<story><title>Ex-Finance developers mock McKinsey&apos;s monitoring metrics</title><url>https://www.efinancialcareers.com/news/2023/09/mckinsey-how-to-measure-software-developer-productivity</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>ryandrake</author><text>&amp;gt; It&amp;#x27;s a sort of clueless MBA thinking that believes software engineers should be furiously typing all the time&lt;p&gt;(Your point is good, but the dig against MBAs is unnecessary and I wish it was less acceptable here on HN. It wouldn&amp;#x27;t be ok to make fun of people with Sociology degrees or History degrees here, but jokes about MBAs get a pass. We really should be better than that, but I realize I&amp;#x27;m swimming against the current on this one.)&lt;p&gt;That aside, I &lt;i&gt;have&lt;/i&gt; found a lot of clueless folks in tech leadership have that &amp;quot;furiously typing&amp;quot; misconception, as if developers are only productive when their fingertips are pounding keys. I once worked with a CEO who refused to set aside time in the schedule for things like setting up source control and a bug tracker, because he believed that developers should be furiously typing code in at all times.</text></item><item><author>q7xvh97o2pDhNrh</author><text>I clicked through to the linked McKinsey article [1] to see what all the hubbub was about, and I found this gem:&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; For example, one company found that its most talented developers were spending excessive time on noncoding activities such as design sessions or managing interdependencies across teams. In response, the company changed its operating model and clarified roles and responsibilities to enable those highest-value developers to do what they do best: code.&lt;p&gt;The rest of the article is equally hare-brained. It&amp;#x27;s a sort of clueless management-consultant thinking that believes software engineers should be furiously typing all the time, and it entirely fails to understand that actual software engineering is about solving business problems.&lt;p&gt;Stuff like this really makes me wish I&amp;#x27;d optimized for $$$ earlier in my career, and I only hope I can retire before this kind of absurd thinking spreads into real technology companies.&lt;p&gt;[1]: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.mckinsey.com&amp;#x2F;industries&amp;#x2F;technology-media-and-telecommunications&amp;#x2F;our-insights&amp;#x2F;yes-you-can-measure-software-developer-productivity&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow noreferrer&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.mckinsey.com&amp;#x2F;industries&amp;#x2F;technology-media-and-tel...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;EDIT: Changed &amp;quot;MBA thinking&amp;quot; to &amp;quot;management-consultant thinking,&amp;quot; in response to fair feedback below.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>version_five</author><text>What is the problem with criticism &amp;quot;mba thinking&amp;quot;? It&amp;#x27;s a legit complaint against the kind of naive &amp;quot;efficiency&amp;quot; analyses and measures that happen, and is completely justified. I have an MBA, I certainly don&amp;#x27;t find it offensive, I think the criticism is apt.&lt;p&gt;The usual art student tropes are more offensive because they are about people in a chosen degree being dumb (incidentally, when I did engineering all the hardcore &amp;quot;haha artsies are so dumb&amp;quot; engineers failed out after first year). That&amp;#x27;s not the same as criticizing a specific flaw in their education. If there&amp;#x27;s some big blind spot the average sociology degree leaves, that should be fair game.</text></comment>
<story><title>Ex-Finance developers mock McKinsey&apos;s monitoring metrics</title><url>https://www.efinancialcareers.com/news/2023/09/mckinsey-how-to-measure-software-developer-productivity</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>ryandrake</author><text>&amp;gt; It&amp;#x27;s a sort of clueless MBA thinking that believes software engineers should be furiously typing all the time&lt;p&gt;(Your point is good, but the dig against MBAs is unnecessary and I wish it was less acceptable here on HN. It wouldn&amp;#x27;t be ok to make fun of people with Sociology degrees or History degrees here, but jokes about MBAs get a pass. We really should be better than that, but I realize I&amp;#x27;m swimming against the current on this one.)&lt;p&gt;That aside, I &lt;i&gt;have&lt;/i&gt; found a lot of clueless folks in tech leadership have that &amp;quot;furiously typing&amp;quot; misconception, as if developers are only productive when their fingertips are pounding keys. I once worked with a CEO who refused to set aside time in the schedule for things like setting up source control and a bug tracker, because he believed that developers should be furiously typing code in at all times.</text></item><item><author>q7xvh97o2pDhNrh</author><text>I clicked through to the linked McKinsey article [1] to see what all the hubbub was about, and I found this gem:&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; For example, one company found that its most talented developers were spending excessive time on noncoding activities such as design sessions or managing interdependencies across teams. In response, the company changed its operating model and clarified roles and responsibilities to enable those highest-value developers to do what they do best: code.&lt;p&gt;The rest of the article is equally hare-brained. It&amp;#x27;s a sort of clueless management-consultant thinking that believes software engineers should be furiously typing all the time, and it entirely fails to understand that actual software engineering is about solving business problems.&lt;p&gt;Stuff like this really makes me wish I&amp;#x27;d optimized for $$$ earlier in my career, and I only hope I can retire before this kind of absurd thinking spreads into real technology companies.&lt;p&gt;[1]: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.mckinsey.com&amp;#x2F;industries&amp;#x2F;technology-media-and-telecommunications&amp;#x2F;our-insights&amp;#x2F;yes-you-can-measure-software-developer-productivity&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow noreferrer&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.mckinsey.com&amp;#x2F;industries&amp;#x2F;technology-media-and-tel...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;EDIT: Changed &amp;quot;MBA thinking&amp;quot; to &amp;quot;management-consultant thinking,&amp;quot; in response to fair feedback below.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>turndown</author><text>If sociology or history degrees doled out management positions the way MBAs somehow do I guarantee you they would be met with derision. It’s like making fun of politicians, it happens because they are often inappropriately given power.</text></comment>