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Admin
I'm confused that's how 90% of managers work. They make up some random budget with no basis in reality and then they spend all of their time to defend it.
Not really a WTF tho cause thanks to advancements in AI those jobs are going to be the first to be replaced.
Admin
why CodeSod? was in several companies where the consultants made the estimates, fortunately for them they had the budget which meant there was none left for the developers
Admin
Hmmm. My first thought was, unlikely because AI depends upon being able to draw logical inferences and as most management styles have all the predictability and stability of a lump of sodium in bowl of water. However a moment's reflection of this random behaviour makes me think you're basically right, but it doesn't need a full blown AI engine. Any half way decent random number generator linked to a list of common managerial responses or decisions would do. What responses? Well we could start with the following...
Recruit someone Recruit someone inappropriate Halve the project budget Bring the deadline forward by one month Discard all current work in favour of the currently fashionable technology Discard all the current work with the "hot" technology and revert to legacy technology Organise a team building event Sack half the project team Change the project requirements*
Feel free to add "decisions" as you remember (and shudder at the memory) of them.
*Yes, this one is a joke. There won't be any project requirements.
Admin
Middle management is the one job that can't ever be automated away. Executives will always need a taskmaster to whip the slaves and we the workers will in turn always need someone in between us and the executives to hate and complain about. It's a role that inherently requires a human being or equivalent.
Admin
Technically that's not the reason why middle management exists. Usually it comes down to three different reasons:
Scapegoat. If something goes wrong, top management points to some mid manager. The whole point of this person is to generate a ton of paper weight and then point to the lower level. At a certain point someone looking for mistakes will get frustrated enough to give up.
Lackey. Top management wants to do important stuff, like networking on their yacht or buying politicians, therefore they need managers to to the other less important stuff like creating IRS reports or signing the bills of external work force actually generating business value.
Cronyism. Sometimes top management wants to no longer invite certain people to their yachts, so they need a place to put them without making them too upset. Sometimes those positions are called bullshit jobs, simply because sometimes people creating business value have colleagues that hold them back and the only way to get rid of them is promoting them.
Disclaimer: This post might me ironic. Or not. You'll never know.
Admin
AI is super useful for lightly complex patterns with an acceptable low error rate.
So basically that means it's completely useless for replacing developers, because spoiler: Software that works randomly 94% of the time would still be considered a bad outcome. Obviously there will be attempts to try it anyway, but it will sooner or later backfire.
Managers on the other hand are perfect as an replacement target. So are by the way politicians. Which is ironic, because if your job would be on the line, no politician would even lift a finger - but oh boy, they are super scared about AI for good reason :-)
Admin
Guys, project managers are not management. These people exist for charity, headcount, budget, or any other reason. But they don't actually manage anything, and definitely they don't contribute to the effort in any way. The entire institution of project management has to be abolished, like, yesterday.
Admin
"Those are the requirements! I need to know what the actual implementation is!"
"I mean, the code is probably your best bet, then-"
"I shouldn't have to look at code to know what it does!" Vince shouted down the phone.
I don't even know how to process this exchange. "I need to know the implementation but I can't look at the implementation" is the weirdest requirement I've ever heard from anyone. Does he want the algorithm it uses documented somewhere? (Presumably that's the business logic in the requirements document).
I honestly wonder what she told him. Was he just embarrassed that he didn't understand whatever programming language was being used to code the back end or something and decided to yell at someone instead of admitting it?
Admin
Yeah, this sounds like the unfortunate reality many of us have lived before. No requirements, nobody has time to capture requirements, nobody has time to read requirements, "the software is the spec", the project is late and we haven't even started yet (nor have we defined what it is)... Developer's daily work flow is the true daily wtf.
Admin
"Sure, you shouldn't have to... but you do have to."
Admin
In a past job, a middle-manager in another division had a reputation for halving estimates his direct reports provided before sending them higher. Those who reported to him quickly acquired the habit of doubling their already padded estimates to counter this.
Admin
In a past job, a middle-manager in another division had a reputation for halving estimates his direct reports provided before sending them higher. Those who reported to him quickly acquired the habit of doubling their already padded estimates to counter this.
Admin
I see you're still used to doubling everything, even your comments :)
Admin
"The manager snapped... The manager shouted..."
The more TLs or managers shout at me, the less useful I become. Suddenly I can't find the files, the network is down, the WiFi is slow, I need to reboot and reinstall Linux first, I'm late for a meeting, etc.
Once in a startup, a same-level coworker started shouting at me, I literally told him to GTFOH and if he had a problem to go yell at my boss. Which he did. That did not help him at all.
Admin
Yes, that is how 90% of managers work - but it doesn't mean that it isn't a WTF! It is only experience of being ground down by the industry over the years that makes us cynical lackeys accept (and expect) it...
Admin
thanks for info
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