
The management myth (2006) - wtbob
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2006/06/the-management-myth/304883/?single_page=true
======
maxxxxx
For the last 4 years I have worked for the first time in my career as employee
of a big corporation. The "managing class" of MBAs reminds me of the way a
communist state like East Germany was run. Centralized decision making,
information withholding, the desire to plan out everything for years, saying
one thing while meaning the opposite, hanging up motivational posters "we are
innovative" while squashing innovation, ignoring of inconvenient facts and so
on. All that comes with the appearance of "management science" and its own
insider language.

~~~
jacques_chester
Well, yes. This is because both are examples of command economies and both
evolve additional non-hierarchical mechanisms to achieve actual outcomes.

In any large enterprise there is always a Nomenklatura who actually "make
things happen".

When explaining to people that trying, for the billionth time, to create The
Perfect Reward Scheme won't work, I put it this way: GOSPLAN had decades, and
access to unlimited men with guns and dogs, to make its plans work. And it
failed.

~~~
wz1000
> GOSPLAN had decades, and access to unlimited men with guns and dogs, to make
> its plans work. And it failed.

I am no fan of oppressive regimes, centralised planning or Stalinism, but it
always grinds my gears when people point to the collapse of the Soviet Union
as the One, Absolute proof that centralised planning is always doomed to
failure.

While I'm sure that the hierarchy and command structure of the government and
economy had their parts to play in the collapse, their importance is often
overplayed by gargantuan proportions.

At the time of the October Revolution, Russia was a largely agrarian society,
which henceforth industrialised and developed remarkably quickly under
Stalinist Five-Year-Plans, in the midst of the Great Depression. However, it
was still poor and barely industrialised when it was decimated by WWII.
Despite this, it recovered to become a major world power that challenged the
US during its peak.

US GDP has consistently been 3-5 times USSR GDP during the the latter's entire
period of existence. Despite this, the pressures of the Cold War forced USSR
military spending to match US spending, reaching more than 25% of GDP.

Any country in a similar position would be doomed to crack under the economic
strain, regardless of the structure of government or economy.

~~~
crdoconnor
Yeah, it's funny how many people look at a country that went from agrarian
society to first spacefaring society & 2nd most powerful nation in ~40 years
and go "obviously their economic system was an abject failure".

The level of growth experienced by the SU was unsurpassed. In the 50s the US
media was fretting over it being "too successful".

~~~
wtbob
> Yeah, it's funny how many people look at a country that went from agrarian
> society to first spacefaring society & 2nd most powerful nation in ~40 years
> and go "obviously their economic system was an abject failure".

The U.S. went from agrarian society to the first spacefaring society to make
it to the Moon, and became the most powerful nation on earth, in ~40 years.

The issue is not that the Soviets didn't develop: it's that they didn't
develop as quickly as they could have, had their central planning not retarded
their growth rate. Not to mention their utterly murderous regime.

~~~
wz1000
> The issue is not that the Soviets didn't develop: it's that they didn't
> develop as quickly as they could have, had their central planning not
> retarded their growth rate

Even if centralised planning is doomed to retard growth rates(a hypothesis I
consider quite plausible), you cannot reasonably confirm that hypothesis, or
the extent of the retardation, using the example of Soviet Russia. There were
too many factors involved for you to lay so much of the blame on centralised
planning.

There were multiple geopolitical and economic factors involved, including the
fact that USSR was trying to match the military and diplomatic might of an
economy triple its size, fought wasteful wars(Wars are a centralized decision
in almost all modern countries) and suffered from variations in the rates of
global commodities. These factors alone would most likely decimate a country
no matter what its economic system.

------
xivzgrev
"In my experience, for what it’s worth, consultants monitored the progress of
former clients about as diligently as they checked up on ex-spouses (of which
there were many). "

Former consultant here. That is 100% true - the metric of success is whether
clients buy more work, not how successful your recommendations were (and there
can be many reasons to buy consulting services beyond they produced successful
strategies)

