mhss

I've had to let go of incompetent managers (I used to manage managers). Maybe I am an incompetent manager myself that no one has discovered, so take my input with a grain of salt.

Competent managers will listen and not jump to conclusions, collaborate with you, ask thoughtful questions about your work driven by curiosity and not because they want to control or micromanage. They will usually be able to catch up and understand what you say and the technical work you do when you explain it (make an effort and you'll be surprised). If there's some tech you work on they do not understand they will educate themselves and ask a bunch of questions trying to catch up so they can help you and assess you fairly.

> Management that is not deeply aware of what their reports are doing is either unnecessary or incompetent.

I am biased as a manager, but, for context, I was a senior IC for a long time before management though. I also transitioned first being a TL/manager "deeply aware" (reviewing most PRs, coding large parts myself, etc) and then eventually as a more traditional manager.

Sometimes management can be unnecessary or incompetent, but also you're excluding the possibility of companies trying to find a reasonable organizational balance of management costs. A manager that is deeply aware or involved, is also a manager that cannot manage more than maybe 5-6 people. If you want a manager to manage more people and focus in coaching, cross-team dependencies, unclogging stuck projects, roadmap building, etc; you rarely can have a manager doing IC work still and that means they cannot be involved in every PR or conversation their team is involved. If you give autonomy to the team members to make decisions and progress, by definition you won't be involved nor "deeply aware" all the time. Your 1:1s are an opportunity to address this divergence and a brag document helps feed your 1:1 with your manager to bring them up to date.

> Ironically I think these types of exercises are part of the problem at major software companies; terrible efficiency and over hiring.

They're not the problem they're a consequence of the problems.

> Because you need to “brag” to get rewarded, everyone ambitious has a list. And each list is nearly impossible for middle managers to evaluate.

This will be read mostly by your manager not a middle manager. It's up to your manager then to represent your accomplishments to middle managers and above. Good thorough middle managers will still be able to assess them though.

> Another person might redo some docs. Someone may create a design system version. Lots of token achievements, but not real work.

Competent managers can distinguish between those, if you don't have competent managers that's the problem, not the "brag doc".

> Real work should stand on its own and competent managers should be able to identify it. Mediocre managers rely on lists, so then people start showing up to work and making lists.

No because even competent managers have often a wide span at large companies and cannot be involved in the day to day details for all the work their team does and things can fall through the cracks. This would only be solvable by having first line managers have less reports or less manager overhead so they can be immersed in their team's work. I have done both, but at large companies is often not possible to be immersed in the work of all of your reports, no matter how competent you are. As mentioned in the article, even you often forget what you have done last week.

In my experience this is more important at large companies, because your work is more likely to get lost in the noise. At startups work is often much more visible and perhaps there's less of a need for this, but not a bad idea to do it either way and you can KISS, ask for a quarterly check-in with your manager to go over your work accomplishments, ask for feedback, etc;

And Google search doesn't "generate" new content that potentially puts out of business the very same entities it learned from.

The loyalty argument does sound somewhat bizarre, but I think the overarching point is about whether technology use benefits humans in society or not. We should not implicitly treat LLMs owned by corporations with the same rights as humans. LLMs without some form of legislation is looking like it will benefit corporations that are salivating at profits and the prospect of reducing or eliminating the number of creative workers they need.

> The study reveals that novel technology attracts early adopters, 'techies'. The 'normies', for lack of a better term, will watch what 'techies' do before committing because moving costs are higher for non-technical users.

Yeah well, this is not what happens with social networks, like, at all. The idea that somehow 'techies' were going to draw critical mass to the Fediverse doesn't sound plausible to me.

Details can be hard, even if small. Don't get me wrong, I try to do it myself every time I write, but I often find myself wondering if it's worth to link to a definition or will it be too obvious and come across as condescending. Maybe is just me.

Appreciate the clarification. It's a good write up either way!

