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The Basic Rules of Nerd Management are:
There is no single management style that can be used to manage nerds. Every nerd, company and project are unique. A Nerd Manager must be flexible and familiar with a variety of management styles.
Nerds cannot be pressured, but they can be motivated. Nerds value recognition, admiration and challenges. Once motivated, nerds will obsessively seek to solve apparently insolvable problems.
Nerds have social skills and emotions, but they do not have manners. Nerds should not be trained to interact with clients in ways that might enhance arrogance, resentment, and, especially, suspicion (which will give rise to conspiracy theories).
Managing programmers is like herding cats. Managing engineers is like steering bees. Even cats and bees will head towards food. Bees perform a dance for other bees to show them how to reach the same food source. In engineering terms, this is known as documentation. Cats prefer to sleep and scratch the furniture. If you are in possession of a programmer who regularly documents work, pay that programmer more money.
Every technical problem has at least five solutions. Unfortunately, the first four solutions have to be considered and rejected before the “obvious,” elegant, simple fifth solution is discovered. This process typically takes two weeks to two months, depending on importance (more important solutions take longer).
Nerds do not want to perform activities that they have already performed before. Hiring Managers want to hire experienced nerds, i.e., nerds who have already performed certain activities before. Nerds should be hired because they are smart, capable, and eager. Nerds that are experienced in the activities to be performed will be bored and unproductive.
Gantt charts (and associated project management software) are useful sometimes, but not when they are misused. In a manufacturing environment, MRP (Material Resource Planning) is more appropriate. In a construction environment, a good construction estimator can provide accurate resource allocation information. To stimulate thinking into "we can't do this until we finish that," Gantt charts can be the best tool. But for design projects, Gantt charts are useless as a true "report to upper management" tool, since Pareto's principle applies to design work: 80% of the time will be devoted to 20% of the problem to be solved. So when a design task is 80% done, it is really only 20% done. Breaking tasks down into subtasks (i.e., increasing the granularity), will only make matters worse. Gantt charts are the primary source of garbage in-garbage out nonsense in the workplace today.
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