
Project Manager asks for complete 100% confidence every time committing code - emrgx
http://workplace.stackexchange.com/questions/20098/project-manager-asks-for-complete-100-confidence-everytime-committing-code
======
columbo
I don't think this can be solved with book recommendations or one-liners. I
bet the PM already knows it's unreasonable to ask for 100% quality. The person
in question probably comes from the mindset that setting an unachievable bar
forces quality; like the line manager that screams when there's a speck of
dirt on the floor after a shift.

If you must continue to work with this person then you need to play by their
rules. Create a manual test suite that takes about 2 hours to complete. Every
time a new issue is found tell the manager that you'll add X tests and
increase your test suite. Eventually you'll have a test suite that takes
longer to run than the bug fixes. If the manager doesn't like the drop in
performance ask them which tests you should pull out.

Unit tests are arbitrary magic to non-developers whereas tests written down on
paper are tangible. They can see the document grow in size and they'll start
to see their name appear on the document (Added 25 more tests by direction of
Joe Manager). Managers can hide from unit tests, they can accuse you of not
writing enough unit tests, it's harder for them to hide from physical tests.

It's not fun. Really I'd say find a new job.

~~~
analog31
In my view, the idea of escalating the amount of work has a pitfall, which is
this: The manager isn't really looking for 100% perfect code. He or she is
looking for someone who promises 100% perfect code, and can thus be blamed
when a bug crops up. If you don't fulfill this function, she'll find someone
else who will. The boss wants to play the game of demanding unrealistic
promises.

~~~
munin
there is another pitfall, which is you come up with a scheme where every hour
of dev is matched by 8h of testing and your managers reaction to this is
"good".

(ps you probably should do 8h of testing for every hour of dev)

------
fiatmoney
I would tell him that this can be achieved, roughly, as long as you follow a
process like this one:

[http://www.fastcompany.com/28121/they-write-right-
stuff](http://www.fastcompany.com/28121/they-write-right-stuff)

Now, the question becomes if they can afford the headcount & time in order to
implement such a process. Unless they are actually coding up avionics, defense
systems, etc. the answer is probably "no".

------
kordless
Typical cognitive dissonance playout. Know you aren't perfect, don't want to
say you aren't perfect because you care more about what someone else thinks.
Post on the Internet asking how to resolve dissonance. Get a bunch of answer
saying find a new job. Continue to try to downplay your fears. Rinse and
repeat.

Frankly, what this guy needs to do is to stop being afraid of what others
think. Especially others who are clearly exploiting the guy's tendency to
cater to others feelings. That may or may not involve finding a new job and/or
boss, but if he doesn't fix himself, he'll just repeat it all over again.

I'm making blaming statements here, but I'm tired of narcissists fucking
things up for the rest of us.

~~~
ChristianMarks
You're probably right about the manipulative psychology of probing for and
exploiting weaknesses. Absolutely disgusting, unprofessional, completely
extraneous and non-work related. Very offensive and obnoxious to deal with.

------
harrystone
Like has already been said, the right answer is to find a new job. That
behavior is not the mark of a perfectionist, that's just someone who isn't cut
out to be a manager. And they likely know it, too.

Also, just like columbo said, the next best answer to dealing with a micro-
manager is to bury them in status reports, requests for approval on everything
short of putting more paper in the printer, and as many emails every day as
you can possibly justify. You're not ever going to convince them to stop micro
managing, just try to give them what they think they want. They'll usually
leave you alone after that. I don't know if it makes them face their own
incompetence or what.

~~~
beedogs
> That behavior is not the mark of a perfectionist, that's just someone who
> isn't cut out to be a manager. And they likely know it, too.

