I found this development model works exceptionally well with Indian contractors. I have been auditing their code does not meet our quality. I tried explaining what they need to do in email and over the phone how to fix their code, but somehow they just could not get it exactly right. It is to the point of frustration that it would simply faster for me just fixing their code. However, I only have two hands and I couldn’t not do all the work myself. I decided to try the chief programmer team model. I clean up the structure of their code and take care of make sure all the pieces works coherently. Then I wrote instruction in the code and get my team clean up any syntax error or careless logical error and most important finish the mundane wiring work.

I found I am super productive using this work model. I can focus my mind on solving the big problem and let my guys take care of the boring details. When I am writing and qualify my own code, I can work on one file at a time. Now I can work on 3-4 files at the same time. It is like I have an AI automated code generator or I have a few extra pairs of invisible hands help me type the code. I just specify the flow and structure of the code, jot down some high level instruction and the code is auto generated the next morning. I gave enough information in the code so my guys only need to fill in the blanks like in high school programming assignment. I estimate I am 3-4 times more productive by having 3-4 contractors serves as my remote fingers and low-level brain. If I leave those contractors figuring out the code on their own, they won’t even be half as productive as me.

The only problem of chief programmer team model is hard to implement in a typical N.America work environment where everyone is more or less equal in the hierarchy. No one wants to be the supporting programmer who carry out all the boring grunt work while the chief program gets the fun of creativity and all the glory. Moreover the role of supporting programmer seems like a dead end job with no career perspective, so naturally no one want to stick around doing it. The supporting programmer has to reach at least the basic competency level or he won’t be any use, but at the same time he much not be very competent or he will seek a greener pasture other than working as a supporting programmer. The biggest challenge of the chief programmer team model is find some stable decent supporting programmers.

Jim Collins是我喜歡的商管作者﹐初次接觸他的著作時﹐改變我對一般商管書藉多流於吹水的負面印像。他的前作有Good to Great和Built to Last﹐均是重量級經典商管書藉。他在書中用科學方法﹐分析企業如何從同業中脫穎而出和在競爭劇烈的環境中歷久不衰。這次的新書How the Might Fall則是企業崛起三部曲的最後一章﹐分析一些在行業手執牛耳的龍頭企業﹐如何盛極而衰急速從高處滑落﹐一間大企業可以在一夜間從此人間蒸發。

大慨今年經濟受到金融海嘯衝擊﹐企業在衰退潮中慘淡經營﹐更有不少著名大企業倒閉。作者正好趁機推出這本書﹐趕及在這熱門話題上大賣一筆。我不是說這本書言之無物﹐其內容還是很有啟發性﹐只是與上兩本著作珠玉在前﹐這本書相對下比較遜色。作者在序言中也直認不諱﹐這本書的研究資料是把前兩本書的資料循環再用﹐從資料中發掘出從高墮下的大企業﹐把它們的共通點加以分類整理﹐歸納出巨人倒下的前因後果。

作者研究得出的結論一半是常識﹐另一半則是推反常識。很多人以為大企業倒下來﹐是因為大企業不懂變通﹐被後來者的創造性壞破殺過措手不及。緩慢的大笨象最終會倒地﹐但可以吊命長達數十年才慢慢死去。很多大企業的死亡卻來得很突然﹐有些甚至在外看似最高峰時﹐短短幾年間把用幾十年時間累積的資產敗掉。作者指出所有突然倒下來的大企業﹐也有經歷五個階段。

第一個階段是驕兵必敗﹐大企業被自己的成功衝昏頭腦﹐忘記了一直以來賴以成功的核心價值。
第二個階段是好大喜功﹐盲目追求增長和利潤﹐管理層劣幣驅逐良幣﹐被無能的人佔據決策位置。
第三個階段是無視風險現實﹐管理層發出豪言壯語﹐並把消滅異見聲音。
第四個階段開始下滑﹐管理層換血希望有救世主的出現﹐把企業從水深火熱中拯救出來。
第五個階段已是返魂無術﹐企業只餘下被拆骨收購或倒閉的命運。

當然分析了大企業倒下的成因後﹐作者便對症下藥開處方。醫治失足巨人的方法很其實簡單﹐只需按作者前兩本書成功企業的素質便可以了﹐只是作者有些賣花讚花香﹐幫自己賣廣告之嫌。書中對比一些成功和失敗的例子﹐說明只要使用正確的方法﹐到了第四階段還可以扭轉頹勢。最有趣是對比IBM和HP翻身的例子﹐Louis Gerstner和Carly Fiorina完全相反類型的CEO。實幹型的Gerstner帶領IBM成功轉型﹐相反只懂空談改革的Fiorina則把HP拖進更深的黑洞﹐要後來Packard後人出面換人才能止血。

This is the classic paper on work and schedule. It is a known fact that work will expands to fill up its allocated time. Somehow our management take it one step further, thinking work can also be squeezed into a unrealistically tight schedule.

