
People leave managers, not companies - theyeti
https://blog.intercom.com/people-leave-managers-not-companies/
======
Greed
One of the issues I've had that isn't mentioned here is the value of mutual
trust. Communication and trust are the two cornerstones of a really solid
manager <-> managee relationship in my experience. Whether that lack of trust
manifests itself as micro-management, constant check-ins, or a constant threat
of surveillance it can easily turn an above average performer into an
apathetic and demoralized employee.

I used to work remotely for a company that spanned more than a few timezones,
with a wonderful daily team manager and a not-so-great weekly department
manager. Learning that my minutes and output were constantly monitored
completely destroyed my trust with the latter, and had me searching within the
week. My reaction to that was so strong I actually considered it a fortune
when I was laid off for unrelated reasons rather than having to quit.

I would be reprimanded for signing on five minutes later than usual despite
being on a team of individuals that spanned multiple countries, and would get
a questioning ping if I was offline for more than 10 minutes (especially
problematic if you're the type of programmer to write or plan code on the
whiteboard / paper first). Extremely draining to deal with that sort of
nonsense and mistrust.

Please, managers of the world, trust your employees! You have performance
metrics for a reason!

~~~
crdoconnor
IME this kind of experience comes when you have a manager who has no
fundamental understanding of what it is that they are managing and has no
particular reason to trust you.

A manager who can monitor your output by reading your pull requests simply
won't engage in this type of behavior whereas a manager who can't will usually
instinctively gravitate to terrible metrics like "does he show dedication by
being in at 9am rather than 9:05am"?

Managers should form a very deep understanding of whom to trust and why or
understand on a very deep level what it is that they are managing.

Managers who cannot do either of those things should be terminated with
prejudice.

>You have performance metrics for a reason!

As far as developing software goes, every single performance metric is
terrible.

~~~
subsubsub
Is turning up on time for your job a terrible metric?

To me being on time is just a very basic low level requirement of being a
professional.

As the initial commenter said: trust goes both ways. Turning up on time is a
good way to show your manager that you can be trusted.

 _Edit:_ Actually, turning up on time may not make your manager trust you
more, but turning up late will definitely make them trust you less.

~~~
crdoconnor
>Is turning up on time for your job a terrible metric?

 _The worst_ metric.

That is, unless the "turning up on time" is actually causing a serious and
recognizable problem. Then it's the problem that's a problem.

>As the initial commenter said: trust goes both ways.

No it doesn't. If you put the onus on the developer and say "not only do you
have to deliver high quality code you have to make me _trust_ that you've
delivered high quality code by adhering to these arbitrary metrics I've come
up which bear no intrinsic relationship to how you do your job" you're
admitting incompetence as a manager.

It's a manager's job to know whom to trust and a manager that trusts the
useless developer who turns up at 9am sharp over the excellent developer who
turns up at 9:05am requires termination.

>Actually, turning up on time may not make your manager trust you more, but
turning up late will definitely make them trust you less.

It will definitely make a _bad manager_ trust you less.

A good manager will either recognize that you're delivering or not.

~~~
titzer
> A good manager will either recognize that you're delivering or not.

And a great manager will evaluate the wider effects of your behavior on the
whole team and over a long timescale. If you being late to your job causes
others to start doing the same, and if your manager cuts you slack because you
are a "high performer" then social dynamics come into play that must
be...well...managed! Performance also slips over time. People get spoiled,
sometimes depressed, sometimes lazy.

Managers look at whole teams and long-term trends. Stop focusing on yourself
and the immediate moment. Success is a marathon, not a sprint, and requires
careful, regular progress.

~~~
IronKettle
> If you being late to your job causes others to start doing the same

You're missing the point entirely: Who cares if they're also late?

Short of them being late to something important like a meeting, it seriously
couldn't matter less than any of the thousand other things you should focus on
as a manager.

Unless you work in something with external time pressures (e.g. I used to work
in equities and US market hours dictated our need to be available) there's no
reason it should matter whether someone shows up at 9 or 9:45. If you're
really worried about people missing each other, set core hours (11-3 say)
where everyone's expected to be available.

