4 ms·

From what I hear, the roles are quickly collapsing at Microsoft. In the service orgs especially, the role that was previous done by a Test team is now handled

by bunkat 12y ago

From what I hear, the roles are quickly collapsing at Microsoft. In the service orgs especially, the role that was previous done by a Test team is now handled by the Dev team. They are also increasing the ratio between PM and Dev (less PMs and more Devs) and many PMs are being asked to code in some fashion (prototypes and tooling). Be interesting to see how long the unique role of PM remains at Microsoft.

deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
grouma 12y ago
I work on Bing at Microsoft. What you have stated is correct. We have already done away with our test and operation teams. Moreover, a number of PMs were let go last week. Developers are now expected to wear many more hats. We are also reducing the number of middle managers in the name of agility. All good things in my eyes. Another interesting thing to note is that we are trying to reduce the size of projects and break apart the notion of "cores" within an org. The idea is to allow features that span several different areas to be implemented with greater ease. I like the idea but I am concerned with how these features will be maintained after they are completed.
- pbh101 12y ago
  My impression is that most all developers have their own office at MS, or at least share an office with 1-2 other devs (not sure if this is different inside bing teams or not either) Has this 'more-hats' change you describe (specifically ops) changed that at all? Where I work, I hear an argument against offices: that they promote and encourage isolation in what can be an ops-heavy role at times (I see the merits but think there are better ways to combat that) My company is at orders-of-magnitude different size than MS, wondering if something similar occurs there.
  - turtles1 12y ago
    I also work in Bing. Most people are in offices or in an area with a few people, but (at least for me) our team is scattered around, so we're not nearby each other at all. It's not easy to stop by or ask a quick question without going for a short walk. Personally I like the office arrangement - you can make it silent, control the temperature, etc. I do wish that teams were grouped more closely together but that doesn't seem to be a concern for anyone higher up.
  - shanselman 12y ago
    We're moving towards more open spaces. Buildings like 44 have large scrumish workrooms, no private offices.
  - grouma 12y ago
    It depends where you work in Microsoft. Most everybody I work with has their own office. I have several friends at Microsoft who work in open office spaces. As with most things in life, there are benefits and downsides. Personally I like my own office, but I have yet to work in an open environment.
- SubuSS 12y ago
  How is that working out? FWIW - I spent about 7 years in MS and now >5 in Amazon - I overall like the MS model, at least from a developer perspective. It gave you a lot of time to focus on getting your complicated piece right with unit tests - and you could leave the integration tests / PM'ing to the respective folks. Amazon is like where Bing is going - but the end result is that it ends up favoring breadth oriented folks more than depth folks. That's ok if you are building a business logic / app tier, system teams are a different story. For the same reason, the latest MS path doesn't seem right to me. It feels like they are taking the wrong lessons from startups / AWS. But again, it has been 5 years since and I don't have the big picture - so I guess I will wait and watch.
  - grouma 12y ago
    Although I have a couple friends at Amazon, I was unaware that their development model is what Microsoft is aiming for. The points you make don't bother me right now since I am so young in my career. I haven't developed deep expertise in any particular area yet. In fact, one of my strongest assets is the ability to quickly pick up technologies. Hopefully this will serve me well when I eventually have to jump from system to system with the new development model.
bcbrown 12y ago
PMs are writing prototypes now? That's a huge change from when I was there (left in '11), when few PMs even had Visual Studio installed.
- shanselman 12y ago
  Totally they are. Folks like MadsK and DamianE write TONS of code. Plus, now that we're doing all our work live on GitHub, the roles can easily blur.
  - tdicola 12y ago
    That would never have flown in a Sinofsky organization. The marching orders were PM's define the what and dev's define the how (and test makes sure it works), and it was driven down to everyone in the trenches constantly.
    - shanselman 12y ago
      It's a new dawn, it's a new day, it's a new life.
  - AdamTReineke 12y ago
    I'm not sure the folks in Visual Studio are representative of all of MS though. Being a business unit where our customers are developers, the PMs have to also be developers. I'd be surprised to find PMs in WP or Xbox writing as much code as the VS PMs do.
randomfool 12y ago
PMs writing code is a travesty- the PM role should trend much more towards UX. Devs can already prototype.
- randomguy7788 12y ago
  agree with this sooo much

