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A good manager is simple to see: success is the team's, failure is their fault. If it is not the case, you have a bad manager.
by arkh 2y ago
A good manager is simple to see: success is the team's, failure is their fault. If it is not the case, you have a bad manager.
- lotsofpulp 2y agoIs it possible for the manager to be given insufficient resources by their manager? Such as insufficient pay to hire sufficiently skilled people, or insufficient budget to hire sufficient people? Whose fault is the failure then?
- soco 2y agoIs it possible for the IC to be given insufficient resources by their PM? Such an insufficient pay or insufficient time or or? Whose fault is the failure then? My point is, we all work between lines and try to do our best, whether we are managers or ICs. A good manager will try to do their best just as you do, a bad one will throw all his troubles on your back, or blame you/the organization/moon phases for them.
- washadjeffmad 2y agoIt's a responsibility of management to ensure that the work is understood and proper resources are negotiated for and allocated to perform it. When a manager doesn't understand the scope of the work or has not made the case for adequate resources, to the project's jeopardy or their team's, it's typically referred to as mismanagement. If this culture of under-serving itself for no apparent benefit except to appear too busy to be assigned more work extends elsewhere, it could be an organizational issue. If it's a SNAFU principle situation, management needs to be brought in alignment and trust with leadership, or leadership needs to be replaced. I've encountered both at the same place at the same time, and thankfully the board agreed.
- LargeWu 2y agoIn a good organization, there will be several layers of people owning failures of different types. The low level manager can claim ownership of failure to sufficiently manage expectations, their manager can claim ownership of failure to prioritize properly, and a yet higher level leader can own failure to provide funding.
- osigurdson 2y agoWhat is so amazing about someone who throws themselves under the bus? Shouldn't a manager increase the probability of success?
- LargeWu 2y agoIt's about shielding the team from the consequences of failure. A good manager will say "If my team failed it's because I did not prepare them well enough/lead them well enough/manage expectations well enough". this is what ownership looks like. It is orthogonal to probability of failure.
- osigurdson 2y agoWhat is the actual utility of this however? Instead of trying to determine who is to blame, why not try to identify areas of improvement?
- Mordisquitos 2y agoHence why a good manager "throws themselves under the bus" in the event of failure — the manager failed to increase the probability of success.
- osigurdson 2y agoI like this take a lot. This assumes that authority, competence and responsibility are aligned. However, this is often not the case in "modern" management as authority is spread very thin and responsibility is fluid (highly dependent on outcome).