Slashdot Mirror
Geeks in Management?
The Other Side of the Coin asks: "I've been doing a relatively interesting job until now, but they've pushed me into management recently. Although the new position is pretty boring (I manage normals), I do still have time for all the geeky stuff I used to do before. My problem is: I have no formal (or any other, for that matter) management training. Sure, I'll read a lot about it (and take some education), but what are your experiences as geeks in management? For example, I naturally started to use Borgish management methods, and this wasn't received well by people, to say the least. What are the most difficult hurdles for a manager geek to jump, and can our personality be used as an advantage in management?"
I was just offered a management position yesterday. Being an engineer who will be going into management, I am also curious to what the responses will be.
100% Insightful
Treat your "normals" as you would like to be treated if the positions were reversed.
Will solve a lot of problems that way.
So rise up, all ye lost ones, as one, we'll claw the clouds.
if you can do the job of the people you're managing, you have an advantage. I cannot count time times where I've been in a job and the pinhead that was hired to be manager was just that - a manager... a manager that had absolutely no idea how to do the job I was doing. They were just a buzzword spouting talking head.
Biggest Hurdle = Keeping Friends.
For me, the toughest part of getting "bumped up" was giving up control. Let people do their jobs. Let them make their mistakes. Yes, as management, you are responsible. But you are also building a team for the long term. Encourage and correct, don't micromanage.
You are likely to be better at something if you enjoy it. If you feel like you were "pushed" into management and don't want to be doing it, then find a role as a technical lead, architect or similar where your primary responsibilities are still deeply technical, not managerial.
Nobody wants to be managed by somebody who doesn't want to and doesn't know how to be a manager or a leader. You don't need formal training, unless you want to advance to higher ranks, then it might help. But for most purposes, you just need a willingness to listen and to talk and to think about things from a non-technology-driven perspective at times.
I am not sure what "Borgish" management methods are (you must be a graduate of Starfleet Academy's MBA program?), but it certainly sounds like something that nobody would enjoy being subjected to. Not everybody is as smart as you, but if you go around treating people like they are a different species ("normals" from your own post) don't expect to develop a good working relationship with them. If this is what you mean by your "personality", then no, that won't be an advantage in a management role, period.
I think of myself as a "geek" in certain ways, I enjoy understanding and creating technology, I like to take things apart and hack on them, and I can spend hours focused on a task intently. But I realize that when I'm operating in a management role, decisions are driven by the best long term interests of the business and the team, not by technology in isolation. And you reap what you sow with the people who work for you. If your team respects your intelligence AND likes you, there is nothing they won't do for you. That's a strong, loyal team. If they think you are a smart geeky asshole and they shit on you regularly behind your back, don't expect them to achieve very good results for you, and don't be surprised when *your* manager realizes how ineffective you are and gives you the boot.
How about you stop calling them "normals"?
The first thing you need to know is what exactly is expected of you. You need to know this for two main reasons. First, you need to know the extent of your job and second you need to make sure you meet managments expectations.
Every company is different and will have some things that are more important than others. Look and adapt from other peer managers.
Read 7 Habits of Highly Effective People (Covey?).
Most importantly, if you don't know, but you think you should, ask your boss. It's better to establish a clear line of communicaiton with your boss than to sit there and worry about not knowing.
Oh, and have fun with it, and turn the cell phone off when you get home.
My sig left me for a younger user id.
For starters, I'd get rid of the geeks vs. normals mentality. Look at the individual characteristics of the people you're managing. Figure out what parts of the job they like and what parts they don't like. Figure out what they like to do outside of work, as that will give some insight into what makes them tick. Think about what you have in common with them. Basically, just treat them like people.
I've moved into Project Managment myself, voluntarily. What I've found is this:
1) Remember all those things that managers did that you hated? Be open to the discovery that some of them actually made perfect sense but you didn't see it. Your Geek perspective may have been more limiting than your realize.
2) After you get through #1, take the things that still don't make sense and don't do them. Your Geek perspective can also be liberating.
