Stalemate: Are you building a culture of silence?(morgamic.com)
morgamic.com
Stalemate: Are you building a culture of silence?
http://morgamic.com/2012/04/26/stalemate-are-you-building-a-culture-of-silence/
3 comments
I just left an environment that was eerily similar (on a point to point level of the article) a few weeks ago, after management started panicing that their new product (which is a pivot of the code base) was slipping (almost day-for-week in some aspects). It was getting so bad that only one of the developers would actually show up in the office (and everyone else working from home) just so that they didn't have to deal with the awkward silences. Nobody wants to speak up or admit responsibility, so mistakes are swept under the rug.
When you remove the ability for individuals to speak openly and freely (either because of pedestals, political reasons, or silos), you lose the dynamic that allows for true innovation to foster with your development team. Calling an all-company meeting to say that "We're not going to promote anyone to any new position, we're going to hire everyone externally" doesn't feed the team/company spirit, it makes you feel like you're in a dead-end job...and when you feel that you have no motivation/skin in the game, your quality of work, life, and support start to diminish.
Ultimately, I started seeing that I was becoming miserable in spending any time working, and I started to notice the quality of my own work starting to diminish as I started to take on less and less risky moves; something that is completely unacceptable to me. While I've left without a formal offer in hand, (and I'm confident that I'll find something that works for me) I've found that I've been in a BETTER mood, knowing that I don't need to deal with the stress, the mis-management, and the 'zombification' of my former coworkers. I'm happier -- and that's what matters the most to me -- and I've now noticed first hand what the warning signs are so I can avoid places like this in the future.
When you remove the ability for individuals to speak openly and freely (either because of pedestals, political reasons, or silos), you lose the dynamic that allows for true innovation to foster with your development team. Calling an all-company meeting to say that "We're not going to promote anyone to any new position, we're going to hire everyone externally" doesn't feed the team/company spirit, it makes you feel like you're in a dead-end job...and when you feel that you have no motivation/skin in the game, your quality of work, life, and support start to diminish.
Ultimately, I started seeing that I was becoming miserable in spending any time working, and I started to notice the quality of my own work starting to diminish as I started to take on less and less risky moves; something that is completely unacceptable to me. While I've left without a formal offer in hand, (and I'm confident that I'll find something that works for me) I've found that I've been in a BETTER mood, knowing that I don't need to deal with the stress, the mis-management, and the 'zombification' of my former coworkers. I'm happier -- and that's what matters the most to me -- and I've now noticed first hand what the warning signs are so I can avoid places like this in the future.
Sorry to hear that, but I'm glad you're happier and I hope you find something soon.
Getting ahead of it, obsessing about culture and addressing things before they get bad are so important for leaders to do but sometimes it gets lost in the shuffle... :(
Getting ahead of it, obsessing about culture and addressing things before they get bad are so important for leaders to do but sometimes it gets lost in the shuffle... :(
They sound true, but are they really true?
It's one thing to dispense advice, it's another to have it grounded in cold hard facts.
It's one thing to dispense advice, it's another to have it grounded in cold hard facts.
I think there's certainly some conjecture mixed in with experience, but if you want something a little more focused I wrote this a while back: http://blog.mozilla.org/webdev/2011/08/08/pragmatic-growth-f...
The "Build a culture people want to be a part of" section is probably most relevant.
But really, most of the concepts are so simple that you could find them in a children's video about bullying: http://www.brainpopjr.com/health/relationships/bullying/
The "Build a culture people want to be a part of" section is probably most relevant.
But really, most of the concepts are so simple that you could find them in a children's video about bullying: http://www.brainpopjr.com/health/relationships/bullying/
That mozilla one is especially great and covers some things I've worried about with work culture. Especially great are the give people credit and laugh rules.
I think I've made strides. I've started recording the rules I've adopted for my emotional life; I'm calling it my emotional framework. :) Feel free to fork, etc.
https://github.com/aantix/emotional_framework