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January 13, 2005
Where have all the "Techies" gone?
Has anybody else out there noticed that almost all the managers these days are people who have never done the jobs that they manage? It seems that more and more, if you are someone who can actually do something, rather than ask for reports on performance, request new forms to be filled in, or re-arrange everyone's job titles, working arrangements, and pay levels, you are unlikely to be promoted out of the job you are doing. "Management" has become a "specialist" function that you enter at stratospheric heights without ever having had contact with the actual workface.
Looking around me I find that all those filling management roles today seem to have come in at middle or upper middle management level direct from university (MBA or similar degree) and then hop and skip from one "management" position as "head" of different functions, frequently "managing" quite complex technical areas with a staff of highly qualified (and definitely lower paid) staff whose work and often their needs are completely beyond those managers' comprehension. These so-called managers make the most amazing strategic decisions without any reference to the people they manage or to the complexity of the functions affected, usually by simply rendering everything down to the simplistic question - "What does it cost?" Or, more accurately, that famous buzz-phrase, "What's the bottom line on this?" It seems to be a defining feature of these managers that they understand nothing but the cost of everything; its intrisic value is beyond their grasp, and frequently how whatever it is is done, what it actually contributes, and what will cease to actually function if it is not done or provided is never understood.
A good example of this is provided by the events following a rail disaster in the UK which identified a need for renewal and replacement of large sections of track. British Rail had last placed an order with the then British Steel for track in approximately 1974. Some bright spark in the newly formed Railtrack around 1995 phoned British Steel (by now under new management) and wanted to know how soon the company could supply some 200 miles of new track and was surprised when told that it would take at least six months to (a) find the dies and extrusion machines for making it, (b) set them up, and (c) to actually find the recipe for the steel, assemble the right ore mixtures, and run the smelters and pourers. As far as I am aware they never did place the order - at least not with British Steel! It seems to have escaped the "managers" of Whitehall that if a company hasn't got a market for something they aren't going to make any, and it certainly isn't viable to keep a factory stood idle for 20 years or more so it can produce railway tracklines at the drop of a hat!
Other examples of this sort of stupidity abound, going right from the start of the rise of the management age - cancel all capital ship building for 10 years and then - expect the factory that makes the 15 inch guns to be still operational and ready to produce at a moments notice, cancel all UK combat aircraft orders - and then act surprised when you can't buy any British made aircraft, and many many more similar examples - and that's just the civil service! It seems, sadly, to be a Europe-wide phenomenon, now, as more and more frequently one meets engineers, chemists, doctors, and now fire safety and fire fighting specialists who find themselves being buried under layers of "management" and having to explain at great length the need to fund or do something vital. The cry of the manager of every function of which he or she has no understanding whatsoever is "Put together a business case so I can take it to the board!"
What really beggars belief is that they expect the "Technical Specialist" who is supposed to be "facilitated" by being freed up from having to manage his or her function to focus on their area of expertise, is now also expected to be able, at a moments notice and on top of their "real" work, to do something which is the function of the "manager" who is earning the big salary to do it - so that the "manager" can get a committee of equally ignorant but highly qualified "managers" to make a decision. I am constantly told, but do not believe a word of it, that the "board" doesn't make "operational" decisions, only strategic ones and that my input via "business cases" is vital for informing this process. I do not believe a word of that for one very simple reason, every strategic decision impacts directly upon the operational work of any organisation. It simply cannot be otherwise, and, if as is increasingly the case, these decisions are in the hands of people who have no understanding of the actual functions their decisions affect, you have a recipe for corporate failure. At best you have the scenario of trying to buy railway track, at worst someone ends up dead.
The purpose of the "business case" in this situation is threefold: firstly it makes the presenter aware that he/she is not the decision maker, and secondly, it makes the manager presenting it to the board look as if he/she actually does know something the rest of the board doesn't. The third purpose is more sinister; it provides a "blame trail" to the originator if the decision taken leads to a failure, as the board will argue that they acted on the information it contained and the best advice available. The board itself is, of course, almost bomb-proof in this scenario as all decisions are "by the Board" and the individuals hide behind this joint responsibility. Therefore, no individual is exposed as being incompetent; it is the whole board that made the decision.