3) People skills, people skills, people skills. If you can schmooze, talk, flatter, cajole, comfort, query, and chat - and get results, good. If not, start working on your people skills. You will need them.
4) Business perspective. Stay informed of business issues, policies, plans, and news. If you did previously, good.
5) Your Geek past is a great building block. You have an area of strength, start with what you learned in that.
You will have to change, but coming at a job from a different perspective is also a great advantage.
A fantatic technique I was taught - go to people you respect and ask them to list
1) Your two best traits.
2) Your two worst traits.
3) The two best traits of a manager.
4) The two worst traits of a manager.
You need to query at least 4-5 people, but it'll give you a perspective on yourself, on management, and what you need to do to do it well.
Will you get widely differing answers? Yes. But reconciling those answers is part of the learning process.
Good luck.
"The Sage treasures Unity and measures all things by it" - Lao Tzu
First read "The One Minute Manager." This is a very quick read and following this book alone will put you into the top 20% of all managers I have ever seen.
Then read the Dale Carnegie book, or even better take the public speaking course at the local Dale Carnegie branch which heavily involves this book.
We've all seen it, or borne the brunt of it. A very skilled coder/plumber/accountant/scientist gets promoted into a management position and turns out to be a lousy manager, who makes life difficult for his underlings with his incompetence. Why does this happen?
Because, even though you were (and still are) a great coder/plumber/accountant/scientist, a high level of competence with code/pipes/money/mesons does not automatically give you the competence in the skills of budget and/or personnel management, like motivation, encouragement, discipline, conflict resolution, appropriately rewarding the good and punishing the bad, etc.
Go take a class like Introduction to Supervision, Conflict Resolution in the Workplace, Budget Process 101, etc. It sounds like PHB-type stuff, but guess what? You're a suit now. If you flail around trying to figure it out on your own, you'll end up a lousy supervisor, and you'll just make your own job harder.
The man who does not read good books has no advantage over the man who cannot read them. - Mark Twain
I was a geek 6 years ago than became a manager. I would say the most important thing to do is understand the difference between being a manager and a leader. The key difference is a manager will tell you to do something. You will only do the action if it is in your best interest. A leader will convince you to do something that isn't necessarily in your best interest and you will do it. I haven't read any management books and I wouldn't recommend any. Just treat your people with respect and remember that they are always watching you .
You can't depend on those you are supervising to do what they ought to be doing. Especially those who are brilliant (often only in their own opinions) will not do what needs to be done.
For example, in a recent post about Ruby-Rails someone said he would ignore what he was told and just code up the application in Ruby-Rails, regardless of what the company actually needs. Unfortunately, firing people like that isn't easy.
Discovering these facts was a great disappointment to me. I had always been a self-starter doing whatever obviously needed to be done without ignoring what I had been told to do. The average person is the complete opposite.
You will find yourself requiring regular status reports from people. Not because you find them interesting to read but because it is the most expedient way of making sure your staff is at thinking about their jobs at least a little.
Go ahead and read Dilbert and "How to Win Friend and Influence People" because they are good. However, you will soon discover that a lot of the boneheaded actions of your previous managers were forced onto them by boneheaded employees.
I as well am a geek who made the leap to management. I've found that, geek or no, people are people. Treat them with respect, listen to their concerns, solicit input, encourage development and accountability, promote teamwork, and all the things we wanted when we were doing the geek work. Geeks often make good managers because of their problem solving skills, but sometimes encounter problems (I did at the beginning) with the arrogance we often feel speaking to non-geeks. Don't make that mistake, you'll be fine.
better than you. Ask them for input. People generally are interested in making themselves more productive, and almost always know better than management what is holding them back in their job, or where they can improve their efficiency. If you think you know best how they can do their job (and therefore, don't listen to their suggestions), you will most likely end up hurting the company.
Oh, and also, watch Office Space.
-=Lothsahn=-
"Surround yourself with the best people and you will succeed as a manager."