~~~
ionforce
You're missing his point. Being late could (hypothetically) have side effects
that affect the morale of other team members.

------
ZenoArrow
I think this article misses an important point, which is that managers, or at
least line managers, are often the messenger for decisions made in upper
management.

If I think back on the jobs I've had in the past, it's very rare for me to
have issues with line managers. However, I had serious doubts about the
competency of upper management in multiple companies that I've worked for.

In this case, unless upper management recognise the problems that the line
manager is highlighting, there's often not much more the line manager can do.
Seeing as upper are (in my experience) frequently out of touch with the
repercussions of their decisions, line managers should accept that they can
only do what they can with what they're given (either that or leave).

~~~
maxxxxx
As manager in the middle you often feel helpless. You want to help your people
but you have nothing to offer. Can't give raises, no place to promote people,
top management doesn't support your initiatives. It's a difficult place to be
in.

~~~
dagw
My last manager quit because of that feeling of helplessness. Basically my
manager left his manager.

~~~
wetpaws
Can relate to this.

------
ravenstine
It's probably easier for managers to overrate their skills and performance
because the problems they cause are often not overt; if parts of their team
are underperforming, the knee-jerk assessment is that "there's something wrong
with Joe" rather than "there's something wrong with our process" or "there's
something wrong with what I'm doing."

Some of my worst experiences with management involved cases of serious
micromanagement. I'd say if you're micromanaging, there's a 99.9 percent
chance that you're a bozo and you don't belong in the position you're in even
if you had initially earned it. You have trust issues with your employees and
you've failed to build a team and environment that allows people to
effectively manage themselves.

The best mangers I've known are the ones who are _minimally_ involved. People
who are given the space to make choices, be creative, and fail every so often,
will often figure out how to manage themselves.

I'd argue that people usually leave both managers and companies because
companies too often fail to recognize the broken patterns of managers. This is
anecdotal, but I worked at one place where more than half of the development
team(those with the most talent) quit within a span of 2 weeks, and somehow
upper management decided it was not the fault of our tyrannical manager and
instead replaced those positions with junior developers they could underpay
and abuse. It's all the more insulting when you can point out the problems and
provide actual solutions, and the aloof men in suits on Mount Olympus allow
the problem to fester. I might have stayed for another year had they booted
out our manager.

The fact that most people have stories of terrible management is astounding,
and it doesn't say very much for whatever training managers receive(if any?).

~~~
lars512
> The best mangers I've known are the ones who are minimally involved. People
> who are given the space to make choices, be creative, and fail every so
> often, will often figure out how to manage themselves.

In those cases, did you feel you shared values with those managers? Or were
they indifferent to your values, and just left you alone?

~~~
ravenstine
I've experienced both kinds of low involvement, but I was definitely referring
to cases where we shared values.

A case of indifference is still preferable to tyranny, though it obviously
comes with its own set of problems. The biggest issue I have with uninvolved
managers is the conflict between knowing what's expected versus the level of
autonomy I should have. This problem is not isolated, of course. But an
uninvolved manager may grant a lot of autonomy while failing to make it clear
to their employees what sort of decisions they cannot male autonomously. As an
employee, I will only ask so many questions before deciding the system is
ridiculous and then overriding it. That's just my nature. If something is so
important to a process, like communicating with a bunch of anonymous suits on
Mount Olympus before a major release of one particular product, that
information should be handed down to me. I shouldn't have to pry every detail
out of management to get my job done, and occasionally they'll be punished
when I make an arbitrary decision.

A good manager should be able to provide relevant information and facilitate
the product process while staying out of the way. If they're always too busy
attending meetings outside the team, then they'll reap what they sow and have
no one to blame but themselves.

By the way, I do not make character judgments on most managers. Most of the
people who've managed me are great people outside the office setting.

------
somberi
I have been managing large teams (Anywhere from 100 to 300 people) and in my
experience I would phrase it differently.

1\. In a going concern, which has found traction, a manager is often the
_reason_ for people to leave the company.

2\. In a company that is not finding traction, or the larger view of its
direction is obfuscated, managers are the reason people _stay_ back to work.

This manager being the end-all of association comes from military knowledge
that you fight because of allegiance to your battalion, cause and the country
- in that order.

In an knowledge enterprise, these constructs exist, but with almost equal
weightage.

The best manager cannot make an employee stay back if the company is not going
anywhere, or if the cause is not evident.

The worst manager will lose employees even if the company is going bonkers.

