

Why former employees say Microsoft can't innovate - felixmar
http://www.betanews.com/joewilcox/article/Why-former-employees-say-Microsoft-cant-innovate/1265750084

======
larsberg
Interviewing only the disgruntled and fired is just as one-sided as business
books that determine rules of success by only interviewing people who made it
rich. What's the opposite of survivor bias?

Just to give the other side as somebody who worked there for a while and
retired pretty successful, driving big changes isn't trivial but it isn't hard
either. As an individual with an idea, you don't have to do ROI, fill out
complicated budgeting forms, etc. Just make it work and then convince your
managers -- all of whom are techies! -- that it's a good idea and you're
willing to spend the time to make it happen. But I did see a lot of people
fail with their "great idea" when they didn't want to be the one to build and
ship it. Nobody there is going to do your work for you.

~~~
MikeCapone
Can you give example of innovations that bubbled from the bottom like that and
that were shipped?

~~~
larsberg
The VS2010 text editor and MEF (the Microsoft Extensibility Framework).

To be honest, I'd have a harder time naming innovative features that shipped
at Microsoft and didn't come up from the bottom. Pushing innovation from the
top seems like it would be really hard for anyone not named Steve Jobs :-)

~~~
mbreese
What about things that aren't developer tools? It seems to me that a lot of
the more interesting things coming out of Microsoft have been developer tools
and languages. These just scream like something that should be bottom-up style
innovation.

No one ever said MSFT didn't have top-notch developers. And developers tend to
produce cool tools for themselves to use.

What about something more consumer facing? Has there been anything like that
to come out in a while?

------
zitterbewegung
The real question is does microsoft need to innovate? The business philosophy
seems to be more reactive than innovative and it has worked out for a great
deal of time.

~~~
jsz0
I think that works for a while but it catches up with you eventually. Once you
miss enough _next big things_ you just aren't prepared to react anymore.

~~~
mbreese
Case in point: The Internet. Microsoft has been reacting to that since 1995
and still hasn't gotten good at it. Given the ungodly amounts of money that
they have put behind MSN/Live Search/Bing, you'd think that they'd have more
mindshare than they do. This is a case where Microsoft was trying to react to
the situation on the ground, rather than create the situation on the ground
(like a Google).

Another case would be digital music. After using partners to create MP3
players (which is their traditional strategy), they switched over to making
their own (Zune). They just kept reacting to the iPod and iTunes Store. This
meant they were playing by Apple's rules in the market, not creating the
market.

~~~
ismarc
The Zune's I've used are phenomenal products and much more suited to me than
any of the ipods ever were. The touch-but-not-push button that also acts as a
button, with the intuitive, clean, simple text listing for the UI is great. I
personally really like the Zune (especially the brick shaped ones) for
multitudes of reasons, the highest being that I can drop-kick it down a flight
of cement stairs then land in a puddle of water and it be fine.

What the iPod has is the iTunes store and household name (along the lines of
Q-Tips and Kleenex). What Microsoft fails at is delivering an experience that
makes an individual's entire experience easier. They are pros at providing
tools, systems and support for the management of large deployements (e.g.,
corporate desktops/laptops, Apple and even Linux don't come anywhere close to
the capabilities Microsoft provides in this regard), but they have always had
problems directly targetting the consumer. The only direct-to-consumer product
they have that they did good on in their own right is the XBox 360. They did
this by being first and doing a great job of getting production companies on
board for games. They did not go with the level of innovation that some
companies did (PS3/Wii). It doesn't take innovation to lead the pack, or even
just to succeed in an arena. It takes knowing who your target customers are
and providing the experience that they didn't even know they wanted before
they used it.

~~~
mbreese
I've never used a Zune, and probably never will... not because of anything
that Microsoft has done, but because I'm well served in the iPod ecosystem.
They might be great products, but that isn't my point. I'm not trying to say
that Microsoft doesn't make good gear, but that in music players they aren't
defining the market. So far, they are playing in a market that is defined by
Apple.

Even Apple in this regard wasn't very innovative. They took a concept that had
already been proven in the marketplace (MP3 player), and made it better. I had
an old Rio MP3 player back in the day, and it was a pain to get music onto it.
When the first iPod came out, it was much more useful because it was easy to
get my music on there. The innovation was in making it simple to buy music
from iTunes and put it on your iPod.

I'm curious to see what the new Zunes look like when Microsoft announces them
next week. But I suspect that it will be evolutionary, not revolutionary.

------
mixmax
Incentives don't work. This has been documented over and over again, and it's
truly puzzling that large corporations don't learn from it.

Here's a quick and light article on the subject:
<http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000070.html>

Here's a video lecture on the subject:
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FdkQwQQWX9Q>

And here's the classical Harvard business review article that originally
proposed it:
[http://cb.hbsp.harvard.edu/cb/web/product_detail.seam;jsessi...](http://cb.hbsp.harvard.edu/cb/web/product_detail.seam;jsessionid=F70EF90E20FF356FBD77BC18BC48618D?R=93506-PDF-
ENG&conversationId=382686&E=59880)

