Are there still groups at QC run by and for engineers? Or is it time to throw in the towel and try to join program management? After all, they seem to be revered as gods while engineers are treated as commodity.
19 replies (most recent on top)
@81610, morality and social order can exist without requiring fear of eternal damnation from fabricated deities.
So far I have seen very technical managers and also those who just know how to play politics and for those, here are the to-do-list 1. Attend all the meetings 2. Check your emails! 3. Create a meeting for your employees whenever you really get too bored and emphasize on the importance of the projects/deadlines 4. If things go well, cheer up & send a thank you email to the team and from upper executive view, assure you grasp all the credit. Make sure that everybody thinks that it happened because of your leadership! 5. If something doesn’t work, as you can’t technically help with anything , remind everybody that you are too occupied with the “management”! and meetings and everybody is responsible for his own work. Make sure you blame somebody later on and cover your own ass. 6. Once in a while ask everybody “When can you finish your project?” Regardless of what they say, ask them “Can you do it sooner?” Now, you are a very well-qualified smart manager @ Qualcomm
I've know many technical managers or engineers that has no clue to initiate a project all the way to close a project. Let the Program Managers and Project Managers to their job and manage their team, efficiently. All you engineers, do what you do best. If you think you can do better than a PM, then why are you still where you at?
If these posts are an example of the lack communication skills of PMs at QC company-wide, it demonstrates (a) these people are not qualified for their jobs, and (b) assuming one gets a PM job based on "merit" or "initiative," QC has drastically different definitions of these terms than Webster's.
The PM doesn't even have proper grammar. How can this person be a functional PM with good communication skills?
The defense of PM's sounds juvenile....that is what I am saying that the presence on non-technical managers who need these PMs to manage things. If you have technically good managers and less number of managers, then you don't need the PMs. There is a general degradation of Qualcomm culture over time. Increase in the numbers of PMs is symbolic of the decadent and toxic environment Qualcomm is getting in. If you have good technical managers you don't need PMs. And that is what is wrong with Qualcomm. The role of PMs
a) An incompetent manager needs a PM ....
b) One can hide behind the PM logistic to avoid real work. A customer requested me something, if I want to do it ...I do it right away else ask him to file a ticket, goes to the PM, and then discussion..... they are a good tool to delay things.
c) Pin the blame on other team through PM.
There are definitely uses of PM as mentioned above.... I have more respect for a janitor in the building who does something useful. I don't recall anyone who has said "That PM was very helpful to me in my work".....so keep praising yourself about usefulness to the company.....
It sounds like PMs justifying their existence, like lawyers. We need them interpret the complexity law that they created. More lawyers, more laws, need more lawyers, loop back. Lawyers may be first people to create infinite loop.
i don't know what to say, you have answered it for yourself "crowd control" and it is needed because the sheer size of company and number of projects.
I don't think any company would keep PM's if it is not required obviously there is some value !! and if you have problem with it i would suggest you sort it out with executive team and not blame PM's, they are just doing their job which is to track and report for which we have to send mails and collate the report. If you think you can do it better i am all ears educate me.
To each its own, it may not be worth PM to you but it may be worthwhile for someone else. again i will not argue on meris of engg vs PM. Each has its own place.
— Anonymous81692 : Your argument for the need of PM is outright ridiculous.... I worked at Qualcomm when it didn't needed PM's and things worked very well. Now there are many PM's who contribute nothing and the need of PMs is necessitated by the fact that Qualcomm has hired so many people that it needs "crowd control". PMs are joke in every company : zero respect and no output. Writing emails and preparing xls sheet is not a talent.......being a traffic police is not worth it.. so don't be proud of it....it is sad to see a good company culture destroyed which is unfixable.....
i am PM in QC, ratio of PM's to engineers 1:25 so there aren't as many PM jobs as you think. in ideal world there would be no need for PM but we don't live in ideal world, do we? grown up's do need baby sitters because they can't resolve conflicts among themselves, also someone has to priorities for Project may differ from individual stake holders someone has to align them.Last but not the least PM's are not here because engineers need them, they are here because executives need them so that they can be updated about the latest development and ensure smooth execution without day to day monitoring affecting there bandwidth !
I won't argue about engg. vs PM but this narrow mentality of few is precisely why PM's are needed to babysit you, so thank you ;-)
Are you kidding me? PM's are the 1st ones to get whacked. Every freakin time! It's done so smoothly that people don't know about it. For a company like QC, I would say being an Engineer is much safer after all it's an engineering company and no one needs PM.
You know what he meant, "babysitter".
Hi Anonymous81580, a certified PMP here, have a really quick question - what's a 'baby setter'?
There is a good reason why religion is about believing in God. If he was physically real, no one would have to be converted to believe, you would simply know. Believing in God serves its purpose in keeping social order. We need religion. I am not sure about having PMs, though.
haven't seen a god kill or save anybody. sounds like perception or even delusion. same logic elevates PMs to deity status.
Gods are not useless, at all, in fact exactly opposite. They unite people and ironically divide people, as well. They save people and they kill people. For something that powerful, I say they are as real as we perceive. Perception is reality. Back to PM. PM are a bunch of useless human being, as QC define the roles of PM. They are baby setters, and why would grown man/women need baby setters.
gods ARE useless. But its the perception that gives them such lasting value. Without PMs the world may stop spinning
Program managers are useless and a waste of space.
PMs are the first to get wacked.