~~~
xerophyte12932
You have been _directly_ managing over a hundred people? That just sounds like
textbook bad heirarchy

~~~
jpatokal
They did not claim to _directly_ manage 300 people, and it's somewhat bizarre
to assume they did.

~~~
pbhjpbhj
I think it's the "large teams" bit that makes the OP appear to be saying the
"team" is up to 300 people. Team suggests a group of equally ranked members to
me.

You can't really have a team of 300, sounds more like a management speak
version of team.

Of course only the poster knows for sure their intended meaning.

------
toomanybeersies
At my previous job, I left due to the company, not the management.

My direct supervisor was great. He was a good manager on most levels.

I left because the company had no future, they weren't going bankrupt, but
they weren't growing either. I never got a pay rise, probably never would. My
benefits actually shrunk as time went on, staff social functions were cut
(e.g. team lunches), use of networking funds became more restricted, and my
work environment became less flexible.

In fact, the only reason I considered staying was my manager and coworkers.

People leave poor working environments, whether it's a company or a manager
causing that poor environment.

~~~
murukesh_s
Yea, its too easy to say people leave managers, but it was never in my case. I
think it varies between industry. With the software companies, the churn is
mostly due to folks looking out for better opportunities..

Me personally almost always looked outside due to availability of better
opportunities. The argument that people leave managers makes sense only if you
are in the best possible job/company you can get with your skill set (which is
a very small %) and you somehow got a rift with the manager big enough to
leave.

But it could be different in other domains/industries where people stick with
the same company till their retirement..

------
quickthrower2
You don't just leave a bad manager. You escape! Emotionally it is deflating,
defeating, a real grind that affects your whole life if your work situation
sucks.

------
jdsknene
No, people leave companies too. Using my throwaway account because I don't
want my name attached to this.

I went contract-to-hire at my current job. When it came time to come on full-
time, the offer they made was far too low to accept. The owner of the company
made a big deal out of the bonus and at the time I believed him. I held out
for $5k more before accepting.

Fast forward a year later and I'm really looking forward to this bonus. It was
5% of my salary, basically an extra paycheck. I was expecting at least three
times that because of what he said during the negotiation. I started looking
that day and am interviewing with two companies.

I've since realized that I just don't want to work for consultants anymore.
You're being farmed out and your labor is being arbitraged. This incentivizes
them to dick you on comp. I know in his mind it's just business, but I don't
want that in my life anymore.

So while the thesis of this article may hold for a certain segment of the
labor market, it certainly doesn't hold for all of them. Some segments just
suck. Conflicts of interest in these segments invariably pit line workers
against management and no amount of manager cordialness or professionalism
will prevent turnover.

Sure there are a few workplaces that have ironed out conflicts of interest and
so can attract the cream of the crop, these places can build nice engineer
caves and then personal relationships rather than endemic conflicts of
interest become the dominant cultural factor that drives turnover. But these
guys trying to tell the rest of the world's managers how to run a shop is just
profoundly naive.

------
rich_archbold
Hey all,

I'm the blog author, Rich Archbold from Intercom. Just to clarify …

I wrote this blog, with the exaggerated / cliched title, to try to speak to
the large cohort of over-confident, under-skilled and often lacking-enough-
self-awareness, managers out there. I was (and often still am) a member of
this cohort. Being a great manager _all_ the time is really hard and almost
impossible IMHO.

The goal was to hopefully try and generate some more self-awareness and
introspection and thus make life a little fairer, more pleasant, more growth-
oriented and hopefully more successful for all concerned.

I wasn't trying to deny or downplay that people also leave their jobs for all
of the other reasons highlighted by folks here.

Thanks, Rich.

~~~
nishantvyas
My take based on my experience is,

#1. People get hired for what they are good, their skills and then get
promoted (to management) for same technical/IC skills not for the MGMT skills.
No MGMT ramp-up. No MGMT tools. No MGMT framework. You are now tasked to lead
a team. it's surely will fail.