Nov 19th 1955 – The Economist

IT is a commonplace observation that work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion. Thus, an elderly lady of leisure can spend the entire day in writing and despatching a postcard to her niece at Bognor Regis. An hour will be spent in finding the postcard, another in hunting for spectacles, half-an-hour in a search for the address, an hour and a quarter in composition, and twenty minutes in deciding whether or not to take an umbrella when going to the pillar-box in the next street. The total effort which would occupy a busy man for three minutes all told may in this fashion leave another person prostrate after a day of doubt, anxiety and toil.

Granted that work (and especially paper work) is thus elastic in its demands on time, it is manifest that there need be little or no relationship between the work to be done and the size of the staff to which it may be assigned. Before the discovery of a new scientific law—herewith presented to the public for the first time, and to be called Parkinson’s Law*—there has, however, been insufficient recognition of the implications of this fact in the field of public administration. Politicians and taxpayers have assumed (with occasional phases of doubt) that a rising total in the number of civil servants must reflect a growing volume of work to be done. Cynics, in questioning this belief, have imagined that the multiplication of officials must have left some of them idle or all of them able to work for shorter hours. But this is a matter in which faith and doubt seem equally misplaced. The fact is that the number of the officials and the quantity of the work to be done are not related to each other at all. The rise in the total of those employed is governed by Parkinson’s Law, and would be much the same whether the volume of the work were to increase, diminish or even disappear. The importance of Parkinson’s Law lies in the fact that it is a law of growth based upon an analysis of the factors by which that growth is controlled.

The validity of this recently discovered law must rest mainly on statistical proofs, which will follow. Of more interest to the general reader is the explanation of the factors that underlie the general tendency to which this law gives definition. Omitting technicalities (which are numerous) we may distinguish, at the outset, two motive forces. They can be represented for the present purpose by two almost axiomatic statements, thus:

Factor I.—An official wants to multiply subordinates, not rivals; and

Factor II.—Officials make work for each other.

We must now examine these motive forces in turn.
The Law of Multiplication of Subordinates

To comprehend Factor I, we must picture a civil servant called A who finds himself overworked. Whether this overwork is real or imaginary is immaterial; but we should observe, in passing, that A’s sensation (or illusion) might easily result from his own decreasing energy—a normal symptom of middle-age. For this real or imagined overwork there are, broadly speaking, three possible remedies

(1) He may resign.

(2) He may ask to halve the work with a colleague called B.

(3) He may demand the assistance of two subordinates, to be called C and D.

There is probably no instance in civil service history of A choosing any but the third alternative. By resignation he would lose his pension rights. By having B appointed, on his own level in the hierarchy, he would merely bring in a rival for promotion to W’s vacancy when W (at long last) retires. So A would rather have C and D, junior men, below him. They will add to his consequence; and, by dividing the work into two categories, as between C and D, he will have the merit of being the only man who comprehends them both.

It is essential to realise, at this point, that C and D are, as it were, inseparable. To appoint C alone would have been impossible. Why? Because C, if by himself, would divide the work with A and so assume almost the equal status which has been refused in the first instance to B; a status the more emphasised if C is A’s only possible successor. Subordinates must thus number two or more, each being kept in order by fear of the other’s promotion. When C complains in turn of being overworked (as he certainly will) A will, with the concurrence of C, advise the appointment of two assistants to help C. But he can then avert internal friction only by advising the appointment of two more assistants to help D, whose position is much the same. With this recruitment of E, F, G and H, the promotion of A is now practically certain.
The Law of Multiplication of Work

Seven officials are now doing what one did before. This is where Factor II comes into operation. For these seven make so much work for each other that all are fully occupied and A is actually working harder than ever. An incoming document may well come before each of them in turn. Official E decides that it falls within the province of F, who places a draft reply before C, who amends it drastically before consulting D, who asks G to deal with it. But G goes on leave at this point, handing the file over to H, who drafts a minute, which is signed by D and returned to C, who revises his draft accordingly and lays the new version before A.

