3 ms·
is it still 20% of the people doing 80% the work in software projects? if so finding those 20% and rewarding them accordingly. give them a raise, assign them s
by synergy20 5y ago
is it still 20% of the people doing 80% the work in software projects?
if so finding those 20% and rewarding them accordingly. give them a raise, assign them stock options, make them feel appreciated and financially tied with the company.
this should be more effective than micro-management.
in my book, management is basically trying to use the least money to get the most out of employees, if instead reward people based on their measurable finished items(e.g. work got done on time), most of the management tricks go away on its own, they will manage themselves better than you can ever do.
- quickthrower2 5y agoMy objection to this is someone's contribution is a factor of culture / role / assignments and person. You could have a great person who's had to do some low-impact work (someone has to fix those bugs!), finds themselves in the 80% and then realises it (they will), and self-selects out of the company. You don't want to lose such people. The trick is to bring out the best talent in everyone in my opinion.
- synergy20 5y agoThose who do testing/bugfixes could be the 20% too. Yes they probably will be paid less then core developers but they're still the 20% to keep and get rewarded. I would say for each job category, reward their top 20% more and do your best to keep them.
- quickthrower2 5y agoYou might work for much bigger companies than I have, but there is no 'bug fixing' vs. 'core' job categories. Instead it's like "Susan worked in that area once last year, the expert has left, so Susan can fix it, while the feature work she was on gets postponed a bit".
- synergy20 5y agonot really, doing startup now actually but yes I worked in big companies in the past. the point is to find those gems and reward them and keep them, they deserve it and they're the true core of the company as well.
- quickthrower2 5y agoI agree. Finding them is good. Creating them from the rough stone is even better. In this job market, it is perhaps the only viable option.
- hackerfromthefu 5y agoThis sounds so sensible, yet the only company that ever did this did it with no other option but when they needed to re-hire me away from a sabbatical.
- adra 5y agoThat doesn't really reward workers that take on hard problems and open themselves up to failure. Plus the limitation of this 20/80ism is that it's not explaining why some people are more effective. Maybe they did really well a long time ago and manager afforded them more freedom to set technical direction. Now every way is their way, they are bombarded with negative reviews and requires rewrites, etc. A good manager can see a problem even in their aces. Just because they're high performers, it doesn't mean they aren't a problem. Real world story time, a company I worked at had the worst employee I've ever met. He was aggressive, openly berated staff, insert a bunch of things that would get you fired and they did those. But the rub was he was one of their most capable developers they had, so he got away with it. You could argue the company was fine, but a trivially deep analysis would dictate that the company lost a boat load of potential talent that quit due to this disruptive influence. I still to this day feel lousy because I never had the guts to personally raise a complaint against them with HR.
- paulio 5y agoThanks for your comment, it's enlightened and motivational. Unfortunately so much management isn't like this.