#2. Next the mindset. Typical mindset when you move from technical (or any IC)
role to MGMT and the higher you go in MGMT should completely change....
unfortunately its not so easy to give up the control. MGMT is about making
others successful... giving up your control to others is very frightening and
often causes identity issues... moving from do it all (as an IC) to
ask_and_inspire is not easy...

#3. Assuming you overcome these two... typical problem of MGMT/leadership is
they try to find, "What's the matter?" where as the focus should always be on
"What matters to you (an individual/ICs in team)"

------
seanmcdirmid
Likewise, there probably isn't such a thing as a 10X developer, but I totally
believe 10X managers exist (they provide cover, they have empathy, they are
able to lead people who otherwise aren't very manageable). I've only met very
few of them in my career, most managers are 1X or even negative.

~~~
jclarkcom
10x developers definitely exist, quite amazing to work with them.

~~~
mianos
But 0.1X managers are always telling us they are a myth. Do the math. :)

~~~
seanmcdirmid
It’s the 0.1x manager who generally demands rock stars to make up for their
inability to manage.

------
lliamander
I have only ever left good managers. I've had bad managers, but it was only
under good managers that I was fully enabled to do my best work - work that
would give me the confidence (and the resume fodder) to pitch myself to a new
company for better pay.

That may seem disloyal to those good managers, but I never left on a whim. It
was always an agonizing process. But it was also always necessary. My former
managers have never held it against me, and I now have connections with a
number of great managers who would hire me without question if I was ever
looking again (and they know I would work for them in a heartbeat).

What always happened was that it became evident that my interests and my
company's interest had diverged, whether it was a lack of opportunity for
advancement, the company was going under, the product was a non-starter, or
upper-management was bent on self-sabotage.

EDIT: Added missing words

------
notacoward
There's often a third possibility; leaving _groups_. At a small enough startup
they're effectively the same, but I've seen distinct groups form in companies
as small as 20. While it's true that a manager can affect the quality of the
entire group, they're only one factor. High-performing fun group with a ho-hum
manager? I'll probably stay. Dysfunctional bunch of ho-hum peers with a really
good manager? That was my last job, and it's not my _current_ job for exactly
that reason.

Especially at a larger company, managers might be constrained wrt hiring and
firing, reviews and raises, pushing back against misguided product-management
decisions, etc. Even a good manager might not be able to deal with these
issues quickly enough to prevent attrition. I've seen some _really_ good
managers, people I'd worked with before and who have been superstars at other
companies, burn out trying. That's sort of leaving the company that hobbled
the manager, but other managers and other groups within the same company were
doing fine so I'd call it leaving the group.

------
CalRobert
Tellingly, when I interviewed with Intercom their "culture fit" manager was
extremely rude and condescending, and constantly interrupted. Everyone else
was polite, but if this is the person who gets to decide "yeah, they'd fit in
here" that's a pretty huge problem.

People turn you down because of managers, not companies, too.

~~~
sloxy
Funnily enough, I like Intercom's hiring process (as it appears on paper).
But...my real life experience was quite different.

Interviewed by a precocious child who didn't have interview skills.

~~~
CalRobert
Intercom does a fantastic job with content marketing. I'm not sure how much it
reflects reality, though. Again, most of the people I talked to were polite;
it was just one extremely off-putting interviewer. I nearly thought it must be
some kind of perverse test to see how I handle jerks.

------
lovich
I've definitely left companies and not managers before. To be fair it's
usually because my manager's manager's manager was an asshole who thought 1%
and an attaboy would be enough to keep people when our rent had gone up 7% and
neighboring companies we're offering 50% more. Also to be fair, my managers
were good enough that I stayed 6 months longer than I would have with even a
neutral manager

------
k__
Problem is, managers shape companies.

Last company I left went bankrupt and got bought by a VC who replaced the
whole management.

The new managers were running around telling people how to do things because
of the "company spirit".

A few people, including me, were in the company for over 7 years and we knew
the company spirit, because well, we lived and formed it.

Now some newly hired MBAs try to tell me that I'm wrong?

The bankruptcy lead many people to leave. The rest left because of the new
management. Now the company has the old name and product, but noone of the
people that created or formed it remained.

