
Management things I learned at Imgur - jasoncartwright
https://medium.com/@gerstenzang/21-management-things-i-learned-at-imgur-7abb72bdf8bf
======
mordrax
"It’s terribly difficult to manage unmotivated people. Make your job easier
and don’t."

I want to add to this by saying, it's terribly difficult to keep yourself
motivated in a team with unmotivated people. I left my last job because all
the team cared about was money, job security and doing their 9-5. At my
current place, we could fire half the staff and the company wouldn't miss a
beat. Sadly, there is no management, leadership or clear direction. We are
self managed and so it's very easy to spot the handful of proactive staff
because they usually end up picking up all the tasks which eventually causes
burnouts and reduced motivation etc... I've tried to motivate my team mates
but how do you motivate someone who's comfortable and secure in their 9-5 and
don't really care to achieve any more than mediocre? Nobody gets fired and
everyone's on pretty good pay for the job they do.

So I really do agree with this point. Find people who are not satisfied with
the status quo. You can't change everyone, in fact, you can't change anyone.
All a manager can do is hope to keep these people accountable if they do not
hold themselves responsible.

~~~
rifung
Is there really anything wrong with the fact that some people don't care to
achieve anything more than what's required of them at their job? I think it's
unfortunate that you're in an environment you don't enjoy, and I hope you can
find other people you relate with.

I hope I don't offend you, but it feels a bit selfish to try to change them to
be more motivated. For many people, a job is just something they have to get
through to survive and there's nothing wrong with that. In a way you are lucky
because these people will likely never enjoy their jobs as much as you do.

Don't forget that they may very well have other things besides work that
inspire them, but those things might not pay the bills.

~~~
2chen
There's nothing inherently wrong with that kind of person. The problem arises
when you mix the two types of people in a demanding environment where more
than the status quo is expected (e.g., at a startup). If you want to coast,
stick to defense.

~~~
ivanhoe
The problem arises when managers have unrealistic expectations. If you hire
someone to do 9-5 job and you expect them to do more than that, it's your
fault if that fails, not theirs. Different people have different priorities in
life, some will be ready to work more to finish more tasks, others will be
ready to work just 8h but will be more productive in that timeframe. Or will
produce better quality of code during that time or solve harder problems. Not
all tasks are the same, nor all programmers produce equal quality of code, so
the number of closed tickets in a unit of time is not a very good metric and
definitely shouldn't be the only one that matters for an IT company.

~~~
grrowl
> If you hire someone to do 9-5 job and you expect them to do more than that,
> it's your fault if that fails, not theirs.

I think the biggest teller of an unmotivated person is a generally negative,
problem-focussed attitude. No matter the hour of the day, "We can't do x,
because..." will destroy nearby "We can do this, if...." people, eventually.

------
kzhahou
When did it become a Universal Truth that good management requires regular
scheduled 1-1s (weekly or biweekly at most)? Clearly managers should meet
frequently and in depth with people on the team, but the "regular 1-on-1"
thing is mantra, and I'm not sure there's research/evidence to support its
efficacy.

People never look forward to them. You gotta remember everything you did that
week so you can report on it (even when told the 1-1 isn't meant for status
reports... it kinda always is). You gotta think of some issue to bring up to
manager's attention. It interrupts your whole day. Your manager didn't yet
help you on your problem from last week -- now they want to listen
thoughtfully to problems this week?

From the manager's POV: You've been keeping up with the team members all week,
helping out and checking in every day... now you're gonna lose one or two days
with back-to-back 1-1s which leave your voice hoarse. They need a few more
days to finish out whatever you discussed last week... should you cancel the
1-1 and sync up on the next week (and lose the 1-1 tempo), or have a "no-diff"
meeting that you both know you coulda skipped?

~~~
thawkins
Agreed, i dont do 1:1's with my team a) i have about 90 folks to deal with, so
it would be near to impossible. b) all my folks know (and do) that they can
grab 30 mins at any time with me if they have something on thier mind. I kinda
keep track of who is not talking to me, and hit them up with a chat now and
then. I also do something I call "walking the floor", where every few hours i
get around everybody and just say hi and ask how everybody is doing, and what
they are up to, ask if they have any problems. Show interest in what they are
doing. I usualy time it when i know folks are takimg natural breaks etc so i
know im not distracting them.