~~~
bla2
What are other reasons?

~~~
slgeorge
Access to skills, networks or resources you don't have. For any significant
decision it can be valuable to get a different perspective. It can also be a
way of protecting confidentiality.

Lets say that you are deciding whether to sell a business unit, or to ramp up
investment to try and break through.

\- Skills benefit: creating the financial models is something many companies
don't do all the time. Using an external consultant may also benefit as they
may know current industry valuations.

\- Network benefit: They might know other people in the segment who would be
interested in your business unit. (for product development this is a better
benefit). Counter-argument, it's part of managements job to know about the
industry so your own network should be enough.

\- Resource benefit: The whole team is busy so bringing in external resource
to consider the problem lets internal resource keep focusing on existing
business. The counter-argument is that if this is the _most_ important thing
to do then existing resource should be focusing on it.

\- Different perspective: Someone coming from the outside who's not part of
your group think. You can _sometimes_ get access to real expects - counter
argument is that they're often not real specialists, you have to test.

\- Protecting confidentiality: You may not want it known that you're
considering selling the unit. Consultants can act as a natural firewall. Tends
to be more useful if you're looking at an external purchase - since in my
example they'd have to crawl through the numbers of the unit and that makes it
obvious.

The benefit no-one talks about:

\- CYA: it's a tough decision and may turn out to be wrong. Helps to have
"blah blah international consultancy says that X market will do Y and
recommended as follows ...". Counter-argument: get some integrity. In fairness
it can help to bolster an argument to have external 'calls to authority'.

~~~
Hermel
Don't forget the bypassing of anti-trust laws. Coordinating prices with your
competitors directly: illegal. Asking the same consultancy as all your
competitors about what prices you should charge: perfectly legal.

------
Annatar
The article confirms my own suspicions and experience: management is the art
of selling bullshit, and being a deterrent rather than help (which it is
supposed to be, and bills itself as).

The most disturbing (and correct in my observation) thought in the article is
that there is now a new ruling class. And when I think about it, the
management ruling class is like an octopus, like mafia, with connections and
tendrils everywhere: it does not matter whether one is competent or
benevolent, as long as one is well connected, the rest of the management
mafiosos will always find "a slot" for one of their buddies and shove them
somewhere to be a parasite in a company, parasite to the workers and society
at large. And while they might be the ruling class at the moment, like a
metastized cancer of society, now that we are aware of their presence, I say:
nothing lasts forever. Bullshit cannot defeat logic, because problems are
real, and bullshit cannot solve problems, only logic and knowledge can.

~~~
dvdcxn
There must always be bullshit for logic to prevail over. There must always
be...bureaucracy.

------
SmellTheGlove
10 years later, this article still holds up. It's not necessarily the MBA
that's at fault, but it is a degree handed out by too many institutions to
students with too little experience to benefit from it. The MBA has become a
career changer degree, rather than a supplement to people with solid
leadership credentials - and the reason is obvious, once you have a track
record, you don't need the degree, so schools have found a way to collect the
tuition somewhere else. And the curricula don't vary as greatly across schools
as the marketing materials would lead you to believe.

I am biased. I did some time in a large consultancy. I also chose a JD over an
MBA precisely because it was different than the subject matter and way of
thinking that I was exposed to on a daily basis at my employer and clients. So
to a large degree, I agree with Stewart's position. Every Fortune 500 is
pushing for "different perspectives" and "out of the box thinking" \- and they
pursue it through diversity. However, they hire the same consultants as the
rest of their peers and advance individuals with the same degree from the same
schools as everyone else. The hired diversity and diverse perspectives wash
out somewhere in the middle management ranks. I'm now a director at a fortune
500 and I don't fit the profile at all. There are zero people in my peer group
with backgrounds like mine, which is fine. But there are zero people in my
peer group with backgrounds similar to mine (meaning non-traditional degrees
and work experience) and that probably isn't fine. Naturally, the corporate
initiatives are the same as what every other large corporation has done over
the last decade - and it's funny because we tend to go last, and still don't
learn from the mistakes of other companies. I suppose we don't even hire the
good MBAs.

------
hacknat
It is interesting that the most successful founders of companies are almost
always domain experts in their field, or, at least, have spent time in the
trenches of their domain. Bezos, Zuckerberg, Gates, Ellison, Page, and Brin
all studied CS. Jobs had Woz, and is the exception that proves the rule (Jobs
was maniacally product obsessed). Jack Welch was an Engineer. The list goes on
and on.

Of all the topics that pop up on Hacker News the fact that MBAs are not useful
to founding companies or creating new products seems to be a sentiment we
share very little controversy over.

Yet why have MBA types come to dominate the ranks of the startup scene? I used
to think that this trend wan't a big deal, but now I'm becoming convinced that
MBA types cannot, generally speaking, found successful companies.

