> We have all worked for a "John" in the industry.
Agreed. But since so many middle managers are twits isn't it incumbent on the employee to learn a set of skills to deal with Johns?
Managing people is hard. Being a good manager is really hard, which is why there are so few of them.
Rather than rail against how terrible Person X is as a manager I feel like it's more productive to say, "Unless I start my own company there's always going to be some clueless middle manager above me. How do I deal with him/her effectively?"
My current manager where I work is pretty cool. We get along pretty well, and I don't mind working for them. However, I think my manager's manager is...umm, well, let's just say "not very good at their job", fairly close to the "John" in this story.
If my current manager quit or was fired or died, and I had to work for their manager, I probably would quit before I learned to effectively work with "John"; the job market is pretty good for engineers right now, why the hell not?
These are multiplier soft skills. For example, we already know that a people manager that can manage brilliant people with otherwise toxic personality defects is worth a lot, but we have yet to explore the worker that can manage up a people manager with toxic personality defects. I personally only encountered this kind of a manger once, and was fortunate that I could transfer somewhere else in the same company quickly (the guy only lasted a year, but it would have been a hard year....).
Agreed. But since so many middle managers are twits isn't it incumbent on the employee to learn a set of skills to deal with Johns?
Managing people is hard. Being a good manager is really hard, which is why there are so few of them.
Rather than rail against how terrible Person X is as a manager I feel like it's more productive to say, "Unless I start my own company there's always going to be some clueless middle manager above me. How do I deal with him/her effectively?"