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Companies That Don't Understand Engineers Don't Respect Engineers
An anonymous reader writes Following up on a recent experiment into the status of software engineers versus managers, Jon Evans writes that the easiest way to find out which companies don't respect their engineers is to learn which companies simply don't understand them. "Engineers are treated as less-than-equal because we are often viewed as idiot savants. We may speak the magic language of machines, the thinking goes, but we aren't business people, so we aren't qualified to make the most important decisions. ... Whereas in fact any engineer worth her salt will tell you that she makes business decisions daily–albeit on the micro not macro level–because she has to in order to get the job done. Exactly how long should this database field be? And of what datatype? How and where should it be validated? How do we handle all of the edge cases? These are in fact business decisions, and we make them, because we're at the proverbial coal face, and it would take forever to run every single one of them by the product people and sometimes they wouldn't even understand the technical factors involved. ... It might have made some sense to treat them as separate-but-slightly-inferior when technology was not at the heart of almost every business, but not any more."
Real engineers don't size databases.
Exactly how long should this database field be? And of what datatype? How and where should it be validated? How do we handle all of the edge cases?
That is not a business decision, that is a technical decision where you try to come up with the most universal and correct to spec answer you can. You are not shaping the business with this decision, you are trying to shape your solution to the business.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
I think this has a lot more to do with the machismo of business people than anything else. The suits don't have a lick of understanding of what the engineers actually do--sure, they understand the iPhone once it rolls off the lines, but up to that point, what engineers do is basically a bunch of technovoodoo magic to them. Since lots of businessmen are macho, domineering types (especially in large, competitive companies), the concept of having subordinates who are doing things far beyond their understanding is not one they like. In turn, the business people feel the need to assert how hard whatever it is they do--"oh, you wouldn't understand because business is sooo much more complicated than rocket science"--and elevate the complexity and importance of their own job beyond that of the lowly engineers.
I don't think it's lack of "understanding the engineers." I think it's lack of understanding the engineering and feeling uncomfortable about it.
/. may be a software-centric site, but those of us in mechanical, electrical, optical, materials, and other branches of engineering are in the same basic position. But sadly, even in businesses which promote engineers into senior roles end up respecting people primarily on the basis of how many direct reports (that's the term for peons whose salaries they determine) they control. Until you're able to rate people by the quality/quantity of output regardless of altitude in the org chart, this problem will continue.
https://app.box.com/WitthoftResume Code: https://github.com/cellocgw
Should I halt work on the next version for a month to do custom work for this important customer?
Should I save time by making the system very inflexible in this regard to get it out the door for a narrow market at the expense of a wider market later?
Should I follow the spec that management and business analysts wrote even though it seems wrong, or go up the chain or to the customer and likely fix or rewrite the spec?
These are the kind of business decisions I used to find myself making. In most cases it turned out that I made the correct decision in hindsight, but I got a lot of fighting from management in the process about that not being my job, even though there was nobody else competent to do it.
The biggest problem I run into is that the management assumes that the engineers are completely unable to talk to customers and look at outside non-technical specifications. I have found that engineers tend to be better at it than managers and all but the best business analysts.
Go green: turn off your refrigerator.
I think you're getting engineer confused with self-opinionated hipster who wants to pretend they are businessmen and engineer without having the skill or talent to be either.
See "Startup" for more details.
That seems fair (at least at face value), given that engineers tend to hold business weenies in complete contempt.
We do, however, have both a power and a knowledge imbalance in the situation. We have a power imbalance in that those business weenies can fire me, but I can't fire them; and we have a knowledge imbalance in that many engineers do know the business side of things. I can work up a set of financial statements as well as the weenies; I can perform a ratio analysis better than the weenies, because unlike them, I "know" what the numbers mean beyond a cut-and-paste job in Excel; I can analyze the company's capitalization structure and consider the impact on near-term cash flows right up there with the best of the weenies.
Now, you might fairly point out that I've mostly describe accountancy, not "business"... But the knowledge imbalance gets worse when we get into actual strategic planning, market analysis, and consideration of macroeconomic factors - At least many of the weenies have significant exposure to accounting, sometimes even a related undergrad degree. For the harder material, they just can't grasp even the basics of supply/demand curves without a solid math background (in taking my MBA, I found one particular economics class hilarious; we spent more than half of the semester learning a set of related equations for (for example) forecasting optimal production levels, that all just took the derivative of the same damn underlying equation from different perspectives. And that counted as one of the "killer" classes in a goddamned graduate-level degree?
Sadly, though, business weenies do have exactly one trait that engineers lack - Smarm. And in this sick sad world, that will get you further than any level of mastery of any legitimate domain of knowledge.
