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TIL that you're no longer allowed to say that a team is fudging their numbers. The new corporate drone speak for that is "we have to examine their practices" You simply can't just be direct and honest about what is obviously happening right in front of everyone's face anymore and everyone is a huge baby about being called out for doing stuff that they obviously shouldn't be doing Like, we're willing to work with you and help you out. We're not saying you all suck. But you're clearly focused on trying to make management happy instead of actually trying to get better as a team
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May 17, 2024 16:42
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Elephant Ambush posted:TIL that you're no longer allowed to say that a team is fudging their numbers. The new corporate drone speak for that is "we have to examine their practices" it's probably that being direct got tried before and it wasted more time with folks getting defensive and bloodthirsty in turn.
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May 17, 2024 17:04
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FAUXTON posted:it's probably that being direct got tried before and it wasted more time with folks getting defensive and bloodthirsty in turn. Probably. My latest was a project management doc I was expected to sign off on, but the "lite" version that they just invented. One page, mostly a template. But it has dev effort and a GA timeline on it. I had to decline with "The assertions being made are not substantiated in this document."
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May 17, 2024 17:13
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I wish American culture was direct like the Dutch.
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May 17, 2024 17:15
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Maybe it's because I'm older and/or notice things that others don't or the fact that I've been at a lot of large companies as a contractor, but literally every single place I've been people always try to hide delays and keep management happy and in the dark, but then when release time comes and they're forced to admit that things aren't fully ready management goes ballistic. Whereas if you inform them of delays as soon as you find out about them, there will definitely be some concern but there's still time to ask for help and make adjustments in order to keep things going. But there are still people who try to hide problems anyway and I just can't wrap my head around it If you have grumpy management then you might get yelled at a little when you inform them of delays, but it will be 100x worse if you hide it and inform them last minute I dunno maybe some people have had really bad experiences at other companies or under other lovely managers but it's still always worse to hide delays until you're forced to admit them
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May 17, 2024 17:16
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Boris Galerkin posted:I wish American culture was direct like the Dutch. I worked at a company a couple years ago and one of the teams was a Dutch company that did contract work for us and they were some of the coolest and best and most professional people I have ever worked with in my 25 years in the corporate world
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May 17, 2024 17:18
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Edit: whoops, should have refreshed, this was about the person saying they can’t say a team is “fudging the numbers”. TBH I wouldn’t be comfortable being that direct in writing unless I’m very sure that that’s what’s happening, and even then it raises the question that if you’re sure then why aren’t you escalating the issue internally and/or reporting it to any regulatory bodies (if you’re in a regulated industry or a publicly traded company).
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May 17, 2024 17:19
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in my experience working with Dutch people they are insanely backbiting and have an oppressive do nothing corporate culture that they pretend doesn't exist because Well We Are Blunt and Honest
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May 17, 2024 17:26
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Elephant Ambush posted:
If you hide it you gamble that someone else will have a bigger delay that you can resolve yours in the shadow of, that the project will be terminated before the delay becomes apparent, or that you'll depart the project before the delay becomes apparent. Notifying management early generally gets you yelled at as much as notifying them late plus you get "assistance" that makes it even worse, so the smart move is often to keep it quiet until you are forced to disclose.
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May 17, 2024 17:28
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In my experience, it's both the crime and the coverup.
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May 17, 2024 17:29
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Elephant Ambush posted:Maybe it's because I'm older and/or notice things that others don't or the fact that I've been at a lot of large companies as a contractor, but literally every single place I've been people always try to hide delays and keep management happy and in the dark, but then when release time comes and they're forced to admit that things aren't fully ready management goes ballistic. Whereas if you inform them of delays as soon as you find out about them, there will definitely be some concern but there's still time to ask for help and make adjustments in order to keep things going. But there are still people who try to hide problems anyway and I just can't wrap my head around it Yeah the way I gave that talk focused on how responsibility, accountability, and blame are different things functionally but not always emotionally, folks can have had 15 years under shitheads who confused all three and shown up at your place with all that proverbial armor still on their back and treat everything like they're personally being called out as the main character. It's not because they love lying, it's because for a long time their good intentions were met with venom. Folks in those places tend to be kind of weird and defensive until someone they somehow trust enough has the compassion and patience to tell them they're not being blamed or judged on their oversights but are expected to be accountable and responsible for getting it right in the end. If they give you that story about past corporate traumas and they still just won't stop doing that poo poo, well, you tried.
