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0 pointsbhouston1y ago0 comments

Stack ranking will tell you when something isn't working, but the solution isn't always to fire, but rather use that data to fix things in a more general solution.

I found that team composition and role assignment matters a lot, at least if you hire people who are at least above a certain bar. Match a brilliant non-assertive coder with someone who is outgoing and good at getting along and at least decent coder, and the results from the two outperform generally either of them individually.

You can bring out the best of your employees or you can set them up against each other. This either brings everyone up or brings everyone down.

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dataflow1y ago

Wholeheartedly agree with you on team composition mattering a ton, but how often do you have such an abundance of engineers and tasks that you can match them up the right way?

bhoustonOP1y ago

I think if you get to know your engineers, you can figure out the right pairings to bring out the best. But this requires intimate knowledge and probably subjective based on how good the manager is at managing coders. So I guess from up high, stack ranking-based firing is easier.

But I think it is also cheaper to make great teams rather than just doing brutal firings all the time. But it may be a micro-optimization?

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