Joerg snipped-for-privacy@removethispacbell.net posted to sci.electronics.design:
Jeff Liebermann wrote:
>> "Frithiof Andreas Jensen"
>> hath wroth:
>>
>>> "Jeff Liebermann" skrev i en
>>> meddelelse news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com...
>>>> I like the next sentence even better.
>>>>
>>>> "The candidate must be self-motivated and self-directed,
>>>> with ability to set priorities and achieve quality results."
>>>>
>>>> Apparently the engineer is self-motivated (sets one's own goals
>>>> and salary), self-directed (ignores management directives), sets
>>>> priorities (does managements job), and achieves quality results
>>>> (gets
>>>> the job done despite the efforts of management to derail it).
>>>> Now that's a job I could enjoy doing.
>>
>>> You really think so?!
>>
>> Yes. In my limited experience, the benefits of NOT having
>> management around, far outweigh anything they can provide by their
>> presence.
>> Managers do what managers do best, which is to manage. To most,
>> that
>> means to change things. If nothing needs changing, they must find
>> something to change or they are not acting as managers. If
>> everyone did their job perfectly, and things were going perfectly,
>> then managers should be able to lean back, do nothing, go sailing,
>> and reap
>> the rewards. That's never the case. Instead, they meddle, change
>> things constantly, demand reports, reorganize, and generally make
>> things worse in the name of managing. The clueless PHB (pointy
>> hair
>> boss) in the Dilbert cartoon strip is all too typical. If someone
>> advertised a position, where I could do my own thing
>> (self-directed) without reporting to the traditional meddling
>> managers, I would have jumped at the opportunity.
>>
>>> In reality it begins to grate on your nerves every time you read
>>> about the latest achievements in getting some sailbout to
>>> cross the globe in the corprat nuws! ... While YOU are on your own
>>> waiting for approvals from all the managers participatiing in the
>>> "event". I just left a place like that.
>>
>> Great. If sailing events are unavailable, I can supply a list of
>> other suitable distractions. Even if management does remember to
>> show up to work occasionally, there are plenty of things to keep
>> them busy
>> that does not involve project management. For example, at one
>> employer, my immediate boss spent the bulk of his day on the phone
>> with various stock brokers, micro managing his portfolio. At a
>> consulting temp job, my immediate boss spent his time playing
>> various computer games.
>>
>> Unfortunately, some managers just cannot be tricked into spending
>> their days with unproductive activities. So, I arranged for a
>> small
>> part of the project to simply not get done. Conveniently, it was
>> well
>> within the expertise of the manager. To pick up the slack, he
>> volunteered to this part of the project, which kept him busy and
>> out
>> of my area. It was great.
>>
>>> Luckily the stock is way down & I dumped the crap already.
>>> Hopefully some manager bought it!!
>>
>> When you're inside, and see all the daily horrors, the company
>> always
>> looks like a disaster in action. You wonder why anyone would want
>> to
>> own the stock. However, on the outside, a proper public relations
>> effort, a dash of creative accounting, and a few bribes to the
>> analysts, can make even the living dead look like a going concern.
>> Perception is everything and largely runs the stock market.
>>
>
> It's sales, gross margins and the balance sheet that impresses the
> serious investor (except for companies that somehow inherited huge
> real estate holdings and the like).
>
Really? An awful lot of supposedly serious investors got burned with the dot.com bomb.