Whats wrong with the managers of the world? In my career I have experienced several cases where the demand for status update trumps the need for problem resolution. Here is a crazy anecdote from past when I was really young ….
This executive wanted an update every 5 minutes (no negotiations). If you are in IT, you know problem resolution involves looking millions of lines of code. So here is the status update
10:00am : We are on line 50 of server log, no idea about the problem yet ….. this is the line
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX (line hidden for security purposes)
10:05am : We are on line 950 of server log, no idea about the problem yet ….. this is the line
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX (line hidden for security purposes)
10:10am : We are on line 10050 of server log, no idea about the problem yet ….. this is the line
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX (line hidden for security purposes)
10:15am : We found the problem on line 10901….. this is the line
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX (line hidden for security purposes)
10:20am : Oops false alarm, we are on line 10910 … this is the line
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX (line hidden for security purposes)
At this point I got a call ” Ok Ok .. send me status updates after every 10 minutes not 5″. Genius!
Micro Managers don’t realize how counter-productive they make the team.
“Reason is not automatic. Those who deny it cannot be conquered by it. Do not count on them. Leave them alone.” – Ayn Rand