~~~
simonswords82
> Yet why have MBA types come to dominate the ranks of the startup scene?

Have they? I wasn't aware that MBAs were infiltrating the startup scene? Would
be interested to hear about some examples.

Edit: I totally agree that MBAs shouldn't be let anywhere near a startup.

------
mwfunk
The article looked familiar, and it turns out that I had read the author's
book on the same subject published several years later. It goes into a lot
more detail about the author's personal experiences in the management
consulting business, plus much more history WRT MBA programs and where the
whole concept of management as a standalone discipline came from.

It's not my field so I don't know how fair the criticisms were. Still, it was
a really interesting window into an area that overlaps quite a bit with the
tech industry.

Anyhoo, the book that emerged from this article is "The Management Myth:
Debunking Modern Business Philosophy":

[https://www.amazon.com/dp/B002PQ7B72/ref=dp-kindle-
redirect?...](https://www.amazon.com/dp/B002PQ7B72/ref=dp-kindle-
redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1)

------
woodandsteel
Companies hire M.B.A.'s and consulting firms because management is so hard.
Alas, I think the fundamental reason for this is that the human psyche was
designed by evolution to operate in small foraging bands, not large,
hierarchical organizations, and it is really hard to get anything so unnatural
to work very well.

~~~
dilemma
My belief is that, after working in a couple of dysfunctional companies,
organization design with proper work and communication processes, and
effective management, is the "secret" to company success. Almost no one seems
to understand what management is and that it is a job in itself, just like
being a designer or engineer is.

That being said, I've studied management and agree that as it's being taught
it is indeed inane. Currently, I'm learning how to _not_ manage a company by
working as a grunt and being managed. I think this experience will be very
valuable in the future as I intent to start a company.

~~~
cookiecaper
Can you walk us through your idea of the daily work of a manager, since you
say it's "a job in itself"? I understand that if you give a person a title and
tell them to sit around for 40 hours a week and collect a paycheck, they'll
invent ways to stretch that out, but in real terms, what are the daily
objectives that a manager must address? How many people can one manage before
they need to commit their attention 100% to management? 10 subordinates? 5? 1?
Is someone not a "real manager" as long as they have time to do code work on
the side? Is a manager who does code automatically less qualified than one
that would ensure his managerial duties exclude any time for other pursuits?
Is someone only a legitimate "manager" if they went to school for it? Can it
be self-taught?

I've had management positions before so I have my own answers to these
questions, but I'm curious about yours.

------
Dwolb
A point-of-view from the essay is the author dislikes employees who can't
think critically.

The big issue I have with the piece is that poor critical thinking skills
isn't an issue with _only_ MBAs. Every field and every degree has a spectrum
of people with poor critical thinking skills to good critical thinking skills.

So yes, dumbly putting up a client-facing diagram of a 5 forces analysis might
be pretty stupid, but knowing to think about the role government might play in
the firm's ability to capture profits is good practice.

Similarly in hardware, blindly following a manufacturer's board layout is dumb
too if you don't understand the specific needs of your application and how the
schematic and board might change.

~~~
dilemma
Inability to think critically or be creative often come as a result of
management. Positions are too narrowly defined, so operators lack context for
their work. Without information, you literally can't think at all.

~~~
wallace_f
>Inability to think critically or be creative often come as a result of
management.

Unfortunately, in my experience management does not want you to think
critically. They want you to do what you are told.

From the article: >... the science of handling pig iron is so great and
amounts to so much that it is impossible for the man who is best suited to
this type of work to understand the principles of this science, or even to
work in accordance with these principles, without the aid of a man better
educated than he is.

This is so accurate a description of management in my experience.
Unfortunately, I have not always worked for the best companies, but I don't
know if it's the same at the best places.