And here are some other principles I learned while managing and being managed:
As a manager, you cannot succeed without your employees succeeding. Any of their major accomplishments are shared with you inherently...broadcast these accomplishments and sing their praises to the masses. Recognition is a great incentive, and when your employees get credit for something, YOU get credit as a good manager.
When they do something wrong, defend them to the hilt...even if it was something stupid. Then behind closed doors let them have it and make it clear that you put your butt on the line for them. Be willing to take a personal hit on their behalf...NEVER sell them out.
Realize that to be first, you must be last. You are there to facilitate their performance as someone who works for them.
For cryin' out loud...never micromanage anything. All employees are different, but for the most part you can measure them by results and not stupid timeclock things, etc.
And I stress that all people are motivated by different things. Money, recognition, who and what they work with....learn and listen. If you reverse engineer their motivation you have very important information in your hands.
Be very careful of minority groups--and no I don't mean the legal minority groups--whoever the smallest group is in your team be they white male or indian female. The smallest subgroup tends to fight amongst themselves, or unite to destroy the rest of the group. Watch those situations carefully.
You can start by stopping referring to non-geeks as 'normals'. I understand that it's a defensive reaction against being called a 'dork', but as a manager, you can't afford the luxury of name-calling anymore.
The best boss I ever had focused on results. I was the project manager for a team of 5 smart young developers. I did the project management stuff to keep my developers working on what they want to do -> programming not meetings. We showed up for work at 2pm and worked till 12am. It was pretty crazy but we were all night owls. Somebody approched my boss about our weird schedules. My boss went to the CIO about it. The CIO basically said, "What he is doing is working. I'm not going to ask him to change a thing." During my 2+ years there my team finished several large enterprise-wide web apps (using Java & DB2). /.ing too much. Tell them that you completely trust them. If you can't, why not? Address that problem on a person-by-person basis (don't revoke everybody's freedom because of one lazy bum). Have clear goals that you expect them to accomplish.
The CIO was praised. Why? Because he and I focused on the important stuff. Don't worry about your guys coming in a little late. Don't pester them for
You get paid to produce results and so do your "normals". Focus on getting those results and not all the other crap that makes employment such a game. Your employees will love your flexibility and will know that you appreciate them when they meet their development schedules. Your bosses will love you because you make them look good (by getting stuff done).
Find a great manager you respect, and have her/him become your mentor. Best think I ever did.
I started as a self-taught programmer (probably ended as a bad one), but I have always wanted to move to management. Here is a story my Dad related to me about being a camp counselor at a summer camp:
Once upon a time, a long time ago, in a land far, far away there lived a King. He was a benevolent King. His subjects were well cared for, and for his time, he was extremely flexible in administrating the laws of his Kingdom.
The King noticed something however: what had at first started as a few simply "exceptions" placed upon his magnimity had become a torrent of complaints. The court was nearly overwhelmed. One discourse went something like this:
"Oh majesty, because you deeded, in your infinite wisdom to allow Serf Brown to allow his cow to pasture on Sunday mid-morn (in contrary to your previous rulings), his cow has eaten all the new shoots and will definitely fetch a better price than my scrawny heifer!"
On and on it went. Until finally the King decided to do some research. He had his most trusted aids "go forth unto the kingdom to determine the mood of realm". After sometime the aids reported back. The findings were not good. They reported that the king is jested in every ale-house and out-house. The subjects barely fulfill their duties to his farms and their taxes are woefully past due. Furthermore, one sherrif has become so arrogant as to simply ignore your edicts all together as simply too tiring.
The king was enraged. He called in his knights and scribes and began. He wrote new laws, he demanded the back taxes, he demanded the serfs work one hour longer. He revoked all his flexibility: things would change. He would get his respect.
History would show it was the quickest and most decisive battle ever. The peasants enraged at the curtailment of their freedoms had stormed the castle, pitchforks in had, and had beheaded the king.
The realm was governorless for sometime and it fell into disrepair. The people asked for a new King. The King was ascended to the throne was a long distant cousin of the newly deposed King. The King quickly restored order, took back lands, got the back taxes, got serfs to work. Further, he ruled that anyone who didn't pull his weight would feel the consequences and quickly. The people rejoiced, they had a strong King and the land was quickly restored to bounty.
