This Business and Moment...
- Thread starter randomshenans
- Start date
Well done! And good luck with the job search.
That useless PM was annoying me again today and with the most petty of requests... He was trying to get me to sort out the authorisation of a order which I can't do myself and he knows this. He could have saved us all a load of time by going to the person he named directly. Instead he gets me to copy them in the email. Wondering when he will realise it will be easier to email the person directly, but this is the second time he has done this... I think next time I will just reply with 'please speak to them directly'.
- Joined
- 11 Sep 2009
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- 14,064
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- France, Alsace
I bet you do. Well done for putting yourself first!
Not been here in a while. Not in here really! Lurking, just not posting. Lots going on really. Loads. At once. Trying to stay sane at work at the moment, but at least it's not like above working 750475 hours, so I can cope for a while.
Yeah, gotta look after number 1...
Just re-doing my CV, trying to make it 1337.
Funnily enough, I just started thinking about some of the CVs I've seen over the years for people I've had to interview, the other day a CV came in for someone to interview who's CV was 14 pages!!11 fourteen ****** pages!!!11
He even had like, a signature section at the bottom, where it said something like "I hereby certify that the information provided above, is true accurate... yada yada" with his bloody signature, like it was a mortgage application or something... Never seen anything like it
(He didn't even turn up for the phonescreen)
Thanks for the advice, spent the last couple of days hashing out the contract to make sure its as IR35 proof as possible. 2 days a week, no working hours or location stipulated, clear defined project objectives and in theory the ability to send a substitute to perform the role for me. I think I covered all the bases.
Not based purely on what he's written IMO.
Yes, my boss asked me how I was feeling after I resigned with no job lined up (also 3 month notice) and "relieved" was the main thing that came to mind. It was like a weight lifted from my shoulders and there was light at the end of the tunnel, something to look forward to.
I don’t think so, the whole thing is a product of hubris and being over ambitious, it’s affecting everybody in the team not just me.
Basically, we went far too fast and had too many people doing so many different things at once, in an uncoordinated rush.
The end result is a sort of technical birds nest of misery, where the system is now so complex and poorly understood that even making what would normally be simple or basic changes, results in incidents.
The problem is that program managers, VPs and the like, think that we can continue going at the same speed we were before and not have any issues, but we can’t.
It’s a bit like running on tarmac, then suddenly you’re knee deep in mud, and people are horse-whipping you and don’t understand why you’ve suddenly slowed down.
Yes.
Man, last night I felt more relaxed than I had done for ages, closed my laptop at 1800 on the dot, ignored slack, had dinner and chilled. Then I put BB King on grabbed a drink and started working through my CV, the feeling of relief is very pleasant indeed.
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It shows that there's no portfolio alignment. What worked when scaling up with a large number of staff will not work now with budget constraints as more projects than local talent pools allow easily without investing in people's abilities (even hiring as apprenticeships).
I've had direct experience of picking up a number of services that had some serious issues - like being based on services without having the risks signed off by the CEO risk delegate of the region (I was on calls with the UK board risk officer sorting their crap out), that had third party vendors patch security holes in things and I had to sort out the operational finances (read they had no operational budget) for an adopted service.. I've had to sort out product management volume figures based on simply going to the mobile app team for numbers rather than using gartner market % reports (lol) for my commercial renegotiation of their contracts to sort their crap out.
There's an certain amount of not doing the right thing - people cut corners or simply don't go beyond their role definition but yes.. it sounds like the project/programme managers are simply trying on the "do more for less" and then wonder why they have "cultural issues" or resourcing issues. This actually becomes a serious risk to the operation of the business and should be addressed quickly.
Bingo. I should have read the entire thread before responding.
What happens when you have a large hierarchy of non-invested leadership, all too busy attempting to hide the problems out of fear and a veil of obscurity covers the issues from higher up. The issue is that tree also attempts to penalise anyone that talks out of turn, or minions that don't sacrifice themselves etc etc.
This is why I have a problem with program-project only run deliveries - they focus on delivery but not the customer product. The business should be invested, it should be own it and not be at arms length interfacing with a programme manager.
When was the last time a business budget owner attended the planning sessions?
With a do or be fired is it doesn't work with a competitive skills market.
Oddly I applied to be a Senior Technical Program Manager yesterday. I don't tend to hold my punches, so I suspect I'll probably not get into the role.
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Congrats @Screeeech, hope you can start enjoying your life again!
Yes, it's a great feeling. Good luck with the future.
Final interview for somewhere tomorrow, no idea what I'll do if I get offered the role as whilst I've been kind of keeping my eye out and I'm not happy with some things where I am, I still don't know if I'd actually leave.
I've got it easy where I am, pay is good, work is relatively easy for me as I've been doing it so long so not a huge challenge anymore, but it gives me a relatively easy life of it albeit having to deal with all the corporate crap that comes with the job.
First world problem but be interesting to see if it's a decision I have to make!
I've got it easy where I am, pay is good, work is relatively easy for me as I've been doing it so long so not a huge challenge anymore, but it gives me a relatively easy life of it albeit having to deal with all the corporate crap that comes with the job.
First world problem but be interesting to see if it's a decision I have to make!
Had a meeting with my manager on Friday, it was awkward and annoying, as I expected.
It started off with him asking me how I felt or if there was anything I wanted to say, I initially kept it pretty brief.
