Management types think technical types do magic.

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

“Can you magic this” “Can you magic that”

Over time they get used to the fact we can just do stuff. They have no idea how we do it. They just know they can put out a request and it will invariably be fulfilled.

What they don’t know is - we have no idea how to do it until we spend some time messing about and researching it, and working out how to do it. It’s not rocket science (or maybe it is - Maybe rocket science is people messing about and researching until something works)

My own boss’ occasional request is a “can you fix” (or “will you fix”) request. To which my usual reply is “I’ll see what I can do” followed usually by a reply stating that it’s fixed and what caused it to go wrong in the first place.

We’re (or I’m) talking about levels of magic far lower than the stuff that happens in the IT world these days. The stuff that makes us technical types think ‘magic’ and go ‘wow! how the **** did they do that?’

2

I hate working for management that has no technical experience … or even curiosity. They think we just wiggle our fingers over the keyboard and play with the mouse a little, and everything magically gets done. And I love it when they make an impossible demand, adding “I know I can count on you, because you’re so good at this sort of thing.”

3

Huh. We encourage that sort of thinking where I work. I’m forever having to tell management/internal customers “Don’t tell me how you want it done, just tell me what you want accomplished. Leave the rest to me.” After all, it’s not their job to know how they want this stuff done—that’s why they keep me around.

Besides, most of the time when they think they know how something works, they’re wrong. Either flat wrong, or wrong in the sense that what they’re asking for would work, but not very well.

4

I’ve been the “Tech Guy” for my company for so long it’s ammusing for me now as a manager to take that approach.
“Just get it done” I say, and off they go without my knowing how.

My background does make me a better, more understanding, manager though.

5

As a one-time design engineer (semiconductor devices), I remember getting constant requests for the impossible. You have to (patiently) explain just what is doable. Unfortunately, management takes this as insubordination-sometimes, you have to put your foot down.

6

Oh, heck yes! I remember explaining to our CEO that it simply would not be possible to do what he wanted in the way he wanted in the timeframe our client gave us given the equipment we had and why it couldn’t be done, only to be told, “Oh, now you’re being practical.” I looked him dead in the eye and told him, “Yes. That’s what you pay me for.”

In that same company, the manager 2 levels above me and one below that CEO freely admitted he knew nothing about what I did and compared it to voodoo, so, when he asked me about one project, I told him I’d submit a requisition for chicken bones and incense. :wink:

7

Fun story:

A few years back, my manager came to me and said, “Do you know INTERCAL*?”

I said, “No. Why?” (Never ask why. It only encourages them.)

“We need some code written in it real fast. Project Doomfest** is depending on it. No one else we’ve asked knows anything about it.”

“Then why are we using it?”

“Because the third party that wrote most of the software used it, until they went out of business last week. It’s too late to rewrite it in something else.”

“Well, I don’t know the language. Sorry.”

“I’m sure you can figure out enough of it to add this module. It’s a pretty small change. Here’s the requirements document. How long do you think it will take?”

I blinked at him for a moment, then opened my desk drawer and took out a small pouch. You see, I happened to have a small bag of cleaned bones I was planning to use for a prop in a game. I dumped the bones in my hand, rattled them around a bit, and cast them on the table. After peering at them for a few moments, I said, “Three weeks, if it can be done at all.***”

My manager, being somewhat accustomed to my quirks, just looked at me oddly, and asked, “What’s with the bones?”

“Well, you’re already asking me to work magic. I might as well use it on the time estimate, too.”
*It wasn’t actually INTERCAL, but it was something cryptic that I didn’t know anything about at the time. INTERCAL stands for “Compiler Language With No Pronounceable Acronym”, by the way.

**The project name wasn’t actually Doomfest. This was because the manager in charge of it was in denial.

***I had it ready in two and a half weeks. It didn’t save the project, though.

8

Needed more Come From loops, clearly.

9

At a previous job (designing for print), a management person was telling a visitor “Oh, it’s all so easy nowadays. They just hit some buttons and it goes straight to the printer!” (The printer being the professional printing company, not the office printer.)

Ah, but which buttons do we hit?

Oh yeah, that’s my favorite thing ever.

10

He gave you a requirements document? And not a half thought through, unintelligible, intracontradictory set of verbal instructions?
Lucky.

11

You must understand that our “requirements documents” are often straight transcriptions of the half-thought-out, unintelligible, self-contradictory verbal instructions…drawn from the end of a long game of “Telephone” with the customer. With transcription errors added. (Although those sometimes actually improve them.)

12

What kind of companies do you people work at? I’m happy to say that pretty much all my management knows what they are doing. In three companies over 30 years I’ve never heard a request for “magic.” One guy was a doofus, but even he wasn’t that bad.

13

Nonprofit substance abuse recovery program.
I do the magic. I’m just never sure exactly how.

14

That’s awesome. I need to get me some bones.

15

Why would you expect other people to have curiosity or interest in what you trained for? I’m in IT support and I couldn’t care less about how the geeks do their job. I’d be much happier if they did it without whining about it. After all, it’s their job.

16

When I get a request like these, I say “I know you think I can create anything from vapor, but you must at least give me the vapor!”

17

Grins. When facing ridiculously short deadlines (I had an employer who specialized in them), I’ve sometimes said, “I’m going to need another couple of loaves and some fishes.”

18

Well, I think you people need to ask yourselves why you are working for companies where management has no knowledge or conception of what you do. For me, that’s usually a red flag that I’m working at the wrong place.

Personally, I think the technology field is the worst field to work in, unless maybe you work for Google or something. The hours are shit. People in technology tend to range from smug and arrogant to condescending and bitter, probably from years of having to meet ridiculous deadlines for ignorant and unsympathetic managers. Technology tends to be viewed as a separate entity outside the rest of the corporate culture. And finally you are constantly in danger of being outsourced or becoming obsolete.

19

I’m one of the management types asking the techies to do stuff.

The problem I have is quite the opposite: I’ve spent enough years working in tech companies alongside developers to appreciate the magnitude of the planning, resourcing and thought that has to be achieved before the work can even start.

I am also quick to realise when something is logically impossible, and can sometimes make suggestions and create workflows that are better than the developers’, even though the maximum extent of my programming ability is a bit of JavaScript and PHP.

The result of this experience is that I don’t make unreasonable demands, and I often get sucked into the developers’ dramas.

Or in other words, I’m a pussy.

20

I’m often asked by my higher-ups to do things that only I know how to do/can do/willing and able to do. I like to handle these “impossible” taskings the same way as Scottie did (will do?).

“Overhaul the warp engines, replace the dylithium crytals, rephase the tractor beam and align the phasers? Can’t be done in less than three weeks, Cap’n.”

“Well, get on it Scottie. We’ve got two cloaked Klingon cruisers bearing down on us right now!”

15 minutes later…

“All done, cap’n. You’ve got warp drive and phasers.”

“You’re a fuckin’ miracle worker, Scottie!”

“Aye, cap’n, I am.”