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Comment by majewsky

5 days ago

Then no high-level decisions would get made. Any technical argument that spans beyond one person would be at risk of running into an eternal stalemate. No strategic choices would be undertaken.

(Tone indicator: Not a value judgment. I'm not saying that all managers are particularly good at this, same as how observing that "builders build things" does not mean that the builders are necessarily good at building.)

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majewsky

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throwaway746262  5 days ago

I feel like "making choices" and "making decisions" isn't really a full time job. Maybe just see what a group of seniorish people think?

I don't sort of "hate managers" or anything. Just curious about why businesses always seem to think they have to have them.

  • Jemaclus  5 days ago

    I think you should ask yourself that last question again, and this time really think about it. Why /do/ all companies seem to have managers?

    (Tone clarification: I'm not approaching this in a condescending manner, but more of a "let's talk through this problem out loud and see where it gets us." So please don't take this as condescension.)

    One way to think about "obvious" solutions to problems, such as a "no manager" solutuon, is this: if it's so obvious, why is no one doing it? For example, I worked for a grocery delivery startup for a while. Every single new hire, without fail, would show up at the end of the first week and say "I have a great idea, why don't we let users shop by recipe?"

    On its face, it sounds like a brilliant idea! One intuition-based shortcut to find the answer is: if that's such an obvious thing, why doesn't Amazon or Kroger or Safeway or HEB or any of the major grocery chains let you do that?

    And of course, the answer is: that's not how users shop. If it worked, the big players would be doing it. They're not. Are you smarter than Amazon? Probably not. That's not to say a smaller group can't innovate past Amazon, but Amazon has some /really fucking smart people/ working for them, and the odds are fantastically small that you'll out-think them. (You can certainly out-_pivot_ them by doing something faster than they can, but if it turns out to be valuable, in the long run, they'll do it too.)

    So when you approach a conversation like this and say, "Maybe just see what a group of seniorish people think?", one way to do a quick sanity check on it is: can you think of successful companies that are run that way?

    You probably can't. I certainly can't.

    There's a similar problem in the theatre world. It is universally understood that someone doing a 60 second monologue for an audition is _the worst way to evaluate theatrical performance_... except for everything else.

    And similarly, it appears, based on scanning the successful companies, that having managers is possibly also the worst way to ensure performance... except for everything else.

    So... managers it is. It's unlikely that there's a better way to do this at scale. Many people have tried. Management chains always win.

    • throwaway746262  5 days ago

      Yes, I take your point.

      But if I said "I don't understand the point of brakes. Why do all cars get made with brakes?", then as well as making your point ("look, do you really think you know better than Stellantis!?") there's also a straightforward answer which is "cars need brakes so they can stop instead of killing people."

      What's the "straightforward answer" case for the existence of managers? Your answer just suggests that such an answer does exist, without revealing what it is.

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