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> Motivation is a hired trait. The only place where managers motivate people is in management books. This seems entirely false to me. To be honest it is so inc

• deleted 9mo ago
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• tayo42 9mo ago
  So what did those managers do to make you more motivated?
  • idontwantthis 9mo ago
    Treat me like a human being, work with me to set reasonable expectations, share blame and focus praise.
  • dannersy 9mo ago
    Cared about anything other than their own upward movement, actively worked towards my professional development, made sure I had actual, not hand wavey, feedback, and made sure my compensation reflected my growing responsibility. I am aware that all of those things may not be in their power to give, but some combination of that in any org that is somewhat functional would be motivating.
  • sgillen 9mo ago
    In addition to what the other responses said: 1. Share a cohesive and inspiring vision for the project. 2. Understand your skills, strengths/weaknesses etc and try to give you work that challenges you / help you grow / are interesting. I think these are rare and can be hard to do (I'm now trying to do it myself!), but when it happens it's very motivating.
  • rectang 9mo ago
    I had one manager who got extremely excited about whatever you were working on. It was infectious and motivated most of the team including myself. He’s an innately curious person, but also whip smart and surely developed this skill deliberately. I had another boss, a founder, who had a difficult relationship with engineering but was extremely gifted and had a great vision. I found myself highly motivated at this company as well, but for wholly different reasons. There are many paths to success. Both startups had successful exits, and I felt as though I contributed meaningfully to both.
  • friendzis 9mo ago
    I have read the sibling comments here and it is so saddening. The general expectations for management are, apparently, so low, that a manager attempting to do some duties in their job description is lauded as some savior. <crying-cat.jpg>
• jimbo808 9mo ago
  I've only experienced de-motivation from managers, personally. At least for me, motivation comes from ownership, impact, autonomy, respect. You can cause me to lose motivation in a lot of ways, but you can't really cause me to gain motivation unless you've already de-motivated me somehow. You can de-motivate me in a lot of ways, some examples: - throwing me or a coworker under the bus for your mistakes - crediting yourself for the work of someone else - attempting to "motivate" me when I'm already motivated - manufacturing a sense of urgency, this is especially bad if you try to sustain this state all indefinitely - using AI or market conditions as a fear tactic to motivate the team - visibly engaging in any kind of nepotism Honestly this list could go on and on, but those are some that come to mind.
  • theshrike79 9mo ago
    Also: - not letting me have ownership of what I build and dictating features - not giving me autonomy of how to solve a problem
  • trusche 9mo ago
    > manufacturing a sense of urgency, this is especially bad if you try to sustain this state all indefinitely Sadly, I have seen this in almost every startup led by founders without an engineering background I've ever been a part of. In my personal experience, this is often caused by overeager sales team promising the world for the next deal, only to fob it off to the engineering team who now "urgently" need to build "features" and "work hard" to make it happen. This is when your intrinsically motivated engineers start looking for the exit.
• zeroq 9mo ago
  It is. Motivation is a whimsical thing. The fantastic element that explains the appeal of games to many developers is neither the fire-breathing monsters nor the milky-skinned, semi-clad sirens; it is the experience of carrying out a task from start to finish without any change in the user requirements. As a lead or mgmt I set my highest priorities to: (a) make sure that the goals are set to stone and crystal clear (b) the team can do their work without any unnecessary distractions (c) try to remove some of these "necessary" distractions as well It can be really hard. And it can very ungrateful. I aim to be a nightwatchman, and I'm really proud of myself when the team thinks I'm getting paid for nothing. The bigger the structure the bigger the drama and I don't want them to be any part of it. Meanwhile I struggle with stakeholders who are like "c'mon, you already build the skyscraper, we just want you to move the parking lot from the underground to second story, how hard can it be, you have all the parts in place, just move them around".
• f1shy 9mo ago
  I’ve been working for more than 30 years. I was seriously demotivated by managers, but never motivated by them. The beat I got was protection from them to give me free space to work. But the motivation was always internal. Being a manager myself, I never got to motivate anybody do anything they didn’t want to. If they wanted to, it worked, but the motivation AFAIK was internal. Of course that is one person speaking. Milage can vary.
  • Y-bar 9mo ago
    I want to hazard a guess that a motivational manager is just like a well-oiled cog in a machine. You essentially never notice them as having influence over your motivation and only pay attention to the squeaky and rattling and faulty ones.
    • lan321 9mo ago
      The best one I had in that regard was just a nice dude who I wanted to help as much as I could since he'd help me when needed. I don't think any other way would really work in the current landscape. Whenever a manager talks about our grand product and the clients dying to get a taste of our artisinal code stew, even they can't take themselves entirely seriously. The only thing that seems to help is just being liked so your team wants to make your life easier. (outside of money/benefits/promotions and maybe short term gaslighting)
      • skeeter2020 9mo ago
        I've found the best managers are very aware of the "clueless manager" trope and suffer from imposter's syndrome more than most, but use that to make them good managers doing what you said: recognizing & owning where they are blind or lack skill (working on it, asking for help), helping where they can (doing a share of the shit work, or backfilling holes), and trying to be a nice person (building a relationship beyond the manager-employee dynamic). This doesn't mean they are your friend, but most people want to work (and win!) with people they like.
