4 ms·

Neither. Trust. Empowerment. For the really good folks: Just get out of their way (and have good channels of communication so that it's clear they're not utter

by kabdib 13y ago

Neither. Trust. Empowerment. For the really good folks: Just get out of their way (and have good channels of communication so that it's clear they're not utterly going off the rails). Having people continually worry if they're going to be punished will make your org a hopeless mess. Supplying people with free snackies and flexible hours without giving them freedom won't make them work harder, it'll just give them a sense of entitlement.

etler 13y ago
I was going to say this. People aren't going to work hard for someone else (they'll work enough to get by but that's it). If you empower them they'll be working for themselves, and they'll actually want to do a good job. It reminds me of a blog post by a guy managing a few open source projects. The quality of the pull requests he got were poor, and required a lot of fixing up. He decided to add anyone who gave a pull request as an admin, and suddenly the quality of their code went way up. They weren't working for someone else anymore. They were working for themselves.
- pestaa 13y ago
  I don't think I would have been brave enough to give admin permissions to authors of disappointing pull requests. Well done. If you recall who he is, let us know.
  - chrisdotcode 13y ago
    This was Felixge - former core Node.js developer - with his pull request hack [0]. [0] http://felixge.de/2013/03/11/the-pull-request-hack.html http://felixge.de/2013/03/11/the-pull-request-hack.html
    - etler 13y ago
      Thanks for finding that!
ryandrake 13y ago
Not a good general rule. What if your employees are simply mediocre performers? Do you really want to trust & empower them? Get out of their way? I don't think so. Not every company can afford to hire the very, very best. Employee incentives and motivation is not a one-size-fits-all optimization problem. It depends on the company, on the team, on what they're working on, etc.
- davidw 13y ago
  I think 'caring' works pretty well for most people. What I mean is this: care about what they're doing. Ask after it. Ask if there are problems, or they need help, or about what problems they faced. This lets them know that people do care about the results and are watching, without being authoritarian or putting them on some kind of pedastal. I think you can be a mediocre worker (I've met some really awesome coders myself, guys like Andrew Tridgell, and compared to them, I'm as mediocre as it gets), and still put in your best effort, be diligent at what you do, and so on.
- InclinedPlane 13y ago
  I'm not sure it matters, actually. Most of the highest value work is going to get done by the best folks, so as long as the "trust and empower" regime doesn't cause a complete erosion in the productivity of the mediocre programmers then it might end up being a net positive. Even so, you are correct that there's no one size fits all management strategy for every individual and every situation. Holding such a view is a sure fire route to failure, typically. If managing were as easy as consulting a lookup table for the correct policy to apply then we wouldn't need human beings with lots of experience to do it would we?
- calinet6 13y ago
  "Do you really want to trust & empower them? Get out of their way? I don't think so." Trust begets trust. This will beget none. Is it any wonder your employees are being mediocre when you don't trust and empower them to be anything else? Not every company can afford to hire the very best, but you don't need to. Good management will strive to improve the systems (including the human systems, the learning systems, and the motivational systems) which empower your employees to work better, and for your quality to improve. Traditional (read: negative or carrot-and-stick type) motivational tactics almost all have complex and difficult-to-measure complications which do more harm than good. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._Edwards_Deming#Key_principles http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._Edwards_Deming#Key_principle... - and follow them. Designed for factories, but applicable to all management of all work. It's counter to the standard American idea of the employee-employer relationship, so extremely difficult to adapt to, but it is based on behavioral science, psychology, and statistical methods and should be regarded as basic truth. Start there and base your ideas about management on facts.

by kabdib 13y ago

etler 13y ago

I was going to say this. People aren't going to work hard for someone else (they'll work enough to get by but that's it). If you empower them they'll be working for themselves, and they'll actually want to do a good job. It reminds me of a blog post by a guy managing a few open source projects. The quality of the pull requests he got were poor, and required a lot of fixing up. He decided to add anyone who gave a pull request as an admin, and suddenly the quality of their code went way up. They weren't working for someone else anymore. They were working for themselves.

pestaa 13y ago
I don't think I would have been brave enough to give admin permissions to authors of disappointing pull requests. Well done. If you recall who he is, let us know.
- chrisdotcode 13y ago
  This was Felixge - former core Node.js developer - with his pull request hack [0]. [0] http://felixge.de/2013/03/11/the-pull-request-hack.html http://felixge.de/2013/03/11/the-pull-request-hack.html
  - etler 13y ago
    Thanks for finding that!

ryandrake 13y ago

Not a good general rule. What if your employees are simply mediocre performers? Do you really want to trust & empower them? Get out of their way? I don't think so. Not every company can afford to hire the very, very best. Employee incentives and motivation is not a one-size-fits-all optimization problem. It depends on the company, on the team, on what they're working on, etc.

davidw 13y ago
I think 'caring' works pretty well for most people. What I mean is this: care about what they're doing. Ask after it. Ask if there are problems, or they need help, or about what problems they faced. This lets them know that people do care about the results and are watching, without being authoritarian or putting them on some kind of pedastal. I think you can be a mediocre worker (I've met some really awesome coders myself, guys like Andrew Tridgell, and compared to them, I'm as mediocre as it gets), and still put in your best effort, be diligent at what you do, and so on.
InclinedPlane 13y ago
I'm not sure it matters, actually. Most of the highest value work is going to get done by the best folks, so as long as the "trust and empower" regime doesn't cause a complete erosion in the productivity of the mediocre programmers then it might end up being a net positive. Even so, you are correct that there's no one size fits all management strategy for every individual and every situation. Holding such a view is a sure fire route to failure, typically. If managing were as easy as consulting a lookup table for the correct policy to apply then we wouldn't need human beings with lots of experience to do it would we?
calinet6 13y ago
"Do you really want to trust & empower them? Get out of their way? I don't think so." Trust begets trust. This will beget none. Is it any wonder your employees are being mediocre when you don't trust and empower them to be anything else? Not every company can afford to hire the very best, but you don't need to. Good management will strive to improve the systems (including the human systems, the learning systems, and the motivational systems) which empower your employees to work better, and for your quality to improve. Traditional (read: negative or carrot-and-stick type) motivational tactics almost all have complex and difficult-to-measure complications which do more harm than good. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._Edwards_Deming#Key_principles http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._Edwards_Deming#Key_principle... - and follow them. Designed for factories, but applicable to all management of all work. It's counter to the standard American idea of the employee-employer relationship, so extremely difficult to adapt to, but it is based on behavioral science, psychology, and statistical methods and should be regarded as basic truth. Start there and base your ideas about management on facts.