
Top 5 Reasons Business Execs Fail to Work Effectively with Product and Engineering Execs - terpua
http://gigaom.com/2008/08/16/fr-top-5-reasons-business-execs-fail-to-work-effectively-with-product-and-engineering-execs/
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babul
Teams that play together, stay together. It is all about the relationship
people have with one another. We all have different strengths and weaknesses
and essentially it is about knowing each other well enough to compensate for
one and other, know what people can and cannot do, and create unity through
this diversity and iteratively build on competencies. That is how great teams
are built, and great things are made.

Articles like this in essence create a divide in thinking (them/us,
execs/techs, etc.), which maybe reflective of some big work places where
people work with strangers, but which do not have to exist (especially in
smaller businesses).

Think of the early days of many of the great companies today. They often had
people with diverse talents, and created great things because of harmony
rather than divide.

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hooande
There are generally problems between tech and business people and two or three
person startups as well. The biggest cause of this in my experience is a
business person expecting a technical founder to be a wizard who can defy the
laws of physics to make a crazy idea happen.

Business Guys...please try to do a little research. You don't need to know how
to implement a solution to a problem, but 15 minutes on Google will usually
tell you what's possible and what isn't. There is nothing I hate more than the
implied "Well if you're not good enough to figure this out just say so".

There is nothing I love more than coming up with a truly innovative solution
to a problem, but it just isn't possible every day. There is a difference
between lack of ability and an improbable solution.

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thwarted
Hearing "maybe you're just not good enough to figure this out" is a sign
you're working with a passive aggressive personality. In my experience, it's
also said by the person who's been touting the technical person's skills to
other people as "the person who's going to solve all our problems". They're
setting you up for failure, because not only are their tasks often impossible
to deliver on, they use it to threaten to bring someone else in.

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rokhayakebe
Ok two of those remarks can be said about engineers too.

4\. Failure to Show Respect. Business execs show little respect to developers
because they think they know what is the clear path to the next million
dollar. They also do not want to hear complaints and simply want to see that
new breakthrough feature appear on screen 5 minutes ago. Engineers on the
other hand pretend to listen to execs but they are only hearing blah blah
blah...They think business execs are idea guys who talk a lot and think their
plan to reach that million dollar makes no sense and they are here just to
drive the company to the deadpool (In most case they do)

1\. Failure to be humble. My friend, my friend. Developers are usually quite,
and they can pretend to listen, but that does not mean they give a rat's
behind about what you are saying or even think you are worthy of their time
for that matter (I mean this inside the office), hence they say "yes" just so
you can get out their way. Not talking does not mean, Humble. Engineers can
brag too and in fact they do. I asked a CTO last week "I heard you launched an
open source project last week and got x downloads"? That was it. The guy who
did not even know my name after 3 weeks, sat there for 20 minutes telling me
about this project.

The Fact of the matter is that as individuals we usually think people who are
different are less this or that than we are. This problem goes beyond
engineers and business execs. It is the same between PHP guys and Ruby
advocates, Young and Old, Nations etc...

We should simply learn how to accept differences in and outside the office and
be open to learn what others have to offer instead of going to through life
with a "I got to defend my position" attitude.

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hello_moto
This article seems to be the result of Facebook execs war.

