He /she hires you because you have an A-1 rating in your field and your expertise is needed. You lay out what needs to be done and your recommendations are ignored. You say parallel and they go perpendicular. The job goes crap and your name is on it.
Would you fire your boss?
- Thread starter nobbie48
- Start date
Yup. Can and did (a few times actually). If I feel like I am often fighting internally rather than the entire team fighting against external forces, it's no longer worth my effort and it's time to move on.
In my cases, it didn't immediately result in financial reward, but it increased happiness significantly (and ensured my reputation didn't follow the companies).
On the downside, you can't control the narrative after you are out. I have a strong suspicion that clients were told that the problem with their projects lied with me (even though it was from above). It's an easy approach for the company to take.
In my cases, it didn't immediately result in financial reward, but it increased happiness significantly (and ensured my reputation didn't follow the companies).
On the downside, you can't control the narrative after you are out. I have a strong suspicion that clients were told that the problem with their projects lied with me (even though it was from above). It's an easy approach for the company to take.
Last edited:
It does sound like a bad boss. But maybe not for the reasons you are stating.
The thing with being an Individual Contributor as opposed to a team leader or manager is that you are often shielded from the larger picture. Issues outside of your purview, like the internal politics and direction of your own organization, customer requirements that are not part of your immediate scope, etc. may take the project in a different direction that what your recommendations are given your narrow focus.
However, employee retention is part of being a good manager, and if your boss can't communicate to you satisfactorily why they went contrary to your recommendations, it may indicate a failing on their part.
Or perhaps a stubbornness on your part not to take into account other pressures your boss might be facing.
The thing with being an Individual Contributor as opposed to a team leader or manager is that you are often shielded from the larger picture. Issues outside of your purview, like the internal politics and direction of your own organization, customer requirements that are not part of your immediate scope, etc. may take the project in a different direction that what your recommendations are given your narrow focus.
However, employee retention is part of being a good manager, and if your boss can't communicate to you satisfactorily why they went contrary to your recommendations, it may indicate a failing on their part.
Or perhaps a stubbornness on your part not to take into account other pressures your boss might be facing.
Am a software developer.
4 years ago, not even graduated yet, I told my CTO and manager at the time that they had made a horrible tech choice as there were obvious signs Microsoft would drop support. 1 year later, Microsoft dropped support. The results of these mistakes, which need to be fixed, are now mine.
4 years ago, again, I created a prototype/proof-of-concept to automate something that would cost the company $100k/y. I also specifically told them to not use the prototype in production as it wasn't structurally sound or meant to be extended. I go back to school, come back 8 months later, and see that some moron had taken my POCs and extended them without changing the foundations. Every one of these extensions are now broken. And of course, I have to fix this now.
3 years ago, I tried to get the stakeholders to meet with each other with me as the mediator because their requirements were literally clashing. They did, but never took my questions seriously probably because I'm young looking and not white (every upper management dude is white here.) Well, now they're fighting amongst each other because the system I created is based on their clashing suggestions and I had to interpret a bunch of **** via crystal ball. The worst part about this is that I actually understand every department's role very well, and even the ****ing president doesn't based on my conversations with him.
Forget my boss, I would never work with this company in the future. I would even urge my future employers to run if we need to work with them. Only reason why I'm here is because, frankly, everyone is too technologically retarded to realize I've automated most of my job so I sit around in the stairwell playing the Nintendo Switch frequently.
I’ve gone from a manager of people to an employee and rarely find it difficult to manage my manager and make my life fairly easy.
I can identify with the challenges they have and have an empathetic ear. I also understand what they are looking for from me and know it may not be the same as what I think I should be doing.
Some bosses are complete ***** and found they rarely stay where they are. It’s also a small world so, as a rule, I don’t call them out publicly as I may end up working with them in some way or another.
If I get caught in something I’ve said about them, I can generally state something positive about their knowledge or experience and in the same breath state they are not a good manager of people.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
I can identify with the challenges they have and have an empathetic ear. I also understand what they are looking for from me and know it may not be the same as what I think I should be doing.
Some bosses are complete ***** and found they rarely stay where they are. It’s also a small world so, as a rule, I don’t call them out publicly as I may end up working with them in some way or another.
If I get caught in something I’ve said about them, I can generally state something positive about their knowledge or experience and in the same breath state they are not a good manager of people.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Owner rides. Owner's right hand man rides. Immediate boss rides. If I called in Monday and said I crashed my bike the first question would be "Is the bike OK?". 
"Is the bike OK?".
Been there,got the t-shirt. (thanks Caboose56)
Mad Mike
Well-known member
Methinks you might work at a bank?
Yes and same experience at an insurance company too.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
wonderings
Well-known member
油井緋色;2597356 said:
Of course if they do not agree with you or do what you want they must be racist. Because everyone in upper management is white means nothing about them being racist. Being younger I agree with people will look differently at a young "kid" who they think does not have the experience despite degrees and all that. Unless you have some hard evidence of racism I would not be tossing that about and if you were indeed working for racists I would ask.... why?
sburns
Well-known member
油井緋色;2597821 said:
A friend of mine does this, she is just a programmer, and does very well for herself. Works at home most of the time and takes care of her 2 kids.
Also from the sounds of it either you are too eager or the people you work with don't respect you (or enough). People in charge sometimes are intimidated by people with better ideas or they don't like to be told how to run things (even if you don't say it like that).
I think it's both. I graduated with a perfect GPA, and worked on a few open source research grant funded projects. One of them is the only cloud based tool in its field and I was one of the 3 original developers. The original hiring manager knew this, but was let go, and both the new manager and CTO had no idea; the CTO straight up told me this year he thought I was a fresh grad and my manager openly admits this company hires cheap labor (I am not motivate by money) and hit a jack pot with me; needless to say I'm pretty ****ing mad at myself thinking all I needed was technical prowess to succeed in the business world.
My CTO and manager now respect me after seeing all of my warnings come to light but there is a brick wall between business folk who are technically inept, and those who understand what technical debt is.
There is also a lack of ownership which I found very surprising. As a software developer that's worked with other brilliant developers, I haven't worked with people who don't own up to their mistakes. We all make them (it's really common in software), so I auto assume when ppl make mistakes they will own them and fix them.
.......but I guess most of you already went through this and know. I was naive as a ****ing doorknob.
Last edited:
Iceman
Well-known member
I'm pretty fortunate. On the boardroom wall, our President/CEO has written in his own hand "I didn't hire smart people to tell them what to do, I hired them to tell me what to do."
