Technology management/leadership - we're doing it wrong

First, this blog is not aimed at any particular person. It was inspired based on a conversation with a former co-worker who let me know their prospective new employer actually provides training. Yes, you heard correctly! Real formal training, and not in a booming economy when massages and gourmet meals are flying around. Imagine that!

This led the conversation to management and leadership in general, irrational fears of treating people properly we'd come across in our careers, and failure to recognize how to do things right. Why was this? This is what this blog is about. Read on.

I've had the good fortune of working in technology for 15 years now. On top of a good standard of living, it's given me a healthy jaded view of how real life in large companies resembles Dilbert all too often. It's the latter paying homage to the former, but that doesn't make it any less ridiculous. One of my hot buttons is how organizations can get career evolution so badly wrong. Let me explain what I mean.

A truly exceptional plumber, with plenty of experience has a career path of being an even better plumber who makes more money and perhaps has a title of master plumber or something like this. I apologize if I don't have the title right. This person, as they reach the pinnacle of their career, they may get increasing choice in which types of jobs they do. Kind of makes sense doesn't it? Keep doing what you're very good at, and earn perks focused around it. If they're willing to take one on, they pass their knowledge on to an apprentice who learns the trade from them. I believe this makes sense. Plumbers out there, please feel free to correct me if I screwed this up.

In a technology company, why is it that the best coder is often promoted to a management position? This is the person who's technical prowess with code has made them very proficient and producing quality work compared to their peers. All too often, this person is promoted to a management or leadership position where they need to work on things like schedules, project plans, budgets, personnel reviews, create strategies based on analysis of trend business data, hire/fire, and perform other tasks that are completely different than what they had done so well previously. Some adapt and have a talent for management and/or leadership as well. Many others struggle and succumb to the Peter principle. With enough of this going on, it is only inevitable that technology companies will be poorly run as a rule.

I was trying to articulate how silly this practice was and came up with the following. It has an element of hyperbole to it to make the point, but the essence is there. I hope you enjoy it:

"Congratulations John, you've been doing an excellent job maintaining our companies electrical systems for nearly 20 years now. We've decided to make you head of accounting."

This is what I'm getting at. Why on earth would you take someone away from something they are very good at only to drop them in a job that requires a completely different skill set that they are untrained for. There's no guarantee they will even like doing that job. As a real life example, I have a relative in this situation. It's painful to hear them complain about doing personnel reviews as they painstakingly grind through each one counting those remaining as rungs on the ladder to salvation.

I'll talk more about why I think this is in a future post.