The qualities of a good manager 7

[guestgulkan]

Judging by a lot of the posts in this forum, it seems that a major obstacle to getting work done is bad managers/management.

Why is this??

Is this because most managers are inadequately trained or acting beyond their capabilities?

What qualities do the members of the forum believe a 'magager' should have?

 

[CajunCenturion]

There are many reasons besides the two you've already mentioned, but before getting into all the reasons, I'd first like to say that not all managers are as bad as reported.

First of all, when managers are being judged by subordinates, the subordinates are usually judging unfairly because they do not know what mandates have been placed on their manager by higher levels. The manager's job is to support senior management, and to do that job, and not to do what the subordinates think should be done. It's like asking an individual tree to judge the quality of the forest.

Generally, the higher you rise in management, the more that profit becomes the objective, after all, that's why they're in business - to make a profit. Its management's responsibility to insure that the business makes a profit, so the decisions being made are not necessarily in the best interests, or even make sense, to the IT department, but are rather geared towards making or increasing profitability.

A simple example, when a programmer thinks (s)he has a bad manager because the project they are working on that is 80% complete is cancelled, as being a waste of money. What in fact would be a waste, would be to spend the additional 20% to complete a project that will not have any ROI. Was the original expenditure a waste? Maybe, but without an understanding of the business environment at the time the project started, and the changes in business environment which led to the cancellation, it's impossible to say. But most programmers are not trained or experienced enough to evaluate from that perspective, nor do they have all of the information at their fingertips.

Good Luck
--------------
As a circle of light increases so does the circumference of darkness around it. - Albert Einstein

 

[smittytech]

1) Listen.
2) If I ask you a question and you don't know the answer, say so. Don't go call the outside tech spt place, get the answer and then pretend that you knew it all along.
3) Don't tell me that I can't get training on something just because YOU haven't learned it first.
4) Sometimes explaining a little bit of the "Why" instead of just giving an abrupt answer.

....ok that's enough for now.

"Life without chocolate is too terrible to contemplate!"

 

[Lozbinator]

CajunCenturion - that is a good point, and I think you are right.

Perhaps if managers find themselves in such a position, with staff feeling this way about their decisions, encountering such feedback etc, they (and their subordinates) may benefit greatly from improved communication.

Expressing further reasoning (be it generalised or specific), and providing more information may help the subordinates better understand the decisions made, and therefore respond more appropriately and/or with more understanding.

guestgulkan - I find that people tend to make judgements of their managers rather quickly (myself included), when perhaps they are not really in a position to know what skillset their managers have and whether or not they are qualified.

Having said that, I also dont think we can generalise that the majority of managers are or are "inadequately trained or acting beyond their capabilities". Some are, some are not.

The things that I personally value in a manager are:
(1) Honesty - admit what you don't know, admit if you need help, and don't make promises you may not be able to keep
(2) Communication - somebody who tries hard to communicate clearly, often, and effectively
(3) Care about subordinates - when a problem is raised, show (and feel) real interest, concern if they are not coping, etc. Don't just shrug it off.
(4) Organised
(5) Fair
(6) Work a little bit of enjoyable time into the working day

 

[DonQuichote]

There are a few "natural" ways for bad managers to arise:

[li] The best worker is promoted to manager, regardless of any management skills

[li] Managers and "managed people" have to match. Some people need a lot of freedom, others need a lot of guidance. You can be a good manager, but for the wrong people. If many employees come and go, a manager might grow "out-of-place".

Best regards

 

[pmonett]

Although I have done my share of manager-bashing, I must also point out that a perfectly good manager can turn to crap if higher up decisions are made that make his/her managing style impossible.
Adapting to new rules can have a devastating effect on everyone's morale when the new batch has been devised by a group of people entirely out of contact with the way things are done locally.

I used to work in a rather successful Notes company. We were bought by other companies four times, sometimes through mergers, sometimes through outright acquisitions. Each time, a new set of rules was thrust on the local management team, and everyone had to struggle to get to terms with it. In the end, most of the people that were there at the beginning have taken leave and are now working elsewhere. Now, the company has more employees than five years ago, but hardly any of them (including the managers) are from the "original" team.
I am not commenting on the effectiveness of the management team. Mistakes and bad decisions were made like everywhere else.
But I am sure the regular change in office rules and administrative obligations did not help at all.

