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Ask HN: How do you cope with incompetent team members?

• JeremyChase 18y ago
  It depends on your current relationship, but you should be as straightforward as possible. You should tell him that you think others work is being compromised because of the way he is doing things. The best solution is for him to realize what he is doing wrong and to improve. The situation will not get better by itself.
• wastedbrains 18y ago
  I ended up giving a nickname to a coworker like that "destroyer of worlds" Then I got him bumped to a another team for awhile. Then he ended up back on my team and I eventually quit. In my exit interview I mentioned him.I am sorry but keeping an employee around that is pushed from project to project because no one wants him on his team is bad for the entire company. So I honestly would bring attention to it eventually.
• JayNeely 18y ago
  It sounds like he's not incompetent so much as he isn't efficient. If he were better at prioritizing, would he be contributing value? I'd first try to get the group to condense the 10,000-feet view into a single document, including priorities, and get the group to agree on it (presenting it as a 'helpful reference'). Then you'd have an easier time saying, "Hey Bill, whatcha working on?" "I'm really bogged down with <task>." "Huh, is <task> really that important based on the priorities in <document>?" If "no": "Awesome, slash it and move on, dude. What's your next task?" If "yes": "Huh. I'll talk with some of the others, see if they agree or if you can drop this and move on to something easier."
• Brushfire 18y ago
  That depends entirely on your role in the team, which isnt clear. If you are the leader, its your job to get him working correctly or get him out. If you are not the leader -- ie you are his equal, its a little harder to go about, and it depends on his, the team, and the leaders personalities and operating style. There is no hard and fast rule. But you should do something instead of being pissed off, certainly. In my situations, I 'cope with incompetent team members' by firing them. But that is not always such an easy prospect if you are actually friends with this person, or you arent the boss. If you care more for the friendship than the job/project, then tell him what you think and help him yourself to get over it.
• jm4 18y ago
  You might also try understanding his thought process and give him tasks that he will excel at. Not everyone gets the 10000 ft view and it's probably not necessary that everyone in the group think that way. Try to figure out what his strengths and try to use them to the group's advantage. It might be that this guy is incapable of doing routine work but is able to complete the near-impossible jobs. It's very possible that the problem here isn't this particular person but rather the management style. In the end, even if it doesn't work out someone should have the decency to explain exactly what the problem is. Alienating him to get him out of the group is a pretty dick move.
  • arupchak 18y ago
    Alienating or even marginalizing the individual is the worst thing you could do. You need to act soon and make sure it is the right decision. It is bad for morale for the rest of your team to have 'the common enemy' even if it gives something to share. That being said, booting off the person may not be the best course. He has to be good at something or this would have come up sooner right? Leverage his strengths if you can. If your manager is competent, have him address the individual in the context of self-improvement. This can be a great way to re-motivate someone or send a signal that things are not working out. In any case, act soon and with tact. The last thing you want is an angry and incompetent person on your team.
• Kirby 18y ago
  You're doing nobody any favors by being passive-aggressive. The employee needs to know, management needs to know. Talk to his manager behind closed doors. Be reasonable. Provide data. Metrics can be misleading, but if you have them, now is the time. (I recall one coworker at a job, when we looked, had done 12 CVS checkins during a given period where the average was close to 100 and the next lowest was in the 30s, or something like that. Illustrative!) I have seen people improve if someone lights a fire under them! That's his manager's job. More often this doesn't happen, but it's not uncommon for the chastised person to start job-hunting and solve the issue fairly quickly anyway. I wouldn't confront him directly unless you are his manager. If you are, talk to him ASAP. Set up a plan with measurable deliverables, and make it clear that he'll either make the goals or be asked to leave. Little is as bad for morale as the crappy employee that drags everyone down and isn't fired. Good managers understand this. If the company doesn't care, it's just a matter of time before more bad employees sneak in, and like a cancer the good employees start slacking off more (because why not? The idiots are never fired!) and you don't have a fulfilling job anymore. So, that's when you dust off the resume yourself. Good luck!
  • russell 18y ago
    I agree. Trying to alienate one person can poison the whole group dynmamics. Others could get PO'd at you. People who don't have the 10000 ft view often are good at details or at administration. Best to find something that he is good at that helps the group. As others have said this is more properly the manager's or lead's job. If he ignores it, your hands may be tied.