That's why they're a _project_ manager. It's like being a _rug_ doctor.

~~~
pjc50
Good project managers are very valuable. Unfortunately they're not easy to
find and evaluate.

------
thejerz
Don't walk. Run.

------
im3w1l
So I think of this and then I think of

'THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR
IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY,
FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE
AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER
LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM,
OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE
SOFTWARE.'

Could the poster be up for some nasty legal surprise?

------
allochthon
It is this kind of thing that makes me do what I can to avoid working for
nontechnical people in a technical capacity.

------
jey
"Sure, it'll just take me infinitely long to reach 100% confidence."

------
joshdev
Some more context here would be useful. It's easy to assume the request is
100% ridiculous from the PM's side, but maybe the project has seen a
significant decrease in quality recently. Has the bug rate skyrocketed? Have
outages been on the rise? I'd expect a senior level person to be able to
identify the warts and put a plan together on how to raise quality as a whole
on the project. Educate them on what the right question to ask is, How can we
improve quality, and have a well thought answer to follow it up with.

------
chris_wot
Just say yes (assuming you have done tests!) and have confidence in your
changes. If it breaks something, put in some more tests to make sure it
doesn't happen again, or find the bug unveiled by your fix, then correct this!

I should note that this is legally unenforceable. Bad place to work, but if it
ever came to court, you just cite the halting problem to show that you cannot
say in all cases that a problem won't be halted. What is being asked in
impossible, so unenforceable.

~~~
munin
your courtroom defense would hold until the expert witness reveals that you
have not been programming a Turing machine with an infinite tape...

~~~
chris_wot
lol! Only flaw there is that the halting problem works on modern computing
also :-)

~~~
Robin_Message
Nope, technically it has to be an infinite machine, otherwise it's just an
over complicated finite state machine and proving termination in those is
trivial.

I/O (except to bounded sources like disks) could probably save you, but the
proof will be harder.

------
fleitz
There's two situations here:

You're being paid to write aviation quality code and the manager is
incompetent about how to go about achieving that quality, or the manager is
incompetent.

Also, just parse the requirements, she's asking for confidence that it won't
break any features, not that the commit won't actually break any features.

Just be more confident.

Seriously though, find a new job.

------
jv22222
I wrote a blog post about clients like this a while back -
[http://justinvincent.com/page/302/bugs-vs-mistakes-
warranted...](http://justinvincent.com/page/302/bugs-vs-mistakes-warranted-
code) \- I've found that educating the client about QA helps in these
situations.

------
pyalot2
Well, 100% isn't reachable. But a high confidence is reachable. The thing
though is, your PM isn't asking you for 100% confidence. He's asking you to
make every single 2 hour tasks into a weeklong research and engineering
project.

So sure, tell him everytime he asks this, it'll take you a week to make sure.

------
nl
It's on jobs like this where you charge by the hour...

------
toolslive
maybe you should ask him what exactly he means with "confidence" ?

In the end, you should be able to get a bet on it. If it fixes the problem,
without unwanted side effects, you get X. If it doesn't, you pay Y. See if you
can work out X and Y.

If he really insists on 100%, and wants to pay for it, you might get rich in
the process.

------
ChristianMarks
When I hear from a manager that I must be absolutely certain that some complex
system utterly beyond my control must work without the possibility of error, I
leave. (I have done this.) Life is too short to spend it working with
manipulative turds, let alone smug imbeciles with no comprehension of
computational complexity, recusive unsolvability, probability, the problem of
knowledge, the philosophy of science, and on and on. I hate to sound so
negative, but surrounding yourself with individuals capable of this kind of
psychological torture when the subject of software guarantees is a research
industry with an extensive literature going back at least to the Mythical Man
Month is bad for your health. I find it deeply offensive that one has to
respond respectfully and professionally to outrageous demands as if they were
reasonable.

------
balloot
This is an unbelievably stupid request.

Nobody writes bug-free code - people in the comments on SE talking about how
this can be done with automated testing are utterly delusional. All
developers, no matter how talented and/or cautious, create bugs from time to
time.

So if you are to say you have 100% confidence in your code, you are either:

1) The first developer ever to write all bug-free code, all the time (hint:
you aren't)

2) Willingly overlooking the fact that no matter how hard you try or how
confident you are in your code, you will introduce bugs every so often.

Neither of those is an even remotely reasonable stance to take. This project
manager is a total moron.