You might be right, but the alternative is to resign yourself to stagnation. I'm not sure that's better.

> It’s more silly not to realize that 60 years ago the janitor could buy a house and put the kids through school, 40 years ago you could get a college degree and buy a house as soon as you graduate…

woah, this a completely different topic. We're talking here about getting promoted. If you want to discuss the topic of how capitalism has degraded the benefits for workers this is not the thread for it.

> People shouldn’t work hard if the deal gets worse every year. Don’t reinforce this bad system. Tear it down.

You're not "tearing it down" by doing the bare minimum and not getting promoted. You're just hurting your own odds. I did not say work yourself to the bone, there are plenty of ways to show initiative and engagement in your 8hrs at work.

re: "tear it down". Replace it with what? we need serious adjustments, but there's no need to descend into anarchy.

Exactly! it varies by organization and you need to find what your organization cares about, what it values more or less. This is where talking to your manager, observing who gets promoted, etc; The worse organizations are those that say one thing and do another. No organization is perfect, but they're also not equal by far, some of them try to do the right thing, even if imperfectly.

> It's hard not to be cynical when the risk and time investment is on our side while the profits are on their side.

I guess we just don't see things the same way. I'm not a business owner. You're seeing things black and white. "The profits are on their side" is a black and white statement. You do get some of the profits through your salary and sometimes bonus, stock options or RSUs (depending on the company). It sounds like you're unhappy with your share that you don't feel is worth doing any "extra" effort. See my other comments here. You need to find companies where you feel this balance is fair, so you don't get taken advantage of.

> You want us to "work hard" for the chance of getting a raise or a promotion? We're working, not playing the lottery. If we wanted these risks, we'd start a company.

I don't want you to do anything. I am just sharing my experience getting promoted and then as a manager how I have seen other people get promoted. You're free to take or dismiss my experience of course.

You're severely misunderstanding magnitudes of risk. I was only a "business owner" for a brief period early in my career. I did not get a salary at all when I did not make a sell or found a customer, no social security, vacations, or any benefits to speak of. That is way closer to "playing the lottery". I did not have a good social safety net and decided to become an employee. As an employee you get a "guaranteed" salary and benefits for doing some work most of the times for white collar workers in fixed schedule. A "cushy job". You don't get a guaranteed promotion or more salary for the same work however. Do you really think you're owed promotions or increased benefits for doing the same work?

> How about these managers write down these rewards in the employment contract instead?

What do you imagine they'd write? what kind of guarantees about increased salary or promotions do you think they can make in a contract?

> Unfortunately many people listen to terrible advice and get exploited by companies before learning the lesson the hard way.

It's my opinion, not particularly advising anyone.

> I'd be more inclined to believe your advice if your other comments on this topic was... realistic or actionable I guess?

Not really asking you to listen to my "advice", just sharing my perspective.

> realistic or actionable I guess?

Not being cynic is pretty realistic and actionable.

> Caution = cynicism, and companies are either "good" (reward hard work) or "shitty" (??? not good?).

That's your understanding. I am a cautious person myself, a bit cynic at times, but they're different things and I'm not the one mixing them up.

You are also oversimplifying "good" and "bad" companies. I never said it was sufficient for a company to reward good work to be a good company, but good companies do reward good work (either with promotion or just better comp and benefits).

A company that doesn't reward good work is shitty yes, I did not think that was controversial.

Unfortunately many people get into a vicious circle of cynicism early in their careers that their lack of growth becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Not once after a promotion I've been asked to work more than the rough expectation of 8hrs a day (and even that has been flexible). Work conditions vary across companies and it's a shame people gets so cynic that they miss opportunities at good companies.

The point is knowing where your limit is. A promotion often comes with more money and career opportunities. At least it did for me most of the times. The only time when it didn't I left and found better opportunities within a few months.