The insidious degradation of the status of the technically competent and the elevation of those who, a generation ago would have been labelled "Administrators" and taken orders from the professionals who knew what they were doing and how it was done, has been achieved very rapidly. They have quietly taken over organisation after organisation. It began with the civil service and it has spread into business. No longer is the Chairman's son or daughter required to enter at the shop floor and spend even a token length of time actually getting to know and understand what went on there; now they go from school to university to boardroom.
This degradation of the real professions will have critical longterm effects, not the least being the loss of expertise as more and more "technical professionals" find themselves cut off from the rewards their "management" colleagues cream off in all the top posts at the payscales formerly open to all with the ability to rise there. Their only options are to join the herd or to go where their skills and expertise are better regarded and rewarded.
Eerily there is a parallel to this in history. It can be found in the fall of the Roman Empire where bureaucrats acquired more and more power at the expense of the people who actually built, maintained, and extended the infrastructures until eventually the cost of "managing" it became so great it collapsed. An equally eerie parallel can be seen in the rise of the status and wealth of "sportspersons" and "entertainers", both groups of whom now enjoy the status and wealth that accrued to the successful gladiators and "circus" performers of ancient Rome. This seems to go hand in hand with the decline of a society and the rise of bureaucracy. As the bureaucrats become more powerful, they bribe the "proletariat" with "spectacles" and "games" to distract them from the truth - that, under their "management" the position of the taxpayer, worker, and professional in any field (I don't include "Management" as a profession!) is being steadily reduced in status and in wealth.
With apologies to Peter, Paul, and Mary, perhaps the answer to my opening question is ....
"Where have all the Techies gone, long time passing,
Where have all the Techies gone, long time ago,
Gone to dole queues everyone!"
Posted by The Gray Monk at January 13, 2005 10:39 AM
Comments
Good post, Monk. You have described accurately the 'Peter Principle'. The same thing applies to Government ministers and civil servants who hop from one job to another, does it not?
Posted by: Slim Jim at January 13, 2005 01:05 PM
What is both horribly depressing and utterly hilarious is that if the Chairborne Corps at British Steel (and we know there is one) had actually got up from the conference table, walked out on the shop floors and asked a few questions, they'd've all but certainly found within a few minutes a few old-timers who (a) knew the formula; (b) knew where the dies had been stored and then forgotten by management; and (c) could set them up in days, not weeks. I don't know that there's a comparable analogy for artillery tubes and combat aircraft but, count on it, it would never occur to Management to actually talk to the people who might have the answers.
Out there where the work is done are people who have faced the same life problems, survived the same personal and family triumphs and disasters, paid the monthly bills and otherwise proven themselves as competent, often more competent, at dealing with what life hands us all as any management elite but, since they do not have that MBA, they are considered stupid. Management both prides itself on and pities itself that it has The Responsibility And Must Decide. This is in other circles called "arrogance."
Here in the US, it was Management that wanted airline deregulation. The Managements, for instance, of Braniff, Eastern, TWA and PanAm, not to mention such bankruptcies as United and USAirways. Today, it is a UN Management that wants to take over tsunami relief efforts, though taken as a whole it has not delivered as much as Bonhomme Richard and some Aussie C130s - crewed by "techie" sailors and airmen - do in a day.
Posted by: BobW. at January 13, 2005 06:31 PM
As a long term techie (33 years) I read your post with both amusement and despair. I am fortunate, I left the Aircraft Industry where the only way I could progress would be to become a manager (obviously the lobotomy would prevent further technical thought).
I joined a well known computer company that recognises separate professions, and I can (and have) advanced as much as techie, as I could have as a manager. In fact we may be one of the few companies that has Technical Executives.
I may gripe a bit, but we respect each person for their ability to fulfil the role they perform - the trolls of the adminisphere excepted !
Posted by: Gorse Fox at January 14, 2005 05:48 PM
I have been lucky since leaving the navy. All my supervisors have started out at the bottom. I just rue this coming june. For the 1st time in Intel's 35+ year history a non-engineer will be the CEO. We are already reeling from 2 of his mistakes as a VP, I shudder at what he will do next. You can feel the culture shift already, it use to be a place were you could argue with your boss over a technical point. To one were "the nail that sticks out sees the hammer"
It's so hard to explain to someone with only a account math class why you needs a certian chemical, if the only way to explain it is with calculus. Most buisness are becoming a Tower of Babel, or to borrow from churhill "Two people separted by a common language."
Posted by: skipjack at January 15, 2005 08:28 AM