Some of these are really funny looking at them now, though I’m sure no one was laughing at the time.

I’ve run into my share of clueless managers, which is probably one of the main reasons I now work for myself. Working for myself means I don’t have to wonder how clueless management is. I already know.

Great title by the way.

oh Steve, I just spent the last 40 hours working continuously from a client office. I am exhausted and frustrated. So this post is a cry for help!

Bad management can kill a team morale and motivation.

[...] read more | digg story [...]

when I was interviewed I mentioned that a lot of websites were becoming blogs (like this one) and that I suggest we jump on the bandwagon.

The IT head said that blogs were a thing of the past and that CSS would never catch on.

Dick.

Storing laptops for five years before even using them? So, did they even perform well enough to do the work?

@cenzi: what a visionary manager. did CSS every catch on

@HMTKSteve: oh, they throw them away because they could not run widows xp on them. The state had to order another 1000 laptops!

yeah, i was doing AJAX development using asp.net 2.0 with a SQL backend. Of course, the project was way behind schedule (which is the reason why i was hired) and after i join the team, this guy decides that it’s a good idea to fire the outsourcing firm that has been working on this project for a year and then tells me that i get to finish it. “This is a great opportunity for somebody like you” as if he’s doing me a favor.

My favorite line this guy tell me while i was debugging the source code was “If it’s going to take you more than 15 minutes, then don’t worry about it”

oh and here’s another one “We need to , there has to be a checkbox you can click to do that”

needless to say i still cherish the day that i sent the final update back to the SVN server.

My own favorite. An engineering manager told one of his staff members, “You know, when one man works for another man, it’s like that man owns the other one.”

“We want you to produce just enough, not to be more efficient”,
Upon discussing a development tool with a so called technical leader.

I’m a telephone/broadband tech for large phone company. Numerous techs have retired/died/been terminated, yet no new hires. Facilities are deteriorating rapidly, yet company reduces dollars spent on upgrading and decreases the time we have to repair the problem, because we have fewer techs. Is this an oxymoron or what.

I recall having a meeting regarding an employee survey. The short and sweet was the employees said pretty much in unison the management sucked. The managers responded with “you know how bad this makes ALL of us look. How should we do our jobs better?” and my friend responded “you know it doesnt look good when You are asking Us how you should do your job. If we were constantly asking You how we should do our Jobs, you’d question our ability to perform.”
which the plant manager responded with a tirade about “respect” and completely avoided the question.

This is why it is important when interviewing to not only look at the technical aspect of the job but ask the interviewer directly what they think the balance between work and their employee’s personal lives is. Companies/managers who think that their employees must sign their entire lives over to the company are unrealistic, naive, and foster a negative atmosphere in the workplace. You’d be much better off looking longer for a job with a company that better understands this balance.

I’m a programmer, have wife and two kids, and I love my job. I’ve had to put in some late nights and early mornings to meet some deadlines, but those are the exceptions and not the norm. When I interviewed, I plainly told the interviewer (the VP of engineering) that I’ll work hard but when it comes down to it my family is more important and I didn’t want a job that required me to sacrifice my relationship with my family.

When you’re up front with people about expectations and show that you can maintain and expect a balanced workplace any company or manager will see that you’ll be a valuable addition to their team. Those who insist on a 100% work lifestyle also tend to be the bad apples and non team players that end up making quotes like the above.

During a scheduling meeting, our manager insisted on getting the project done in two weeks using more resources. A colleague snapped at the manager and said “As far as I know it takes 9 months to make a baby. You seem to think we can make a baby in 3 months if have 3 women working on it.”

It’s amazing what comes out of the mouths of managers sometimes. I remember a manager telling us that no matter what he was always going to be “our advocate.” Which meant that he wouldn’t let the client dictate crazy hours and unreasonable tasks. However, very early on we realized that he was a people pleaser. If the client requested anything he was at their command and at our expense! I guess it’s rare to find someone who can be a good and fair leader, yet also please the other side. Like Khalid said, of the 100 managers he worked for, only 3 made the cut! that’s unbelievable!!

I am constantly surprised at how little people understand about technology. It’s like if they don’t acknowledge it then it will go away.

@Auran - You’re colleague must be a genius. That’s the best assessment I’ve ever heard regarding resources.

I had a manager once who would only let other managers get pens and supplies from the supply cabinet. Everyone else (I was a lowly sales rep at the time)had to ask the receptionist (!!!) to unlock the doors to the cabinet and then give us what we needed to do our jobs. This woman was also reputed to limit the number of sheets of toilet paper that could be used in the warehouse bathrooms.

