robert young
Posts: 361
Nickname: funbunny
Registered: Sep, 2003
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Re: Do Career Plans for Developers Actually Damage an Organisation?
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Posted: Jun 3, 2010 7:40 AM
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We should distinguish managers from Managers.
Managers (cap) are similar to general officers; they determine the strategy and encompassing tactics.
managers (lower) are lieutenants who are told, "take that hill, and I don't care how many men you lose". Some will sacrifice the entirety of his troops with poor tactics (and may get the hill), while another will protect his troops to the loss of the hill, and there will be a few who take the hill while losing only a few men.
In between, strategy is reduced to ever more fine grained tactics by lower level Management, with attendant responsibility.
In the IT world, the general officers are most often Managers who know little, and couldn't care less, about what IT is, only that it is something which supports the overall organization. A general who doesn't know the naughty end of a tank, but knows he has two armoured divisions; in the real world, not as likely to occur, but you get the idea.
The managers (lower) that have been discussed here, fall into the lieutenants' type. In both milieus, this lowest level of management may, or may not, have authority to devise tactics of his own choosing. In military, likely not; at best, he can pick from a small menu. In business, lowest level management which behaves at odds with the group-think of Management (no matter the quality of the outcome) is soon removed. The notion that managers are judged by results is fantasy. Managers are judged by how well they adhere to the group-think of Management.
For example, it's clear (to me, anyway) from the reporting that BP management on site insisted on BP Management's insistence. They were just following orders. Lousy orders, but lucrative if nothing goes wrong. Lousy plan, from a military point of view, in that it had no contingency. But costs are socialized, so it is no skin off BP's nose. And likely won't be in the end. Too Big To Fail. Just watch.
The overriding goal of Management is to attain Too Big To Fail status, sometimes known as monopoly power. The rearing of managers to Management is the inculcating of that ethos. Or, as Jimmy Carter said, "the fish rots from the head".
Is there any reason, then, to strive to enter the management ranks? Only if $$$ is the most important thing in life, and personal integrity the least. So, to answer the title of the thread, yes Career Plans do damage; but said damage is irrelevant to the goals of Management. Or, perhaps, orthogonal.
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