Why is tech management so f-ing distant? Very often NOT in meetings which they created and very not interested in anything the team/teams do. It is really a large offset between the work actually being done, the day-to-day operations that we do and the competence of management to acknowledge the fact that we actually do those things.

A lot of times they just stay silent in meetings and in the end they say something to try and make some conclusion and perhaps something ”funny” to try and lighten up the atmosphere. They fail on both of their tasks. They have no clue and are not interested in learning.

I feel like many of them don’t actually do anything. They are often ”away” but it is really unclear what that means.

I think it is symptom of a truly dysfunctional tech process. Bad leaders tend to hire more bad leaders and it is a toxic circle ending in good competent people leaving wanting more in the leadership.

Well.

If you want to understand management... Go to a management school.

I can really recommend it. Talk with the guys who are close to master etc.

It doesn't matter btw if person has technical background or not.

Management in a competitive type is what is taught.

You live in an arena, you kill or be killed.

As simple as that. They might use nicer terms for it, they might try to hide it, but it boils down to it.

... You can now add 1 plus 1 to put together to what this "competition" leads in a company.

There is more than one approach possible, but once one was taught and trained that they must be the person number one... It's hard.

I know many managers who have a complete different personality at home vs at work.

Like Jekyll and Hide. Only worse.

@IntrusionCM I have no problems with management. As long as they know what they are talking about. Too many times (I’ve seen inside many companies) it is not competence that is being rewarded. For any stuff that is bad, but for complex stuff like software development that is worse since the result will be that the guys actually knowing stuff will quit. Leaving a huge know-how gap behind them. Not all of us are just doing simple stuff. One good dev leaving could easily cause a complete standstill for some systems to evolve for a long time.

This is of course not restricted to our business. I am saying that it is worse. I can probably learn to weld in a couple of months. It’s not like that for us.

Once a dysfunctional leadership has taken hold of a department it’s quite difficult to get away from it. Bad leaders tend to hire more bad leaders.

I agree with what you’re saying (”do or die”) but people leaving and management still insist that ”all is well” is truly toxic.