~~~
gaius
_Incentives don't work._

Given the choice of doing exactly the same work for company A that believes
that and company B that pays bonuses anyway, what sane person wouldn't go for
B? That's not puzzling at all.

~~~
mixmax
Research on the subject seems to contradict you. There are several problems

\- Incentives are very hard to get right. If your bonus is tied to sales you
inflate sales and don't care about margins. If your bonus is tied to margins
you oversell and someone else suffers in aftersales support. If your bonus is
tied to stockprice you do what you can to inflate the stockprice, hoping
everything won't come crashing down before you receive your bonus. And so on.

\- When it comes to it very few people are driven by money. They'll say they
are but in reality they aren't. Would you knowingly sell something expensive
to an old lady who can't afford it that she doesn't need in order to make a
sell and get your bonus? Most people wouldn't.

\- Incentives drive you to only care about the incentive for which you're
awarded. If you're in one department and can make $10 knowing that another
department will lose $100 that's what you'll do.

Besides very few choices in life, if any, are as black and white as you put
them.

~~~
gaius
_When it comes to it very few people are driven by money_

No economist believes that they are. People are motivated by a concept called
"utility" which is, money, a nice office, interesting colleagues, meaningful
work, a short commute, opportunity to assert authority, and other factors. The
exact mix will vary from person to person, but the money is important: it
often determines quality of life outside of work. All other things being
equal, people will _join_ the company that will maximize this, or appears to
at hiring decision time. If one company has, even on paper, profit
sharing/bonuses/stock options/whatever, and its rival doesn't, who's going to
get the pick of the talent?

------
hga
Very good, detailed _high level_ overview of how Microsoft's management
structure, style and bloat makes it currently unlikely to innovate well.

One simple and concrete thing that struck me was how the distance from the top
to the trenches has severely increased as of late. The old metric of "no more
than 5 levels" is being wildly violated by a factor of a bit more than 2.

Also high level overview on who was RIFFed in last year's surprise layoffs
(hint, not much in the way of middle management).

Bottom line: What PG pointed out a while ago continues to the true and there's
no signs that will change.

~~~
ilamont
But is the distance from the top to the bottom surprising? Microsoft in 2010
is a much more complex animal than it was in 1996. IE, Xbox, Azure, Windows
Mobile, Bing, etc. didn't exist back then, or were in the early stages of
development. With more products and more interconnection between product
groups, there is bound to be an increase in managers and layers because the
existing management can't scale to take on all of these new tasks.

~~~
hga
I'm not addressing your point, I'm only saying that harsh experience shows
that an organization gets grossly disfunctional as you increase the number of
layers from 5.

My answer to your point would be that it's the job of the CEO and board to
structure the company so that it's as close to the ideal as possible. In the
case of Microsoft, one approach would be to force less coordination on some of
these separate units. As it is, they pay a terrific "architecture tax" by
having to use and support (and generally only use and support) Microsoft
products.

If it turns out they must do that to keep the core of Windows, Office and
server products viable, well, that suggests they shouldn't get into the
businesses that can't be usefully built on top of the core in the first place,
and get out once they realize that.

~~~
ilamont
I agree that in Microsoft's case, less coordination on some of these separate
units would really help. I've read elsewhere that getting buy-in from
different departments/product groups has led to some seriously delayed or
disfunctional products.

But regarding one of your other statements, I am not so sure:

 _Harsh experience shows that an organization gets grossly disfunctional as
you increase the number of layers from 5._

What about other organizations like Wal-Mart or the Navy? Surely there are
more than five layers from door greeter or new recruit to CEO or 4-star
admiral, yet the organizations are able to function and carry out their
missions. Or are software companies different?

~~~
philwelch
While the military is far more top-down, there's still only about 5 layers
between a newish recruit and a general or admiral.

A Marine rifleman at the rank of private in a deployed MEF reports to a
platoon leader who reports to a company commander w.r.t. a regiment commander
w.r.t. a division commander w.r.t. the MEF commander. Private to general in 5
steps--and that general commands a full task force complete with air and
support units.

The MEF commander reports to a combatant commander, a 4-star with authority
over all military operations within a given theater. There are ten of these
unified commands. (Sometimes a special command is created underneath the
unified command, as in Iraq--the US Forces, Iraq command reports to US Central
Command.) The combatant commander reports directly to the secretary of
defense, who reports to the president. So the chain of command is around 9-10
deep for the entire US military, but about half as long for a task force.

Almost as importantly, just about every servicemember knows--and can tell you
--his entire chain of command between him and the President. There's no
ambiguity at all. You're fully responsible for everyone beneath you, and you
are fully responsible to a single person above you.

It's probably impractical to organize a software company similar to the
military, but militaries are very consciously attentive to organizational
structure, and their organizational structure probably meets their needs more
than most businesses.

~~~
cabalamat
> _A Marine rifleman at the rank of private in a deployed MEF reports to a
> platoon leader who reports to a company commander w.r.t. a regiment
> commander w.r.t. a division_

Have you missed out the squad and battalion levels, or is the USMC organised
differently from how it used to be?