 

[BJCooperIT]

My worst manager obtained the position of Vice President of IT by sabotaging his predecessor. On Tuesday he would know nothing about a concept. He would go home and read up and on Wednesday he would present himself as an expert on the subject. He would ignore you for months on end and when management got upset with his failures he would take it out on passersby. He was a horrific procrastinator. When he was supposed to be manually calculating the Salesmen's bonuses (because he "forgot" to assign a programmer to automate it), instead he was designing the ultimate computer room layout. When he was worried about programmers making a deadline he asked for printouts of source code (funny thing was he only knew COBOL - not a language we used). I once dumped an entire box of greenbar paper in his office. He never asked again.

My best manager was this guy's successor. She gave public credit when it was due without sounding patronizing. If she had a problem with you she talked to you privately. She instituted weekly meeting to keep everyone abreast of IT projects. She was knowledgeable on things IT and was willing to delegate tasks without micro-managing. How I miss you Tracy!

^{Beware of false knowledge; it is more dangerous than ignorance. ~George Bernard Shaw}
Consultant/Custom Forms & PL/SQL - Oracle 8.1.7 - Windows 2000
^{When posting code, please use TGML to help readability. Thanks!}

 

[palbano]

Bad managers are a systemic problem of the company. The highest level executives ( in most cases CEO) are directly responsible for bad managers existing in a company. This is definitely a top down problem.

Speaking strictly in regards to software development, the term management is horrible to begin with. No one can manage me other than myself, period. What is really needed in software development is leadership not management. If you are technically able then you can be an active participant in the technical decisions. If you are not technically able then you cannot be a technical leader period. You can still be a good leader however by acting as an enabler. As an enabler you create the best possible work environment for the development staff, obviously listening to them to determine what “best” is.

Taking responsibility and being accountable for your decisions. Never taking credit for anything but always giving credit to the staff. Not making decisions based on fear

Do not ever ascribe to the manipulation techniques published in so many management books and seminars, PERIOD. Be truthful, respectful, thoughtful and ethical. Never miss an opportunity to say: I was wrong. Don’t play games, if you want to be a Player try out for the NBA or the NFL or go into Sales or something, this is not a game!

Ok now let’s see some good flaming!


-pete

 

[sleipnir214]

palbano:

I think you've got it: truthful, respectful, thoughtful and ethical

The only thing I might add is "industrious"

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TANSTAAFL!

 

[EdwardMartinIII]

guestgulkan: Judging by a lot of the posts in this forum, it seems that a major obstacle to getting work done is bad managers/management.

Why is this??

Imagine the quiet deconstructionist snickering...

It is because there are fewer managers in this forum than there are end-persons managed.

In other words, you may be drawing a trend from tainted data.

Another reason might be that simply enough, it's okay to kvetch about anyone higher than you in the company hierarchy, but not vice versa. When a Programmer kvetches about their Manager, other Programmers nod their heads knowingly and chip in anecdotes. When a Manager kvetches about a Programmer, other Managers hint at managerial incompetency ("Man, my Programmers are just idiots." "A poor worker blames his tools, Edward." and so on).

It could be said, I suspect, with equal veracity, that Technical Staff represents the major obstacle in getting work done, as described by their immediate supervisors.

Oh, except if they say that or imply that, then Action Must Be Taken because, after all, they're the Manager. An IT person kvetches essentially because they have no other power or expectations of control -- kvetching is their only outlet!

Now, I re-read this and I'm starting to nudge toward the idea that Management takes it on the chin so often because if they strike back, it's unfair due to the power differential.

And that makes sense.

