More on problems....or happiness

or unhappiness and problems as the case may be.

Hal Macomber points to an article by John Brandt in Industry Week.

"The sad truth about unhappy companies: They won't be around much longer," says Brandt.

Unhappy companies share a set of traits that make it difficult for them to change and respond to their troubles (quoting Mr. Brandt):

1) A belief that employees are dangerous and lazy.
2) A conviction that customers cannot be trusted.
3) A focus on policies, not principles.
4) An obsession with today, not tomorrow.
5) Leadership in all the wrong places.

When I hear managers say things like:

"We're not here to make people happy, we're here to get them to work!" or

"Forget 'best place to work' -- you should be glad you have a job!"

It's information that usually points to a flailing (if not failing) project, department, or company.

Of course, managers (and others in corporations) aren't responsible for making people happy -- we can't make others happy.

But when everyone is unhappy, it's information about the system and how people in the system handle problems.

The problem isn't the problem

Julian Elve points to an article on How to be Happy in his post on Positive Psychology.

Now there's something worth knowing :-)

Also see Keith Ray's post on the Paradox of Happiness.

I'm reminded of one of the sayings of Virginia Satir:

"The problem isn't the problem; the problem is coping with the problem."

If Jane told you to jump in a lake, would you jump?

My mother used to say that to me when I was a child and didn't exhibit sufficient independence of thought.

I was reminded of that (annoying) phrase recently at a talk I gave on influence and managing your boss.

My premise is that influence depends on:

1) having a relationship

2) understanding the other persons interests and concerns

3) being willing to state your concerns in terms that relate to the other persons interests and concerns

4) looking for a mutually beneficial outcome - influence isn't about getting someone else to act against their own best interest

Part of the talk focused on understanding how your company makes money and being able to state your case in terms the other person finds important - and with management that usually means money, schedule, risk.

After the talk a man came up to me and told me he didn't want to bother with making the case to his boss.

"I don't like doing the work to come up with the numbers, and I don't have time to do it. I want my boss to do something because I said so. That's the kind of trust I want from my boss."

He wanted a way to get that trust now. Building up trust over time wasn't interesting to him.

I found his position just slightly disturbing:

It's not reasonable to expect another person to give up their own judgment.

Managers have a responsibility for fiduciary oversight when using company assets. Managers should be wary of allocating company assets with out some rational justification.

Blind trust is wide-open to abuse.

When I have history, track record, and trust with someone, I will give serious consideration based on their recommendation. I don't give up my own judgment.

BTW, This month marks the 25th anniversary of Jonestown.

Agile methods rely on people (!)

I've come across a couple of references lately that state that aglile methods won't scale because they are people-centric -- they rely on highly-skilled, people who are capable of working together to produce software.

When has this not been true?

Any method or process will fail when it's applied without consideration of the context and the capabilities of the people doing the work. (A recent riff on that theme here.)

I suppose the positive aspect of these curious (to me) statements is that at least some people are resisting seeing agile methods as the latest silver bullet. (Picture Esther making a generous interpretation.)

harrumph.

Qualifications for management

I believe that great managers are made, not born.

And there are some minimum qualifications to become a great manager.

A while back I wrote about one of them, the ability to delegate and trust people to achieve results.

The other entry criteria is liking to work with people, or at least being willing to work with people.

I recently listened as a manager introduced himself by declaring: "I don't like working with people, and I'm not good at it. I want to be alone with my computer."

He continues out of a sense of duty. He believes that he's helping to keep the company going.

I wonder how much better off the company would be if he stepped out of his management role. This manager is miserable, and I'm fairly sure he's making the people who work for him miserable, too.

If you want to be a great manager, learn as much as you can about working with people. Make it your major field of study.

If you don't want to learn about working with people, there's no dishonor in saying management isn't a good fit (for you, at this time, in this situation).

Blog post grows up to be an article

Way back last March, I pointed to a post on visible status on Tim Van Tongeren's blog.

Well, Tim's blog post has grown up to be a very nice article published in the current issue of STQE (Nov/Dec 2003). It's a subscription magazine, but perhaps Tim will ask for a pdf and post it on his website in the not-to-distant future (hint, hint).

If you're interested in other ways to make progress visible, check out Big Visible Charts on Fairly Good Practices.

Elaborating on The Prime Directive

I walk through a variation on this statement (originally from Norm Kerth) at the beginning of a retrospective:

The Retrospective Prime Directive
Regardless of what we discover, we understand and truly believe that everyone did the best job he/she could, given what he/she knew at the time, his or her skills and abilities, the resources available, and the situation at hand.

Once in a while, I run into someone (almost always a manager) who rejects this notion and says, "I don't believe everyone does the best job they can."

So here's Esther's Elaboration

I personally make a rather broad interpretation of "the situation at hand" which (in my mind at least) may include:

personal problems

low self-esteem

family distractions

not liking the job

not having the necessary skills

systemic problems that lead to less than desirable results

being bored with the work

having a character disorder

having significant difficulties in the area of self-management.

Now, some of these aspects of the "situation" may require management action. The fact that some one is doing the best job he/she could doesn't always mean it's acceptable within an employment arrangement.

But that's not part of the retrospective... that's management work.

Management work means:

hiring appropriately

setting clear expectations for results

creating an environment for success

removing obstacles

providing feedback about the work

providing appropriate training and coaching

working with people to make sure they are in a job that's a good fit

developing capabilities in the group

and making difficult decisions when necessary.