What does A do? He would have every excuse for signing the thing unread, for he has many other matters on his mind. Knowing now that he is to succeed W next year, he has to decide whether C or D should succeed to his own office. He had to agree to G going on leave, although not yet strictly entitled to it. He is worried whether H should not have gone instead, for reasons of health. He has looked pale recently—partly but not solely because of his domestic troubles. Then there is the business of F’s special increment of salary for the period of the conference, and E’s application for transfer to the Ministry of Pensions. A has heard that D is in love with a married typist and that G and F are no longer on speaking terms—no one seems to know why. So A might be tempted to sign C’s draft and have done with it.

But A is a conscientious man. Beset as he is with problems created by his colleagues for themselves and for him—created by the mere fact of these officials’ existence—he is not the man to shirk his duty. He reads through the draft with care, deletes the fussy paragraphs added by C and H and restores the thing back to the form preferred in the first instance by the able (if quarrelsome) F. He corrects the English—none of these young men can write grammatically—and finally produces the same reply he would have written if officials C to H had never been born. Far more people have taken far longer to produce the same result. No one has been idle. All have done their best. And it is late in the evening before A finally quits his office and begins the return journey to Ealing. The last of the office lights are being turned off in the gathering dusk which marks the end of another day’s administrative toil. Among the last to leave, A reflects, with bowed shoulders and a wry smile, that late hours, like grey hairs, are among the penalties of success.
The Scientific Proofs

From this description of the factors at work the student of political science will recognise that administrators are more or less bound to multiply. Nothing has yet been said, however, about the period of time likely to elapse between the date of A’s appointment and the date from which we can calculate the pensionable service of H. Vast masses of statistical evidence have been collected and it is from a study of this data that Parkinson’s Law has been deduced. Space will not allow of detailed analysis, but research began in the British Navy Estimates. These were chosen because the Admiralty’s responsibilities are more easily measurable than those of (say) the Board of Trade.

The accompanying table is derived from Admiralty statistics for 1914 and 1928. The criticism voiced at the time centred on the comparison between the sharp fall in numbers of those available for fighting and the sharp rise in those available only for administration, the creation, it was said, of “a magnificent Navy on land.” But that comparison is not to the present purpose. What we have to note is that the 2,000 Admiralty officials of 1914 had become the 3,569 of 1928; and that this growth was unrelated to any possible increase in their work. The Navy during that period had diminished, in point of fact, by a third in men and two-thirds in ships. Nor, from 1922 onwards, was its strength even expected to increase, for its total of ships (unlike its total of officials) was limited by the Washington Naval Agreement of that year. Yet in these circumstances we had a 78.45 per cent increase in Admiralty officials over a period of fourteen years; an average increase of 5.6 per cent a year on the earlier total. In fact, as we shall see, the rate of increase was not as regular as that. All we have to consider, at this stage, is the percentage rise over a given period.

Can this rise in the total number of civil servants be accounted for except on the assumption that such a total must always rise by a law governing its growth? It might be urged, at this point, that the period under discussion was one of rapid development in naval technique. The use of the flying machine was no longer confined to the eccentric. Submarines were tolerated if not approved. Engineer officers were beginning to be regarded as almost human. In so revolutionary an age we might expect that storekeepers would have more elaborate inventories to compile. We might not wonder to see more draughtsmen on the pay-roll, more designers, more technicians and scientists. But these, the dockyard officials, increased only by 40 per cent in number, while the men of Whitehall increased by nearly 80 per cent. For every new foreman or electrical engineer at Portsmouth there had to be two more clerks at Charing Cross. From this we might be tempted to conclude, provisionally, that the rate of increase in administrative staff is likely to be double that of the technical staff at a time when the actually useful strength (in this case, of seamen) is being reduced by 31.5 per cent. It has been proved, however, statistically, that this last percentage is irrelevant. The officials would have multiplied at the same rate had there been no actual seamen at all.