Cheers,


Edward

"Cut a hole in the door. Hang a flap. Criminy, why didn't I think of this earlier?!" -- inventor of the cat door

 

[palbano]

Now, I re-read this and I'm starting to nudge toward the idea that Management takes it on the chin so often because if they strike back, it's unfair due to the power differential.

huh? take it on the chin? What does that mean? If it means screwing everything up to the point of failure and getting a promotion out of it then i'm with you. If your trying to get me to feel sorry for some underhanded, egotistical, lying sack of dung that doesn’t know the difference between a web browser and the internet, FORGET IT!

Bye the way, the only POWER a manager has is the power i give him to kiss my ASP! Whew... breath.... breath....


-pete

 

[EdwardMartinIII]

Pete,

I addressed the original question and offered two different ways of looking at that question, each of which suggested an explanation that wasn't simply grousing about a manager (or the manager's manager, or the company as a whole).

So, as far as power differential, I figured that was obvious, but I guess not. If I thrash on my boss, my boss can fire me. If my boss thrashes on me, I cannot fire him (oh, I know it's not quite as simple as all that, but I'm comfortable being cute and fluffy for illustrative purposes). I can quit, of course, which is my exercise of a different kind of power, but I clearly do not have the same position as my boss. I cannot lay my boss off. I cannot chip at my boss when he arrives ten minutes late. I cannot glower at my boss and have him spend the next four hours wondering when I'll drop whatever bomb's on my mind in his lap.

On the other hand, if I chip at my boss and he overhears it, he cannot sue me as readily as if our positions were reversed. If I make a sexist comment in the presence of my boss and it offends him, he can do a bunch of things up to and including canning my tuckus. However, if my boss makes a similar comment, the entire company is vulnerable to a lawsuit from me. This is well-established harrassment law and it exists this way solely because of the massive potential for abuse of power (how antiquated and unnecessary we might think of labor unions and labor law until we lose our weekends and other legal protections secured by the application of those laws... ). One of the first things I learned when I was being formally trained as a manager was to recognize the huge difference and how important it was personally and professionally to realize that I wasn't just "one of the guys" any more, nor could I be without potentially endangering the company.

But, I digress.

My point is that -- unless I am sorely mistaken -- there is no level of a company/organization that does not hold those above and below it in a position of some sort of contempt! The closer the level, the more specific the grievance.

I'm not saying IT isn't chock-full of incompetent people, I'm just suggesting that it probably isn't as, um, stratified as people might perceive.

If I believe those I manage are incompetent, it is almost certainly because I have not sufficiently engaged them in what it is we're trying to accomplish such that they see themselves as the same kind of vital function as I see them. If I believe those who manage me are incompetent, it is almost certainly because I have not sufficiently engaged my supervisor to understand exactly what role they expect of me to accomplish the task at hand.

This I get from years of watching Superfriends as a kid...

Cheers,


Edward

"Cut a hole in the door. Hang a flap. Criminy, why didn't I think of this earlier?!" -- inventor of the cat door

 

[sleipnir214]

EdwardMartinIII:
When I was in the U.S. Army, I attended a leadership class. The instructor stated the One Axiom of Leadership: You can only lead if someone agrees to follow you.

Your comments in your second-to-last paragraph, where you discuss engaging both your subordinates and your superiors (a very good comment, by the way), seems to be a direct application of the One Axiom.



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[palbano]

Edward,

You sound like a thoughtful intelligent individual and I respect the moderation that you are attempting to maintain in your point of view. And in some cases your statements might indeed be accurate. However in some other cases it is pure hogwash. When I company places non technical people in positions of authority over technical staff and those managers make arbitrary decisions about technology and architecture that they have no comprehension of, it has nothing to do with mine, nor anyone else's failure to engage them.

They listen to some salesman's pitch for some 3rd party software rather than their own IT staffs recommendations and then purchase a product that has no chance of solving the problem at hand. Then want the IT staff to hack some junk together to make the 3rd party software work in an attempt to cover up the poor decision they made. That does not happen because someone failed to engage them.

Sometimes things really are simple. People try to complicate them to hide their own ineptness. Sometimes people in the software industry really are totally unqualified for the positions that they occupy. That does not happen because someone failed to engage them. I'll say it over and over again, sometimes you just need to say "I don't know" or "I was wrong". Many managers just can't do that ever, and it's not because someone failed to engage them.

