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>>> Jerry: But I made some good decisions about what shows up when. For instance, I don’t like the idea of showing deals for Bermuda when someone searches for “

>>> Jerry: But I made some good decisions about what shows up when. For instance, I don’t like the idea of showing deals for Bermuda when someone searches for “Caribbean” While Bermuda not being part of the Caribbean might be true…it’s really not a valid point in this circumstance. It was an apparent dev assumption that this level of precision was desired even if it wasn’t requested or its absence as a requirement was a mistake. When it was reported as a bug, that should have prompted the developer to clarify with the PM the OG requirement so they were both on the same page. He didn’t, he assumed she was wrong…apparently twice. The PM probably understood that to their lay users the terms “Bermuda”, “Caribbean”, and “Islands” all have a degree of marketing relevance to each other (There is a reason why you might dumb down search results for something like that). Judging by what was information given in the story, apparently dumbed down search results was known and required in the past. Not sure there is any “right” way to gently coach an employee that disregarded proper protocol and requirements, lied about it, blamed a colleague, and initially refused to accept responsibility when it was brought to their attention. That would be damn frustrating. I know HN loves to blame the manager, but this is one of those instances where it seems every portion of the problem and its escalation appears to lie solely at the feet of the developer. It least in my opinion.

Herring 2y ago
It’s super easy to coach an employee about this. I’ve done it many times, even once publicly to a director while I was a senior. Just acknowledge their train of thought extra generously, then explain why this case is different. ChatGPT has been trained to do this. I’d say your paragraph 2 was great, and yes the manager should have tried talking about “level of precision” or “marketing relevance” instead of defaulting forcefully to “because i/product said so”.
- kcplate 2y ago
  Yeah I agree that the manager seemed to leap pretty quick onto the “you don’t get to have independent thought in secret” train. Of course we only see one side of the story too. But it kind of feels to me like this might not have been the first time there has been a need to coach this person either. Not sure that just one instance really gets you to lack of trust. I’ve been in the business a long time in multiple roles up to senior leadership. I am at the sunset of my career and found a lovely tech role where I happily don’t have to manage anyone but myself and it’s glorious. In all that time I have encountered my fair share of the Jerry types in the last almost 40 years so I am probably jaded and know the frustration.
  - Herring 2y ago
    Yeah and maybe the employee has been asked to implement dark patterns before. Such is modern capitalism.
    - kcplate 2y ago
      I’d suggest that if the general populace that use your app sort of see “Caribbean”, “Islands”, “Bermuda” to a degree of equivalence to the general area that they are considering for vacation, it’s probably not a dark pattern.
      - Herring 2y ago
        Ethics is like wearing a condom. If someone tries to tell you that you don't need to worry about it (after defaulting to force!), then you *really* need to worry about it. Edit: Sure enough, look at your comments. Elon, Tesla, Musk, Trump, Trump. Hilarious + predictable.
        kcplate 2y ago
        So you are comment history mining on me? Wow…that is some creepy as fuck behavior.
roenxi 2y ago
> I know HN loves to blame the manager, but this is one of those instances where it seems every portion of the problem and its escalation appears to lie solely at the feet of the developer. Yeah, that is a tell that the manager is being unreasonable. What are the odds that every portion of this sits with the developer? Close to 0. That isn't how miscommunications generally happen. But it is a pattern that turns up when borderline abusive people report their interactions on the internet [0]. I don't trust this paraphrase of what Jerry was saying at all. It seems much more likely he led with something reasonable "Bermuda isn't in the Caribbean and we made a decision in the past to exclude Caribbean deals when that sort of search happens" then the manager fumbled the conversation in follow-up and managed to make it weird. Though it does seem like the developer was making mistakes; I've seen scenes play out that I'd rate as similar. Part of the dev's job is to manage their manager when that manager is struggling. In this case the manager seems to have gotten stuck in the mindset of being a big monkey and the response to that is to let them monkey out peacefully and not make a fuss. It could have been worse; but this looks like bad-to-average leadership on display. [0] Big red flags in the "I wasn't sure he was working in good faith" and "Maybe he was feeling lazy" quote with no evidence. We're likely seeing misreported conversation; the manager doesn't understand what is going on conversationally if he got to that mindset in this sort of situation. What else did he get wrong?
- kcplate 2y ago
  While it’s certainly written from the managers POV and will show that bias, but the behavior and attitude he is describing is not unheard of from SWEs and the personality types that are attracted to that vocation. Frankly it’s frustrating and a challenge that cannot be easily dismissed as “bad-to-average leadership”. It might be bad leadership, but it’s bad behavior from the employee too and that should be acknowledged. When I managed technical people I used to describe the challenge to management folks outside of tech that in tech management you are managing a group of people where everyone is absolutely convinced that they are smarter than everyone else around them. Often not only just smarter but their other colleagues are bumbling idiots. So my bias from experience is that this dev was wrong, because I have been through very similar scenarios with similar Jerry’s. I spent 2 decades managing engineers, but haven’t for a decade so I acknowledge that times change and perhaps stroking fragile egos is a management necessity in 2025 where it wasn’t in 2015. I also had the benefit of supportive executive leadership that allowed me to quickly cycle out those personalities like “Jerry” to build a team where even if folks were convinced they were smarter than their peers, they would at least communicate with each and be respectful of the entire team’s contribution that allowed us to minimize source issues like was described in this story.

