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Comment by ryanburk | Hacker News Reader

true, but the theme is fairly timeless. I've always heard it (and seen this personally as an employee and manager myself) boiled down to "people don't leave companies, they leave managers".[1] and there is a lot of writing / data out there to support it.

[1] http://www.forbes.com/sites/victorlipman/2015/08/04/people-l...

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As a manager that line is always in the back of my mind when I'm trying to figure out how to help an employee do better. Turnover is not cheap, and you can be somebody's jerk boss and not even know it if you aren't careful.

I feel like I'm constantly trying to evaluate if I'm being too tough or too friendly, and I'm not sure how to recognize the truth. And I think it varies by employee.

Very much. I come from a creative writing and performance background where people are constantly giving each other feedback, and eagerly looking to edit/improve their work. In that world a lot of people feel like what they are doing isn't ever perfect and welcome suggestions. In other industries this is ... Not always how people feel. You can't help everybody, and you won't be the right boss for every person you meet.

I stuck around at my last job for a long time because of my manager. When interviews I was evaluating the role but most of the time It really came down to my new potential manager vs my old manager. I needed to see that they would be able to offer / teach / give me something that my old manager wasnt able to. It's not an easy way to interview but it is really satisfying when you find the right fit.

This is good advice. My current manager has a good mix of high standards, clear feedback, and letting me try my own things.

and one of the big challenges is getting unadulterated feedback. too often, even if you do your best to set up a culture of trust and openness with your employees, you will get a filter on what they are going to tell you.

having ways to anonymously get regular feedback from your team can help a lot. as well as getting as much second hand data from other teams / managers as possible.

I might expand that to "management", rather than the specific manager. I disagree with decisions made at higher levels in the company (local layoffs, then international outsourcing, when the company's not struggling by any stretch of the imagination). My manager's awesome, though.

The new developers are nice enough, but the culture in the office here was taken out back and shot by management 3 or 4 levels up.

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