The moral of the story is if you are strict at first and become flexible where approrpriate people will love you. If you are a push-over at first and become strict, people will revolt.
Lesser minds will say be an arse-hole to start and ease up. This, of course, is not the answer. People are bizzare. You can take all the management books, (I have a degree in Management), your Franklin planner, and your otherworthless Management ideas and forget them.
The only thing you can never get back is your direction. It is set on day one.
Good luck and welcome to the club.
"This isn't a study in computer science, its a study in human behavior"
Management is like playing an RTS game, but without the pretty interface.
It's all about resource generation, allocation, deployment, etc.
If you're not already good at thinking about a situation from multiple points of view, develop this skill. Make sure you take into account not just what you know and what you're good at, but what you might not know and what others might need, both internal and external to your team/organization.
Good communication is essential, both listening and talking.
Respecting your team members is critical.
You should have a political awareness of your group and the others around it, learn who's dependent on what, etc.
Figure out what your mission is, what your objectives are, what problem is your group there to solve, and concentrate on identifying and reaching goals.
Document your practices and procedures and policies and use the information to generate performance metrics which you can use to justify your teams worth to the organization.
All of this is more than one person can reasonably accomplish, so be sure to delegate intelligently. You're going to do much less doing and much more delegating if you want to be successful as a manager. Your job isn't to do, it's to make sure it gets done. Coordinate and make decisions. Leave it to your team members to tackle the implementation.
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
For example, one chapter is dedicated to smiling. You should smile often, because it makes you seem happier, more approachable, and a nicer person in general.
God.. smiling more? Think about what you're turning yourself into by smiling all the time. Plastic. We aren't all idiots that can't see through someone that's just smiling because they read it in a book somewhere.
Rather than just putting on a nice mask, maybe you should figure out why you're not happy? If you are happy, hey great, find a way to express that. But simply telling people to bulldoze over true feelings with masks is just terrible advice.
AccountKiller
1. Get a banner that reads "Is this good for the Company" 2. Get a big coffee mug and walk around with it... 3. Wear a binary tie... Seriously, management is about teamwork. Project to your team that you trust them to do a good job. Give them random perks (i.e. Pizza, sodas, etc.) Take time to understand the people you manage; some people want a lot of recognition, some want to be left alone. Understand that as long as they know you care, you probably won't have to do much managing at all. People respect management that understands the tasks their subordinates perform. If your "normals" want to talk to you about the latest news and you have no clue, "respect -1" There will be a learning curve for you and them. They are probably as nervous about you being the new boss as you are. People tend to assume the worst when new management arrives. In my personal experience, new management is truly a bane to all that is good and happy. Your new team is probably quite nervous that you are about to go in and start customizing the office a way they don't approve of. I would say just lay back and learn about the position and try not to be super manager of the dacade.
Yeah, I managed to piss off my subordinates in my one management experience. Once you lose the trust and respect of your crew you're permanently screwed.
Even if you fail here, you can learn, but it'll be ugly.
The Attila The Hun management method doesn't work unless you actually have the power and are actually willing to cut out their tongues. It'll just piss them off and they'll find a way to screw you over, and will be justified in doing so. It probably won't take any overt acts on their part, they'll just not save you from yourself when you really need it.
I think that the original poster may not have any serious power so the Attila method is out, and it is not really any good anyway, in the long term.
Why do I have this? I don't smoke.
1) Know your peoples capabilities and never ask them to do anything they are incapable of.
Its OK to challenge them a little, but never give them more than they can chew. You will be confronted with this when senior management gives you tasks that your team are incapable of meeting. The easy thing to do is simply delegate the tasks and put your head in the sand, but this will lead to unhappy workers, the job won't get done, you'll discipline your workers for their failure and kill morale, and you'll look like a failure to your superiors. The harder thing to do is tell your senior management upfront that you can't do it. But that's what gets you respect. If your senior management won't listen to reason, tell your team frankly what the situation is, tell them you don't expect them to be able to achieve the impossible, but that you've got to do your job, so can they do the best they can and let you make the excuses later.