It makes you wonder where the fault lies. Are bad managers proof that the Peter Principle is undeniable? Or are corporations unable or unwilling to weed these people out, preferring instead to promote them simply as a matter of policy? Perhaps we should be thankful for bad managers - without them we wouldn’t have “The Office” or “Dilbert”!

In my company we work with AGILE so every month we have new features to implement. The funny think is that our manager never discuss how long each feature take to implement and I we do not know the presence absence of the team during the month. So at the end of each sprint we never finish to implement the features. And the next month we receive new list of features and the one that we could not have implemented are lost ! I could not understand how he’ kept is job.

As a manager, I have seen this day in and out. It somtimes makes me wonder how these organizations or managers keep a float. The one that does intrigue me is :
3. The original estimate for this project was 11 weeks but we reworked the plan to cut the estimate down to 7 weeks without adding any additional resources: I had to work 18 hours per day for 3 months including weekends to deliver the 7 week project.

It is interesting to note that situations were this type of situation occurs, it is imperative that the PM ensure that there are enough resources. By working overtime, the general conscientious is that you will work more and therefor accrue overtime where as if it was delivered correctly, nothing like this would have happened.

I wrote a 10 part story built around the classic SDLC model that featured a manager from hell that drew upon my own and several other peoples’ experiences. I don’t know if you allow links in comments or not but it’s on my site under the name “The 7 Steps of Software Development Case Study”

My favorite manager from hell gets pwnd story happened back in the good old dotcom boom days at a company I was consulting at. An IT manager told his only remaining network admin, “Get it done now! A trained monkey could do your job better!” The admin responded, “OK, why don’t you hire one” and he walked off the job, leaving the company network down.

Frank,

You can definitely leave a link to the story. I googled the name, and found

http://vbnotebookfor.net/2007/05/22/the-7-steps-of-software-development-%E2%80%93-an-un-real-world-case-study/

Very funny and real!

@Dave, I wonder sometime if it is legal to keep on expecting the team to work overtime without any pay. I am not sure what the laws are in that regards. But even when I was paid for those additional hours, I was not happy having to work 15-20 hours a day.

“I hired you in order to have a buffer zone between this project and me. If all goes well, it’ll be thanks to me. If something goes wrong, that’ll be your fault.”

This project manager said this very casually, and then went on about his week-end, just like that…

There are psychopaths out there, I tell you!

I got one…
“I don’t expect you to understand the big picture, you’re just a component developer.”

What about…
“You are acting as TL but u r not TL coz if u r so then i have to double ur salary”
also,
When i resigned the same manager said to me “i though that u r loyal to the company i never expected that u might resign”

Why do managers always play the loyalty card? I’ve never seen a business that was loyal to its employees. We’ve all seen layoffs happen rather quickly, so why are companies suddenly surprised when we go and look to take care of ourselves.

Let employees speak up freely and anonmyously. That is democracy. Go to http://www.RateMyBossCafe.com to let your voice heard by the world. Don’t give bad management a chance, they are destructive to our lives and to the society.

according to some of these “quotes” it seems only quantity which matters, not quality!!

great telecom site: http://www.glemnet.co.uk

It seems like the dumber the boss is, the more likely they are to be promoted. I guess if you kick someone upstairs, they spread their stupidity over more people and it’s not as concentrated?

There are some undeniable forces in this world: gravity, the tides, and incompetent managers. I’ve also noticed an inverse relationship between manager quality and the number of “how to be a manager” books on a manager’s shelf.

We have a classic. Our general manager could not make it as the Service Manager, nor the Sales Director; so our owner promoted him to General Manager. He generally works 8-11:30AM, goes to lunch, comes back and then leaves at 1:00PM to go coach a local high school sports team. To make matters worse when he’s in the office he is on the phone about his sports team. He has been here around 10-11 years and still knows less about this industry that an individual that ’s been here for a year. He is a complete buffoon, all one has to do is read his memo’s and correspondence….full of misspelled words and grammatical errors. A grade school kid could do better. Anyhow, word is half of our office is looking for other positions, unless he is gone. It’s so bad now we actually have clients questioning his insanity.

Those are some great quotes. While reading this post I was reminded of The Office and Office Space more than once. I have been in situations like those before and sometimes I just wonder if these people hear what they say.

Really funny.
Tomorrow will be my last working day at current company, which is probably one of the main reasons, now Monster.com will be my best friend.
Hope can find a nice manager in my future career, not clueless damn manager.
Bad management can kill a team morale and motivation.