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Comment by Frondo | Hacker News Reader

Eh, I've joined 3 or 4 projects where there was a "genius" behind it.

They liked being in control, and to a one they all talked about being irreplaceable.

I don't know Rick, of course, and can't speculate on what's going on in his head, but he certainly seems like the geniuses on the projects I and others ended up rescuing from their own respective geniuses.

I think everyone's quick to pile on the author, for some reason, but the Rick side of the story just rings so many bells for failing projects I've joined (or, later on, took over and reimplemented by myself).

I'm no genius, either, just old enough to know a little tiny bit better.

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Please don't take my analysis as a way to absolve Rick. He's the worst type.

Ok, fair, that's good, I think we probably agree more than disagree then.

I guess my take on it is that the handful of Ricks I've seen, they all wanted to position themselves as irreplaceable, as kings of the project. For them it was intentional.

Maybe not the case with the Rick in this story. Without knowing the person (or even if the person is real, or if this is a composite character from multiple situations, etc), we're all just guessing.

I'm just more inclined to sympathize with the author, because of my own experiences with Ricks. :)

I think everyone's quick to pile on the author, for some reason

Oh, that's easy.

The prevailing wisdom around here is that management is always, without fail, a bad thing.

Management is either bad because they get in the way by doing anything, or, when a project goes sideways, management is bad because it failed at doing something.

For example, the devs involved in the BMW scandal? Well management told them what to do, so it's management's fault.

And this post? Well, it's management's fault for not stopping this guy.

Well, yeah. Balancing your entire tech org around one guy is a ridiculously bad plan. What does management do if not plan and organize?

But it's also this guy's fault for not being enough of a leader to avert the crisis.

I'm not sure how people read my post and say, "This is a story about how Rick was good or right."

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