2) Know what is going on.
Your manager is going to ask you things like "How long will this take" and you're going to go and ask your people the same question to enable yourself to answer. Don't make the mistake of giving people questions that they cannot answer and expecting them to do so. I don't know how many times in the past I've had a dumb manager ask me how long this task will take, and refuse to accept "I don't have enough information to answer that and here is why" as an answer. Work with your people to get the real facts, and instead of presenting a number pulled out of your teams respective asses, present a break down of knowns, unknowns, mitigating factors, etc so that you're not promising something you don't know if you can deliver.
3) Manage your planning.
You don't want to micromanage, but you do need to juggle a whole bunch of different peoples estimates and manage to coordinate peoples working together. Typically managers will either make the initial plan then let things go and remain in the dark, or they will have way too many meetings to ensure that they are up to speed. If you have too many meetings, only the few will have something to add, and it will be irrelevant to most present, with the result that everyones time is wasted and people percieve meetings as a waste of time. Not a good perception to engender in them. Instead, help each person involved understand what the red flags are that you need to be notified of and make them feel safe and welcome bringing them to you. That way you don't need to micromanage but you will always know what is going on and will know where to reallocate resources before its too late.
I'm sure I can think of more things than this, but I'd say these are the most important points.
Oh, and I don't have any formal management training whatsoever, so I don't know how this holds up with conventional wisdom. I just know it seems to have worked for me.
BTW: Don't read those books on Making Friends and Influencing People. You're not there to make friends, you're there to make shit happen. Try looking for How To Make Enemies And Infuriate People instead. Much more useful.
-1 Uncomfortable Truth
Take stock of your surroundings, and decide if you want to be a "Successful" manager or a "Good" manager. "Successful" managers are dynamic, demanding, decisive, and action-oriented. These are all good qualities, as long as they don't lead to disaster. "Good" managers have these qualities too, but they are also dependable, respectful, thoughtful, and solution-oriented.
Unfortunately, being "good" often doesn't lead to advancement as quickly as being "successful". We all admire the person that can step in and take control of a crisis. It's too bad we don't usually notice the person that prevents the crisis from ever occurring.
So, first you need to decide what kind of manager you're going to be. Then go out and [wreak havoc | do good].
Getting tired of Slashdot... moving to Usenet comp.misc for a while.
I'm in IT management training with a very large and successful company. Here's some of my companies tactics, with my own advice.
1. People are your most important resource. You can't invest in people expecting to get something out of them. If you have 5 free minutes spend them with one of your employees. Don't ask him how the project's going, ask about girlfriends, parents, pets, and hobbies. Treat your people well and they will not only do what you ask, but they will cover your ass when you make your inevitable screw ups.
2. Be decisive. You should always listen to your people, but the final decision rests with you. Trust your people to make small choices and use initiative, but if there's a tough call to be made you make it. People criticize George W. Bush, but he may be the best example of this in the world. He encourages debate and even argument in his cabinet (which he recruited very smart people for), then he weighs the arguments and makes the decision. Finally, the entire cabinet (regardless of personal feelings) backs it.
3. Manage resources. Don't manage people (see 1 above), but manage resources. Make sure your people have what they need to do their job. People's time is also a resource. Make sure you assign your teams efforts effectively.
4. Make sure expectations are understood. Make sure you know what your boss wants from your team. Then make sure members of your team understand what is expected of them individually, and how they fit into the team.
5. Be Proactive, this is stolen from the "7 Habits of Highly Effective People". Don't wait for problems and then fix them. Seek out solutions before the problems present themselves. This should be familiar from software design. Don't wait for people to find and report bugs, think your product through at the beginning and eliminate bugs in the design phases.
6. Ask for help and provide help.
A few reading tips:
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen R. Covey
The 8th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness by Stephen R. Covey
Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap... and Others Don't by Jim Collins
Built to Last : Successful Habits of Visionary Companies by Jim Collins
Some advice...