If my colleague is tasked with writing a Socket Server application and he has no experience with multi-threaded development or socket communications so he fails miserably to deliver the project, that does not happen because his manager failed to engage him. It happened because neither one of them is qualified for the positions they hold and they won't admit it.

I could go on and on with stories like that but it's late and at the end of the day I don’t think your going to see nor agree with my point so it just doesn't matter. I have worked with some very experienced professional people in the past, both engineers and managers. I have also worked in extremely poorly staffed companies as well and the difference is dramatic. Look, I believe that you cannot operate based on fear, risk takers must be rewarded to promote progress, I understand that. But that's not the same thing as just guessing because you don't know the first thing about the problems at hand and your not responsible enough to admit it and move on to a position that you are qualified for.


-pete

 

[guestgulkan]

Palbano
There is an expression:
The man who has never made a mistake has never tried to do anything
Likewise the man who is afraid of making mistakes will never try to do anything.

You say that:
If my colleague is tasked with writing a Socket Server application and he has no experience with multi-threaded development or socket communications so he fails miserably to deliver the project, that does not happen because his manager failed to engage him. It happened because neither one of them is qualified for the positions they hold and they won't admit it.

The post-mortem of this debacle should include questions like:
Was the programmer ever trained in socket communications?
Did he (the programmer) overestimate his abilities and said he could do it.
Did the manager keep enough control of the project as it proceeded to ensure that it did not descend into farce?
And so on.............


I think a lot of people fall into the trap of thinking that
a manager should be an ex.. By that I mean for example people think that a manager of programmers should be an ex-programmer.

I do not think this should be so.
A manager in my opinion is there to manage resources such as time, people, money, projects of his department, for the benefit of the company. he is there to liase with higher management, and other departments.
He should also make that those he manage are up to the mark

A manager programmers does not write code..
He should however be aware of how programs are made, how computers work, the various abilities of the individuals withing his dept, what tools are available that would would make things easier, etc...

All the responsibilities of a department should not be on the manager's shoulder alone. Each person within the dept has a responsibility to his manager and his colleagues as well.
Too many people sit back and complain (I'm only an employee, why should I do this, that or the other ) and expect the boss to do everything.

 

[KenCunningham]

A very interesting thread. See:

http://www.namibian.com.na/Netstories/2000/February/Columns/eye22022000.html

for a discussion from 'The Namibian' (ain't the internet wonderful!) and in particular The Peter Principle.

 

[pmonett]

I agree that a manager of programmers does not have to mandatorily be an ex-programmer himself.
In fact, for having through the ordeal, I find that it may just be a good idea to not have that happen.
Example : manager gives you a deadline for a project, basing that deadline on what he thinks is necessary for him. All is well and good, normally, but when said manager has lost sight of programming for a while, said manager may tend to over-estimate his past programming abilities. If that happens, the deadline is liable to become cruelly insufficient for the completion of the project. If the programmer charged with the project happens upon an unforseen issue that increases the time of development, guess whose fault its going to be ?
Of course, the developer will be at fault. And the manager will be in an ideal position to state that the issue should not have been so much trouble. And the upper management will listen to the manager, obviously, since he is, after all, a programmer.
This happens even when the manager used to program COBOL and the project was in C++ using SQL statements via a Java frontend.

Basically though, I believe it is simply a communication problem. If you cannot communicate with your manager, you're bound to get into hot water one day or another.
More than technical or leadership qualifications, I think nobody should become a manager if he/she cannot communicate correctly (ie. listen to someone and understand that person's point of view, and clearly make himself understood by that person).
Unfortunately, the requirement of communication skills cannot be expected if the upper management does not know what communication is either.
This is truly a top-down issue. Becoming the manager of a company requires less communication skills than managing the company. To become a manager, you only have the board to convince, which you can do with a well-prepared speech. To effectively manage, you must respond to unprepared situations. That requires much better communication skills.