------
hardmaru
Check out this recent article from The Economist:

Nothing special: MBAs are no longer prized by employers

[http://www.economist.com/whichmba/nothing-special-mbas-
are-n...](http://www.economist.com/whichmba/nothing-special-mbas-are-no-
longer-prized-employers)

I think this is just the beginning of a much longer trend in management
reform.

~~~
Amygaz
That article doesn't look at if or how a MBA brings value. It mainly points
out that a MBA is not a differentiating factor in easily finding a high-paying
job, unless it was acquired from a highly regarded MBA program anymore. The
reason being that, since MBA programs are money makers for their teaching
institutions, they expanded like any rabbit population would do without
predation, and with rabbits also getting into the Matrix, since you can earn a
MBA from the cozy cushion of your pillow in your bedroom.

------
singingfish
Good article. Presumably because I did something bad in a previous life I
apparently have a PhD in information systems management (fortunately these
days I make my living by bending computers to do my will instead). The whole
field is infested with ideology. One reason I'm a failed academic is because
of the whole prioritisation of convention over a logical evaluation of the
actual problem space. Because I prioritised the latter over the former (and my
subfield was especially ideological) I worked more slowly than those making
convention-based shortcuts. On the other hand my thesis was accepted with
spelling mistake corrections required only :P.

Also I was unaware of Taylor's fudging of his data. Nobody ever draws
attention to that, and presumably when I was reading the originals I skimmed
that part due to looking for specific information which never made it into
later write-ups as I couldn't make it relevant enough to my narrative (thus I
never re-read the originals).

~~~
ktRolster
_I apparently have a PhD in information systems management_

I honestly didn't know that was possible.

~~~
singingfish
yep, baffles me as well. Also the fact that it got through with spelling
mistake corrections only :o

------
kfk
Well, I did study BA 1.5 years (for free in DK) and I have mixed feelings.
From one end, it's just what the author says as there is a lot of fluff
floating around. From another end, though, we did a lot of field studies,
which included inferencial statistics, that focused on teaching how to
properly test theories. Look, the business world is full of complex issues
that need research, humans are difficult. The problem with MBAs is that they
don't take BA research very seriously - they pretend to teach academic papers
just by reading the abstracts and the easy material. Core competency is
actually a great line of research, unfortunately by the time it reaches those
doing an MBA it has been stripped of all the useful parts and it has become a
mere slogan.

------
digi_owl
The basic thing about the MBA is that it boils down the inner workings of a
widget factory to generic parts.

This is all well and good when your inputs are chips or bolts, but when they
are humans things break down fast.

------
miraj
I am a bit perplexed. I think there is a mechanism to prevent duplicate
postings on HN?!

Wonder what happened to the filter? I posted this same article earlier:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11928990](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11928990)

------
aryehof
I'm somewhat unclear why management consultants are hired.

1\. Is it to help management solve problems they can't themselves solve? 2. Is
it to show and teach how to manage? 3. Is it to help improve the management
process and organizational structure?

~~~
refurb
You missed the most important reason! To have an "objective outsider" look at
a business issue in an "unbiased" way.

Please note my quotation marks.

When I was a consultant, the purpose of hiring us ranged from a temporary
extra pair of hands to the above. Most projects were somewhere in between.

In terms of the "unbiased view", every single company knew what they should
do. These were smart people. However, internal politics prevented them from
getting the ok from leadership. So, you hire an outside consulting firm and
when someone says "that's a bad idea" you hold up the McKinsey deck and say
"these smart guys think it's the right decision".

Works nearly every time.

~~~
enraged_camel
It works the other way around too: consultants make very convenient
scapegoats, which allow managers and executives to push for change (via the
consultants they hire) without risking their own neck.

~~~
wallace_f
This thread of thoughts is the reality I have seen first hand.

Management consultants are simply there for often political reasons. Sometimes
as an extra pair of hands, but often not.

In addition to the reasons given, it was also sometimes as simple as inept
ivory tower management having lost faith in group and deciding they needed to
hire real pros to come in and fix things. Another one: Management never wants
to point the finger at themselves. They hire some real pros to come in and lay
down what went wrong. I hated that job--swimming in bullshit all day every
day.

I have so many ridiculous stories I've experienced in my short time doing that
kind of work that I don't think the average person would believe.

------
ACow_Adonis
Really, what can i say other than a good piece of writing that essentially
matches my own conclusions and experience (and of course, I'm biased because I
have the philosophy degree like the author and, now having worked for
government and a big private corp, though I've not had the "pleasure" for
working for a consulting firm, I have had the "pleasure" of working with them
when hired by senior executives). I feel I need to comment just so this
article generates some discussion/anecdotes.