1. You will loose some of your technical skills over time. You're spending less of your day on that sort of skill. Knowing this, identify what you cherish the most and what will make you a valued staff member at another company and keep those up-to-date.
2. Recognize that when you take manager as your title, you've walked away from some mobility opportunities. Managers aren't keen to hire former managers to staff positions and there are less manager jobs around.
3. Recognize that not everyone is as productive, smart, or responsive as you are. You'll have to set a standard of performance for the positions you manage and judge your staff by that standard and not you. Keep it in perspective, if they were as good as you; you'd be doing their job.
4. Make the workplace fun. Carnation used to put on their milk "Content Cows Give More Milk". In other words, happy people are more productive.
5. Learn to let the little things go. Just because someone brings an issue to your attention doesn't mean you have to follow through on every one. Learn to establish a split between when people see you to vent and when people see you for action.
STFU & GBTW
All the world's a stage. Your attitude is really no less plastic, no less a pose, than the one that Carnegie promotes.
I nice bit of sophistry, but you haven't really said anything. How is not posing posing? I guess we can't reflect what we feel anymore.. that's posing.. somehow.
Here's a thought: Maybe if you smile more, you'll have more effective or more enjoyable interactions with others. Couldn't that be something to smile about? Perhaps the effect precedes the cause, in this case.
Maybe, or maybe you'll just feel more miserable because you didn't "let your emotions out". I could probbably make up a dozen other good sounding theories as well, but it wouldn't matter. Theories are all great, they can sound good, people can like them but they don't mean squat without evidence to back them up.
AccountKiller
For instance, I have a web site that tracks my team progress against deadlines, lists what they are working on, major risks, etc. Set it up according to the suggestions in the Software Project Survival Guide but it applies to any kind of management.
Read, and follow the suggestions of, the One Minute Manager. Be sincere, I ignore a lot of the touch feely stuff, but the delegation, goal setting etc. is key and easy with this method. Use advanced management techniques later.
I naturally started to use Borgish management methods
Ha... I know exactly what you mean. I left a MIS degree to get involved with an early dot-com startup. After that venture, I've been put into quasi-tech management roles in company after company where I'm expected to be the ruthless SOB that saves all the disaster projects from the mid-level Bellheads that blow their money on the wrong vendors, empire build by hiring useless employees, and focus on everything except getting the project done.
I'm assuming the poster is in that category of competence and not some high-self esteem low competence poseur. You'd better understand a few basic facts rather quickly - if you are not only technically exceptional, but get results for management and have moved up into this world, you need to understand you are one serious threat to the 'order' of ineffective suits with degrees. Your lack of credentials will very quickly be used to take you down unless you take heed of some necessary actions:
1. find a powerful higher-up you respect (hopefully your boss; if your boss isn't of this caliber, arrange to get under one of this nature quickly or plan on a new job soon. You won't survive with a no-backbone boss.). Make him/her look awesome, and most importantly, establish a mentoring relationship. Not only will this probably save your ass af few times if you're damn good and make enemies being efficient and effective, but you will learn something about how the game works at the upper levels. They need credentials too, if you can manage - Harvard, Wharten MBAs are awesome at deflecting this crap in a political environment. Read about mentoring relationships - it works on two levels. Not only are you learning pretty important stuff, but there is an overt channel of communication your boss knows exists that is critical when you don't play things right politically. Think of it as out-of-band management on a circuit - when you blow the circuit down through well-intentioned but stupid political moves, this channel will be there for the boss to explain your errors (rather than just getting pissed and firing you). You've become an understudy, and in the bosses eyes, it would be his/her failure too if they had to fire you.
2. Learn how to be nonconfrontational publically and use your boss as a screen for unpopular decisions, like getting departments of ineffective people fired. Again, you make the boss look great and he/she will use their clout to protect you. You absolutely must use this mode until you get the credentials to take on the upper level yourself. Really, this approach can be fun. It took awhile for me to get used to it, but it really can be pleasurable letting some programmer shit mouth off to you, only to participate in the decision to lay him off when the bosses decide on the annual fat trimming.