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May 17, 2024 17:38
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Elephant Ambush posted:Maybe it's because I'm older and/or notice things that others don't or the fact that I've been at a lot of large companies as a contractor, but literally every single place I've been people always try to hide delays and keep management happy and in the dark, but then when release time comes and they're forced to admit that things aren't fully ready management goes ballistic. Whereas if you inform them of delays as soon as you find out about them, there will definitely be some concern but there's still time to ask for help and make adjustments in order to keep things going. But there are still people who try to hide problems anyway and I just can't wrap my head around it I just watched this happen. Another team has been reporting their project as green and on track for months, and then all of a sudden they flipped it to red, and in danger of not being done in time. The SVP went off on the management over that team. Ya'll can fill in the blanks, but the point he wanted to make was tell me earlier so I can get you resources and tackle any issues before we get to red. We can't bring in contractors or supplement staff on super short notice. We have money, we have resources, just ask for them. Notify them of issues as soon as you can, and bring solutions if possible.
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May 17, 2024 18:01
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Yeah I mean part of my job is compassion and trying to understand what's actually going on instead of jumping to the conclusion that people just suck at their jobs. Every person and team has different ways of working and different needs and another part of my job is to figure that out and ask for the right kind of help from whoever can offer it but one of the things I always find myself repeating is "I can't help solve problems that I don't know about" And with some people and teams I get that it takes time to establish trust in me and my org and management in general so I'm always super patient. But it's just so frustrating and I'm mostly just venting at this point
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May 17, 2024 18:06
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We just did a training on Psychological Safety. It was awesome. The end-stage component of that is feeling safe to put your hand up and say that you made a mistake. That builds on a couple of other components, but once you know that you can give bad news or take accountability for a delay you can accomplish so much more. The first time I had to put my hand up when QC started paperwork on a deviation was terrifying. I knew in my head I was okay, but my guts weren't convinced yet. Most importantly, by doing that and then being still okay, I demonstrated that you are safe doing that. The other two components are being safe to present your ideas and being safe to criticize or question other peoples. When everyone is demonstrating that, you have psychological safety at work. It's a process, not a state.
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May 17, 2024 18:45
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One of my favorite bosses used to say to “approach everyone with love in your heart, we’re all just here to solve the problem together”. I think about that advice a lot. It’s not about you or the other person being a bad person, you’re just all here to solve the problem. Assume the best intentions until you’re shown differently.
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May 17, 2024 18:48
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I would like to applaud a certain building on our campus for being the fourth place to ignore me when I told them to fix their washrooms to have hot water. They just joined the other three in getting written up by the FDA for that. I think that some people either don't know how to read regulations or think they can outsmart them. If the regulation says something like "Facilities must have adequate measures to ensure operator cleanliness during processing," then you have wiggle room. That's the FDA telling you that you can be creative / work-appropriate and create a justification around your systems. You can say that you all wear gloves and use hand sanitizer and then handle product through a glove-box / isolator, therefore the product is clean. But this?  This ain't it. This is not an open-ended guideline. It is remarkably specific by the standards of the Code of Federal Regulations. You do not have flexibility of interpretation here, and yet over and over I end up arguing with people who think somehow they'll be the ones to explain away the hot water requirement. It never works. 
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May 17, 2024 19:01
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Sundae posted:I would like to applaud a certain building on our campus for being the fourth place to ignore me when I told them to fix their washrooms to have hot water. They just joined the other three in getting written up by the FDA for that. I think that some people either don't know how to read regulations or think they can outsmart them. Well, anything above 0 K is "hot" really. I don't see the issue.
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May 17, 2024 19:02
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Boris Galerkin posted:Well, anything above 0 K is "hot" really. I don't see the issue. I would pay good money to be in the room when someone tried to sell that.
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May 17, 2024 19:04
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I spent the past few weeks working on a project for a new manager who is indecisive, anxious and tech-averse. I have been on twelve-hour days every day, and finally had to just cut management off of making any additional last-minute changes in literally the final hours so we could get the project over the finish line. In the middle of all that, I got a physical, and my blood pressure was in stage 2 hypertension. I told my doctor that I figured that to be work related more than nutritional etc and he asked me to monitor from home for a month. First day off that project and my blood pressure is at the low end of the healthy band.