This is actually a very touchy subject. The Engineers have felt it for years, but this applies to SO much more in business.
How many times haven't you been seen as the "useful idiot" every time someone need something technical fixed? This is something I've lived with and experienced since I was a kid (we're talking 30+ years here), and I wasn't even the geeky one. But it seems like every manager, every company executive and even just everyday people think they're somewhat "superior" because they make money on your kindness and professionalism.
I even had friends like that for years, sure...when something breaks, they'll come to me to get it fixed, and expect not to pay for it. But when I needed something, then they where nowhere to be seen. I made millions for one of my bosses back in the Commodore heydays when I literally was the "driving" motor of his entire store chain, I got people together, computer-clubs, repaired the computers etc. One could always argue that I was the IDIOT for not being business savvy enough to charge more, but they are just better at business than fixing things. When I left, his business went to ruins within 2 years, he thought he did it all by himself because he was such a smart businessman. That's the worst part...these company directors wouldn't know good people, and they always get high on "their" own success. And eventually fail.
How many times haven't you seen bosses walk away with HUGE fat bonuses, and all they basically do is talk. You do all the work anyway. Small minds think small, and only see the carrot dangling in front of their face. Intelligent bosses actually think ahead and invest in great minds. The companies that have the biggest successes - are those who appreciate their workers and the incredible minds behind it all. The best company executive in the world, praises his coworkers where credit is due.
What this world is coming to - is for you and me to decide.
But business managers don't respect anyone who isn't also a business manager.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
Coincidentally everyone but the managers of a company think that management is overrated, overpaid and in general the reason that things go south when (not if) they do. A bunch of dorks with zero clue what the company is actually doing making decisions about it and the products they have never even seen. Hell, the idiots even claim that it doesn't matter just what kind of product we're producing 'cause they're equally qualified to run a potato chip company as they are running a computer chip company. Actually I'd agree, they're usually qualified for neither.
So you see, the feeling is definitely mutual. The only thing that saves them is that they make the HR decisions, too. Else they'd have been outsourced to the local zoo.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
I worked for 13 years at a company that designed and manufactured switch mode power supplies up to 3kW size. The last ten years was in the design lab with a team of about 15 engineers. We made decisions on a daily basis in respect of fire and electric shock safety for our products; things that affect the very lives and properties of the end users of this equipment. One wrong decision or non-comliance with a particular regulation could have caused our company to be sued into oblivion. Despite this responsibility that we shouldered, we were not allowed access to the stationery cupboard - we had to go and ask permission of some junior office member for a simple ball point pen etc.
I hit upon a slight variation of this years ago when a friend of my was partnering up with a sales guy to start a company. I told my engineer friend to make sure that their written agreement was that not a dollar could be spent or a contract of any sort signed without his agreement. This included hiring peopel. Also any employee could be fired by either of them. The great twist that his lawyer threw in was that if one or the other agreed to something without the approval of the other that the cost came out of their share of the profits and has no legal standing with the company.
It wasn't two weeks after their first client wrote them a big check that the salesman leased himself a "company" car. My friend said, nope that comes out of your profits. The salesman went to a lawyer and then managed to return the car.
The other clause that totally screwed the salesman was what is called a "shotgun clause" basically what that states is that one partner can make an offer to buy out the other's share and that offer can not be refused; but it can be matched in which case the first party must sell for the amount they offered.
So the company was taking off and my friend just made an offer on a house. So the salesman made a lowball offer for my friend's half of the company thinking that all his money was tied up. My friend actually had quite a bit of money saved and combined with credit cards and family raised the matching money in about a day. This one ended up in court but didn't go anywhere as my friend was 100% in the right. What came out during the initial discovery was that now that they had hired a handful of engineers was that the salesman was ticked that he was paying 50% of the profits to my friend who he thought could be replaced with interns and local tech school graduates. But as my friend gleefully was able to do was replace the salesman with someone who was much cheaper than the 50% profits going to the salesman.
Needless to say, both of them were fairly replaceable but I would say that my friend had at least as good business skills as the salesman, while also possessing masterful engineering skills. The salesman only had moderate business skills and zero engineering skills.
The reality of the story was that while my friend was willing to let things continue as normal and let the salesman enjoy the fruits of his initial investment, the salesman was pretty much trying to screw my friend once a month. He just could not believe that some techy was his equal. Every new employee that was hired was told by the salesman that the salesman was in charge and that the engineer was basically a hanger on. So my engineering friend would often have to point out to people such as the accountant how things worked(as opposed how the salesman dreamed they worked) and that either one of them could fire anyone so if they tried picking a side they would be gone the next day.
Yet my friend fully agreed that when he turfed the salesman that either one of them were by that point replaceable. As he had brought engineering skills that at first the salesman could not get cheap enough, and that the salesman had brought a rolodex that got the company started before it was exhausted.