      • josecodea 9mo ago
• evalstate 9mo ago
  A lot of those books are more about persuasion than motivation - they can look similar from a distance.
• solatic 9mo ago
  I'll agree with you that the author tried to put in a sound bite and it failed to clarify the author's point. The author is trying to argue for hiring early engineers who have exhibited ownership values and who want to take ownership for their work. These are the people for whom you establish "extreme transparency" (see: late in the post), a Google Doc for them to help align with others on high-level plans, a kitchen for people to informally talk in, and then get out of their way. That kind of environment is indeed in and of itself quite motivating for a certain kind of engineer. Of course, it doesn't scale to BigCorp-size. Eventually you have too many cooks in the kitchen. The truth is that the vast majority of engineers really do want someone to tell them exactly what to do, so that they can come in to a highly structured 9-5 job and earn a paycheck that pays their mortgage and feeds their family. Author's prescriptions do not apply to large companies or to most engineers, and Author makes it clear as such.
• friendzis 9mo ago
  > A good manager understands this, and motivates by helping you understand how the things you are doing are actually critical to the success of the team and the company Your definition of a "good manager" is essentially "does not actively sabotage work of subordinates". That's not motivation, that's merely absence of active demotivation. A person knowing how and in what ways their work contributes to the success of the unit and the whole are absolute basics and if a person is not aware of those either their manager is incompetent as hell or actively hostile. Reminds me of those job ads where "benefits" section contains gems like "salary paid on time". That is not a benefit, that is such a basic that even mentioning it puts into question everything about such company.
  • n4r9 9mo ago
    Disagree. This is explicitly active: "helping you understand how the things you are doing are actually critical to the success of the team". It could include building out a team dashboard that tracks the consequences of bugfixes, for example.
    • friendzis 9mo ago
      Sorry, I do not understand which part do you disagree with. > This is explicitly active Is merely being active (hopefully towards eventual success) automatically places a manager among "good managers"? What defines an "average manager" then? I have explored this in more detail in a reply to a sibling. I see "helping you understand how the things you are doing are actually critical to the success of the team" as a critical work of any manager, therefore I find it strange when such duties are attributed to "good" management.
      • n4r9 9mo ago
        It is critical. Done well, it motivates people. Some managers are better at it than others; some are great at it. Such managers are actually motivating rather employees rather than avoiding demotivation.
  • watwut 9mo ago
• xkbarkar 9mo ago
  I have experienced both. I d argue its not the manager that motivates people that can only be found inbooks. Its the manager that can come in and mend a toxic and dysfunctional team. The toxic teams end up breaking good managers in the end and they either become part of the problem or leave. The hero manager described in the phoenix project is a myth. The motivational one imho is very real but they need a good platform just like everyone else.
  • boobsbr 9mo ago
    In my experience, no manager can fix a toxic, dysfunctional team. That team is doomed and the best course of action is to disband it and let the worst people go.
• skeeter2020 9mo ago
  The author seems to lack any sort of understanding of motivation beyond some sort of vague, blackbox "fire in the belly" concept. This is definitely not true. My take aligns with yours: motivation is a vector, having both magnitude and direction. You want individuals with the fire and then somehow need to figure out how to direct the combined heat. In the earlier stages of an externally-funded venture this is the difference between building a jet engine and pouring gasoline on a campfire. I agree you don't need a manager to do this, but also feel strongly that by the time you're at multiple teams your CTO-founder is also the wrong person. They're probably a core developer who earned the title with limited experience; don't make them learn how to manage a dev team's day-to-day while they also learn every aspect of engineering management. I wish every CTO started as a team lead, but in this scenario it's too late. CTOs largely lead the parade, but you're devs need a servant-leader in the trenches who can articulate from the front, constrain the sides and push from behind.
• pavel_lishin 9mo ago
  The author seems to be thinking of word "motivate" in the way that someone in the olden days would motivate a donkey - with a whip. Every example they're listing is not "motivation", it's effectively forcing additional work and hours. No motivation is happening there.
• Nemi 9mo ago
  The point is that the 'maximum motivation level' for an employee is an inherent trait. It is a ceiling. Some people have high ceilings and some don't. If an employee has a low ceiling, no manager can motivate that employee higher. But if someone has a high ceiling, the most a manager can do is create an environment that allows the employee to achieve their max potential. A bad manager on the other hand, can very easily bring a normally high-potential motivated employee down to mediocre levels. If you are one of those self-aware leaders that knows how to create an environment where people can excel, then hiring highly motivated people is the winning strategy.