~~~
philwelch
Yeah, I missed those actually.

------
city41
The criticism against the commitments isn't entirely fair. They are just
guidelines. I found myself suddenly thrown into an entirely different product
and doing entirely different things from what I expected, and when I returned
to my commitments I realized I didn't meet many of them. My manager still gave
me an "exceed" because he was still able to see that I performed and
contributed well to my team and MS.

And as for reporting to many people, I didn't experience that either. I had
one manager, and was 6 away from Ballmer. My manager, skip level, and skip
skip level were all in the same hallway as me and very accessible. My manager
truly worked his butt off to ensure his employees were happy and headed where
they wanted to head in their MS career (at least, as much as his power let
him).

------
raffi
"When I started at MSFT in 1996, there were six people between me and
[Microsoft cofounder] Bill Gates," Boris said. "In 2009, there were 13 people
between me and [Microsoft CEO] Steve Ballmer." Fred said, "the number of
managers between me and the CEO went from six to 10," during the last decade.
Another long-time Microsoftie, whom I'll call Barry, saw his reports go from
six to 12. \--- Just to give perspective, when I was in the military it was
probably 13 links between a two striper and the President

~~~
bitwize
"And here's something else. I have eight different bosses right now."

"Beg your pardon?"

"Eight bosses."

"Eight?"

" _Eight_ , Bob. So that means that, when I make a mistake, I have eight
different people coming by to tell me about it."

------
acg
The more that I read the more I feel that perhaps Microsoft might have faired
better--- and we'd all have better technology--- if they were indeed broken up
after the antitrust investigations.

Doesn't the best technology come from well funded small companies?

~~~
eru
Does it? Any data?

------
va_coder
Microsoft, the company, is "long at level"

------
yanowitz
I'm not a grammar Nazi, but this headline (which is from the actual article)
is actually misleading. This is not an article about the the motivations for
criticisms by former Microsoft employees but is instead an article about those
criticisms. It should be entitled, "Former employees say why Microsoft can't
innovate."

------
ilamont
Can someone define "middle management" at a giant software company like
Microsoft? Does it only mean people with direct reports, or does it also
include people with no direct reports but significant product/business
responsibilities as well?

------
tbgvi
To me, Microsoft's dilemma is that they need to keep market share in their
core products while at the same time be quick and innovative with new ones.

Their corporate structure seems to be geared towards managing their complex,
large projects like Windows and Office. With a vast project like Windows, it
makes sense that they need teams devoted to certain specifics with middle
managers. That structure keeps things focused on the goals coming from up top.

Unfortunately since everyone is focused on their little piece of territory,
innovative stuff is happening on the outside and they don't realize until its
too late. Then when they realize something is a big idea they toss it into the
same machine they have rolling for huge projects like Windows or Office.

As HN readers know, resourceful startups can get a lot accomplished with a
small team. If startups had a huge organizational structure with everyone at
the top trying to get a piece of the action then nothing would get done.

It would do Microsoft a lot of good to have an internal YC-like program that
gives resources to small teams with a good product idea, and then leave them
alone until they had something to demo.

Edit: I read my last point and realized something - it sounds a lot like
Google's 20% thing. Does Microsoft have anything like that already?

------
redsymbol
You know, I just realized that there has got to be a sample bias here. Almost
by definition, ex-employees are more likely to have negative things to say
about the company than those who have chosen to stay. Microsoft has been big
enough, and for long enough, that no matter how great a place they are to
work, many people would have had bad experiences - by bad luck and honest
miscommunication, if nothing else - that caused them to leave.

I'm not saying the article's points are not valid and true; as far as I know,
they are. Just pointing out that if we're looking at what EX-employees are
saying, we're looking at reality through a certain filter.

~~~
codexon
And I would say that if you are looking at what CURRENT-employees are saying,
you are looking at rose-colored glasses or people who are too afraid of
reprisal.

~~~
redsymbol
Agreed, good point.

------
gamble
I noticed a theme while reading reviews of tech companies on Glassdoor: people
either complained that a company had too much bureaucracy and layers of
management, or they complained there was no room for advancement.

~~~
potatolicious
False dichotomy I think, but depressingly common thinking that really strikes
at the core of the problem: in most corporations, advancement means
management.

In a company where advancing _means_ going into management, you do end up with
what you are describing: no room for advancement, or too much management.

Thankfully there are companies out there where sticking to the technical track
is a viable way to advance.

~~~
gamble
Even worse, many companies (Microsoft included, apparently) have an up-or-out
mentality where you either graduate to management or are shown the door.

------
josefresco
Maybe it's _them_ who can't innovate .. any maybe that's why they're _former_
employees.

~~~
noarchy
I would hope that they left in order to be able to innovate, if the working
environment was really that suffocating.

