Every attempt to manage academia makes it worse

Re:Every attempt to manage academia makes it worse by sevensor on Monday April 03, 2017 @11:01AM (#14023197)

From ground level, though, it's really easy to see the dysfunctional cultures growing up around metrics. At the factory where I used to work, we'd zig-zag from metric to metric. Yield one quarter, Cpk the next, scrap rate the quarter after that. Special cross-departmental teams to manage the metric. Regardless of which metric was chosen, people would do really dumb things to try to meet it. If scrap rate was the metric, we'd send terrible material through the line to keep the scrap rate low. If yield was the metric, we'd scrap anything that was even slightly abnormal. Cpk was the worst (or maybe the best), because we just adjusted our spec limits until Cpk was acceptable.

The better managers translated the quantitative metrics into qualitative guidance for their teams. The worse managers provided no such buffer and instead made their teams achieve metrics by any means necessary.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Every attempt to manage academia makes it worse by rattray on Monday April 03, 2017 @01:12PM (#14024768)

> The better managers translated the quantitative metrics into qualitative guidance for their teams. The worse managers provided no such buffer and instead made their teams achieve metrics by any means necessary.

This seems like a key insight.

Metrics are key to good management – but metrics are for the managers, not for the teams. Managers that pass metrics directly down to their teams as goals aren't doing their jobs; they're trying to make their team do their job.

Maybe. Thoughts?

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Every attempt to manage academia makes it worse by sevensor on Monday April 03, 2017 @03:22PM (#14026186)

Agreed. What I left out is that being a good manager can be really hard. If this quarter, the metric is scrap, and you've already exceeded your scrap budget, you have to be willing to tell your people to scrap bad material anyway. You have to do that, knowing that you're going to get raked over the coals in the managers' meeting. Knowing that it's going to count against you at review time. Knowing that the people you manage mostly don't understand that you're all that stands between them and the torrent of abuse. Middle management is a hard job.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Every attempt to manage academia makes it worse by hobs on Tuesday April 04, 2017 @09:53AM (#14032571)

I sense a "its hard but its good" theme in this post, and frankly, I disagree.

Making middle managers accountable for the failure of executives to manage their company, effectively just insulates those people who made decisions from those who know they are terrible decisions.

I was a middle manager who had to do this very thing, and even though my company was happy due to making gobs of money, every review I had was terrible because I wasn't hitting the metric of the month (that generally ended in horrible burn out and hiring even more replaceable people) and I was constantly warned that "You wont bonus this month."

I never got a bonus while I worked there, and yet was highly respected and valued by all my employees.

When I left the company the other great managers followed me, and the business folded, having hundreds of people lose their jobs.

So tell me, why would anyone want this or claim that this type of decision making is "good management"?

Why setup a system that punishes those that help the business and deliver actual value to customers instead of meaningless metrics?

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Every attempt to manage academia makes it worse by codys on Monday April 03, 2017 @02:39PM (#14025721)

> Metrics are key to good management

This doesn't follow from the GP's comment. All we know from that comment is that Metrics + some managers = bad.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Every attempt to manage academia makes it worse by sqeaky on Monday April 03, 2017 @03:06PM (#14026013)

Parachutes are key to survival when jumping from airplanes. Doesn't mean they always work or are always used correctly.

Maybe this is a matter of necessary but not sufficient? I have no strong opinion, I am just pointing at a grey area.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Every attempt to manage academia makes it worse by willhslade on Monday April 03, 2017 @02:56PM (#14025931)

Guys, this one is self aware!

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Every attempt to manage academia makes it worse by portent on Monday April 03, 2017 @04:50PM (#14027012)

This article by Ben Horowitz seems relevant - he mentions his history of managing teams by metrics. I like this quote:

"Management purely by numbers is sort of like painting by numbers—it’s strictly for amateurs."

http://a16z.com/2011/07/19/when-employees-misinterpret-manag...

[ Parent | on HN ]