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Good tech leaders generally don’t command: they inspire. And when you’re at the point where you’re trying to figure out the “right way to say things” you’ve al

Good tech leaders generally don’t command: they inspire. And when you’re at the point where you’re trying to figure out the “right way to say things” you’ve already, utterly, failed. Good tech leaders influence, guide, and grow people. They are honest and authentic. The management style I have seen work the best is when people act in a real, genuine and sincere ways that are true to who they are as individuals and avoid manipulative behavior. They can still be hard chargers. They can still be abrasive. But they generally have a great degree of self-honesty and consideration to others to go along with their ambition. Spending oceans of time trying to figure out the right turn of phrase is a terrible idea. It’s focusing more on how things look rather than putting the focus on how things are and how things should be. Obviously there are oceans of management styles. But I can say that the smooth talking, super considered people who are focused on how exactly to say things rather than bigger picture leadership ideals are typically to worst, most manipulative people I have ever worked with.

opportune 3y ago
I don’t think this is necessarily true. Delegation is the name of the game in any large organization - managers exist to sift down tasks to a doer. You can’t delegate many kinds of tasks by inspiring people. You can generally only inspire people into things they want to do and find interesting anyway but the unfortunate truth is that there is a lot of boring/annoying/not fun stuff that needs to be done and it can’t all be done by the CEO alone.
- happytiger 3y ago
  Managers are leaders are vastly different animals that are often incorrectly conflated.
  - Paul-Craft 3y ago
    Correct. Managers handle process and paperwork. Leaders direct, influence, inspire, and occasionally even cajole or prod. It's the difference between a bureaucrat and a bard. The best managers are both, but you definitely want to make sure you're not sending a paper pusher to do a playwright's job.
    - 7952 3y ago
      And you definitely want to make sure your playright can handle process and paperwork. Otherwise leadership is just sacrifice to cover up for poor planning.
Paul-Craft 3y ago
> Good tech leaders generally don’t command: they inspire. Ding ding ding! You win the prize. The way I always put this to people is that "if dictating worked, there'd be a lot more dictators in the world." > Good tech leaders influence, guide, and grow people. They are honest and authentic. > The management style I have seen work the best is when people act in a real, genuine and sincere ways that are true to who they are as individuals and avoid manipulative behavior. They can still be hard chargers. They can still be abrasive. But they generally have a great degree of self-honesty and consideration to others to go along with their ambition. The best managers I've ever had never told me to do anything. At my last position (from which I was unfortunately laid off a few months ago) as a senior staff engineer at a ~100 person startup with a ~30 person engineering org, my manager, the CTO, raised this to an art form. I joked with our other senior staff engineer (whom I hired) that our manager never said anything but "Figure it out." Once, after an eng all hands meeting, I Slacked my colleague and said "Well, if that wasn't peak $CTO-NAME, I don't know what is. I'm pretty sure what I just heard was the 25 minute version of 'figure it out.'" "Figure it out" is a great message when you have a talented group of engineers working with you. They're experts at what they do, otherwise they wouldn't have gotten hired. "Figure it out" gives them room to get shit done, and it also goes a long way toward validating any concerns they might express. It's almost magical, really. I worked there for almost a year, and I what I just wrote here for all of you is the absolute most valuable thing I learned in all that time. As a leader, telling smart, curious, and deeply technical people to "figure it out" will get you everything you ever dreamed of and more. The only problem is that if you're not careful, you can end up talking too much, which leads to the other half of the lesson: shut the fuck up. Literally just stop talking, and leave some space in the conversation that you're not filling up with words. It's best if you can stop talking right as you've sketched out the barest outlines of a big idea, or told a good story, or you've just got something that's conceptually interesting to drop in the other person's lap. Once you do that, "figure it out" + interesting idea + "shut the fuck up" is just like weaponized nerd sniping.
- supertofu 3y ago
  I recently quit a dev job because the project manager micromanaged everything (among other reasons). In that job I was treated as a set of hands to execute someone else's vision and nothing more. No one ever said to me "figure it out", even though that is my number one skill as a developer, and that is the part of my job that I love the most. Thank you for sharing this anecdote. It has helped me understand the management style I prefer.
switch007 3y ago
> Good tech leaders generally don’t command: they inspire. Agreed. Compare: We’re going to sail on the high seas and discover new lands! vs Cut down that tree for wood and build a ship.
- dafelst 3y ago
  Sure, but who is going to cut the wood and build the ship? In your first example, no one explicitly owns executing that task, which is very bad if you do want to sail the high seas.
  - switch007 3y ago
    Okay, here's the rest of the story :P : We’re going to sail on the high seas and discover new lands! Who's with me? <loads of hands raise up> Great! Now, what we need is some wood. How can we get some wood? <lots of people point at the trees and eagerly grab an axe>
    - dafelst 3y ago
      Improved for sure
buggyipadmettoo 3y ago
Agree. Ive owned several businesses and probably hired about 100 people in my life. Ive never commanded a single one. These are voluntary relationships. I’m paying for their services. I don’t command the waitress to bring me a drink, and she doesn’t command me to pay her. Why would I ever issue a command? Either you’re choosing to work with me, in which case you want to provide me with your service, or we’re not working together.