~~~
maxxxxx
"ow the company has the old name and product, but noone of the people that
created or formed it remained."

That's probably by design.

~~~
k__
Don't you say?

Just because people do things intentionally doesn't make it any better...

------
mychael
There is an important distinction that hasn't been discussed much:

\- The reason people _decide_ to resign.

\- The reason people _begin to consider_ resigning.

In my experience, bad management is what usually kicks off the whole thought
process, but other factors are what cement the decision (like an offer with
higher pay, better title, higher prestige company etc.)

------
phaus
I work on a team that lost about 66% of its members in the last year and a
half. Every single one of them liked our manager, but the way the organization
works at a higher level was making everyone's life miserable. People
absolutely leave companies because of the company.

I've also had toxic managers at other organizations, so I agree a manager CAN
drive an employee away, but that's not always or even usually the case.

~~~
cgore
I think that too is on the company. A good one-level-up manager will check up
on their underlings, the managers in question, and figure out who's good and
bad and resolve the situation.

------
gadders
I can't help feeling that sometimes saying "People leave managers, not
companies" is something senior company management tell themselves to absolve
themselves of blame for staff turnover.

I could be managed by the best manager in the world, but if I'm paid 20% below
market rate I'm going to leave for a better paid job.

------
korginator
People leave the environment, not just the manager, though the manager is a
big piece of the puzzle.

I quit my last employer because the manager was an abusive bully with severe
trust issues who would constantly threaten, abuse and demoralize people, but
HR was also to blame since they did not lift a finger to address the issue
even though this manager's behavior was widely known throughout the company
for decades.

I've also left a great manager in the past since the business was going
nowhere. I've left a good manager and good team because I was very underpaid
in another company.

------
rconti
Funny, I just left a job where new management was installed and promptly lost
~12/30 people in the span of 9 months. Not only was life markedly worse on day
1, it got worse every time another quality coworker or line manager left.

You'd think this would send a signal to someone that a mistake had been made.
Nope!

------
pan69
The best software teams I've worked on didn't have managers, they had
facilitators.

~~~
balls187
For self organizing teams, and teams with motivated people, servitude
leadership style works really well. Ensure the teams goals and direction is
clearly set, and just remove roadblocks as needed.

But there are other types of teams, and other situations where other styles
are more effective.

------
praneshp
I left my first job because the company(Yahoo) was burning. My manager was
great, I'd love to work for her again. I left a few months earlier than I
needed to though, because her new manager was an asshole.

------
nishantvyas
#1. People get hired for what they are good, their skills and then get
promoted (to management) for same technical/IC skills not for the MGMT skills.
No MGMT ramp-up. No MGMT tools. No MGMT framework. You are now tasked to lead
a team. it's surely will fail.

#2. Next the mindset. Typical mindset when you move from technical (or any IC)
role to MGMT and the higher you go in MGMT should completely change....
unfortunately its not so easy to give up the control. MGMT is about making
others successful... giving up your control to others is very frightening and
often causes identity issues... moving from do it all (as an IC) to
ask_and_inspire is not easy...

#3. Assuming you overcome these two... typical problem of MGMT/leadership is
they try to find, "What's the matter?" where as the focus should always be on
"What matters to you (an individual/ICs in team)"

------
spodek
"People join good projects and leave bad managers" is how I phrase it, quoting
a business school professor and author, Michael Feiner.

I wrote about how to use the perspective to help prepare for job searches and
interviews, and to enjoy your time at work more:
[http://joshuaspodek.com/people-join-good-projects-
leave-2](http://joshuaspodek.com/people-join-good-projects-leave-2)

------
gaius
That manager may not be your line manager, they may be several levels above,
they may even by the CEO. So actually, it _is_ “the company”.

------
everdev
I've left a good manager for a higher salary.

