

Software’s management problem - andyjpb
https://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2015/06/07/softwares-management-issues/

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tboyd47
The claim that management is dysfunctional across the entire software industry
resonates deeply with my own experience as a developer. Programmers do not
organize or manage themselves. If you leave a team of programmers without an
official manager, the work will not be distributed equally. It will quickly
devolve into a game of who can complete this feature first, who can refactor
the biggest chunk of code in a given weekend, who can make it first into the
CEO's inner circle, who can intimidate the rest of the team into letting them
run things, or any other example of the kind of immature foolishness you
always find on poorly-managed teams.

But it doesn't help to blame managers for this, calling them "drooling, non-
technical morons," nor is it even accurate. The dysfunction doesn't come from
a lack of technical competence among managers. The problem lies right in the
middle of this career track:

Junior dev --> Senior dev --> Middle management --> Upper management

Junior dev to senior dev is a logical career progression. Middle management to
upper management is also a logical progression. Senior dev to middle
management is, in many cases, career suicide. When a programmer transitions to
manager, they are (a) giving up the very skill that made them a valuable
employee, (b) transitioning to a job they have no desire to do or experience
doing, and (c) adding on a lot of responsibility and stress to their life.

But we do it because in most places, it's the only career track we have. So a
lot of people in the tech industry who are officially managers don't manage,
but do everything they can to avoid managing and get back to coding. And then
you end up with the same problem you were trying to avoid: anarchy.