It would be interesting to follow the further progress by which the 8,118 Admiralty staff of 1935 came to number 33,788 by 1954. But the staff of the Colonial Office affords a better field of study during a period of Imperial decline. The relevant statistics are set down below. Before showing what the rate of increase is, we must observe that the extent of this department’s responsibilities was far from constant during these twenty years. The colonial territories were not much altered in area or population between 1935 and 1939. They were considerably diminished by 1943, certain areas being in enemy hands. They were increased again in 1947, but have since then shrunk steadily from year to year as successive colonies achieve self-government.

It would be rational, prior to the discovery of Parkinson’s Law, to suppose that these changes in the scope of Empire would be reflected in the size of its central administration. But a glance at the figures shows that the staff totals represent automatic stages in an inevitable increase. And this increase, while related to that observed in other departments, has nothing to do with the size—or even the existence—of the Empire. What are the percentages of increase? We must ignore, for this purpose, the rapid increase in staff which accompanied the diminution of responsibility during World War II. We should note rather the peacetime rates of increase; over 5.24 per cent between 1935 and 1939, and 6.55 per cent between 1947 and 1954. This gives an average increase of 5.89 per cent each year, a percentage markedly similar to that already found in the Admiralty staff increase between 1914 and 1928.

Further and detailed statistical analysis of departmental staffs would be inappropriate in such an article as this. It is hoped, however, to reach a tentative conclusion regarding the time likely to elapse between a given official’s first appointment and the later appointment of his two or more assistants. Dealing with the problem of pure staff accumulation, all the researches so far completed point to an average increase of about 5¾ per cent per year. This fact established, it now becomes possible to state Parkinson’s Law in mathematical form, thus:

In any public administrative department not actually at war the staff increase may be expected to follow this formula:

Where k is the number of staff seeking promotion through the appointment of subordinates; p represents the difference between the ages of appointment and retirement; m is the number of man-hours devoted to answering minutes within the department; and n is the number of effective units being administered. Then x will be the number of new staff required each year.

Mathematicians will, of course, realise that to find the percentage increase they must multiply x by 100 and divide by the total of the previous year, thus:

where y represents the total original staff. And this figure will invariably prove to be between 5.17 per cent and 6.56 per cent, irrespective of any variation in the amount of work (if any) to be done.

The discovery of this formula and of the general principles upon which it is based has, of course, no emotive value. No attempt has been made to inquire whether departments ought to grow in size. Those who hold that this growth is essential to gain full employment are fully entitled to their opinion. Those who doubt the stability of an economy based upon reading each other’s minutes are equally entitled to theirs. Parkinson’s Law is a purely scientific discovery, inapplicable except in theory to the politics of the day. It is not the business of the botanist to eradicate the weeds. Enough for him if he can tell us just how fast they grow.

I am not productive if I don’t get at least half of a day of time. Manager schedule runs only hourly basis, but I doubt how much productivity are those meetings other than showing your presence. If a manager need to do some strategy thinking, he still have to block off half a day.

Paul Graham – July 2009

One reason programmers dislike meetings so much is that they’re on a different type of schedule from other people. Meetings cost them more.

There are two types of schedule, which I’ll call the manager’s schedule and the maker’s schedule. The manager’s schedule is for bosses. It’s embodied in the traditional appointment book, with each day cut into one hour intervals. You can block off several hours for a single task if you need to, but by default you change what you’re doing every hour.

When you use time that way, it’s merely a practical problem to meet with someone. Find an open slot in your schedule, book them, and you’re done.

Most powerful people are on the manager’s schedule. It’s the schedule of command. But there’s another way of using time that’s common among people who make things, like programmers and writers. They generally prefer to use time in units of half a day at least. You can’t write or program well in units of an hour. That’s barely enough time to get started.

When you’re operating on the maker’s schedule, meetings are a disaster. A single meeting can blow a whole afternoon, by breaking it into two pieces each too small to do anything hard in. Plus you have to remember to go to the meeting. That’s no problem for someone on the manager’s schedule. There’s always something coming on the next hour; the only question is what. But when someone on the maker’s schedule has a meeting, they have to think about it.

For someone on the maker’s schedule, having a meeting is like throwing an exception. It doesn’t merely cause you to switch from one task to another; it changes the mode in which you work.

