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Comment by ionwake | Hacker News Reader

I found this comment insightful but I feel I must itirate ( maybe its not needed), that it is not "clear" if leadership were ignorant, as you said, ( though Im sure you are part right ), I have read that it was malicious leadership trying to protect their own asses as per another comment.

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I don't mean to let the leadership off the hook. What they did was profoundly wrong and they have blood on their hands.

There were two phases though: the initial rollout, and sometime later the coverup.

If they had asked very reasonable questions about the software during the rollout there would have been no need for a coverup. No software rolls out without any bugs and it's really reasonable to ask why so many post offices had missing funds and if they were sure if it was real or not. The PO leadership basically ignored all evidence that there were bugs from the very beginning, and that makes no sense until you realize that they were starting from the premise that the postmasters are thieves and this software is going to catch them.

> No software rolls out without any bugs and it's really reasonable to ask why so many post offices had missing funds and if they were sure if it was real or not.

It would be reasonable, but that also assumes the ass-covering started post rollout rather than pre rollout.

>What they did was profoundly wrong and they have blood on their hands.<

This, so much this. Not ONLY that but they kept DOUBLING DOWN for YEARS.

I SO SO wish they would be held accountable for the pain, suffering, Chapter 11's, AND the suicides.

Bankruptcy is probably not chapter 11 in the UK. (or is it?)

haha, you're right. I am so American.

What I've seen so far suggest they were just ignorant and victims of confirmational bias etc. You can see that when they won some cases they wrote internally something to the effect of "Final we can put to rest all those concerns about these cases blablabla". So it became self-validating. Also the courts and defense lawyers didn't manage to the see the pattern and in the huge numbers of such cases. Each defendant was fighting their own battle. Also, a mathematician from Fujitsu gave "convincing" testimony they didn't have any errors. A lot was down to lack of understanding of how technology works. The fact that xx millions of transactions were processed without errors doesn't preclude that there could be errors in a small number, as was the case. In this case sometimes coming down to random effects like if race conditions were triggered.

You're probably right—I just wanted to share a few thoughts and would welcome any corrections or clarification.

If I were in leadership, I'd assume there are edge cases I'm missing and take responsibility accordingly. Id just assume that is my job, as the leader, that is why I am paid, to make important decisions and stop the company from making big mistakes.

This isn’t a critique of your view—just an observation: there's a recurring theme on HN that leadership shouldn't be held responsible when things break down, as if being a CEO is just another job, not a position of accountability.

Where does this come from? Is it a uniquely American or capitalist norm?

I recall ( i dont think incorrectly) 1980s Japanese leadership—tech/auto who took failures so seriously they’d resign or even mention/think of sudoku.

Well, resigning to play sudoku is certainly preferable to seppuku. :)

CEO really is just another job, though. Perhaps you meant to say director? That is where the accountability lies, both practically and legally.

CEO is the top of middle management, but still middle management all the same. The board and owners sit above that position, if you want to picture it as some kind of hierarchy, and are the driving leadership. They call the shots. The CEO has to answer to them.

Perhaps what you are trying to say is that middle management should carry more accountability? But if we were to go down that road, why stop at CEO?

Thanks for clarification I guess all higher ups should share

Why stop at higher ups? Even the bottom run worker has autonomy. They, while perhaps not to the same degree, take the lead and make important decisions too.

And how high up do you go? The common narrative is that the owners/board are the highest up, but in reality they're working for the customer. The customer is the true leader. It is they who make the decisions and who the owners/board have to answer to.

Or are they really the true leader? The customer will have customers of their own. Everyone works for someone. In reality, there isn't a hierarchy at all. It is approximately cyclical.

"victims of confirmational bias"

dude

tbh thats what bothered me

Organisations can be fiendishly good at cultivating this kind of unaccountability. The software is managed by a contractor, maybe a project management company, a local PM team all of which focus on the performance of management and maybe budgets and timelines. Then you have some internal technical experts who just focus on the detail but have no influence on the whole. When things go wrong it is sent down a tech support ticketing system with multiple tiered defenses to deflect complaints. At some point it maybe gets to the point that an investigation is started. But obviously it needs to be done by someone neutral and independent who doesn't actually know the people involved or necessarily the technical details. And they are accountable not for outcomes but how closely they follow policy. A policy written by people outside the normal chain of command and no real skin in the game. At some point it reaches a legal team and then everyone else takes a step back. No one ever takes any responsibility beyond.an occasional case review conducted in a collegial atmosphere in a stuffy conference room by bored people. All the structures are put in place with good intentions but just protect people from actually having to make a decision and accept consequences. Except for the poor soul on the front line who only ever has consequences.

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