    • Tangurena 18y ago
      I strongly agree with the above 2 comments. You are describing what a manager is supposed to do. And you don't give enough details to diagnose the situation. I've seen coworkers who seriously had ADD (and were on enough prescription meds that their pill jar looked like a bowl of skittles), and I've seen coworkers who've had problems at home. The guy with ADD couldn't see the 10000 ft view if you hit him on the head with it because ... ooh, look, shiny! He had to be micromanaged because his own steering mechanism was faulty. May I recommend that you read Dynamics of Software Development? Because it sounds a lot like you want to flip the bozo bit over there. http://www.amazon.com/Dynamics-Software-Development-Jim-McCarthy/dp/1556158238 http://www.amazon.com/Dynamics-Software-Development-Jim-McCa...
• dgallagher 18y ago
  What perspectives do your other teammates have of him? Do they share your same views, or different views? They might shed some more light on the situation. Hypothetically: "Oh, yeah, Joe's a great guy, but you're right. He doesn't really get the 10,0000ft view of things. He mentioned to me the other week that it hasn't really been explained to him clearly, so he just focuses on the task at hand. He doesn't get all of that business stuff either, and really doesn't want to embarrass himself by admitting it." ---------- His motivations, and incentives to work, might be different than you think too. Usually you really have to get to know someone, both at work and in their personal life, to truly understand what drives them. Money isn't always everything. Maybe he's offloading work to other teammates so he can work on his startup instead, on the job! ;) ---------- But as others have said, it's great that you're friends! :) Talk to him about it in a non-threatening way (I know that's tricky sometimes). Ask him how he feels about things. If you do the "we're going to have a manager/employee review" thing, and it comes off negatively from his perspective, that'll probably scare him. When people are scared they can become unpredictable. He might start working harder, he might start looking for another job, he might complain to HR and fight back, etc... That all depends on the person. Some sort of non-confrontational approach usually works best IMHO. ---------- Best of luck to you!
  • joe_the_user 18y ago
    The co-worker who merely fails to do his or her job has been the least of my head-aches in the various teams I've been on. The co-workers who are competent enough to be influential but incompetent enough to insist on poor design and process decisions are the one who have done the most damage to projects I've been on. That said, you really should verify that he is the one who is incompetent. Pointing the finger at others has also been a clue that a given person isn't really a good person for a team. The point about finding something he can do seems good. If someone knows they aren't good at difficult problems, it can work well since you can give them "grunt work" and they might be useful. But really, the most damaging thing isn't someone's degree of incompetence but their exaggerated idea of their competence. If other people helping him is the worst effect this person has, he is low on my scale of damaging co-workers.
    • 18y ago
• moe 18y ago
  Just do what everyone does: Apply the dilbert principle and move on. </cyn>
  • Raphael 18y ago
    And what might that be?
    • moe 18y ago
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dilbert_Principle http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dilbert_Principle
• critic 18y ago
  http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=424699 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=424699
• critic 18y ago
  Do what Elaine did: promote him!
• pg 18y ago
  Measurement often helps people to focus.
• Tichy 18y ago
  Let him create CSS stylesheets for grid layouts without tables.
• blasdel 18y ago
  There's a way you can address him directly without causing drama: defend him! "Hey Bob, I'm worried that the boss will think you're wasting time bogged down in stuff he thinks are unimportant, and that your priority tasks get done by other people. I don't want you to get in trouble, we should figure out a way to avoid this."
• 10ren 18y ago
  > loses himself in unimportant stuff, If you mean he is perfecting an aspect of the code that isn't important, that is a notorious engineer/Asperger's problem, which is a great strength when properly directed. It's hard for me to believe that a software developer would have no empathy for this character flaw, so maybe that's not what you meant.
• minalecs 18y ago
  what do you do if this is your superior ?
• herdrick 18y ago
  Anything you can do to improve the productivity of one of the best people will overwhelm by an order of magnitude even the most heroic improvement of the doofus. If you are in charge and are allowed to make such decisions, axe him. Getting another crack at finding a top performer is your best bet.