[pnathan]

Having worked in similar environments with similar polities before, those sorts of policies tend to mean, "whoever has the most shininess in an argument" is the person who is considered to take the best policy, and frankly? innovation becomes stifled as the most political adult wins or stalls out the innovator who thinks further than others. Because in general, the members of the team are all adults, and we all understand the company, and we are all competent - so it comes down to who has the most appeal in the rhetorical wars. I find it appalling - extroverts and manipulation tends to win.

IOW, I'd rather work for a structured hierarchical firm, where politicians brown nose managers and the managers firewall these people from the rest of the team.

edit: Hum, your name seemed familiar. I attended your LISA talk. You're brilliant and well known (witty to boot, as I recall. :) ). You, sir, will be listened to by default, so you will tend not to encounter the failure modes I described above. But do think about them, okay? Tyranny of Structurelessness really is a great read.

[brendangregg]

Yes, in prior jobs I've seen the extraverts and manipulators win, by use of their charisma over technical facts. Most engineers aren't like that, but a few are, and we try not to hire them.

It helps to have technical management, who are able to understand all sides of a technical argument, regardless of how those sides were presented. It also helps to have staff who all can communicate effectively, at least at some basic level.

Tyranny of Structurelessness is great. But I'd like to see a more focused analysis of tech culture and its failings.