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May 17, 2024 19:10
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Something I’ve noticed lately while idly looking at job postings is that 24/7 on-call is really proliferating in my industry. When I first got into manufacturing, you’d do rotations, but now they seem to want everyone getting woken up every time you have the slightest hiccup at night.
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May 17, 2024 20:43
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tactlessbastard posted:Something I’ve noticed lately while idly looking at job postings is that 24/7 on-call is really proliferating in my industry. When I first got into manufacturing, you’d do rotations, but now they seem to want everyone getting woken up every time you have the slightest hiccup at night. Yep. "Lean" plus 24/7 on-call to make up for the fact that they're actually understaffed. Manufacturing has been going that direction regardless of field for over a decade. It sucks.
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May 17, 2024 20:48
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Sundae, just wondering if you could give an update on the saga of the old creep and the intern. Fine if you can't/won't share details, but I wonder how the issue got resolved (or not). I still chuckle sometimes at 'leave OLD CREEP with HR and he will CONFESS MORE CRIMES'.
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May 17, 2024 20:50
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Sundae posted:I would pay good money to be in the room when someone tried to sell that. Or better yet, be paid good money to be in the room!
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May 17, 2024 20:59
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Elephant Ambush posted:TIL that you're no longer allowed to say that a team is fudging their numbers. The new corporate drone speak for that is "we have to examine their practices" This is like when a government client requested I no longer get included in meetings when they tried to lie about one of their mistakes and I came off mute and said "well, what you are saying isn't true."
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May 17, 2024 21:18
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Clear_Blue posted:Sundae, just wondering if you could give an update on the saga of the old creep and the intern. I can't give too many details, except that it was an unsatisfactory outcome to literally everyone involved. Thanks, HR. Losing all but one of my direct reports in the reorg was actually a bit of a blessing, because it's no longer my problem. EDIT: Oh - one detail I can share because it involves me: HR asked my manager to include, on my performance review, a negative comment that I had failed to manage the situation correctly because the complainant expressed discomfort to HR that I had notified OLD CREEP that he was not to speak to her. My manager called me into his office to talk about it on the phone with HR, where I pointed out that I did that because HR told me, in writing, to notify him not to speak to her, using the exact wording they provided. HR's response was that I "owned the outcome" whether I was following instructions or not. My manager then refused to add the negative comment and said HR should escalate to his manager if they had a problem. They did not escalate. Sundae fucked around with this message at 21:32 on May 17, 2024 |
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May 17, 2024 21:24
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Sundae posted:I can't give too many details, except that it was an unsatisfactory outcome to literally everyone involved. Thanks, HR. Losing all but one of my direct reports in the reorg was actually a bit of a blessing, because it's no longer my problem. lol what the gently caress
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May 17, 2024 21:40
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Sundae posted:EDIT: Oh - one detail I can share because it involves me: HR asked my manager to include, on my performance review, a negative comment that I had failed to manage the situation correctly because the complainant expressed discomfort to HR that I had notified OLD CREEP that he was not to speak to her. My manager called me into his office to talk about it on the phone with HR, where I pointed out that I did that because HR told me, in writing, to notify him not to speak to her, using the exact wording they provided. HR's response was that I "owned the outcome" whether I was following instructions or not. My manager then refused to add the negative comment and said HR should escalate to his manager if they had a problem. They did not escalate. At least your manager seems alright.
