16 ms·

Does this conflict with the mantra, 'Hire people that are smarter than you.'?

by nickfromseattle 15y ago

jpdoctor 15y ago
You bet. I never see the answer to: Why would people smarter than you want to work for someone dumber than them?
- zem 15y ago
  there are two classes of boss, those you look to for technical leadership and some degree of mentoring, and those you expect to do the actual "management" stuff so that you don't need to. for the latter category, i'm not looking for sheer brains so much as i am looking for good leadership qualities.
  - jpdoctor 15y ago
    > and those you expect to do the actual "management" stuff so that you don't need to. Sounds like your answer is: When there are items that smart people want to outsource, they often go work for people stupider than them rather than hire people to take care of it. Do I have that right?
    - zem 15y ago
      no, i think you're falling into the common technical-person trap of assuming that raw intelligence is the only measure of competence. i don't want to work for myself, and i don't want to hire people - i want to be competent at my job, and work for someone who is competent at theirs. that someone may or may not be more intelligent than me; it's largely irrelevant as long as they're smart enough to do their job well. (and i may or may not be more intelligent than they are; it should likewise be irrelevant to them as long as i do my job well)
      - jpdoctor 15y ago
        > no, i think you're falling into the common technical-person trap of assuming that raw intelligence is the only measure of competence. No, I am looking at the logical consequence of "hire people smarter than yourself". If A is smarter than B, then B is less smart than A. Therefore: "hire people smarter than yourself" implies hiring people who are willing to work for someone dumber.
        zem 15y ago
        certainly. it's just that the word "dumber" has connotations of "stupid and therefore not worth working for".
        jtheory 15y ago
        Meh -- "smart" doesn't work on a single scale. Your boss can be smarter than you at his job, and successfully hire you, smarter than he is at your job. That's an odd way to word it, but the fact remains -- there are generally different skillsets and competencies involved, and you are looking to build or be a part of a team with complementary talents.
parsnips 15y ago
Not really. Leadership is about giving clear direction and encouraging others to rise to the occasion. That can happen if the "leader" is not as good technically as his subordinates.
- Tyrannosaurs 15y ago
  More than it can happen, if your programmers are good it should happen. A leader is spending a fraction of the time hands on that a programmer is. Given the developments in technology and the additional time the developers are getting with it, if they're not better than their leader in a few years, you've got the wrong programmers.
bullseye 15y ago
Smarter does not mean better leader. Often great leaders are indeed intelligent, but the skills that make someone a better leader do not necessarily correlate with being "smarter". Instead, great leaders possess the ability to motivate and read people in an effective way. Conversely, you've probably encountered highly intelligent people that have the people skills of a bug.
negamax 15y ago
In my experience it does. "Hire people smart than you" is a management ethos, which translates to delegate the hell out of a task. But software development specially in small teams doesn't work that way. Many a times, junior programmers require direction and even help in completing their tasks. So it comes down to two problems (three, third one later) 1. Either you give someone sub-standard work to maintain that you be able to help them. This will lead to demotivation eventually 2. You accept you are not in position to help them. This generally leads to friction and a bad boss will try to hide incompetence by architecture discussions, meetings etc Smartness is subjective. Which leads to the third problem. How can you assess skills of someone better than you? You can only go as far as grilling a candidate to your own competence. So a B, C player will only be hiring other B, C players and that will soon degenerate the organization.
secoif 15y ago
What is 'smart' though? I think the mantra is basically saying "hire people who fill in the gaps". A good leader is someone who facilitates identifying and filling in the gaps, which has little to do with "smarter".
fabricode 15y ago
Management is orthogonal to code design/dev/maint. No one (ok... almost no one) has no management nor coding skill, rather each of us has a mix of the two. The great organizations I've worked in had extremely smart people in management and in development, but the type of brilliance was different. So yes, hire someone smarter than yourself.

Does this conflict with the mantra, 'Hire people that are smarter than you.'?

jpdoctor 15y ago

You bet. I never see the answer to: Why would people smarter than you want to work for someone dumber than them?

zem 15y ago
there are two classes of boss, those you look to for technical leadership and some degree of mentoring, and those you expect to do the actual "management" stuff so that you don't need to. for the latter category, i'm not looking for sheer brains so much as i am looking for good leadership qualities.
- jpdoctor 15y ago
  > and those you expect to do the actual "management" stuff so that you don't need to. Sounds like your answer is: When there are items that smart people want to outsource, they often go work for people stupider than them rather than hire people to take care of it. Do I have that right?
  - zem 15y ago
    no, i think you're falling into the common technical-person trap of assuming that raw intelligence is the only measure of competence. i don't want to work for myself, and i don't want to hire people - i want to be competent at my job, and work for someone who is competent at theirs. that someone may or may not be more intelligent than me; it's largely irrelevant as long as they're smart enough to do their job well. (and i may or may not be more intelligent than they are; it should likewise be irrelevant to them as long as i do my job well)
    - jpdoctor 15y ago
      > no, i think you're falling into the common technical-person trap of assuming that raw intelligence is the only measure of competence. No, I am looking at the logical consequence of "hire people smarter than yourself". If A is smarter than B, then B is less smart than A. Therefore: "hire people smarter than yourself" implies hiring people who are willing to work for someone dumber.
      - zem 15y ago
        certainly. it's just that the word "dumber" has connotations of "stupid and therefore not worth working for".
      - jtheory 15y ago
        Meh -- "smart" doesn't work on a single scale. Your boss can be smarter than you at his job, and successfully hire you, smarter than he is at your job. That's an odd way to word it, but the fact remains -- there are generally different skillsets and competencies involved, and you are looking to build or be a part of a team with complementary talents.

parsnips 15y ago

Not really. Leadership is about giving clear direction and encouraging others to rise to the occasion. That can happen if the "leader" is not as good technically as his subordinates.

Tyrannosaurs 15y ago
More than it can happen, if your programmers are good it should happen. A leader is spending a fraction of the time hands on that a programmer is. Given the developments in technology and the additional time the developers are getting with it, if they're not better than their leader in a few years, you've got the wrong programmers.

bullseye 15y ago

Smarter does not mean better leader. Often great leaders are indeed intelligent, but the skills that make someone a better leader do not necessarily correlate with being "smarter". Instead, great leaders possess the ability to motivate and read people in an effective way. Conversely, you've probably encountered highly intelligent people that have the people skills of a bug.

negamax 15y ago

In my experience it does. "Hire people smart than you" is a management ethos, which translates to delegate the hell out of a task. But software development specially in small teams doesn't work that way. Many a times, junior programmers require direction and even help in completing their tasks. So it comes down to two problems (three, third one later) 1. Either you give someone sub-standard work to maintain that you be able to help them. This will lead to demotivation eventually 2. You accept you are not in position to help them. This generally leads to friction and a bad boss will try to hide incompetence by architecture discussions, meetings etc Smartness is subjective. Which leads to the third problem. How can you assess skills of someone better than you? You can only go as far as grilling a candidate to your own competence. So a B, C player will only be hiring other B, C players and that will soon degenerate the organization.

secoif 15y ago

What is 'smart' though? I think the mantra is basically saying "hire people who fill in the gaps". A good leader is someone who facilitates identifying and filling in the gaps, which has little to do with "smarter".

fabricode 15y ago

Management is orthogonal to code design/dev/maint. No one (ok... almost no one) has no management nor coding skill, rather each of us has a mix of the two. The great organizations I've worked in had extremely smart people in management and in development, but the type of brilliance was different. So yes, hire someone smarter than yourself.