Herring 2y ago

It’s super easy to coach an employee about this. I’ve done it many times, even once publicly to a director while I was a senior. Just acknowledge their train of thought extra generously, then explain why this case is different. ChatGPT has been trained to do this. I’d say your paragraph 2 was great, and yes the manager should have tried talking about “level of precision” or “marketing relevance” instead of defaulting forcefully to “because i/product said so”.

kcplate 2y ago
Yeah I agree that the manager seemed to leap pretty quick onto the “you don’t get to have independent thought in secret” train. Of course we only see one side of the story too. But it kind of feels to me like this might not have been the first time there has been a need to coach this person either. Not sure that just one instance really gets you to lack of trust. I’ve been in the business a long time in multiple roles up to senior leadership. I am at the sunset of my career and found a lovely tech role where I happily don’t have to manage anyone but myself and it’s glorious. In all that time I have encountered my fair share of the Jerry types in the last almost 40 years so I am probably jaded and know the frustration.
- Herring 2y ago
  Yeah and maybe the employee has been asked to implement dark patterns before. Such is modern capitalism.
  - kcplate 2y ago
    I’d suggest that if the general populace that use your app sort of see “Caribbean”, “Islands”, “Bermuda” to a degree of equivalence to the general area that they are considering for vacation, it’s probably not a dark pattern.
    - Herring 2y ago
      Ethics is like wearing a condom. If someone tries to tell you that you don't need to worry about it (after defaulting to force!), then you *really* need to worry about it. Edit: Sure enough, look at your comments. Elon, Tesla, Musk, Trump, Trump. Hilarious + predictable.
      - kcplate 2y ago
        So you are comment history mining on me? Wow…that is some creepy as fuck behavior.

roenxi 2y ago

> I know HN loves to blame the manager, but this is one of those instances where it seems every portion of the problem and its escalation appears to lie solely at the feet of the developer. Yeah, that is a tell that the manager is being unreasonable. What are the odds that every portion of this sits with the developer? Close to 0. That isn't how miscommunications generally happen. But it is a pattern that turns up when borderline abusive people report their interactions on the internet [0]. I don't trust this paraphrase of what Jerry was saying at all. It seems much more likely he led with something reasonable "Bermuda isn't in the Caribbean and we made a decision in the past to exclude Caribbean deals when that sort of search happens" then the manager fumbled the conversation in follow-up and managed to make it weird. Though it does seem like the developer was making mistakes; I've seen scenes play out that I'd rate as similar. Part of the dev's job is to manage their manager when that manager is struggling. In this case the manager seems to have gotten stuck in the mindset of being a big monkey and the response to that is to let them monkey out peacefully and not make a fuss. It could have been worse; but this looks like bad-to-average leadership on display. [0] Big red flags in the "I wasn't sure he was working in good faith" and "Maybe he was feeling lazy" quote with no evidence. We're likely seeing misreported conversation; the manager doesn't understand what is going on conversationally if he got to that mindset in this sort of situation. What else did he get wrong?

kcplate 2y ago
While it’s certainly written from the managers POV and will show that bias, but the behavior and attitude he is describing is not unheard of from SWEs and the personality types that are attracted to that vocation. Frankly it’s frustrating and a challenge that cannot be easily dismissed as “bad-to-average leadership”. It might be bad leadership, but it’s bad behavior from the employee too and that should be acknowledged. When I managed technical people I used to describe the challenge to management folks outside of tech that in tech management you are managing a group of people where everyone is absolutely convinced that they are smarter than everyone else around them. Often not only just smarter but their other colleagues are bumbling idiots. So my bias from experience is that this dev was wrong, because I have been through very similar scenarios with similar Jerry’s. I spent 2 decades managing engineers, but haven’t for a decade so I acknowledge that times change and perhaps stroking fragile egos is a management necessity in 2025 where it wasn’t in 2015. I also had the benefit of supportive executive leadership that allowed me to quickly cycle out those personalities like “Jerry” to build a team where even if folks were convinced they were smarter than their peers, they would at least communicate with each and be respectful of the entire team’s contribution that allowed us to minimize source issues like was described in this story.