Harsh Truths about the world of Management
A listicle type article with truth bombs
When individual contributors step into people manager roles, almost all of them have somewhat of an idealistic view of what their day to day might look like. They have read all the right books about how to lead with empathy, being a servant leader, encouraging risk taking/learning, bottoms-up culture etc and now they are ready to enrich the careers and lives of the team they are going to manage. That utopian disposition invariably crashes into the harsh realities of the corporate world where profits, revenue and entrenched power structures rule, IF you are not prepared. This post is a list of realities that you should be prepared for and internalize before you enter the world of management so that you can find a middle ground between the Shire and Mordor.
Truths about companies and their executives
Corporations exist to return a positive return on investments to their shareholders. Everything a company does will be in service of that end goal. In times of economic abundance it might seem like some corporations are operating with a higher purpose, but it is false. Ahem, e.g., “Do no evil”. However, economic downturns will force corporations to speak the truth, and the truth is completely capitalistic in nature.
Company boards have a lot of influence on the future of the company. They can fire the CEO, rip and replace the executive team, force an acquisition, force a layoff, affect employee compensation, push the company into new product directions, etc. However, boards will ONLY intervene when the company continuously misses its goals AND the economic conditions are not great.
Most board meetings don’t cover topics like employee morale. Most of the conversation will be centered around revenue metrics and budgets.
Executives do look at Glassdoor reviews, Blind discussions etc, and it does bother them if they see bad reviews. Very few leaders will actually react to those reviews and do something about it. Most leaders will fume in private but then brush it away in public. Their reason, “Can’t make everyone happy” or, “Sour grapes” or “People will always find something to complain about”, etcetera, etcetera.
Executives are constantly justifying their spending to the CEO and the board. Engineering teams are the most expensive and the hardest to justify, because investments in engineering/product teams take at least a year to show returns.
The senior you are, the longer you can get away with bad behavior and/or poor performance. Poorly performing executives last the longest. Yeap, I have a longer runway than a rank and file senior engineer. This is mostly due to two reasons 1) It is expensive to find and hire an executive. If you keep hiring and firing execs, the board will lose trust in your judgment and fire you next time. 2) Organization changes, product changes, personnel changes etc all take at least a year to start affecting the bottomline of the company. This is why most incompetent execs last at least a year or more before they are let go.
Truths about the job
Your job as a manager is to show positive returns on the money the company has entrusted to you in the form of employees.
Hiring great engineers is time consuming and hard. Hiring a senior engineer will take at least a quarter or more. Hiring a staff engineer will take at least six months.
You will make bad hires and good ones.
Women engineers and leaders are even harder to find but they change the dynamics of an engineering team dramatically in a positive way.
Not everyone will like you, no matter how hard you try.
At least one person on your team will question your competency, mostly silently and sometimes publicly.
You will encounter incompetent people (and sometimes with less experience than you) in senior roles.
There will always be someone who has gotten to where you want to go before you.
“Damned if you do, damned if you don’t” is how you will feel everyday.
Your calendar will be perpetually double booked.
You will spend a lot of time in meetings.
You will spend most of your time context and emotional switching. One day you are writing a promotion doc, the next day you are writing a PIP.
If you stay a manager for a decade plus, you will acquire enough skills to become a shrink.
No one will tell you if you are doing a good job. In fact, you yourself will not know if you are doing a good job.
Most managers will spot performance issues after they have become a problem. You won’t be any different.
PIPs (performance improvement plans) are very hard on all parties.
At some point you will have to fire someone. And yes, you will feel bad about it.
At some point someone will cry in front of you.
At some point you might cry.
At any point you might get fired or pushed out for sometimes inexplicable reasons.
Your work day will probably be like this; Team Standup, Status Meeting for projects, 1:1s, Sync with peers, Special status meeting for a delayed project.
Project estimates your team (or possibly any software engineering team) gives you will almost always be incorrect. The good news is, your bosses already know that.
Your team will probably hate the process you want to follow to track projects.
Engineering teams hate keeping JIRA up to date. Actually, I think they all hate JIRA period.
Truth about promotions
You won’t be able to promote people at will. You will have to get most of your peers and your manager and their peers to align to the promotion and promotion cycles are at the most twice a year or less.
Senior promotions are dependent on scope. A senior engineer can’t become a staff engineer unless their scope of influence spans multiple teams. Similarly, an engineering manager can’t become a senior manager or Director if their scope isn’t multiple teams. To put it simply, the company’s headcount has to grow to accommodate senior promotions. You can’t have a team full of staff engineers.
VP+ promotions at most companies require board approval.
The size of yearly compensation changes (cash + equity) for employees are dependent on three things in this order 1) How good is the overall economy doing? 2) How is the company doing? 3) Individual performance.
Managers are judged largely by four things 1) How much usable software have their teams shipped? 2) Have they grown other leaders? 3) Do they deal with poor performers quickly 4) What kind of relationship do they have with their peers and the leadership group above them. Yes, you will be judged by how easy it is to work with you. But mostly, you will be judged by your capacity to frequently ship high quality software.
Leadership (Director+) promotions almost always happen at the back of a big company win. New product launched, revenue targets hit, flagship customer signed etc.
There is a significant amount of luck involved with senior (Director+) promotions.
It is often easier to move up the management track than the individual contributor track.
And that is it! If I missed anything feel free to drop it in the comments!
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P.P.S - I am taking a two week break from posts and recharge my batteries, but will be back the week of Oct 23rd!