I've seen it more and more on the net. Is it that we dare to speak out more? or is there really a change in balance occuring?
(Mis-?)Management being addressed and tech-leads are heard or leave!
Looking at mini-Microsoft, a posts on Joel's blog and finally my own situation (and I'm sure many more out there). It is time for us to get this information into the open and expose the behavior that is currently being promoted in too many (not all) companies. Especially mid and larger companies have this tendency and should therefore take more action to prevent these situation from occuring. Why? Because it will make your stocks worth even more! (Did this work for management types?) ohh, and as side-effect you have motivated people.
This is my story:
It was 1996 and a group of highly intelligent and fun-to-be-with friends asked me to join their newly founded company. Being focussed on the web, SGML and publishing I found it to be the best offer in a long time and happily accepted!
As the years passed, the company merged with another small group and formed a 'internet powerhouse'. Combining technical expertise and business savvy into one company (Ayy! the beginning of the end). More years passed and, next to the many projects, the original product was still very much alive and growing. Abbandoning the project market and forming yet another company, the product was recognized for what is was and became the flagship of the new entity.
Here's where the sadness enters the story. As the product grew and a larger customerbase was realised (which included governmental departments & institution, world-wide renowned banks, etc) so did the need to have more management and middle management (We seemed to have a pretty stable development team for years). In rappid sucsession the CEO's, COO's, CFO's, etc. where hired and then dismissed again. In the mean time spending lots of revenue, earned by the core product, where wasted on 'brilliant management ideas' (read; stupid moneywasting CEO's wet-dreams).
I just have to mention the CEO that thought that 'him ab-sailing from one of the world's known football centers infront of the company personel' would boost morale or be fun somehow! Mr. DxxxHead, if you ever read this; "I still say its a stupid idea and think you're an overrated 2nd hand car salesman".
While the flagship product still reached the upper regions of reports like "Forrester" and "CMWatch" (It's even been labeled 'Best of breed' by Forrester for Europe in WCM twice in 2005), management became more and more lost in the game of politics.
This is the period in which the company culture switched from 'motivated by pride & result' into 'a 9-5 place to stay so I get money'.
Having gone through a number of re-shuffles the company finally reached a state where 'the people that made it happen' where moved into obscurity, left or where ignored.
Politics became the main game. I even saw we needed 'receive notification' turned on as managers started to say "I didn't get that mail from you". Yuck! Those where the kids we'de beat up during school-breaks for lying to the group! They still didn't get the message!
So, where does it leave me? I started looking around as a realist for the first time (always have been an optimist) and saw the shape the company is in, and decided to leave.
"It is a sad day for me, for the core system is my baby. I, together with a limited nr of others, have envisioned - designed - implemented - tested this systen since the 1.0 version (it's now at 5.1 at the time of this writing).
I like to compare it with being a father;
The Core system is my child and I will always love it, however badly it behaves
My child has come home with a group of friends i dispise, and her boyfriend i hate!
My child is an adult now, and has to make her own choices,
time for me to step out (and make another child?)....