions and clarify to make sure they feel like you're not only understanding their pain, but understand their core basic needs.] [Statement of your ability to help solve their problems. Why am I different than the other 200 people outside your door?] "Well, I've been in the software game since I was 8, 37 years; and I've learned a lot of stuff over my years when it comes to high performance R&D. I've been on a bunch of successful high performance teams, including working with X, Y and Z, the team that did Y that was all over the news last year. Having been with this team a few months now, I've been observing what is going on and thinking about how the current tactics of the department are actively hindering us from completing our corporate strategy. I would like to help align R&D with corporate objectives and not only reduce the friction that's preventing us from achieving them, but actively increase our productivity, output and responsiveness to our customer base to move us forward faster, making the product more desirable and more saleable, increasing profitability over current projections, reducing payroll by and significantly shortening our delivery cadence." [Now you've piqued their interest, you've hit every pain point in a CEOs target list except for fund raising. Let the conversation go from here.] The minute you start talking about increasing profits over projections, reducing friction, increasing productivity, reducing payroll costs, decreasing team churn and increasing employee satisfaction, you've basically just become a CEO's wet dream. That's everything a successful engineering team is made of... double if you've already done it before and can prove you can do it again. So it doesn't matter how long the line up is at the CEO's door. It's no more difficult to bypass it and step up to the front of the line than it is to bypass the chain of management between you and their office. Everyone's gotta eat. Everyone has a social life. Outside of the office, everyone is equal. How do you get the ear of a new friend or a potential girl or boyfriend. How do you catch their attention? Figure out who they are, what they do, what's important to them and what you can do to help them achieve their dreams. Make a plan. Execute. That's the secret sauce.
- rjsw 5y ago
  It doesn't have to be driven by the engineer. I have been in this position, The CEO would join me for lunch every couple of weeks for a chat about future directions and current sales leads.
- spullara 5y ago
  I fundamentally disagree that you become a manager because you can influence the company. Manager's manage the projects and the people but should have very little control over what the company actually does and what projects are chosen. That should be the domain of the product and engineering team themselves.
  - groby_b 5y ago
    There are many different types of managers, and "General Managers" are a thing. I.e. they drive product, eng, and UX. Ultimately, every CEO is that kind of manager, and they have to be. You can't just lean back and say "eh, people will figure it out, I hired accordingly". The tricky part is figuring out how much guidance you must give to achieve an overall goal, and then step the hell away from micromanaging.
    - spullara 5y ago
      GMs are CEOs of their group. I wouldn't put them in the same category as line managers that normally an engineer would report to for instance.
slumdev 5y ago
This is not indicative of engineering skill. This is indicative of political savvy and the ability to influence. Rewarding influence indicates a lack of leadership. Humans being social animals, we're already prone to being influenced by those who are good at influencing. If management magnifies this tendency, they'll end up turning the workplace into something like social media with paychecks.
- caseysoftware 5y ago
  Manipulating - aka taking advantage of someone - is bad and leads to what you describe. Building trust and understanding among colleagues is ALWAYS good.

lifeisstillgood 5y ago

But that's not being an engineer. That's being a senior manager. That is great for the one individual with that reach, but does not solve the problem from an organisation perspective. If we took that advice to heart, then the CEO would have a line outside his door of all the engineers in the company, doing what they feel is best for the company. He would then say, Jeez, I think I need to have some managers to group these people together like in a hierarchy. Plus the guy(s) you know, everyone else, including their managers, knew they had the boss' ear. And in my experience that person just becomes another manager, 'cos everyone reaches out to them to get their project unstuck.