~~~
justboxing
Congrats! How is the new manager at the higher salary? Equally good? or Bad?

~~~
everdev
It was years ago, but everything worked out :)

------
DaniFong
people drop out of shitty things that undervalue them, which is much of the
modern world. welcome to the world, 2.0.

------
oldsmallcorp
Not my usual account for obvious reasons, but - I'm on my way out because of
the company, not my manager. My current manager is decent, and my previous one
was the reason I came to work for this company.

The thing that's driving me out is the company's lack of direction. They talk
of innovation, but their actions demonstrate that they're more concerned with
maintaining the status quo with incremental improvements to aging products.

I've spent about 70% of my few years here working on new products that never
saw the light of day. That's disheartening. Fool me twice... time to go.

------
tnolet
Not disagreeing with the point made, but why is this "article" (or rehash of
other people's management philosophy) on the intercom site? What does it have
to do to with them outside the fact they probably have managers. I might be a
sour old man, but I honestly don't get these infomercial type blog posts. It
makes me have a lesser opinion of companies publishing these types of things,
although with intercom their _beep boop_ sound already pretty much destroyed
any sympathy. /s

------
husamia
I can relate to this as a manager and as being managed. I been looking into
this, do you think Self-Managed types of Organizations reduce the issues with
this type of problem of out of date communication style from top down? we are
in the 21st century. We don't need to have information coming from top down we
need information coming the the bottom up. Our smart devices can do better job
than a human manager!

------
paul7986
I left my big fat paying job after....

\- reported a females colleagues non sexual harassment

\- started to be harassed myself by my direct coworker who insisted I use css
lint in the strictest mode. When I disagreed with what lint was saying in the
strictest mode he sold to management that I don’t know how to code or do my
job. From then on I struggled to change their minds even when linking to
things like using negative margins is valid.

------
sriku
It was ironic to see this title and "here is why I left google" on HN front
page at the same time.

------
unabst
The manager is your interface to management. It's their job to tell you what
you need to know and what to do. To an employee, they're the face of the
business.

But at the end of the day, if it's the people that make up a business, then
I'd question if they are not the same thing.

I asked a new acquaintance of mine about something bothering me.

I asked him, "so, how often do you fire people? How do find the right people
for your businesses?"

"I hardly ever have to fire anyone," he said. "I ask them questions, and they
leave."

Damn.

And the thing is, this pressure isn't faked or manufactured. This isn't anyone
trying to fire someone. This is just someone needing work done, and answers.

No business wants anyone incompetent, yet, it happens, because of interviewees
lying through their teeth and not knowing any better.

So they walk in and fail to do the exact job they won for themselves, then
come the questions.

Now they lose their place and have to leave, knowing they got the job by
accident.

There is plenty of real pressure to go around in a real business, and we avoid
managerial roles because we know the stakes are higher. We know that having a
manager is "safer" than being one, because having a manager is having someone
responsible for you, and for your well being. It's how America figured out how
to hire from the abundant talent pool of those who can't handle tough
responsibilities and stay happy on their own, and those who'd rather have it
easier. It's the luxury of being managed.

But above that, it gets even worse. Fewer luxuries, just higher pay. Just
think of all the bullets the CEO has to catch with their teeth every day. And
wen they fail, it's news.

~~~
perl4ever
Being a manager is about being loyal to the company and not individuals. It
pays more precisely because it causes pain to peoples' consciences to put an
abstraction above fellow employees.

Talking about a CEO catching bullets in their teeth is ridiculously inflated
language. Why use such imagery? Because the mission of a typical company does
not sufficiently compensate for the guilt produced by putting the organization
ahead of individuals.

~~~
unabst
No.

Putting the organization ahead of individuals isn't what's happening. The
individuals ARE the organization.

So if you put yourself ahead of the organization, you're putting everyone else
behind you, including your boss. This is a challenge for millennials
especially, who are used to always being put first, and having their emotions
managed.

A good manager doesn't put themselves before their boss or anyone else. How
often do you hear of programmers who enter management to hardly touch code
again? A good manager puts the organization first, both above and below their
pay grade.

But their performance also depends on the people they manage. If a worker is
incompetent, they have every right to be hard on those mistakes. And the
worker is fully responsible for setting things right. Work is not homework
that gets handed back to you after its graded. It's something needed by
someone else that needs it for something important. And nothing is redundant
in a tightly run business.

When I think of Melissa Mayers, I think of bullets. Despite whether anyone
agrees with "her" moves (which were clearly backed by her counsel), she was
doing everything she could to increase market share and rebuild a failing
business. She took on all the risk, and becomes target practice for those who
despise her failures. When was the last time you were bashed on HN? And she
does this so that everyone at Yahoo has a job. She is fighting for YOU.

Regardless of my word choice, to borrow your words, the CEO is a ridiculously
inflated position.