 

[flapeyre]

I have to disagree. I don't think that ex-programmers are necessarily bad managers - in fact, because they know the ins and outs of programming, their programmers are less likely to become frustrated at their boss's inability to understand the project scope and are also less likely to undermine him or her.

In the last 10 years, since I've been a programmer, I have had both good and bad managers who were ex-programmers, and good and bad managers with no IT background.

Of course, it all depends on the manager's managerial skills, which programmers can (but by no means definitly) lack. To my way of thinking, lack of a programming backgound is a handicap, not an asset, for a manager in IT. Programming skills (or the lack thereof) have nothing to do with whether someone are a good or bad manager. It's people skills that primarily count here, but if your boss understands the technical side as well, so much the better.

My $0.02.


"When once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the Earth with your eyes turned skyward, for here you have been, and there you will always long to return."

--Leonardo da Vinci

 

[palbano]

As I stated in a previous post, there is nothing wrong with having a leader that has no background in software engineering as long as that individual takes the role of an enabler. As an enabler he must further understand that his role is to listen to and believe in his staff when they make technical decisions. Unfortunately this is frequently not the case and where things quickly disintegrate into adversarial environments and at that point all is lost.

The single biggest problem with managers that are non-technical is when they make decisions contrary to the recommendations of their staff simply because they are the boss and therefore they believe this means they are more qualified to make the decision. Are they retarded? Being the boss does not automatically give you knowledge, you either know something or you don’t. It’s a binary issue and your title has no effect on it whatsoever. Furthermore if you don’t understand something that simple, how the hell did you get to be a manager in the first place? The best leaders understand the simple things and they are very logical. They are not ego driven nor fear driven.

Here is a statement I frequently make: If you don’t believe me when I give you a technical recommendation for the project, why don’t you fire me for being incompetent?

Instead you just ignore my recommendation and force the staff to do something entirely ridiculous. You believe you are more qualified to make a decision since you’re the boss rather than being more qualified because you know more about the subject. Huh? In what version of reality is that logical?

And so I wake in the morning
And I step outside
And I take a deep breath and I get real high
And I scream at the top of my lungs
What's going on?
4 NON BLONDS


-pete

 

[EdwardMartinIII]

palbano: I respect the moderation that you are attempting to maintain in your point of view.

There's really no reason to be anything but.

However in some other cases it is pure hogwash.

I guess you'll have to be more specific. The legal stuff and the power differential issue are well known issues, although there are a lot of people who just don't seem to be able to grasp it (across the spectrum), which is unfortunate.

Paragraphs #5 and #6 are my basic point, which is that I suggest this is an issue of perception. I don't think it's as subtle an issue as all that.

Anecdotal evidence can be brought to support any point of view, which is why I tend to avoid it, except in such situations where I use it as an example, in which case I try to point out that it is my experience and as such suspect at best.

Your point, as I understand it, is that incompetent people can be hired as managers. My point is that incompetent people can be hired. In any position. Therefore, I agree with you, but believe that it is incorrect to attempt the dislodging of splinters from the eyes of managers when we cannot look past our own logs. Furthermore, I think it causes harm to reasonable discourse to presume incompetency is somehow reserved to only those who manage us (and up).

It would be incorrect to assume that I did not mean to suggest communication and clarity were part of the engagement I wrote of (for the sake of simplicity, I assumed this would be understood, but I was also incorrect). However, I will now be explicit: Engagement should be read as to include clear communication of goals and abilities such that the group can operate as efficiently as possible to achieve the desired goal.

This communication includes such things as "Yes, I can figure that technology out, but it's going to take me a while to ramp up", "The deadline for this deployment isn't realistic. A more realistic deadline is...", "We want to target this deadline because there's another dependency in another department that's controlling this.", etc.

KenCunningham, I rarely see the Peter Principle applied to self, therefore I suspect its usefulness. I'm an egalitarian scumbag that way.

pmonett: Basically though, I believe it is simply a communication problem.

Across the board, man. It's not just "them" (for some arbitrarily chosen definition of "them&quot.

Cheers,


Edward

"Cut a hole in the door. Hang a flap. Criminy, why didn't I think of this earlier?!" -- inventor of the cat door