Comment by theshrike79
2 years ago
There is a difference between "understanding the work" and "knowing how to do the work".
I've had multiple Producers who "understand the work" of creating mobile games as a whole and understand how the team needs to work and interact to produce a result on time.
None of them could code a mobile game to save their life.
What your example is talking is a situation where a fresh off the press MBA is shoved in to a very specific field and they start just doing pure numbers and Excel management out of a management book without knowing how that specific industry operates.
Managing a team of deep-sea welders is VERY different from managing a software team, which is again different from managing a team of people building a physical machine.
>There is a difference between "understanding the work" and "knowing how to do the work".
True. However, the relationship between them need not be a "Total Function" but definitely needs to be a "Partial Function" to a certain degree. You cannot be completely divorced from the "How" and hope to have a good "understanding" of the system.
>Managing a team of deep-sea welders is VERY different from managing a software team, which is again different from managing a team of people building a physical machine.
This is precisely the point; domain/technical knowledge is needed to effectively Manage a project. This is independent of knowledge of techniques of Management. The problem today is that entire industries have been created out of thin air which posit that the latter is sufficient if one follows a certain process/methodology which is patently absurd.