~~~
codeonfire
>I also do something I call "walking the floor"

Also known as drive-by management. Why not schedule some time instead?

~~~
jsmthrowaway
Among "worst qualities of management I've ever experienced," drive-by is in
the top 5. Even satirized in _Office Space_.

Come to think of it, "far too many direct reports" is on the same list...

------
nbm
If one considers the primary purpose of managers to be to improve the
performance of those that report to them, then this list starts poorly.

It _is_ terribly difficult to manage unmotivated people, but most people only
end up unmotivated because of poor management. And it's usually cheaper and
ultimately better to motivate a proved achiever who has lower motivation than
to find a replacement.

~~~
nostrademons
That's not always true. Sometimes people end up unmotivated because the
organization shifts its mission in one direction while they shift their values
in another, and so what starts out as great mission-alignment falls out of
alignment. Sometimes people grow out of a role when the role doesn't grow with
them. Sometimes peoples' life circumstances change and they don't have as much
attention to devote to work. Sometimes people are just looking to collect a
paycheck and don't care about the work at all.

A manager should always _start_ by assuming that a motivation problem is
something he can address, and work with the employee to figure out what the
real reason is and see if they can make the necessary changes. But sometimes,
the employee and organization just aren't a good fit anymore, and it's better
for both of them if they part ways and find new situations that _are_ a good
fit.

~~~
nbm
Absolutely. There are many other ways people end up unmotivated, but the most
common I've seen has to do with things that are within the realm of their
manager - possibly with escalation to someone higher up.

I've encountered only five managers who fully exemplify this, but they had an
outsize role in keeping good people who others might not have been able to
keep, keeping them productive (at least enough of the time to satisfy their
work commitments while they dealt with other issues), and attracting more good
people (because of word of mouth from the existing good people). It seems the
key here was to have the conversations when they were needed. The advice here
"Make your job easier and don’t." doesn't correlate with these great managers
at all. At least two of them to my knowledge have given reports the advice
(and assistance) to find opportunities elsewhere.

------
song
"Fire quickly. If you don’t fire bad performers fast, you’re at risk of losing
your good performers. Don’t underestimate the effect bad performers have on
good performers. Your team will likely move faster even with fewer bodies."
and "It’s terribly difficult to manage unmotivated people. Make your job
easier and don’t." are very very important.

In the previous company I created, I had to keep an incompetent and lazy
employee to appease my cofounder because he was friend with him. There's
nothing worse for team motivation than having an incompetent and lazy
untouchable employee... Never ever do that.

Oh and if you ever find yourself with a cofounder who wants to keep an
employee because he is his friend regardless of performance, treat that as a
huge red flag...

~~~
fallat
Ok, the example you gave is fine. But there is something that scares me a
little.

Could a "bad performer" mean someone who just can't output as much as everyone
else, even though they are trying as hard as possible? What if they exhibit
strong self-motivation to learn, but have a difficult time implementing
something that would otherwise be easy for someone else?...

It scares me as a (well, I consider myself, but I've been developing software
for 5+ years...) junior software developer that I might be compared to seniors
or "prodigy" developers. The only thing I can do is keep pushing my limits and
reach those levels, and I'm lucky to be one of those self-motivated people.
But the others...it sounds hopeless.

~~~
song
In my experience, determination and perseverance trumps raw talent. If you
really push yourself to the limit and are passionate enough about what you're
doing to try to improve yourself, you're going to be a better asset in the
long term for a team compared to someone who understand things easily but
doesn't really try to improve himself unless he has to.

Even in term of team morale, someone who tries hard and pushes himself to the
limit is motivating.

So I wouldn't worry too much about it (plus you might just have imposter
syndrome and discount what you really know ;-))

~~~
fallat
Yeah I get this feeling that 90% of the people I see and hear are just running
a facade...And sometimes I get a glimpse of that...and it feels really good to
know I'm not a fake.

------
lohengramm
"It’s terribly difficult to manage unmotivated people. Make your job easier
and don’t."

And where is the challenge if everyone is highly motivated and easy to manage?
Then you can just leave the programmers alone. They don't need management in
this case.

~~~
wcrichton
Just because people are highly motivated doesn't mean they're intrinsically
organized. You can leave the programmers alone, but you still need someone to
decide what they're working on and how to best allocate resources. A manager
ensures a team stays coordinated.

~~~
nbm
I've found that groups of individual contributors are actually very good on
deciding what is important, what they should work on and when, and how to work
together to get things done.

Managers can provide a useful role in setting the scene, reminding what the
goals of the organisation, the department, and so forth are, and how this
connects with what the team is doing. They are perhaps most useful in working
with individuals who aren't working well as part of the team at the moment -
giving them feedback, mentorship, building bridges, connecting them with
people, training, and so forth.