~~~
perl4ever
You assert that "a good manager puts the organization first", but first does
not mean "ahead of individuals". So what is it ahead of, if not individual
interests?

------
awefpoij
My experience has been the complete opposite. I'm grossly underpaid and I know
for a fact that my manager is fighting for me to stay here.

The company (HR and upper management) and myself (I should not have accepted
such a low starting salary) are solely to blame.

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haddr
people also leave the environment, so not only their managers, but their
peers. managers are somehow reponsible for creating a proper environment, but
it is hard to enforce the atmosphere created by the rest of the team...

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hkmurakami
Do people join managers, not companies?

Serious question btw. I think such a scenario would be vastly superior to the
general "join a black box" type of recruiting we have today.

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Paul_S
People leave salaries.

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a13n
I had a great manager at my last job but left because the role wasn't the
right risk/reward profile I was looking for.

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amyjess
I have mixed thoughts on this. The one company I quit, I quit in large part
because my manager was abusive. A particular tantrum my manager threw was what
caused me to apply to several jobs in a fit of pique, and when one of them
gave me an offer, I put in my notice. On the other hand, the company was toxic
on several levels, the abusive manager was only part of it, and I'd been
looking at job postings on and off for months before that incident.

The pay was abysmal. Nobody at the company had any insurance (because of this
I will never work for a startup again). Company leadership was willing to roll
over for a transphobic landlord and throw me under the bus. The company was a
young startup without any infrastructure or processes, and pretty much
everybody technical had very little professional experience (including both
the technical leadership and the rank-and-file; and I say this even though I
ended up becoming friends with several of my fellow rank-and-file, most of
whom I still talk to to this day). Somehow I got along well with the CTO, but
he was very mercurial and there were some people there (including a couple
friends of mine) he took a strong personal dislike to for no real reason, and
I was always afraid he would turn on me. I definitely quit the company and not
just the manager.

I still keep up with them and their employees on LinkedIn. One thing I've
noticed is that since I left, they've been handing out Director titles like
candy, I'm assuming to compensate for their lack of monetary compensation.

The company was a disaster on pretty much every level. The one good thing I
could say about it was that some of my ex-coworkers there are still friends of
mine, but that's a really low bar.

Edit: I want to add another story. The company I ended up jumping ship to, I
came close to quitting before they laid me off, for reasons that had _nothing_
to do with my manager. My manager was excellent. I liked him a lot. But the
work I was doing had nothing whatsoever to do with my skillset. I felt like an
idiot compared to my coworkers, I made far less useful contributions than
pretty much anybody else at the company (my boss reassured me that he didn't
care because he knew the stuff they did was esoteric and was willing to spend
years training someone new), and the longer I stayed the more it felt like it
was actually harming my career since I was letting my specialty atrophy (and I
still thought this even though I'm not a career-minded person!). Ultimately,
that decision got taken out of my hands because 1/3 of the company including
me got taken out in the only layoff in the company's 20-year history, but if I
did quit it would have been _despite_ my manager being awesome, not because of
him.

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sifoo
There's a lot of talk about full stack developers lately, I'm still waiting to
find the first full stack manager. Someone who's visionary, yet realistic;
confident, yet empathic; powerful, yet humble. I feel like there's some truth
to the saying that the best leaders are those who don't consider themselves
fit to lead.

~~~
perl4ever
I've seen a variety of managers doing bad jobs, and it never makes me think I
could do it better. It makes me think about managerial problems, and how they
are inherently difficult because of conflicts of interest.

On the other hand, I got tired of technical problems, because the _real_
problems always seemed to be managerial where I worked.

