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Sure, there are bad employees at all levels. I've seen plenty of bad/lazy developers in my time too. In fact I was probably on my way to becoming one when I d
by sbarre 5y ago
Sure, there are bad employees at all levels. I've seen plenty of bad/lazy developers in my time too. In fact I was probably on my way to becoming one when I decided I needed to do something new with myself after 20 years of coding.
Also, some of the work a manager does is invisible to the people they manage. In fact I would argue that the "good" work is often the most invisible of all the work.
So when that role, at some level, is responsible for you being able to do your work, whether you see it or not, calling it "not real" feels even more naive.
But yes, there are absolutely bad managers out there. I agree with you on that.
- dwohnitmok 5y ago> In fact I would argue that the "good" work is often the most invisible of all the work. This is just another version of the mantra often seen on HN that the "silent, behind-the-scenes" dev work of refactoring, maintenance, etc. is extremely valuable but under-acknowledged. The same holds for all levels of an organization, whether it's the CEO or a straight-out-of-school IC, but we seem to keep forgetting this principle when presented with a new face.
- sbarre 5y agoNot quite.. I can see all the work my ICs do, even if others can't (to your point, which I agree with).. So I am aware of their challenges and their effort. But my ICs don't see all my work, just like I don't see all my director's work. So it's still somewhat asymmetrical. So it's easy to fall into that "they don't do anything of value" trap when you don't have the big picture. I believe that this is why as a manager it's actually super important to be transparent, and where possible (and desired) provide as much of a view into my work as I can for my ICs.. Some stuff I can't share of course, but if I can, I do. Hopefully this helps everyone in the end.