I find one meeting can sometimes affect a whole day. A meeting commonly blows at least half a day, by breaking up a morning or afternoon. But in addition there’s sometimes a cascading effect. If I know the afternoon is going to be broken up, I’m slightly less likely to start something ambitious in the morning. I know this may sound oversensitive, but if you’re a maker, think of your own case. Don’t your spirits rise at the thought of having an entire day free to work, with no appointments at all? Well, that means your spirits are correspondingly depressed when you don’t. And ambitious projects are by definition close to the limits of your capacity. A small decrease in morale is enough to kill them off.

Each type of schedule works fine by itself. Problems arise when they meet. Since most powerful people operate on the manager’s schedule, they’re in a position to make everyone resonate at their frequency if they want to. But the smarter ones restrain themselves, if they know that some of the people working for them need long chunks of time to work in.

Our case is an unusual one. Nearly all investors, including all VCs I know, operate on the manager’s schedule. But Y Combinator runs on the maker’s schedule. Rtm and Trevor and I do because we always have, and Jessica does too, mostly, because she’s gotten into sync with us.

I wouldn’t be surprised if there start to be more companies like us. I suspect founders may increasingly be able to resist, or at least postpone, turning into managers, just as a few decades ago they started to be able to resist switching from workmen’s clothes to suits.

How do we manage to advise so many startups on the maker’s schedule? By using the classic device for simulating the manager’s schedule within the maker’s: office hours. Several times a week I set aside a chunk of time to meet founders we’ve funded. These chunks of time are at the end of my working day, and I wrote a signup program that ensures all the appointments within a given set of office hours are clustered at the end. Because they come at the end of my day these meetings are never an interruption. (Unless their working day ends at the same time as mine, the meeting presumably interrupts theirs, but since they made the appointment it must be worth it to them.) During busy periods, office hours sometimes get long enough that they compress the day, but they never interrupt it.

When we were working on our own startup, back in the 90s, I evolved another trick for partitioning the day. I used to program from dinner till about 3 am every day, because at night no one could interrupt me. Then I’d sleep till about 11 am, and come in and work until dinner on what I called “business stuff.” I never thought of it in these terms, but in effect I had two workdays each day, one on the manager’s schedule and one on the maker’s.

When you’re operating on the manager’s schedule you can do something you’d never want to do on the maker’s: you can have speculative meetings. You can meet someone just to get to know one another. If you have an empty slot in your schedule, why not? Maybe it will turn out you can help one another in some way.

Business people in Silicon Valley (and the whole world, for that matter) have speculative meetings all the time. They’re effectively free if you’re on the manager’s schedule. They’re so common that there’s distinctive language for proposing them: saying that you want to “grab coffee,” for example.

Speculative meetings are terribly costly if you’re on the maker’s schedule, though. Which puts us in something of a bind. Everyone assumes that, like other investors, we run on the manager’s schedule. So they introduce us to someone they think we ought to meet, or send us an email proposing we grab coffee. At this point we have two options, neither of them good: we can meet with them, and lose half a day’s work; or we can try to avoid meeting them, and probably offend them.

Till recently we weren’t clear in our own minds about the source of the problem. We just took it for granted that we had to either blow our schedules or offend people. But now that I’ve realized what’s going on, perhaps there’s a third option: to write something explaining the two types of schedule. Maybe eventually, if the conflict between the manager’s schedule and the maker’s schedule starts to be more widely understood, it will become less of a problem.

Those of us on the maker’s schedule are willing to compromise. We know we have to have some number of meetings. All we ask from those on the manager’s schedule is that they understand the cost.

Peter Drucker是上世紀最具影響力的管理大師﹐他撰寫的管理理論影響一整代企業文化。這本書從他生前的著作中﹐輯錄了二十六篇文章﹐總結他管理學的智慧。有別於市場上一般的商管書藉﹐這本書沒有多餘的水份﹐每篇文章的內容充實到題。若以智識含金量計算﹐每篇文章的主題也可以獨立成書。可能Drucker讀哲學出身﹐在研究管理學前當哲學教授的關係﹐這本書很強調管理學的理論性。若果以為管理學只是吹水學﹐不過把常識包裝起來的學問﹐這本書則從最基本的慨念出發﹐解釋為什麼那些常識之所以為常識﹐而不是隨便任何東西也能成為常識。

