There is a great deal of truth to this.
The (rude) way we used to say it was "we come to work every day to ship code and the rest of the company comes to work to prevent that from happening."
a good middle manager looks like a guy who just drinks coffee and forwards emails, but his actual job is secretly absorbing insane executive requests so the team can just do their work
Users praise middle managers for shielding development teams from disruptive executive demands, citing personal anecdotes of managers absorbing chaos to protect projects.
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One of the most interesting things about building an organization knowing this reality is where in a 4 or 5 level hierarchy this behavior is a positive and where is it a negative.
There's a purposeful seam between "insane request" and "focus on commitments and a shared goal."
There is a great deal of truth to this.
The (rude) way we used to say it was "we come to work every day to ship code and the rest of the company comes to work to prevent that from happening."
Wrote about this a bunch. Here's an excerpt from when I got this feedback from Steve c. 1998 as he was promoted to President of Microsoft.
"054. Steve and Steven Get New Jobs" https://hardcoresoftware.learningbyshipping.com/p/054-steve-and-steven-get-new-jobs
One of the most interesting things about building an organization knowing this reality is where in a 4 or 5 level hierarchy this behavior is a positive and where is it a negative.
There's a purposeful seam between "insane request" and "focus on commitments and a shared goal."
@stevesi every legal and security review, basically
@stevesi Sat in a review where an exec ask cost my propulsion team six months. The manager absorbing that chaos looked like he was just forwarding emails. Turned out he was guarding the launch window.
@stevesi Shielding devs from circus acts, one coffee at a time.
