No offense intended, but in your comment it comes off a bit selfish and bears the hallmarks of a classic archetype of terrible manager. I'd never willingly work for you. Being in management isn't for everyone, it's a people-focused domain. The whole job is about supporting the team and setting things up for successful outcomes.
There is nothing wrong with being an individual contributor. If your organization limits how far ICs can go, take this as a sign of toxicity and consider finding a higher quality organization to join.
Thanks for the feedback.
But, just to provide some context you're missing, I had someone promoted the last promo cycle without any mention of features or new products in her packet. It was entirely support work, tackling tech debt, etc, all of which was stuff she personally was passionate about, and which had led to her being passed over for promotion -for years- prior to my managing the team.
The incentive I'm working to create is "document your successes so we can ensure they're visible", not "focus on work that is by its nature highly visible", and, yes, definitely not "ignore the visibility of your work and rely entirely on your manager instead". It's no different than "maintain a brag sheet", except that I want them to be aware how that brag sheet feeds into the actual promo packet, and provides a common place for us to connect and discuss. If that means you'd never work for me...okay.
I'd be curious to understand what exactly you feel my points were, and why you think differently. I can't help but feel like I must be missing something or misunderstanding your comment.
Fortunately we're unlikely to ever collide in real life :). Again, I mean no disrespect. Genuinely would like to understand your point and see how it maps to higher overall team health and better output.
You've persuaded me. You don't sound bad at all, and I'm confident I'd actually like working with you, and I apologize for jumping to conclusions prematurely.
Note to self: Ask better questions first.
Best wishes~
>> moving the burden to the ICs means they will be incentivized to focus on Promo Packet instead of real work
Such has not been the case. In fact, I've had to repeatedly remind people to add things to their promo packet. The point is that documenting successes as they happen means they get to own their own visibility; I've walked into multiple teams where people chafed at being passed over, because their past managers didn't have suitable visibility on their successes, and so while the IC was like "I have achieved all these amazing things!", the manager was like "I can't make a strong enough case for them", and the net result was no promotion and poor morale. To fix that, I could either insert myself into everything to know who is doing what (slowing everything down, taking away their feelings of autonomy, and taking up all my time in doing so), and still risk missing things, or I can ask individuals to maintain a brag sheet that I can then rework into something to submit at promo time. Every task has value on a promo packet now, not just those leadership cares about/remembers, and in practice it has meant people take work that grows and challenges them, rather than just work that has innately high visibility.
>> your comment you come off a bit selfish and bear the hallmarks of a classic archetype of terrible manager
I mean, you're entitled to your own read on it, but in my book a terrible manager is someone who insists on inserting themselves into every little thing rather than trusting their team, giving them autonomy, and instead spending their time looking for ways for the team to function better, while clearing out people/organization/process obstacles. I've had multiple people say I'm the best manager they've ever had, as well as one person memorably fighting back tears when I told them I'd gotten them promoted (with a packet they filled out, then I reworked, as mentioned above) after years of being passed over for doing work that wasn't high visibility. You mean no disrespect/no offense you say, but that's a hell of a follow up, that I 'come off as selfish and bear the hallmarks of a class archetype of a terrible manager'. I'm not sure how to say this politely, but if you want people to engage with you, you really need to learn how to not come across as offensive; just saying you don't mean to be doesn't really cut it.
>> The whole job is about supporting the team and setting things up for successful outcomes. There is nothing wrong with being an individual contributor. If your organization limits how far ICs can go, take this as a sign of toxicity and consider finding a higher quality organization to join.
All of this feels very much a non-sequitor; I have no idea what I said that you think this runs counter to (since I agree with every word of it), and so I disagree with the implication that this is a relevant argument.
Thats a benefit to having ICs run their promo process.
Generally, I think freedom to have anyone drive an ICs promo process is better than forcing it to be one group or another. The IC might be best for it, or the manager might.
Regardless of who it is, the IC can work at gaming the system, that's just the nature of systems and abuse
So the GP comes on here, sharing a perfectly nice and candid opinion, and our friend sees the chance of a lifetime ("terrible manager", "would never work under you", "management isn't for everyone", "find a higher-quality organisation", etc). Simples.
