[thenerdhead]

> The value of working for a dysfunctional organization, the place where people build the most skills, is in getting hands-on experience fixing problems. Even if you don’t in fact fix them… and you won’t have enough control to fix everything. Even in situations where you have the authority to execute, you can’t control the ripple effects of your changes. Maybe you’ll accomplish something, maybe you won’t.

I'd definitely agree that you'll build the most skills at a dysfunctional place. The type of skills you learn are typically the opposite of what makes an established organization work though. There's a common saying of "work the people, then the problem". The challenge here is that when majority of your work is to improve the culture, the actual skills you were hired for start to slowly take the back seat.

I don't agree that being selfish is going to help you at all. In fact, being selfish is the exact reason why most organizations are dysfunctional. Here's one that comes off the top of my head. Say you're a line engineering manager and you're incentivized to deliver a large feature that year by your manager who is largely clueless of what your group is doing. But, the whole team realizes that the feature you're incentivized to deliver is not in the best interests of the team right now. What do you do with your role power? Most people will selfishly get that feature implemented to get their max bonus & rewards that year. That type of behavior breeds more dysfunction.

Here's a whole list of dysfunction: output over outcomes, obsession with internal metrics, lack of customer research, optimizing everything for little gain, shipping features like an assembly line, over-dependence on data/spreadsheets, fast paced twist and turns of work, over-engineering, trying to keep everyone happy, flip-flop decision making from people with role power.