All I can really conclude is that it seems to me to be common practice to look
to consultancy either when you:

-don't know what you're doing and from a merit point of view probably shouldn't be in the job you're in

-you just need temporary labor without the problems/responsibilities of permanent employees

-you need to hide/cover-up/massage something

-you have a friend at the consultancy and you just continually hire/swap jobs while managing other people's money/resources and funnel it to each other

-or...possibly combined with all of the above, you need to hide your work/non-work behind a veneer of social prestige and acceptability: if profits increase, you take credit, if it fails (and if you actually measure whether it fails you'll be in the minority), well, you can't be blamed, I mean you hired the best consultancy...i mean...they have letters next to their names and everything (well, more commonly everything except experience in the business they're consulting about).

But in this sense, the management class and consultancy are beginning to blend
together: its just all about image, project confidence, never introspect or
question or measure anything properly, don't hold them to account, and
remember...and the end of the day its about networks, how much you get paid in
fees and bonuses, and your next job. No one's going to investigate your claims
of past success anyway since its all behind NDA's and corporate veils.

Unfortunately, I don't know what kind of legal position I will be in if I
actually talk about some of the...err..."interesting" experiences I've had,
and the people in these industries obviously have to protect their reputations
(since that's about all they have) so I'll just take a quick quote from the
article:

"As I plowed through my shelfload of bad management books, I beheld a
discipline that consists mainly of unverifiable propositions and cryptic
anecdotes, is rarely if ever held accountable, and produces an inordinate
number of catastrophically bad writers. It was all too familiar. There are,
however, at least two crucial differences between philosophers and their
wayward cousins. The first and most important is that philosophers are much
better at knowing what they don’t know. The second is money. In a sense,
management theory is what happens to philosophers when you pay them too much."

------
mactitan
The first myth of management is that it exists.

[http://www.murphys-laws.com/murphy/murphy-
technology.html](http://www.murphys-laws.com/murphy/murphy-technology.html)

~~~
Amygaz
That list is funny.

My preferred line is the first one: "Logic is a systematic method of coming to
the wrong conclusion with confidence". It applies to so many behaviors in
various fields.

Then there is one I am not sure I agree with, it really depends on what "level
of management" means: "The degree of technical competence is inversely
proportional to the level of management". In my experience, technically-
challenged engineers, but who somehow end up with management/supervision
roles, also s.ck at that too, big time, so much that you'd wish there was a
universal law against it.

------
bobsil1
Set a philosopher to catch a bullshitter. Nice.

------
devonkim
People interested in the topic of the great farce that is modern business
management should read in Jeffrey Pfeffer's Leadership Bullshit that also
criticizes the management industry as well as modern corporations' incentive
structures for leaders that make the optimum choice for leaders to lie and
deceive.

------
mixmastamyk
From Ben Rich's biography, about Harvard Business School: 2/3 HBS == BS.

------
sbarski
Brilliant article. I only wish I'd read it 10 years ago...

------
mannykannot
I agree up to a point, but I doubt any successful business was run by managers
who communicated in the style of Heidegger.

------
wallace_f
>… the science of handling pig iron is so great and amounts to so much that it
is impossible for the man who is best suited to this type of work to
understand the principles of this science, or even to work in accordance with
these principles, without the aid of a man better educated than he is.

That is the most accurate description of MBAs and anyone involved in selling
management consulting and advice.

It boils down to is "it's complicated, you need an expert." Don't ask why,
you'll learn your lesson quick enough: "we're smarter than you, and we're
really good at expressing it." In fact, that seems to be the primary skill
required in this field: expressing that 'we're smarter than you.' I don't
believe for a second the selection process at the most prestigious consulting
firms is biased towards undergrad institution prestige for any other reason.
Plenty of firms looking for great engineers/developers will hire a great
candidate with a degree from a less-than-prestigious undergrad. I've never
even heard of that in consulting and finance (I'm sure there's some
exceptions, but I bet they're few and far between, and probably due to
personal connections).

------
jomamaxx
You don't take an MBA to learn how to manage people.

An MBA teaches you about the fundamentals of business and organizations:
Finance, economics, microeconomics, marketing, accounting, management
accounting, and a lot of stuff in between.

MBA's are 'business wonks' \- they may or may not make good leaders or
managers.

The tool of the software developer is code, the tool of the MBA is a
spreadsheet or an analysis framework.

It's not remotely about people skills.

------
xyzzy4
Management is sort of like dating, in that there are so many complexities and
hidden variables that you have to go by instinct and experience. I don't see
how it can be taught well in school. Try to use empathy and don't make
enemies, I guess. Be careful about what you say to both your manager and
underlings.

------
tacos
No love for the typical MBA consultant here, but one thing they seem to have
over the philosophy crowd? Brevity. Good lord this post needs an editor.