這本書可以說是關於管理學的哲學。當然在商企書藉中﹐哲學這一個詞語已被過份濫用﹐失去哲學原本的意義﹐成為這就是某一套觀點的代名詞。不過我在此所說的哲學﹐是回歸哲學原本的學術定義﹐嚴緊地提問what is這問題。書中每一篇文章也是圍繞一個核心問題﹕what is management﹖

這本書分為三個部份﹐第一部份講述管理學的基本﹐管理學包括理性數字化的商業技巧﹐亦包括軟性的溝通技巧﹐但歸根究底管理學如何讓一群完全不同的人﹐在同一個群體或機構下﹐能夠合作生產出有用的商品或服務。管理層的存在價值﹐在於生產出經濟成果﹐讓僱員能更有效率地生產﹐滿足顧客和社會的需要。

很多人有一個錯誤的觀念﹐認為企業的存在意義就是賺錢。企業存在的唯一目的﹐是提供服務和商品去滿足顧客的需求﹐賺錢只是用來衡量企業是否有效率地運作﹐為社會創造財富或是在消耗財富。企業不是賣服務和商品給顧客﹐而是賣那些服務和商品為顧客帶來的功用價值。企業只有兩個功用市場和創新﹐市場就是創造新的顧客﹐而創新則是更有效率地服務顧客。唯有顧客才能夠肯定企業的存在和身份﹐利潤只是企業繼續生存的保障。管理並不是要盲目追求最多的利潤﹐而是要找出若要達成所有企業的發展目標﹐減去風險因素後﹐必需要可持續賺取的最小利潤。

企業並不憑空存在﹐而是依附在社會上才能夠生存。社會容許企業存在﹐是因為企業生產為社會帶來好處。當企業對社會帶來害處時﹐社會可以在一夜間改寫遊戲規則﹐讓企業不能繼續生存。管理層對社會沒有責任﹐但有責任令企業繼續生存﹐不要讓企業成為社會的敵人。管理不只要看今天社會的訴求﹐還要預備明天社會的訴求﹐社會轉變對企業也是一個商機。企業對社會並不有無限責任﹐而責任亦必然伴隨權力。要求企業有無限責任﹐便是等給與企業無限的權力。企業只能夠做能力範圍內的事﹐當然大前題是企業必需能夠賺取可持繼生存的最小利潤。

第二部份是管理學與個人發展﹐這部份的內容與市面其他管理書藉類同﹐都是講述有效率的管理人應如何管理時間﹐作出正確的決定﹐審視自己的能力和如何與別人溝通。分別是此書不會用那些道聽途說的小故事﹐來當增加說服力的幌子﹐而是解釋為什麼這樣做能夠增加效率。第三部份是講述智識型經濟對社會和企業管理帶來的衡激。我自己認為最後一部份寫得有點鬆散﹐一來課題太大很難在數章中完整地掌握﹐二來始終也是幾十年前的文章﹐現在看難免有點過時的感覺。

企管書藉推陳出新﹐每年也有很多新書面世。當中有些會流行一段日子﹐然後被人遺忘﹐直至同一個管理慨念被重新包裝為新的一本書。但更多管理書藉更是濫芋充數言之無物﹐欺騙讀者金錢浪費讀者時間。這本書是少數能夠經得起時間考驗的企管經典﹐不論是現在看還是十年後再看﹐書中的企管理論和知識也不會過時。

Dear chairman, fellow toastmasters, honored guests. A big engineering firm outsourced to Africa and hired four cannibals. On the first day of work, at the end of the orientation, the boss said to the cannibals, “You will make good money as engineers. You can enjoy free food in the cafeteria. Don’t trouble other employees.” The cannibals promised they will not trouble other employees. For four weeks, things is working pretty well, but one day the boss found the co-op student is missing. He came to ask the cannibals, “Do you know what happen to the missing co-op student?”. The cannibal swear they know nothing about the co-op students and the boss went away. After the boss is gone, the lead of the cannibals asked, “Who ate the co-op students?”. One hand raise hesitatingly, and the leader yelled at him, “You fool, we have been eating managers for four months and no one has notice they are missing. Now you ate a co-op student…”

What is management? How many of you have read the Dilbert cartoon? When we think of managers, we always think of the pointy hair guy, sitting in a big office doing nothing, knowing nothing except giving a harsh time to Dilbert. Unfortunately, many people has this misconception about management; and even some managers has the same misconception themselves. Management is the mean to enable a large group of people joint together to form a large organization that deliveries and performs. With out management, any large organization will degenerate into a mob.