In my opinion, managers hurt more than not if they override the self-
organisation of teams, and this most hurts when you need two teams to work
together - and one of the managers has (explicitly, perhaps) made it clear
that doing things "off the plan" is not appreciated.

~~~
jsmthrowaway
That _strongly strongly strongly_ depends on the team and contributors.

I'd agree at my startup employers. I would not agree about several teams I
worked with at Apple, to pick on a corporate example. Teams built from the
ashes of an acquired startup at Apple, again, I'd be more inclined to agree.
You can't support a broad conclusion like that anecdotally, because I can
counterexample it anecdotally, implying there's more to it.

It really depends on the ICs in question. Startups are far more selective
about their ICs because one person has a very big impact. With the exception
of Google and a couple others, large-cap corporate throws IC quantity at
problems and distinguished, autonomous, "rockstar" (sigh) ICs are far more
rare. You need the cat herders there.

~~~
nbm
It does depend on the contributors, and obviously depends on the culture of
the company (ie, if everyone assumes managers are supposed to do it, nobody
will do it).

You can't rely on any random grouping of people to decide well on what's
important to do and how to effectively break up the work. But adding a random
manager to that group doesn't help specifically. Adding a more experienced IC
will generally help more than a less experienced manager.

------
codinghorror
Hmm. Sam was only at Imgur for less than a year. That's a lot of management
lessons for a limited period of time...

~~~
taw-snark0
He writes well, but is only 2 years out of college (Stanford '13). Learning
that (and noticing how he obfuscated it on his LinkedIn) made me take this
piece with an even larger grain of salt than I would normally have.

~~~
nathankleyn
He probably obfuscated that fact so people wouldn't judge him just by his age;
it would seem based on some of the comments in this thread that he was right
to do so.

Some of the best lessons in life can come from those who haven't been tainted
by long stints doing the very thing they're commenting on.

~~~
taw-snark0
Managing teams should be about the long term. Any understanding this guy has
of the long-term effects of his management style is necessarily second-hand.

It's not about age, but experience (and honestly representing yourself in the
world).

N.B. I'm not saying he shouldn't write, or that he doesn't have valuable
insights to offer, just that the author's experience is fair ground for
discussion.

------
Fede_V
I wanted to focus on one thing which I really liked in that list. The author
stresses the need to explain the rationale for decisions (aka, why we are
going to focus on x, instead of y) rather than presenting all decisions as
unquestionable and infallible edicts from god.

This doesn't mean that every employee will agree with every decision taken
from management - but hearing the whys, and understanding the debate that went
into taking a decision helps a lot in getting buy in and getting people to go
that extra mile.

------
jqm
I thought this was a good article. I believe most people who are worth having
want to be part of something bigger themselves, want to contribute to the
world and are willing to sacrifice a bit to do so. These are the people to
identify and reward and it is always frustrating when this doesn't happen.

Per brobdingnagian's comment... everyone has bad days on occasion. A good
manager can work around this. But a workplace is about work. Not therapy.

~~~
rifung
I guess I'm just still too young, naive, and perhaps stupid, but I disagree
with this idea strongly. It certainly is true that most places (in the US at
least) treat work like work and not like therapy.

Maybe you're right and work is about work and not therapy, but why not? If
anything it seems like it's in the company's best interest to provide therapy
if it's needed. They already provide health insurance, and it's well known
that people who are happier perform better on the job than people who aren't.

~~~
jqm
Remember work for you is product for someone else.

All the things we take for granted... the lights being on, the roads being
paved, the bus coming on time... all this happens because people organize,
take care of their personal affairs, show up and perform their duties in a
proscribed manner, even when they would rather be doing something else.

My belief is to play when it's time to play and work when it's time to work
and to keep my personal life separate from work and not to turn personal
problems into workplace problems. Managers aren't (generally) personal
counselors nor should they be. Their function in that role is to insure
something happens in accordance with organizational goals. Not to be someone's
mom or life coach. And again... the function of the workplace is to provide a
good or a service to someone else. Not a place for working out personal
issues. Take that to the appropriate venue lest the buses stop coming on time.

~~~
rifung
I'd argue that if we didn't try to pretend people were robots at work and
tried to ensure everyone was happy, things would be done even better than they
are now.

It's certainly the case that people show up to work even when they would
rather be doing something else. If anything I suspect that's what the majority
of people working are doing, working because they have to, not because they
particularly want to.

On the other hand, do you really want someone who's very unhappy driving the
bus or flying the plane you're on?