~~~
ktRolster
His review of the literature is old too, with his primary sources being nearly
a century old. If he had done a more comprehensive review, he would have found
much of value.

For example, there is no doubt that management philosophies from Japan (like
ZQC or the Toyota way) have had an influence on American production. Is that
all imaginary? Because US auto quality seems to have improved significantly as
a result.

~~~
dredmorbius
Stewart _did_ read the modern literature. He found it lacking. Addressed in
the article's 4th paragraph:

 _After I left the consulting business, in a reversal of the usual order of
things, I decided to check out the management literature. Partly, I wanted to
“process” my own experience and find out what I had missed in skipping
business school. Partly, I had a lot of time on my hands. As I plowed through
tomes on competitive strategy, business process re-engineering, and the like,
not once did I catch myself thinking, Damn! If only I had known this sooner!
Instead, I found myself thinking things I never thought I’d think, like, I’d
rather be reading Heidegger! It was a disturbing experience. It thickened the
mystery around the question that had nagged me from the start of my business
career: Why does management education exist?_

Moreover: he's hammering home the point that management science isn't much
evolved from its early pig-iron days.

Something which I, having studied economics in school, am finding applies
rather well to economics as well. A discipline which is curiously ignorant of
its own history.

~~~
ktRolster
_Stewart did read the modern literature._

He might have. He didn't quote any of it.

~~~
dredmorbius
He does, in fact, quote and cite multiple sources. Michael Porter. Marvin
Bower. James C. Worthy. Tom Burns and G. M. Stalker. Tom Peters. Gifford
Pinchot. Karl Popper.

Perhaps not modern enough for you, though works through the 1990s are
mentioned. None are "century old". Not at the time Stewart wrote, not now.

How about you assert what specific sources are missing?

------
yuhong
Horrible idea of course, but I wonder if there are companies who pick CEOs
randomly from new MBA graduates and pay them an extremely high salary with no
stock options or other incentives.

~~~
Amygaz
I think you may have the beginning of experimental setup to test the
hypothesis that the value brought by a MBA is not different than zero.

------
autokad
to say philosophy majors are better managers than mbas already shows that the
person doesnt know what an mba is.

mbas can go any number of directions, and while one clearly does not need an
mba to be a good manager, most (actually all) mbas I know that did go into
management are much better at it than the philosophy majors I know.

Edit: I also wanted to say that the management classes I did take were super
interesting. Management 101 is more like a psychology class than I would have
expected. Also, I'm pretty sure the author got an MBA between 2008 and 2010

~~~
stephengillie
After taking management courses at a local community college, I was
underwhelmed by the management courses at my state university's Top 15
Management College.

The community college had courses on interpersonal management techniques, and
the purpose of a manager in a company. (Hint: It's to find and remove a
worker's blockers, not to brow-beat lazy workers.) Though designed for front-
line supervisors and other low-middle management, it was some of the best
management education I've ever received. I was stunned not to find any similar
courses at the higher level.

~~~
iofj
I am a consultant, usually not in management, and management is about actually
participating and propping up, rationalizing, and preventing the firm from
dying confronted with management dictats such as:

> Our firm wasn’t about bureaucratic control and robotic efficiency in the
> pursuit of profit. It was about love.

As opposed to bursting out in laughter.

I'll admit: I failed on this one.

~~~
iofj
What I found works best is that you assume that successful managers are just
lucky. Treat them like an addicted gambler and you will be successful. More of
what they think made them successful, never pointing out the odds and the fact
that you'd expect people to succeed on occasion with pure randomness.

Treat them like they know best and never pin them down demanding a response
from them, because they don't have an answer, just "work" to create an answer.
Yes technical people who bubble up are an exception to this for the first few
years of being manager but it doesn't last.

