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I like how he says he doesn't need FAANG level people. Then his next paragraph describes working at FAANG. "We’re an inverted organization. That means that tac

by Sevii 2y ago

I like how he says he doesn't need FAANG level people. Then his next paragraph describes working at FAANG. "We’re an inverted organization. That means that tactical decisions are made by the people who are doing the work, not managers. (In theory, anyway, we’re not perfect.) So we’re looking for people who have peer leadership skills, who are great at teamwork, who will take ownership and make decisions on their own."

holografix 2y ago
Exactly right. People who have “leadership” skills are the ones that pay attention to their own leadership and are manage up more than anything else. They usually repackage people’s work around them into their own, take ownership and defend loudly their territory (project ownership) and methodically build relationships with leadership. Having “leadership skills” and being good a team work are often orthogonal to each other.
- khazhoux 2y ago
  > People who have “leadership” skills are the ones that pay attention to their own leadership and are manage up more than anything else. No, it's actually people who can put together a technical plan and drive its execution with other engineers, or who can clarify complex problems esp. when there are conflicting opinions, or who can see problems before they become disasters and organize the right group of people to take care of it... There are many examples of leadership, which have nothing to do with the sour view of managing-up or taking credit for others' work.
- noirbot 2y ago
  I mean, that's the sour way to put it. As someone kinda stuck in that sort of position now, I own a project and have been able to do very little of the work because I'm spending 90% of my time making sure leadership actually makes decisions so I can get the decisions my team needs in order to proceed. I'm spending hours in meetings with other teams to get them to prioritize our dependencies and data access needs. If you're not lucky enough to have management that's exactly technically aligned to your project someone has to be managing up and paying attention to leadership or else expectations will be totally off from reality.
  - supriyo-biswas 2y ago
    This is not a sour way to put it; extreme levels of information hoarding, cookie licking[1] and building and defending fiefdoms were the norm from what I saw at my time at a FAANG. [1] https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20091201-00/?p=15843 https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20091201-00/?p=15...
numbsafari 2y ago
> FAANG level people "FAANG" isn't a "level", it's just a cluster.

by Sevii 2y ago

holografix 2y ago

Exactly right. People who have “leadership” skills are the ones that pay attention to their own leadership and are manage up more than anything else. They usually repackage people’s work around them into their own, take ownership and defend loudly their territory (project ownership) and methodically build relationships with leadership. Having “leadership skills” and being good a team work are often orthogonal to each other.

khazhoux 2y ago
> People who have “leadership” skills are the ones that pay attention to their own leadership and are manage up more than anything else. No, it's actually people who can put together a technical plan and drive its execution with other engineers, or who can clarify complex problems esp. when there are conflicting opinions, or who can see problems before they become disasters and organize the right group of people to take care of it... There are many examples of leadership, which have nothing to do with the sour view of managing-up or taking credit for others' work.
noirbot 2y ago
I mean, that's the sour way to put it. As someone kinda stuck in that sort of position now, I own a project and have been able to do very little of the work because I'm spending 90% of my time making sure leadership actually makes decisions so I can get the decisions my team needs in order to proceed. I'm spending hours in meetings with other teams to get them to prioritize our dependencies and data access needs. If you're not lucky enough to have management that's exactly technically aligned to your project someone has to be managing up and paying attention to leadership or else expectations will be totally off from reality.
- supriyo-biswas 2y ago
  This is not a sour way to put it; extreme levels of information hoarding, cookie licking[1] and building and defending fiefdoms were the norm from what I saw at my time at a FAANG. [1] https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20091201-00/?p=15843 https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20091201-00/?p=15...

numbsafari 2y ago

> FAANG level people "FAANG" isn't a "level", it's just a cluster.