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On the other hand a good marketing person is worth gold. In one company I contracted at they had a marketing person who was super proactive and really worked so

On the other hand a good marketing person is worth gold. In one company I contracted at they had a marketing person who was super proactive and really worked social media , the press and other channels. She pretty much singlehandedly made the company into a known player in their field. Same probably goes for good salespeople. But there aren’t too many people of that caliber. Most just go through the motions.

OnlineGladiator 5y ago
> On the other hand a good marketing person is worth gold. I don't deny this, but I think you can say this for any position that ultimately can deliver something. A good PM, a good IT manager, or just the accepted good engineer. People that really want to contribute will work on what matters most and set their egos aside. I say this as someone who has been a PM before and realized it was not the most critical function at the time, so I offered to go back to engineering (I've worked full time as both for years). A good employee will contribute the best they can, and a great employee will be able to identify what matters most and works towards helping (even if they can't do it themselves). I realize my comment is a tangent, I just feel like it's unnecessary siloing that props up some positions as more important than others. It will depend on the situation. Sometimes you need more engineering talent, sometimes you need more salesmanship, sometimes you need more product direction - it's impossible to know without being at the company. And it's very hard to recognize what matters most outside of your area of expertise.
- spaetzleesser 5y ago
  I think a good salesperson or marketing person can bring way more value than a good PM or IT manager usually can.
  - username90 5y ago
    Linus Torvalds is evidence that a good PM/IT manager is worth a lot. There aren't a lot of people that can make or lead a team to make world class products, but the number of marketing mangers who are exceptional enough to have significant impact on your company aren't that many either.
  - Teever 5y ago
    Yeah that idea worked out real well for Theranos.
    - helloworld11 5y ago
      It did though. That Theranos was at heart a complete scam doesn't take away from the quality of its marketing and promotion. If anything, it shows how exceptional they can be, in elevating even a mostly worthless "product" to media attention until the lies become impossible to hide.
      - OnlineGladiator 5y ago
        I think this is the wrong takeaway. I understand your point, but ultimately the company failed and there is a possibility Elizabeth Holmes will go to jail. There was no financial payout. Doubling down on bullshit just leads to a worse reckoning (at least in a world with accountability, and sadly that's not always the case).
paulcole 5y ago
> But there aren’t too many people of that caliber. Most just go through the motions. This is true of every field from doctors to lawyers to software developers. Most people are pretty average at their jobs.
- spaetzleesser 5y ago
  I think especially larger companies prefer average but predictable people that execute their role as ordered. Top performers don’t really fit in.
  - paulcole 5y ago
    Top performers aren’t needed for most jobs and in many cases just aren’t desireable. There’s nothing wrong with filling seats with perfectly average people to do perfectly average jobs — and I say this as a person who is (at best) quite average.
    - jjk166 5y ago
      Really there are two types of work: bounded and unbounded. In bounded work there is some well defined threshold where someone is good enough, or at least some finite risk from someone not being good enough. For example a mediocre mechanic might not be able to fix an issue that a better mechanic could, but the cost of going with a bad mechanic will never exceed the value of the car (at which point you would simply buy a new car), and realistically the cost will almost always be quite a bit less. For bounded tasks, it makes sense to hire average people who show up. On the other hand there is unbounded work where the skill level necessary is unknown and the costs of going with someone who is insufficiently skilled could be immense. For example odds are there's no way to know if your surgeon isn't up to the task before they've cut you open, which is a terrible time to discover that fact. For unbounded tasks it makes sense to always hire the best you can possibly afford, even for something that seems like it should not require much skill.
horns4lyfe 5y ago
Because that’s actual marketing, not just spamming dumb commercials to whatever venue you can find.

OnlineGladiator 5y ago

> On the other hand a good marketing person is worth gold. I don't deny this, but I think you can say this for any position that ultimately can deliver something. A good PM, a good IT manager, or just the accepted good engineer. People that really want to contribute will work on what matters most and set their egos aside. I say this as someone who has been a PM before and realized it was not the most critical function at the time, so I offered to go back to engineering (I've worked full time as both for years). A good employee will contribute the best they can, and a great employee will be able to identify what matters most and works towards helping (even if they can't do it themselves). I realize my comment is a tangent, I just feel like it's unnecessary siloing that props up some positions as more important than others. It will depend on the situation. Sometimes you need more engineering talent, sometimes you need more salesmanship, sometimes you need more product direction - it's impossible to know without being at the company. And it's very hard to recognize what matters most outside of your area of expertise.

spaetzleesser 5y ago
I think a good salesperson or marketing person can bring way more value than a good PM or IT manager usually can.
- username90 5y ago
  Linus Torvalds is evidence that a good PM/IT manager is worth a lot. There aren't a lot of people that can make or lead a team to make world class products, but the number of marketing mangers who are exceptional enough to have significant impact on your company aren't that many either.
- Teever 5y ago
  Yeah that idea worked out real well for Theranos.
  - helloworld11 5y ago
    It did though. That Theranos was at heart a complete scam doesn't take away from the quality of its marketing and promotion. If anything, it shows how exceptional they can be, in elevating even a mostly worthless "product" to media attention until the lies become impossible to hide.
    - OnlineGladiator 5y ago
      I think this is the wrong takeaway. I understand your point, but ultimately the company failed and there is a possibility Elizabeth Holmes will go to jail. There was no financial payout. Doubling down on bullshit just leads to a worse reckoning (at least in a world with accountability, and sadly that's not always the case).

paulcole 5y ago

> But there aren’t too many people of that caliber. Most just go through the motions. This is true of every field from doctors to lawyers to software developers. Most people are pretty average at their jobs.

spaetzleesser 5y ago
I think especially larger companies prefer average but predictable people that execute their role as ordered. Top performers don’t really fit in.
- paulcole 5y ago
  Top performers aren’t needed for most jobs and in many cases just aren’t desireable. There’s nothing wrong with filling seats with perfectly average people to do perfectly average jobs — and I say this as a person who is (at best) quite average.
  - jjk166 5y ago
    Really there are two types of work: bounded and unbounded. In bounded work there is some well defined threshold where someone is good enough, or at least some finite risk from someone not being good enough. For example a mediocre mechanic might not be able to fix an issue that a better mechanic could, but the cost of going with a bad mechanic will never exceed the value of the car (at which point you would simply buy a new car), and realistically the cost will almost always be quite a bit less. For bounded tasks, it makes sense to hire average people who show up. On the other hand there is unbounded work where the skill level necessary is unknown and the costs of going with someone who is insufficiently skilled could be immense. For example odds are there's no way to know if your surgeon isn't up to the task before they've cut you open, which is a terrible time to discover that fact. For unbounded tasks it makes sense to always hire the best you can possibly afford, even for something that seems like it should not require much skill.

horns4lyfe 5y ago

Because that’s actual marketing, not just spamming dumb commercials to whatever venue you can find.