If you like what you do, and they give you new challenges that you enjoy (more pie) and more money/benefits. It's a win win scenario. I realize is not always the case and maybe in many jobs is rarely the case. My whole career almost every promotion has had substantial benefits, opportunities and growth. I am working nowadays less than I did my first 10yrs of career and doing almost 10x the comp.

This is silly. A factor may increase your chances significantly yet not be the only factor. This kind of black and white thinking is why people has a hard time navigating life, expecting any kind of guarantees.

At shitty companies, yes. Look around, companies exist where good work is rewarded. A shitty manager will not notice whether you slack off or finish something diligently. Good managers do notice and reward, when the company is not a shithole.

It's more complicated than that. Becoming a go-to person may get you promoted, if the company has an adequate value system. No company is perfect, but they vary a lot and you need to find companies where they at least try to promote the right people.

You do what you gotta do. The only way to learn really how valuable (in a capitalist sense) you are is by getting offers (ideally multiple) elsewhere. I accepted a counter offer once and stayed 2 more years. Ultimately I left for the same reasons, I was hitting a ceiling and they were not budging. I increased my comp 50% and reduced my responsibilities another 50% with the next move.

I've always seen risk management as essential to project management, not a separate concept. It's a way to manage expectations. The same work and results will get you a very different outcome if you managed risk and expectations from the start.

I agree, but it's a hard balance to strike and depends on the writer's target audience. RACI is a pretty common acronym for anyone doing project management professionally. I'd not define REST, HTTP, etc; in an engineering doc.

People that has enough money & wealth to employ others, control corporations who employ thousands and influence the government meaningfully (lobbying). Today, they basically control who is employed and who isn't by deciding how much to invest and in what. No, you cannot just choose to employ yourself in all circumstances. I'm all for being self-sufficient but not everyone can start a company (time and capital intensive, and very risky without a safety net).

You make it sound simple. What's the replacement? UBI is at least somewhat within grasp. Completely replacing capitalism is going to take a long time and it's more likely to happen as incremental improvements.

re: UBI. I don't think they'll let us starve, but that's a very low bar. If we all become fungible and invaluable they can just feed us Soylent green.

Agreed. It's culture, and culture is very hard and slow to change.

Indeed. Same thoughts. I think you need business & product smarts here not raw engineering smarts.

> if you think you're going to make the decisions just because "you're the manager", then I think you're managing backwards.

You're making it sound black and white when is not. You do make some decisions. Judgement is required around what decisions can be made by you (+ provide reasoning) and which ones require building consensus or just be delegated.

> I think the thing that makes someone a good manager, is that they can make anyone effective. Everyone can grow and flourish under you.

If that were true good managers never would PIP or let go anyone, and that's just not true. The opposite is true. If you think everyone can flourish and never let go poor performers you're the one doing a disservice to your team.

> If you want people to care about things, you have to listen to what they care about

Ultimately we are all paid to solve the problems the business needs solved, even if the solution is boring and not 'exciting' or 'cutting edge' tech (which is often). The best people finds excitement and challenge in almost any work and are self-motivated. Sure, as a manager you should try your very best to shield the team from crap work and have a healthy balance, understand their interests and find opportunities that match (even outside your team), but ultimately also work is work and is not always, or even often, possible to have super exciting bleeding edge work that fits everyone's interests. Even harder when people have a very narrow set of interests or they don't even know, they're picky, etc.

> I very rarely tell people what to do, because ultimately, I don't have any power to change what they do.

Are you a manager? you very much should be able to change what they do if you are. If project x comes along with twice the value of the current project someone is working on, you very much should be able to preempt what someone is working on. It's not ideal and we all try to avoid project churn, but it happens and needs to be handled effectively by the manager.

> And they'll respect me, and the project, more if they think they're making the decision instead of me.

I mean, delegation and ownership are fine as a mechanism to boost engagement and career growth, but you can't delegate everything (otherwise what are you doing again?). Also, what's up with the "if they think" wording here. Are they making the decision or not, are you tricking them into thinking they're making the decision?