3. GET CREDENTIALS! Don't let people keep that held over your head. Certifications are quick and dirty solutions. Keep in mind, however, that they are not equal with degrees in the political management world. Start taking 6-9 hours a semester somewhere to get a business degree. If you really want to piss them off, kick it in gear and get a finance degree. Most upper level suits automatically assume geeks don't understand numbers (hey, we do it to ourselves). I'm finishing a finance/banking double major and taking the LSAT for a JD (intellectual property law track). I just *love* it when some suit assumes since I understand tech more than they ever will, I must not understand finance. Imagine the horror this management or marketing graduate has when he tries to talk finance with me and discovers his three semesters of intro finance can't match up either.
4. Treat confidential information absolutely. Never, ever leak, share, etc. information from your boss - ever. You will find you'll actually be tested - my mentor boss slipped layoff info to me and had someone else ask me that he set up. Keeping my silence earned me considerable knowledge and trust. You will be tested!
Follwing up on the "protect your people" admonition, never, ever, sell out your staff for your own benefit. Never give that impression.
If your staff thinks you've offered them up as sacrificial lambs, your are dead meat. If you've actually done that, your deserve to be dead meat.
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
Military leadership and overstucturing is COMPLETELY INAPPROPRIATE for the vast majority of jobs. Consider it. Military leadership techniques are designed to allow people to perform a finite range of tasks with zero chance of screw up, redundancy when necesary, and replacability. If you treat an employee like a soldier, you get minimal efficiency because you're discouraging creative thinking and self-direction. Perhaps more importantly, soldiers have something that employees lack: absolute dedication. If a solider hates the job he toughts it out, that's why they call it "service." You can shoot him if he flips and decides to leave. If an employee hates it, she will quit, or at least do the absolute minimum excepted and bitch about it. And you sure as hell can't cap her for it. "Normals" aren't really that different from geeks, they like to be treated with respect too, and work harder for bosses who "get it" and respect them (or at least seem to).
The parent does make one good point: ask why you were selected. Because if you're such a far-gone geek that you belive that all "normals" need "a firm structure," then clearly your bosses just f*cked up in a big way promoting you. You're a geek, that means you have great technical skills and perhaps a unusual point of view. That menas you have some skills to apply to management, but it doesn't mean you're some sort of Neitzchian ubermenche entitled to treat everyone like idiots.
Sorry to pounce all over that post, but my god did I have a bad experince with a manager who may as well have taken that exact same advice.
how in the USA is management is considered more important (i.e. a promotion) than an engineer.
Engineering and management are two totally different skillsets. Its like taking a good carpenter and 'promoting' him into bricklaying.
I'm a good engineer, got promoted into management then moved myself back to being an engineer, and am more happy than ever. I suggest you should do the same.
If you decide to stay in management, here's what you need to do. Change the way you think about being a boss: start to think of yourself as a facilitator, not a controller. Be there to provide the resources to the engineers that they can't get for themselves. Stuff like involving them with (or at least informing them of) management decisions is a good.
Stop micromanaging. Give them deadlines then trust them to deliver on time. You can ask for progress updates every now and again to check there's not a problem coming up, but don't tell them how to do their job unless they ask you for help.
Most of all, remember when you were an engineer and what you wished your boss would be more like.
1. Give your people the tools they need to do their jobs and then stand out of the way and let them work!
2. Don't sweat the small stuff. A guy who just spent his entire weekend (uncompensated) nursing a project "go-live" doesn't deserve to be called on the carpet for taking an extra 15 minutes on his lunch break.
3. And above all else, never *ever* hang your people out to dry. You take the heat for them and then deal with them appropriately later, but never make them feel like you are not backing them up 100%.
Treat people as outlined above and they'll be willing to walk through fire for you when the time comes. It's a karma thing.
Excessive drinking is fine...in moderation.
If you decide to move to the world of pie charts and performance evaluations, take the change seriously: you're learning a whole new job, and it will take study and attention.