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Comment by mabbo | Hacker News Reader

I think you've got a very poor picture of what management is about- perhaps you've had a string of very bad ones. Power isn't the benefit of the role unless you're a sociopath or an asshole.

Managing people is a complex problem that requires a specific set of skills which take time and practice to get right. I've known (and reported to) incredible managers who not only got us to achieve more than our team would have otherwise, but made us enjoy our jobs more in the process. I've also had managers who've lacked in that skillset, and had the exact opposite effect. And it was never because they were assholes or sociopaths- they just didn't have the skills they needed for the job.

I may take on the management role someday, not because of some dream of lording over people and giving orders (that part actually turns me off) but because it's a new domain of complex problems.

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I got promoted into a team lead once - I told my employer I wasn't ready, and he told me I was underestimating myself. I took advice and decided to give it a shot. I hired some great people to join the team. We finished the product in time for the deadline but everyone was spent, and people left, because I didn't have the management skills to know when people wanted a mentor so they can learn, when people weren't performing and should have been warned, when people needed a raise, etc. And so the team weren't happy because of those things. Long story short, the job was too hard, and we hired an experienced person to perform the role instead, and I get to go back to my old role. :)

In your defense it sounds like you learned a lot that you would not have learned without taking that role. That experience and knowledge will be invaluable in deciding whether you want to do it again some day and if you decide to do it again, what to look out for an address.

>perhaps you've had a string of very bad ones.

The "no true manager" argument is always brought out when I say something critical of the management profession.

>Power isn't the benefit of the role unless you're a sociopath or an asshole.

I agree. Guess who inevitably fills management jobs at medium to large companies.

It's well known that companies quickly turn south around bad manager, if just because they can't retain good talent. But that doesn't make all managers bad: Good ones are rare, and their people know it.

For instance, I just left a well paying job at a very large company because my manager quit: he though no initiative could never be successful in the internal political climate, so he left despite being offered a big promotion. Since he left, the company had 6 high profile resignations, as we all knew the alternatives the head of IT was considering were just bad managers. Now, with tentpole technical people leaving, a lot of other qualified people are looking for new jobs too: It was quality leadership that was bringing the team together.

Really, your original comment on this topic would be 100% fair if you were describing what this company is going to end up with. I have worked for horrible, horrible managers over the years. It's just that once you have seen good management, and understand the wonders of productivity one of those can achieve, it's just very hard to agree with a view quite as dire as yours.

There's all this companies that are working on helping recruit good developers: In my experience, good developers are not really THAT hard to find: But a company that could help hire good managers, and properly identify the people that have management qualities in our office, as opposed to just those that look and sound managerial? Now that's a company that would be worth hiring.

It's not a "no true Scotsman" argument when there are ample examples of true Scotsmen. Larry Page, Bill Gates, and Steve Jobs, for starters.

> The "no true manager" argument is always brought out

That's a fair point- I won't say there aren't any bad managers- there are sociopaths attracted to the field. But I don't think you've met any of the good ones either. I'm sorry to hear that.

> Guess who inevitably fills management jobs at medium to large companies.

The sociopath-style manager will only have short-term gains compared to the managers who've acquired the skill set for the domain. One's people will be unhappy and quit; the other's will stay and encourage friends to join. After a few years of this, when upper management want to promote to a manager-of-managers, the long-term results will speak for themselves.

That's how I lost my best manager- he succeeded so widely that he was promoted up another level (where he continued to do very well).

My advice to you is to consider how you would behave as a manager. How would you run a team of ICs such that they'd be happy, productive, and meeting all goals? It's not about whether you'd want to or not, it's how you'd approach the problem.

> the long-term results will speak for themselves.

No they won't because corporate management creates perverse policies of continuous turnover and stack ranking for this exact reason. Losing all your people many times over in a short time is just portrayed as a sign of a good manager culling the herd.

Well, my experience has been different than yours. Perhaps you haven't worked at a company that values good leadership.

> Power isn't the benefit of the role unless you're a sociopath or an asshole.

But the roles does come with some power. And after a while, it is human nature to get used to that privilege that it starts becoming invisible.

Why are you referring to being a manger as a privilege? It's not a master / slave relationship you know?

Getting used to being a manager (or the 'privilege' as you call it) is not a bad thing and in no way does your interpretation of human nature make any difference.

> Why are you referring to being a manger as a privilege?

I wrote that the powers that come from being a manager is a privilege. Are you arguing that it is not? Or are you arguing that managers don't have such powers?

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