I don't think that work is somehow special, we should care for each other no
matter whether we are at work or at a coffee shop.

Of course, everyone is different and I'm glad to have heard your opinion. I
just think it's a bit sad because for those who work full time, work is where
the majority of their waking life goes. That being the case, I can see a
situation where people might only ever interact with other people at work, and
so if they need help they have nowhere else to go. But anyway, I can of course
also see your point. It's just that it seems with something like depression or
suicide, people don't necessarily know what they should do or act rationally
even if they do know what they should do.

------
mathattack
Many gems are in here.

\- If you can’t fire friends, don’t hire them.

\- Finally, firing for bad performance is easier than having to fire good
people because you’ve run out of money, so fire the bad people before you have
to fire the good people too.

\- The best way to avoid politics isn’t to ignore politics, but to spend your
time on it.

I'm interested in the backstory of the author too.

------
datashovel
The tone of the list seemed to draw a line between the "manager" and the
"managed".

Personally I think the best way to manage a team is to draw a line between the
"team" (including management) and the "objectives".

The seemingly tough part with doing things this way is to be able to draw a
line between individuals and the rest of the team if someone isn't holding up
their weight.

It sounds tough, but I think it doesn't have to be as tough as it sounds. If
people are given enough independence and individual responsibilities, but in a
collaborative setting, it will become obvious to the entire team when
individuals are not carrying their weight.

Keep in mind that once a person becomes a member of your team you're in it for
the long haul. Every once in a while a team needs to rally to achieve
objectives, since it's almost impossible to give perfectly equal distribution
of work in a project. Every once in a while individuals need to be propped up
by the rest of the team if they're having difficulties with their individual
responsibilities.

It should only become a problem when the same individuals, over the course of
an extended period of time, fail to meet their objectives. And even then if
the company is large enough they should be given an opportunity to move
laterally within the company to move to another team. If individuals fail
regularly within multiple teams at that point it becomes obvious they may need
to be let go.

With all that said, different projects / companies have different budgets and
so they may need to cut corners. That's why it's important to be careful to
select people you are in it for the long haul with, and are willing to put the
time and energy into that person as an investment for the betterment of the
company.

Sudden turnover is one of the worst things for morale in any company. Avoid it
at just about any cost, except in extraordinary circumstances.

------
zongitsrinzler
These 21 points make Imgur seem like an over-managed hell pit to work at.

~~~
prawn
I think that if _good_ management were following these rules, you wouldn't
even know it was happening. It'd be more like guiding and less like
controlling.

------
ryandrake
> Define clear merit-based systems, which reduces confusion about what your
> team members need to do be recognized.

This is a great one, I wish more companies/managers did this. It's terrible
when your company's advancement policy is "if your manager like you, you get
promoted". It's demotivating when your bonus is based on someone's subjective
feeling about how good a job you're doing, or some ridiculous self-assessment
essay.

Give me clear, measurable goals, and a clear, scheduled (on the calendar)
performance review.

Ship Product A or complete features B and C on time and your next raise will
be X. Ship it on time and under budget and your bonus will be Y. Otherwise, Z%
cost of living increase only.

~~~
cactusface
What if all your time is spent cleaning up after the cowboys? Or talking to
the other team members about the problems they are stuck working on? A mission
critical 2-line bugfix can take months. There aren't objective measures of
performance. Any metric you come up with, employees will find a way to thwart
it. Shipping a product on time? Easy. Just don't mention the bugs. Surely you
don't believe it's possible to create bug-free software, do you? When all the
team members have their performance tied to them, they'll all collude to game
metrics. Don't even get me started on SLOC. Speaking from experience here,
sorry if it's too cynical / bitter.

~~~
ryandrake
Picking good metrics that are not game-able is not easy, but as long as they
are truly aligned with the company goals, it's kind of OK for people to
optimize for them. You get the behavior that you measure.

From the point of view of an employee, anything is better than "your
compensation depends on the subjective assessment of your manager". Talk about
a system that can be gamed!

~~~
cactusface
Well, I disagree, but it's subjective so you're entitled to your opinion. That
said, the decision about whether or not to use metrics in the first place is
also a subjective assessment by your manager.

------
meesterdude
This was not only a good post, but the presentation was straight to the point:
no fluff, all meat. I really appreciate that, and wish more went that route.

------
balls187
Good list, but what this hits on is managing down, and not much on how to
manage up, or manage across.

In my experience, I've found managing a team fairly easy--I just think about
all the things my great managers did, and try to emulate them.

Managing up, and managing other teams however, has been a real learning
experience.