I explained that I really don’t like how we run things, how we’re expected to accept ridiculous project end dates, which are purposely rigged to be unachievable.
When the inevitable happens - you’re expected to have a rock solid reason for why you didn’t meet the deadline, when the ******** deadline wasn’t achievable in the first place.
I basically told him that I simply can’t be arsed to go on calls and explain the bleedin’ ******* obvious, that date xyz was impossible, to people who just don’t understand or accept reality, every week.
His typical response was to claim that I “don’t understand the role” and that the types of problems we get to solve are unique and difficult, and that should be expected, it’s meant to be difficult.
However, as I explained to him - it’s not the technical difficulty of the work that’s the problem. It’s the fact that every project you work on is already 2 months behind, on fire and knackered by the time you get it.
By the time you start work on it, the only option is to engage brute force and wrestle it to completion, causing incidents, outages and have people working till 3am every day, along the way, it’s a totally miserable and unrealistic way to deliver things.
All of this pain - the result of program managers and VPs who want to burn the teams at 400%, where nobody in any of these teams ever dares to say no to anything.
Of course, when I point out that in the last 6 months we’ve lost, over 10 people from a team of around 40, he didn’t seem to think it had anything to do with how broken things are.. (4 of those people quit less than 12 months from their start date)
My manager is one of those people who seems to have a distinct inability to see things from the perspective of others. It’s something that I’ve practised very hard at over the years - to try and put myself in the shoes of others.
Case in point, when I went on a call last week with him and the program manager to explain why the project wasn’t hitting their ridiculous dates, he wanted me to explain and back up the reasons why I wasn’t meeting them.
It was ridiculous because it felt like someone was asking us to jump 50 feet in the air. Then when we only managed to make 5 feet, we had to come up with some reasoned eclectic argument as to why we only managed 5 feet.
In that sort of situation I’d expect a good manager to not even put technical staff in that position in the first place, and make an attempt to defend them and push back on silly requirements. Any manager worth their salt would see the warning signs, but this guy just doesn’t get it, if 10 more quit he still won’t get it.
Anyway ranting now, but 3 days after deciding to resign I definitely have no regrets at all.
It started off with him asking me how I felt or if there was anything I wanted to say, I initially kept it pretty brief.
I explained that I really don’t like how we run things, how we’re expected to accept ridiculous project end dates, which are purposely rigged to be unachievable.
When the inevitable happens - you’re expected to have a rock solid reason for why you didn’t meet the deadline, when the ******** deadline wasn’t achievable in the first place.
I basically told him that I simply can’t be arsed to go on calls and explain the bleedin’ ******* obvious, that date xyz was impossible, to people who just don’t understand or accept reality, every week.
His typical response was to claim that I “don’t understand the role” and that the types of problems we get to solve are unique and difficult, and that should be expected, it’s meant to be difficult.
However, as I explained to him - it’s not the technical difficulty of the work that’s the problem. It’s the fact that every project you work on is already 2 months behind, on fire and knackered by the time you get it.
By the time you start work on it, the only option is to engage brute force and wrestle it to completion, causing incidents, outages and have people working till 3am every day, along the way, it’s a totally miserable and unrealistic way to deliver things.
All of this pain - the result of program managers and VPs who want to burn the teams at 400%, where nobody in any of these teams ever dares to say no to anything.
Of course, when I point out that in the last 6 months we’ve lost, over 10 people from a team of around 40, he didn’t seem to think it had anything to do with how broken things are.. (4 of those people quit less than 12 months from their start date)
My manager is one of those people who seems to have a distinct inability to see things from the perspective of others. It’s something that I’ve practised very hard at over the years - to try and put myself in the shoes of others.
Case in point, when I went on a call last week with him and the program manager to explain why the project wasn’t hitting their ridiculous dates, he wanted me to explain and back up the reasons why I wasn’t meeting them.
It was ridiculous because it felt like someone was asking us to jump 50 feet in the air. Then when we only managed to make 5 feet, we had to come up with some reasoned eclectic argument as to why we only managed 5 feet.
In that sort of situation I’d expect a good manager to not even put technical staff in that position in the first place, and make an attempt to defend them and push back on silly requirements. Any manager worth their salt would see the warning signs, but this guy just doesn’t get it, if 10 more quit he still won’t get it.
Anyway ranting now, but 3 days after deciding to resign I definitely have no regrets at all.
I can see why, did they try and offer anything to retain you? I guess as you've quit over issues the manager disagrees with rather than over pay etc.. then presumably not?
Gotta be refreshing though, now you can clock off/not feel the need to stay late and if they're dumb enough to ask you to explain why some deadline wasn't met in your notice period you can just shrug: "it will be done when it's done, I'll work on it but I'm not staying late..."
Anyway, congrats
That reminds of a meeting I was once at where I was asked to explain the process on a project that had started 3 (maybe more) months previously based on the project plan in front of us. Unfortunately upper management had not included any of the people doing the project, including myself in any communication or meetings that the project had started or that we were on it.
Bit awkward.
Unrealistic deadlines trends to be habit or cultural in an organization. It's unlikely to change. I've walked myself when I've realized it wasn't working out over similar.
Bit awkward.
Unrealistic deadlines trends to be habit or cultural in an organization. It's unlikely to change. I've walked myself when I've realized it wasn't working out over similar.
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I've never encountered a manager who when they are the reason though unreasonableness that people are quitting in doves is anything other than of the opinion these people were deadwood.