4 ms·

> Without managers, productivity soared. So, the revenue that year increased dramatically? How many new clients your company acquired?

karmelapple 4y ago
This comment made me think of the book The Goal, by Goldratt. I wonder who at the company was tasked with clarifying what the ultimate goal was to every employee? And if everyone measured success in that way?
- SergeAx 4y ago
  In another great, although fiction book "Cryptonomicon" I found a life-changing passage about the ultimate raison d'être of every commercial company in the world: "increasing the value of shareholders". That goal can be achieved by paying dividends or by increasing company's capitalization. Those are still too abstract metrics for most of ICs, so as a manager I am using proxy metrics of revenue and new clients.
bitcharmer 4y ago
Such a bizarre comment to make. Not all work in an enterprise yields revenue. Security or compliance or HR are great examples of that. Also, very often work that you do doesn't bring immediate benefits. They are usually deferred by months or sometimes even years.
- SergeAx 4y ago
  But we are talking about soared productivity. It cannot left key company metrics unaffected, otherwise what kind of productivity it is?
  - bitcharmer 4y ago
    Not sure how to respond to that. You just dismissed everything I said without addressing it.
    - SergeAx 4y ago
      Okay. If not revenue or customers acquisition, there should be some other productivity metrics. Because lines of code committed or tickets moved to the right on Kanban board are definitely not those metrics
Pmop 4y ago
Obviously not the OP but are you trying to imply that mgmnt do sale's work? They don't. The sales people are important, a company can hardly function without them. Meanwhile you can fire all of the management and the company will still work just fine, if not better.
- SergeAx 4y ago
  Sales people need something to sale. Soaring productivity should mean delivery of lots of features wanted by prospective clients, thus an occasion for sales people to contact those prospects, pitch them those features and close a lots of deals. > Meanwhile you can fire all of the management and the company will still work just fine, if not better. I wish you could try it and survive to tell the world that story.

karmelapple 4y ago

This comment made me think of the book The Goal, by Goldratt. I wonder who at the company was tasked with clarifying what the ultimate goal was to every employee? And if everyone measured success in that way?

SergeAx 4y ago
In another great, although fiction book "Cryptonomicon" I found a life-changing passage about the ultimate raison d'être of every commercial company in the world: "increasing the value of shareholders". That goal can be achieved by paying dividends or by increasing company's capitalization. Those are still too abstract metrics for most of ICs, so as a manager I am using proxy metrics of revenue and new clients.

bitcharmer 4y ago

Such a bizarre comment to make. Not all work in an enterprise yields revenue. Security or compliance or HR are great examples of that. Also, very often work that you do doesn't bring immediate benefits. They are usually deferred by months or sometimes even years.

SergeAx 4y ago
But we are talking about soared productivity. It cannot left key company metrics unaffected, otherwise what kind of productivity it is?
- bitcharmer 4y ago
  Not sure how to respond to that. You just dismissed everything I said without addressing it.
  - SergeAx 4y ago
    Okay. If not revenue or customers acquisition, there should be some other productivity metrics. Because lines of code committed or tickets moved to the right on Kanban board are definitely not those metrics

Pmop 4y ago

Obviously not the OP but are you trying to imply that mgmnt do sale's work? They don't. The sales people are important, a company can hardly function without them. Meanwhile you can fire all of the management and the company will still work just fine, if not better.

SergeAx 4y ago
Sales people need something to sale. Soaring productivity should mean delivery of lots of features wanted by prospective clients, thus an occasion for sales people to contact those prospects, pitch them those features and close a lots of deals. > Meanwhile you can fire all of the management and the company will still work just fine, if not better. I wish you could try it and survive to tell the world that story.