opportune 3y ago

I don’t think this is necessarily true. Delegation is the name of the game in any large organization - managers exist to sift down tasks to a doer. You can’t delegate many kinds of tasks by inspiring people. You can generally only inspire people into things they want to do and find interesting anyway but the unfortunate truth is that there is a lot of boring/annoying/not fun stuff that needs to be done and it can’t all be done by the CEO alone.

happytiger 3y ago
Managers are leaders are vastly different animals that are often incorrectly conflated.
- Paul-Craft 3y ago
  Correct. Managers handle process and paperwork. Leaders direct, influence, inspire, and occasionally even cajole or prod. It's the difference between a bureaucrat and a bard. The best managers are both, but you definitely want to make sure you're not sending a paper pusher to do a playwright's job.
  - 7952 3y ago
    And you definitely want to make sure your playright can handle process and paperwork. Otherwise leadership is just sacrifice to cover up for poor planning.

Paul-Craft 3y ago

> Good tech leaders generally don’t command: they inspire. Ding ding ding! You win the prize. The way I always put this to people is that "if dictating worked, there'd be a lot more dictators in the world." > Good tech leaders influence, guide, and grow people. They are honest and authentic. > The management style I have seen work the best is when people act in a real, genuine and sincere ways that are true to who they are as individuals and avoid manipulative behavior. They can still be hard chargers. They can still be abrasive. But they generally have a great degree of self-honesty and consideration to others to go along with their ambition. The best managers I've ever had never told me to do anything. At my last position (from which I was unfortunately laid off a few months ago) as a senior staff engineer at a ~100 person startup with a ~30 person engineering org, my manager, the CTO, raised this to an art form. I joked with our other senior staff engineer (whom I hired) that our manager never said anything but "Figure it out." Once, after an eng all hands meeting, I Slacked my colleague and said "Well, if that wasn't peak $CTO-NAME, I don't know what is. I'm pretty sure what I just heard was the 25 minute version of 'figure it out.'" "Figure it out" is a great message when you have a talented group of engineers working with you. They're experts at what they do, otherwise they wouldn't have gotten hired. "Figure it out" gives them room to get shit done, and it also goes a long way toward validating any concerns they might express. It's almost magical, really. I worked there for almost a year, and I what I just wrote here for all of you is the absolute most valuable thing I learned in all that time. As a leader, telling smart, curious, and deeply technical people to "figure it out" will get you everything you ever dreamed of and more. The only problem is that if you're not careful, you can end up talking too much, which leads to the other half of the lesson: shut the fuck up. Literally just stop talking, and leave some space in the conversation that you're not filling up with words. It's best if you can stop talking right as you've sketched out the barest outlines of a big idea, or told a good story, or you've just got something that's conceptually interesting to drop in the other person's lap. Once you do that, "figure it out" + interesting idea + "shut the fuck up" is just like weaponized nerd sniping.

supertofu 3y ago
I recently quit a dev job because the project manager micromanaged everything (among other reasons). In that job I was treated as a set of hands to execute someone else's vision and nothing more. No one ever said to me "figure it out", even though that is my number one skill as a developer, and that is the part of my job that I love the most. Thank you for sharing this anecdote. It has helped me understand the management style I prefer.

switch007 3y ago

> Good tech leaders generally don’t command: they inspire. Agreed. Compare: We’re going to sail on the high seas and discover new lands! vs Cut down that tree for wood and build a ship.

dafelst 3y ago
Sure, but who is going to cut the wood and build the ship? In your first example, no one explicitly owns executing that task, which is very bad if you do want to sail the high seas.
- switch007 3y ago
  Okay, here's the rest of the story :P : We’re going to sail on the high seas and discover new lands! Who's with me? <loads of hands raise up> Great! Now, what we need is some wood. How can we get some wood? <lots of people point at the trees and eagerly grab an axe>
  - dafelst 3y ago
    Improved for sure

buggyipadmettoo 3y ago

Agree. Ive owned several businesses and probably hired about 100 people in my life. Ive never commanded a single one. These are voluntary relationships. I’m paying for their services. I don’t command the waitress to bring me a drink, and she doesn’t command me to pay her. Why would I ever issue a command? Either you’re choosing to work with me, in which case you want to provide me with your service, or we’re not working together.