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May 17, 2024 21:42
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Awkward Davies posted:lol what the gently caress HR and Legal are a major clusterfuck here. I have several times in my career here refused to do something they have told me (both HR and Legal) because it would either hang me out to dry or potentially be actually illegal. An example was a former contractor who texted me asking for contact information for a higher-up so they could whistleblow something. (He had been fired for cause.) I sent it up to Legal and HR without any response to the former contractor, and Legal replied that I should talk to him myself and see if it was anything important, then escalate it if it is. To which my manager and I said, in slightly more professional form, fuuuuuuck no we're not deciding if it's whistle-worthy. That's your job, Legal. If I think it's worthy and they decide it's not, it leaves me in a pickle where now I have to decide if I'm blowing the whistle, but this time to a regulatory agency, because Legal wouldn't do their job. (Or vice-versa, where I think it's a nothingburger and then it ends up mattering. That's not my job.) Magnetic North posted:At least your manager seems alright. He was pretty good. Not really great at the managing part (he wanted to be just an engineer, but there's no advancement pathway without being a manager too), but he's a decent human being and has empathy for work/life stuff. That's hard enough to find. I'll miss working for him, I think. Sundae fucked around with this message at 21:48 on May 17, 2024 |
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May 17, 2024 21:44
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Sundae posted:HR and Legal are a major clusterfuck here. I have several times in my career here refused to do something they have told me (both HR and Legal) because it would either hang me out to dry or potentially be actually illegal. do you work at a place that pays bounties for getting people fired? what the hell
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May 17, 2024 22:00
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What management wants to hear (truth, greyness, lie until the last minute etc.) depends very much on the management in charge. And the optics, phase of the moon, and how their bonus’ are affected. The whole no advancement as an engineer without getting in to management thing does really suck though, there isn’t really a path to be a highly paid IC in the way doctoring or lawyering does. Not impossible, but effectively so due to rarity of opportunity. And in my previous but sucked me back in industry, lots of talking heads complain about the coming shortage of deeply technical people, due to the good ones going in to management. Yet for some reason the people that are good at numbers make career choices based on numbers 
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May 17, 2024 22:24
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Sundae posted:I can't give too many details, except that it was an unsatisfactory outcome to literally everyone involved. Thanks, HR. Losing all but one of my direct reports in the reorg was actually a bit of a blessing, because it's no longer my problem. lmfao what
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May 17, 2024 22:32
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Sundae posted:it was an unsatisfactory outcome to literally everyone involved. Thanks, HR. Truly, the most Corporate of outcomes.
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May 17, 2024 23:02
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I was just thinking today about how much executives want to replace employees with ai, but how much more liability corporate is going to expose themselves to when they don't have deniability. Like when Wells Fargo executives told Wells Fargo management to increase signups and WF management strongarmed WF tellers into enrolling customers into accounts they didn't want. How are you going to tell a chatbot to do that? How is that not going to be recorded?
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May 18, 2024 02:09
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Just keep doing what they're doing Let megacorps lobby the government to make their crimes no longer crimes.
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May 18, 2024 02:23
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in a well actually posted:I was just thinking today about how much executives want to replace employees with ai, but how much more liability corporate is going to expose themselves to when they don't have deniability. You set a reward metric based on accounts opened and the AI does the needful. It's probably better at blindly achieving a goal without evidence. When you get caught it's just that tricky ai programming stuff, not the fault of any people at all.
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May 18, 2024 03:11
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machine learning is money laundering for bias + infinite paperclip machine = true late stage capitalism
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May 18, 2024 04:04
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ML is a legit use of "AI" you're probably thinking of LLM.
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May 18, 2024 04:13
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I’m just desperately holding it together hoping to cobble together some sort of leanFIRE situation before AI takes my job.
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May 18, 2024 04:17
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Other teams: We've invented a new level of priority called Tier 0 <shows sprawling chart full of endless horrors of project management> My Team: We've been told product is out until September, so lets go catch an american football game as a team. Oh none of you have time? We'll send you pictures.
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May 18, 2024 05:17
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mllaneza posted:We just did a training on Psychological Safety. It was awesome. The end-stage component of that is feeling safe to put your hand up and say that you made a mistake. That builds on a couple of other components, but once you know that you can give bad news or take accountability for a delay you can accomplish so much more. So many places want to have this, but seem to want to drive it by having lower level people just take massive risks with their careers rather than trying to actually make a safe environment. I certainly have no evidence that it is safe to question certain people's ideas, and a great deal of evidence that it's actually terribly unsafe. Problem is, the person in thinking of is constantly switching ideas and randomly interacting with stuff the people on my team have been working on for months, deciding by whims their well thought out work is dumb and his sudden new notion needs to be the direction we should have been following from the start. But he's the one the svp loves to chat with on the weekends, and having even slight pushback to him has damaged several other technical peoples jobs so far, some demoted, others left company, or just kinda targeted. He's competent but not extraordinary in his technical capacity, but what's truly impressive about him is how any credit for successful work he's ever in the vicinity of accrues to him, while any blame of disasters or potential disasters only avoided by other people's heroic efforts slide away from him and stick somewhere else. No wonder the executives love him!!
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May 18, 2024 14:11
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