fsloth 5y ago
I think you are complecting peoples with processes. There is absolutely no reason an engineer could not influence the decision making process of a manager. The manager is the one taking the responsibility for a decision, but it is a poor manager that fails to listen to their top experts and leverage their knowhow. That's what it means to be a great engineer that gets the manager ear. It's not the engineer's job to manage, but is his job to be part of the team, and do what feels right for the team, including to tell their opinion on the matters they are a subject expert. Processes are just scaffolding and general guidelines on top of a functional engineering organization. An engineering organization is not a car factory.
- lifeisstillgood 5y ago
  The whole reason for hierarchies (and democracies) is to avoid this "listening" crap anyhow. No matter how brilliant, or well intentioned, no CEO can listen to all views from all experts - at a certain scale this goes from 'has other work to do' and flips into 'physically impossible'. So, yes there is a reason "an engineer could not influence the decision making process of a manager. " At some scales it is impossible. And if you mean why cant he influence the manager above him - yes thats fine. But that manager has f all chance of reaching the CEO as well. At certain points companies stop acting like autonomus agents and become, some kind of lava like process - predictable and impossible to stop. maybe large firms are the problem overall
  - nicoburns 5y ago
    That's why they're not listening to everyone. They're listening to those who have managed to get their ear.
    - andrekandre 5y ago
      that can lead to a lot of toxic situations and is not sustainable long term; it breaks expectations all across the board of fair arbitration that a manager/leader is supposed to do
  - dv_dt 5y ago
    Well that’s a ceo culture responsibility to not make themselves a bottleneck. Generally this is done by delegating more decision making expectations downward.
- mtberatwork 5y ago
  It sounds like you are describing a tech/project lead, which, depending on the context, can be a thankless task. The organization gets free project management/strategy out of you without any increase in compensation, title change or added authority and with the expectation to still perform all programming work of a senior engineer. It's a line that engineers need to walk carefully, otherwise you will find yourself doing two full time jobs and burnout will hit you rather quickly.
  - rjsw 5y ago
    Another danger is that the senior management can change without passing on the knowledge of the informal networks that were in place.
balabaster 5y ago
A savvy engineer, like a spy, knows how to gain the confidence of the CEO long before they put a plan of "Gee, I think you should do this" in the CEOs ear. I've spent months ingratiating myself with the political circle before someone says "Hey Ben, what do you think?" and from there, it's game on. Read Never Split the Difference by Chris Voss, or watch his Masterclass, which isn't really so much a masterclass in negotiation, although that was its intent on the surface. It's more a masterclass on empathy and understanding other peoples needs and how to leverage helping them succeed for your own benefit. [Statement of my understanding of the situation] "Well, from my perspective of understanding our mission statement and raison d'etre, our company's strategy for success is [describe the strategy from your perspective]. Is that accurate?" [Await validation] "Yes, that's pretty accurate." [Empathize with their needs = instant connection] "It's gotta be pretty frustrating for you to see these things that are happening down the food chain every day that are not only hindering that strategy, but actively competing against it. How do you deal with that?" [Now just listen to them talk and ask questions and clarify to make sure they feel like you're not only understanding their pain, but understand their core basic needs.] [Statement of your ability to help solve their problems. Why am I different than the other 200 people outside your door?] "Well, I've been in the software game since I was 8, 37 years; and I've learned a lot of stuff over my years when it comes to high performance R&D. I've been on a bunch of successful high performance teams, including working with X, Y and Z, the team that did Y that was all over the news last year. Having been with this team a few months now, I've been observing what is going on and thinking about how the current tactics of the department are actively hindering us from completing our corporate strategy. I would like to help align R&D with corporate objectives and not only reduce the friction that's preventing us from achieving them, but actively increase our productivity, output and responsiveness to our customer base to move us forward faster, making the product more desirable and more saleable, increasing profitability over current projections, reducing payroll by and significantly shortening our delivery cadence." [Now you've piqued their interest, you've hit every pain point in a CEOs target list except for fund raising. Let the conversation go from here.] The minute you start talking about increasing profits over projections, reducing friction, increasing productivity, reducing payroll costs, decreasing team churn and increasing employee satisfaction, you've basically just become a CEO's wet dream. That's everything a successful engineering team is made of... double if you've already done it before and can prove you can do it again. So it doesn't matter how long the line up is at the CEO's door. It's no more difficult to bypass it and step up to the front of the line than it is to bypass the chain of management between you and their office. Everyone's gotta eat. Everyone has a social life. Outside of the office, everyone is equal. How do you get the ear of a new friend or a potential girl or boyfriend. How do you catch their attention? Figure out who they are, what they do, what's important to them and what you can do to help them achieve their dreams. Make a plan. Execute. That's the secret sauce.
rjsw 5y ago
It doesn't have to be driven by the engineer. I have been in this position, The CEO would join me for lunch every couple of weeks for a chat about future directions and current sales leads.
spullara 5y ago
I fundamentally disagree that you become a manager because you can influence the company. Manager's manage the projects and the people but should have very little control over what the company actually does and what projects are chosen. That should be the domain of the product and engineering team themselves.
- groby_b 5y ago
  There are many different types of managers, and "General Managers" are a thing. I.e. they drive product, eng, and UX. Ultimately, every CEO is that kind of manager, and they have to be. You can't just lean back and say "eh, people will figure it out, I hired accordingly". The tricky part is figuring out how much guidance you must give to achieve an overall goal, and then step the hell away from micromanaging.
  - spullara 5y ago
    GMs are CEOs of their group. I wouldn't put them in the same category as line managers that normally an engineer would report to for instance.

slumdev 5y ago

This is not indicative of engineering skill. This is indicative of political savvy and the ability to influence. Rewarding influence indicates a lack of leadership. Humans being social animals, we're already prone to being influenced by those who are good at influencing. If management magnifies this tendency, they'll end up turning the workplace into something like social media with paychecks.

caseysoftware 5y ago
Manipulating - aka taking advantage of someone - is bad and leads to what you describe. Building trust and understanding among colleagues is ALWAYS good.