by bunkat 12y ago

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

grouma 12y ago

I work on Bing at Microsoft. What you have stated is correct. We have already done away with our test and operation teams. Moreover, a number of PMs were let go last week. Developers are now expected to wear many more hats. We are also reducing the number of middle managers in the name of agility. All good things in my eyes. Another interesting thing to note is that we are trying to reduce the size of projects and break apart the notion of "cores" within an org. The idea is to allow features that span several different areas to be implemented with greater ease. I like the idea but I am concerned with how these features will be maintained after they are completed.

pbh101 12y ago
My impression is that most all developers have their own office at MS, or at least share an office with 1-2 other devs (not sure if this is different inside bing teams or not either) Has this 'more-hats' change you describe (specifically ops) changed that at all? Where I work, I hear an argument against offices: that they promote and encourage isolation in what can be an ops-heavy role at times (I see the merits but think there are better ways to combat that) My company is at orders-of-magnitude different size than MS, wondering if something similar occurs there.
- turtles1 12y ago
  I also work in Bing. Most people are in offices or in an area with a few people, but (at least for me) our team is scattered around, so we're not nearby each other at all. It's not easy to stop by or ask a quick question without going for a short walk. Personally I like the office arrangement - you can make it silent, control the temperature, etc. I do wish that teams were grouped more closely together but that doesn't seem to be a concern for anyone higher up.
- shanselman 12y ago
  We're moving towards more open spaces. Buildings like 44 have large scrumish workrooms, no private offices.
- grouma 12y ago
  It depends where you work in Microsoft. Most everybody I work with has their own office. I have several friends at Microsoft who work in open office spaces. As with most things in life, there are benefits and downsides. Personally I like my own office, but I have yet to work in an open environment.
SubuSS 12y ago
How is that working out? FWIW - I spent about 7 years in MS and now >5 in Amazon - I overall like the MS model, at least from a developer perspective. It gave you a lot of time to focus on getting your complicated piece right with unit tests - and you could leave the integration tests / PM'ing to the respective folks. Amazon is like where Bing is going - but the end result is that it ends up favoring breadth oriented folks more than depth folks. That's ok if you are building a business logic / app tier, system teams are a different story. For the same reason, the latest MS path doesn't seem right to me. It feels like they are taking the wrong lessons from startups / AWS. But again, it has been 5 years since and I don't have the big picture - so I guess I will wait and watch.
- grouma 12y ago
  Although I have a couple friends at Amazon, I was unaware that their development model is what Microsoft is aiming for. The points you make don't bother me right now since I am so young in my career. I haven't developed deep expertise in any particular area yet. In fact, one of my strongest assets is the ability to quickly pick up technologies. Hopefully this will serve me well when I eventually have to jump from system to system with the new development model.

bcbrown 12y ago

PMs are writing prototypes now? That's a huge change from when I was there (left in '11), when few PMs even had Visual Studio installed.

shanselman 12y ago
Totally they are. Folks like MadsK and DamianE write TONS of code. Plus, now that we're doing all our work live on GitHub, the roles can easily blur.
- tdicola 12y ago
  That would never have flown in a Sinofsky organization. The marching orders were PM's define the what and dev's define the how (and test makes sure it works), and it was driven down to everyone in the trenches constantly.
  - shanselman 12y ago
    It's a new dawn, it's a new day, it's a new life.
- AdamTReineke 12y ago
  I'm not sure the folks in Visual Studio are representative of all of MS though. Being a business unit where our customers are developers, the PMs have to also be developers. I'd be surprised to find PMs in WP or Xbox writing as much code as the VS PMs do.

randomfool 12y ago

PMs writing code is a travesty- the PM role should trend much more towards UX. Devs can already prototype.

randomguy7788 12y ago
agree with this sooo much