At What Point Does the Whoop-Ass Come Out?
So I'm sitting here this morning thinking about all the emails I had to respond to this morning and wondering When can I pull out a can of Whoop-Ass? or just as effectively, When will someone pull out a can of Whoop-Ass? I mean really. Please. Now.
I'm still a bit of the "new guy" here, and I realize that there are a lot of things in every corporate culture that are really evolutionary in their entrenchment, and can't realistically be changed without major moves at the top. But I'm not think about that. I'm thinking about all the people that are fighting me - really fighting me, on the new ticker plant.
Sure, there are those that see it as an untested work, and worthy of suspicion. For those, I offer tests, and testing time for them to run their tests to see if it's working. I don't mind these people at all - in fact, I welcome them because they are the converts that will become my strongest allies. They will pick up the banner and run with it because they beat the crap out of it and proved to themselves that this is a good system, and it's now something they can treat as a provided service and not have to maintain themselves.
Then there are those that see their only value to the organization is the code they wrote a few months/years ago, and I'm talking about taking all that away from them. Maybe it's the team they have built up to help maintain the code. Mine would strip all that away from them as their team would no longer be needed to maintain this code. All these threats breed fear, and fear breeds anger. I see it, but I don't even pretend to understand it.
There are also the completely clueless, often fed information by the threatened, and that's a dangerous combo. I've had several conversations and untold emails from folks like this. They say things like "our needs are different", and "if you consider the efficiency, you'll see this is needed" - as if I've never even tried to understand their needs (have - for months), and that I'm completely unaware of the engineering issues involved (am - for years). It's best when it's all sugary-sweet in the tone you'd hear a parent of a young child use. Yeah... that's right, I'm your 4 year old writing this code and need a little help from Mommy and Daddy.
It's about professionalism, folks. Let's just all treat each other professionally. We don't have to agree on everything - we don't even have to agree on a lot of things. But we do have to agree on facts and numbers. If you show me test results, and I disagree with them, it's up to me to provide proof, typically in the form of better tests, that refute the data. Otherwise, I have to accept them. That's professionalism.
Likewise, if management (whoever that is) decides that we need to go in a certain direction, then that's what we all have to do. It's not a question of whether or not we like it... it's the job. Period. Done.
But it seems that things aren't quite this way. I'm sure the founders expect their instructions to be followed without delay, grief, crud, or delay. And they should. And I'm not totally sure where things start to break down, but by the time they are at my level, it's clear that something very bad has happened to the chain of command and the idea of professionalism. I'm not hypersensitive to it, but I do think I shouldn't have to spend months dealing with people fighting me on topics that I've been asked to do my partners in this firm.
I'm not saying it's my ideas. It's their ideas, I'm just the instrument of change. Still... these people are doing all they can to stop this implementation. Now we've moved and I'm sitting right in the middle of the snake pit. I understand why the managers did this - they want me to effect the maximum change I can, but they aren't thinking that I'm getting sick and tired of this.
They're just going to burn me out if things don't chance soon. Face it - how long are you interested in fighting the fight assigned you with no real support from those that assigned it to you? I'll do it for a while, and then I'll just say "Do whatever. Don't care." and I'm all done.
Guess I'm closer to that than I thought.