Management is a relatively new discipline. It exists merely for 150 years. In ancient time, there was no management, there were only slave and the slave masters. Slave masters don’t manage people, they whip their back. The longest surviving large organization in history is the army. That’s why at the dawn management, managers often borrow ideas from military schools. Command and control is the most common management style in early large organizations. However there are some fundamental difference between a company and the army. A manager can ask the employees to march left and right like a soldier, but they can’t ask the employee die for the company. By the turn of the century, management get a new life when Henry Ford invented the assembler line. Management has became scientific management. The managers break down complicate tasks into simple tasks and trains unskilled labor work together. The managers also measure the performance and output of the workers. After World War II, our society has changed from a blue collar manufacturing society to a knowledge society. Manager has to co-ordinate different people with diverse knowledge and skill in to work together and perform in a large organization.

When we think of management, we often think of business management. It is wrong. Management is a lot more than business. Management is essential to any large organization to perform and delivery result, whether it is a business, a hospital, a university of the government. The result of a business is a satisfied customer. The result of a hospital is a healed patient. The result of a university is a student who can put his knowledge into good use after graduation.

Someone thinks management is science. It deals with numbers, the bottom line, ROI, six sigma and lots of techniques to measure the performance. Someone thinks management is humanities. It deals with people, culture, value, psychology to foster a harmony working environment. Management is really a liberal arts. It is an art deal with knowledge. Not just the knowledge about the service or product of the organization, but also the knowledge possessed by other people. Manager enable a group of people capable of joint performance through a common goal and common value.

There are three men, a manager, a hardware engineer and a software engineer, going to lunch. On their way to the restaurant, they found a magic lamp. They rub the lamp, a genie appears and says, “Usually, I grant you three wishes, but since there are three of you, I will grant each of you a wish.” The hardware engineer goes first, he says, “I want to spent the rest of my life living on a Hawaii beach, with lots of money and lots of beautiful women.” The genie grants his wish and sends him to Hawaii. The software engineer goes next, he says, “I want to spent the rest of my life living on a Mediterranean island, with lots of money and lots of beautiful women.” The genie grants his wish and sends him to the Mediterranean. At last, the genie asks the manager, “It is your turn, so what is your wish?” The manager replies, “I want my engineers back after lunch.”

無線劇集一向垃圾﹐無線的古裝劇更是垃圾中的垃圾。想不到垃圾堆中藏珍珠﹐《巾幗梟雄》竟然讓我每晚追看。或許無線自己也感到意外﹐這套劇沒有豪華的明星陣容﹐起用兩個萬年綠葉當主角﹐在贏得收視之餘還贏盡口碑。或許無線對這套小成本製作從來沒有什麼期望﹐不怕冒險放手讓編劇發揮創作自由﹐寫出一個有別於給師奶看婆媽劇的劇本。看《巾幗梟雄》就如劇中柴九的金句一樣﹐只能用痛快二字來形容。

若果只看劇情簡介﹐說清未太平軍動亂時代﹐富可敵國米商的妻妾爭遺產的故事﹐恐怕會完全提不起興趣收看。再加上無線古裝劇一向的馬虎製作﹐無銀最大米商只有電視城古裝街一間小舖﹐飢荒動盪亂世中米倉連守衛也沒有﹐更不要說青幫三千兄弟﹐沙家幫六百兄弟﹐太平軍數萬士兵﹐來來去去也是那十幾個臨記。雖然故事背景行貨到不能夠再行貨﹐製作簡陋到不能再簡陋﹐編劇把故事重點帶到觀眾意想不到的新方向。爭產勾心鬥角只是配菜﹐主菜由兩主角全力支撐。一條主線講述四奶奶屢憑機智保護無錫稻米無應﹐帶領百娃避過飢荒大災難﹐另一條主線講述柴九在四奶奶的裁培下﹐從小人物向上爬的奮鬥史。