------
nowprovision
This is kind of sad to read, and certainly not a manager Id like to work with,
is this even a company that is profitable? Didnt someone buy this for a stupid
amount years ago?. Back on subject, an unmotivated employee is usually a
symptom a problem with the company or culture, especially if he/she is an
experienced hire that has many years of real world experience, why were they
motivated/productive before and not now?. Perhaps the company is blind that
they have a problem? Perhaps they tick many boxes on Stackoverflow check list
and many employees are HN followers so it can't be a culture problem? Just
food for thought..

------
danieltillett
Number 6 was the hardest for me to learn - I always wanted to give people
another chance to change, but they never did. It is always hard to fire
someone, but once you have reached the decision to fire do it as soon as
possible.

------
mandeepj
> Give feedback frequently and directly. As a manager, it’s easier to wait and
> then hedge critical feedback in soft wrappers, but that’s selfish. I’d try
> to give feedback as soon as I could grab a conference room with the person,
> and not wait until the formal 1:1 days later.

I really wish if everyone could think like this. What is the point in giving
feedback after 6 or 12 months during appraisal. That is also done as part of
formality.

------
thejay
Great discussions. Having had some startup experience myself I would add that
people have drastically different levels of understanding and common sense, so
they will interpret what they see and read differently. There is no shortage
of books/blogs on management or leadership or product management, but things
don't really change and the same mistakes are being made every single day in
startups.

------
caseyf7
Didn't Imgur have a total of 13 people last year?

~~~
mburst
Yea we've grown like crazy over the past year. We're now up to around 55
people.

~~~
nbm
My experience is that interesting things happen to organisations at size 20-30
(basically when the CEO and/or COO can no longer keep tabs on nearly
everything themselves, no longer can maintain some relationship with all
staff), and also when there are more than 33% of people with <6 months at the
company. Hope this wasn't as painful as some of my experiences with just
single dosages of these at a time.

------
mokash
Enjoying your work and working 9 to 5 on-the-dot aren't mutually exclusive.

------
jaimebuelta
The first point is very important. Motivate someone is quite complicated, but
demotivate is extremely easy. Unfortunately, we people are weird and complex,
and sometimes random stupid things can make a huge deal in terms os
motivation.

When I think back on the things that had really infuriated me about works and
managers, they are typically small, avoidable things; not big ones...

PD: Reading some comments on the thread, I understand this as "do not
demotivate people" more than "fire unmotivated people"

------
overgard
I definitely agree with the importance of feedback. I think companies
sometimes tend to be too polite. (Don't get me wrong -- you don't want
rudeness, but directness is valuable). There's nothing more frustrating than
spending a lot of time on a project and having no idea if you're creating
value, or walking down a rabbit hole that is not useful.

------
lifeisstillgood
> People need to feel like they’ve been listened to, not to make the final
> call. Take the time to listen (you might be wrong), make a decision and then
> explain the decision. Don’t offer commentary on others’ decisions until you
> understand why the decisions were made.

very true

------
kenko
"It’s terribly difficult to manage unmotivated people. Make your job easier
and don’t.

Different people need different kinds of management. Be adaptable to figure
out what drives each person’s best performance."

This juxtaposition is deliberate irony, right?

------
AriaMinaei
>> _Define success clearly and don’t flip-flop on the definition without new
information._

Does anyone have an example for this?

------
Giorgi
That was surprisingly on topic and good.

------
known
Management inversely proportional to adversity & diversity

------
spotman
I like a lot of these very much and agree. Thanks for posting.

------
brobdingnagian
Right off the bat you tip your hand: you are selecting against people who are
depressed. Rather than try to help them, you'd rather let them wallow in
misery, fail, become unemployed, schizophrenic and eventually die homeless.

~~~
oh_sigh
Not to be heartless, but why would it be a businesses concern if someone was
depressed or not?

~~~
brobdingnagian
Let's do a reductio-style thought experiment: what if everyone was depressed?
That's obviously a business concern.

The standard argument for socialism follows from the same reductio: what if
everyone was happy? That would be GREAT for business.

~~~
adventured
The second one is not true. Utopia of happiness would result in vast
stagnation.

Agitation, annoyance, something needing fixed, imperfection, desire for more /
self-improvement, etc. is a critical root of invention and creativity.

Ideally not everyone is perfectly happy all at the same time. And it should be
noted that is not the same as saying that everyone should never be happy.
Rather, that it's incredibly valuable to have dissatisfied people in society -
they're often the ones that break with the status quo and push humanity
forward.