Sorry, I only take comments like this seriously when written by someone with an actual user account, instead of an AC. Then they're being "professional" and standing by their words. In all seriousness, I have experienced virtually no hipsterism in engineering culture over the course of 2 decades in the industry. Those that were about style over substance usually didn't even make it through getting their engineering degree. If you look at computer languages through the lens of "C++ is a proven technology" then you're ignoring other advances that make other solutions more appropriate. This comes from a place of not-understanding, rather than something being objectively better for any task. I started as a C++ developer for the first half of my career, and while I still occasionally maintain some older C++ software, most innovative work is done in modern languages now. Also, have you ever heard of a buffer overflow? There are lots of good reasons not to write certain things in C++, one of them being that it's easy to make a mistake and create a security nightmare. You might have heard of this when watching "business news".
Its not about preconceptions based on attire. Its about perceptions based on the wisdom of choosing ones attire that puts the business environment ahead of one's personal need to express himself through dress. That is a statement in itself. Some get it, others don't. The accepted dress in most companies today is much more casual and varied than it was even 10 years ago. It will continue to evolve. Having the capacity to know where the standards of the day are, and what may be pushing the limits, is one that you can demonstrate through your choice of dress. Trying to prove something is fine, just don't blame others for the result it brings. Business leaders don't like complainers.
The point I was trying to make was that the conventions that make up accepted dress in the business environment (to use your words) are arbitrary and based only on social conditioning. I accept that almost everyone has been subjected to that conditioning - not just the managers but also the customers. TFA is about engineers not being respected. The AC points out their clothing can cause them not to be respected.
For respect to be regained someone must make changes. That could be the engineers capitulating and dressing according to the social norms of the traditionalists. The respect could also be regained by the traditionalists waking up and realising that all of these cultural rituals are a waste of time that complicate the process of buying and selling high quality products and services.
Sure, if someone turns up to a series of job interviews today in a t shirt and flip flops they shouldn't be shocked if no-one calls them back and they need to seriously rethink their strategy. The same could be true when trying to clinch that sale - but then how many engineers are sales people?
The AC was attacking the stereotypical "hipster", calling them childish and speaking with much disdain about them. My point was that you can just as justifiably pour disdain on the traditionalist business folk. They are also the ones who are trying to impose their standards on other people. Standards that really should not be relevant, in an ideal world, to doing good business. I accept we do not live in an ideal world, and the hipsters of the AC's comment should know better. It's just that they're not the only ones that would benefit from an improved attitude.
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Why would engineers be any different? Do you think they appriciate the rest of the staff?
You are there because they can not do without you. If they think they can do without you (or without your function) they will fire you. That goes for EVERY job in the company, including the CEO.
The difference is that for some jobs it is very hard to change on short notice. Sales can push a few deals so they will make the new requirements or hold them back so they will have it easier for next years budget.
So they can react to the question of 'increase profit by X percent for the next 3 months'. There is no such thing for e.g. IT without cutting in projects/jobs. (Sure there are some ways to do it)
The real issue is that the majority of companies are in it for the money, so if you want to be understood, you need to speak the language of money. In companies that means budgets. This means when you take a decision in your job like "how should I set up this database" they do not care as long as you can provide the information on cost and profit both short, middle and long term and then they will decide what you should do.
If your datafield for the year still has 2 digits, why should I make it 4? Show me the outcome in $ and then we will see if we do it or not. THAT is taking a business decision, not if it is technically the best solution. Sometimes the technically worst decision is best for business.
I have seen (easy) technicaly solutions overturned time and time again. One time I asked for a soltion and they told me it was 3.000EUR as quoted by Cisco. A while later I told them I had a solution for a problem and would they OK it if I did it for 100 EUR. I never detailed that it was the same problem that had been denied for several years. Without blinking they said yes and looked if I was stoopid because I could spend 250 EUR per month on anything I wanted.
Bought two hubs and solved the issue.
Lesson: They must not talk your language. They must not understand you. You must understand them.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
In the end it is always the customer that pays the bills. If you are selling things to technical people then the engineers may have a better grasp on what the customer wants. I've been in customer meetings where we were selling a machine to the customer and both management didn't really understand the requirements. When I talked with the manufacturing engineer we both understood each other and were able to agree upon some real requirements that could be verified. In this cage management wasn't helping. Luckily they understood this and allowed the technical people to work together.
In other cases when I worked for a company that sold services to the government I had to learn to relize the business wasn't about doing a great job. They have the contract so the business goal was to milk the government as much as possible. This means doing exactly what you were contracted to do even if it wasn't technically correct.
I love Jesus, except for his foreign policy.