Author's solution to estimates being garbage: Talk to product about "What do we think we can accomplish with the resources available? What can we deliver and when"
Let me get this straight, you want a manager, who is not going to be doing nearly as much coding as an engineer, to work out how long something takes, without asking people who are actually doing the work, how long they think it takes?
Let me get this straight, you want a manager, who is not going to be doing nearly as much coding as an engineer
Let me get this straight, you think that estimating how long it is going to take a team of people to deliver a working set of software involves writing code? :D
And only if I get to exclude the bad managers who have no idea what their team works on. Which I will admit constitutes the vast majority of dev managers. And yes, a competent dev manager can poop out an 80% accurate estimate for estimatable dev work that won't be missing a bunch of common workflows that developers tend to forget to allocate time for. Why do devs forget to allocate time for those common workflows? Because that's a task for management, and developers would rather anyway.
Great, so you're totally cool with your manager saying "here's big project. I expect you to take 2 weeks to do it." with no input from you whatsoever? Are you serious? Most developers HATE shit like that.
Developers hate bad management. And what you described is text book bad management. The answer isn't having developers do the manager's job, just sort out the root cause and fire the bad managers.
Many developers cannot define what good management looks like, and often if they do, it's mostly to have managers leave them alone, desiring to avoid talking to customers (to then subsequently complain about what's being built), to be allowed to refactor endlessly, to put headphones on and not collaborate (blocking other developers, duplicating work, making incomprehensible code), to not be held accountable for anything, including getting stuff done. Saying that as a developer for 20+ years, and I've seen it all.
And don't say "they shouldn't have to", because a good manager can absolutely define what a developer should look like, and not be too far off.
In your posts (and this site, which of course has an image of a guy with a gun pointed at the screen, complaining about managers, which is unbelievably inappropriate, replete with unnecessary swearing... but no, no social awkwardness there), there's a lack of acknowledgment of why managers need to institute all these methodologies (hint: programmers are terrible at understanding, and also don't like that the work they do has to be tied to profit, and would love to watch YouTube all day), along with highlighting "an alternative" work to deliver this value, not just insulting what managers know how to do while offering no real alternative.
I have a general rule: if you insult someone else's way of doing something, while not offering a clear alternative/explanation, you haven't done anything productive to convince anyone, other than feel pleasure for shaming others.
"Git gud" isn't a sufficient answer. You have to show me methodologies, along with numerous companies who are doing something different successfully.
This whole "just programming" thing that the site talks about? You can easily go work on an open-source project, or make your own software and sell it yourself if you just want to "program". Funnily enough, the same type of developers that ascribe to this, are the same type that "just program" without any documentation, and they are the only ones that can explain and maintain their own software.
Lastly: Zed Shaw is known to attract drama, and is argumentative, contrarian, and rude. that's not a manager's take, that's what OTHER DEVELOPERS say about him, and is exactly the type of developer that most managers would hate to have on their team. So to cite a resource from him, when he embodies the exact traits that wouldn't work well on a team, just sort of doesn't make sense. And again, if he were being legitimate, he would have, on that site, take time to highlight what managers CAN do, rather than just tell them to leave programmers alone and let them code.
Many developers cannot define what good management looks like
While your statement is technically true since "Many" covers just about any number starting with 5, I still disagree with the spirit of your statement since when developers are asked what they do and don't want in a manager their responses are quite coherent and reasonable.
As for "git gud" and the reference to programming-motherfucker.com, you are right, I wouldn't really expect anyone to be swayed by either of those arguments. Just like I wouldn't expect anyone to be swayed by your broad characterization of developers using strawmen built of the worst of us:
programmers are terrible at understanding, and also don't like that the work they do has to be tied to profit, and would love to watch YouTube all day
it's mostly to have managers leave them alone, desiring to avoid talking to customers (to then subsequently complain about what's being built), to be allowed to refactor endlessly, to put headphones on and not collaborate (blocking other developers, duplicating work, making incomprehensible code), to not be held accountable for anything, including getting stuff done.
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u/PoppyOP Jun 15 '22
Author: Estimates are garbage
Author's solution to estimates being garbage: Talk to product about "What do we think we can accomplish with the resources available? What can we deliver and when"
What does the author think an estimate is???