| For what it's worth, as I can see there have been some flak from the commenters here, I think we're probably on the same page. There are people who I do identify as leaders, and I probably wouldn't object to them calling themselves leaders... but I think the word has been so thoroughly captured that it's wise to use something else. It's a bit like how there are some legitimate blockchain use cases (or so I've been told by a friend who works in the space) but you'd have to be nuts to identify yourself as a crypto-advocate with no further context. >One last thought; I’ve seen it written that people join companies and leave managers and I agree with this wholeheartedly. For me, the simplest measure of whether a manager is a leader is the staff turnover on their team. That is one metric you simply cannot fake. In the tech space, what do you make of high turnover? Do people get a pass if their staff average a 1.5 year tenure, or is this indicative of systemic issues? Also, this would only be done by a true sociopath, but you can fake that number with sufficiently intense levels of psychological manipulation, enforced skill atrophy, and fear. Someone recently told me that they can't leave their organization before a contract expires because their CEO litigated very aggressively against the last person to do so, even though it was perfectly legal. >I suspect that the author would be fine with the company meeting if he didn’t already have well formed (and it appears, justifiably formed) opinions about the competence of the company’s leadership. Absolutely correct. I can imagine a useful four hour meeting, but it would be very rare. A lengthy face-to-face meeting would always be an annoyance, but they've made plenty of other mistakes and this is the cherry on top. I had hoped more people that didn't 100% agree would have been able to make that charitable inference, but I'm glad someone did. EDIT: I apparently don't know how quotes work on HN, and don't have time to find out. Sorry! |
In terms of high turnover, I’m not an engineer and have not managed an Eng team.
However, the companies I most admire tend to have a single digit % turnover annually.
Toyota is my favourite example but there are others - I don’t like Costco for other reasons, but they do seem to be another with a great culture.