四奶奶與柴九雖是男女主角﹐不過編劇沒有浪費篇幅在感情戲上。四奶奶與柴九的關係很獨特﹐在無線劇集中應該從未出現過。他們從上司和下屬關係關始﹐一個是四面受敵的女強人上司﹐一個自負懷材不遇的下屬新人。一起經歷過無數大風大浪大起大跌﹐從孤立無援的谷底攀上事業的最高峰。柴九是有真才實幹﹐他的機智多次為四奶奶反敗為勝。不過柴九少年氣盛也闖出不少大禍﹐四奶奶亦要多次出手相救。到最後編劇也沒有明確交待兩人的感情﹐我倒認為現在隱晦的描寫更好交待兩人複雜的關係。他們已經超出男女情人的關係﹐大既昇華至曾一起打天下﹐到達生死之交的知己境界。

大家族爭產的故事雖仍貫穿全劇﹐但正印奸角大奶奶和長子必文只是白臉小丑﹐根本未夠班與四奶奶過招﹐時勢才是四奶奶的最大敵人。從開場第一集飢民搶運糧車﹐到全城殺鳥惹蟲禍﹐三子必武遭綁架著索﹐蝗禍吃盡殼物耕作﹐與青幫談判漕運費﹐太平天國攻佔無錫﹐四奶奶每次在緊要關頭﹐也能展示出頂級行政總裁的風範。有些評論甚至從《巾幗梟雄》說到現代企業的社會責任﹐領導人材的特質﹐談論商管理論。佷少無線劇集能夠引起這麼大的迴響﹐遠遠超出觀眾對故事大綱的預期。在電視機旁的每個打工仔心中﹐也希望遇到一個像四奶奶般有承擔有遠見有魄力的好上司。

其實只有四奶奶的好上司還不夠﹐若非一路遇上正直善良的貴人﹐恐怕她就算再多材幹也英雄無用武之地。若非蔣大老爺有先見之明﹐把慶豐年全權交給四奶奶打理﹐這套劇集恐怕落入婆媽爭產的舊公式。若非鐵帽子王爺和太平軍趙師帥也是勤政愛民的好官﹐四奶奶早已給奸黨奪去米行﹐空有一腔熱誠和滿腦子材幹也無可作為。很可惜天下烏鴉一樣黑﹐現實中的四奶奶沒有高層關照﹐搞不好還嫌她阻著大家發財。《巾幗梟雄》的四奶奶雖然讓人眼前一亮﹐可惜劇集還是跳不出中國傳統的奴材心態。百姓除了寄望遇上四奶奶的父母官外﹐還要寄望天子英明體恤蒼生。我理想中的故事結局﹐是把背景移後到民國初年﹐柴九沒有染上咯血病﹐靠著沙家幫兄弟起家打天下﹐一路打到做大軍閥雄據一方﹐有足夠實力保護在領地經商濟貧的四奶奶。

They try to hire back ex-employees from the closed design center as contractors.  It is pretty much admitting last year’s decision to close down the site is stupid.  One desperate measure to they try is by making us work hard and longer hours.  This idea won’t work if they use the stick because it would only demotivate us and further lower our productivity.  They try to use carots and lure us to work overtime.  The director said if the project is finish on time, the whole team will have a special bonus as incentive.

This idea sounds great, the only question is how much is the bonus.  The director did not give us any number or percentage, so the incentive won’t work.  No one would work harder if they don’t know roughtly how much we will get in return.  After the meeting, some of us did a rought calculation, we all agree that the bonus has to be at least $10k to be attractive.  Judging from previous record of the company, the so call special incentive bonus could be merely a few thousand dollars, which won’t worth working your ass off.

This cartoon really describe my experience with the Indian contractors.  My project description may not be perfect, but it seems the Indian guys always implement my requirement in an unexpected way.  The outsourcing firm promised a lot but the code delivered are crab.  I have to review every single line of their code to make sure nothing will blow up.  The document is not very helpful, if it exists at all.  The cost is pretty high, the outsourcing firm pockets 80% of our expense, only 20% go to the salary of the contractors.  The support is patching, the time zone difference makes turn around time very slow.  At the end, all i want is some working code.

Never mind the whole XP vs Vista debate about which is a better OS. (The answer is quite evidently obvious.) Why would the CEO care what OS the employees use at all? He should care about our business strategy, concert about our product road map, the morale of the employees, the operating cost etc. What OS to use is the last thing he should worry about. That’s the job of our IT department. Oh well! I guess he probably not aware of most engineers in the company use Windows only to write document, check emails and surf the web. We do our engineering work in Linux! If a CEO lost focus and spent time worrying which OS to use, I don’t think the company will be in a very good shape. Maybe it’s time to sell our stocks.