Great article Steve! One of the most accurate articiles I have read in recent history about IT management's attitudes in the work place. Also, I think a lot of this depends on where the manager worked at before coming into the IT industry. For example, I worked at an IT department for a private contractor at the Kennedy Space Center for years where almost all of the managers, as well as many of the project managers were hired directly from Air Force logistics retired non-comms who had already done their 20 years in the Air Force and was simply picking up a second paycheck at KSC. Their primary career was already behind them. We called them "double dippers" and the last thing on their mind was what the technical staff thought. Their military mind set with the technical staff was very simple "just do it and don't ask questions". Also, I worked at another IT company that the majority of their managment was hired in from a fast-food restaurant chain (Burger King). If you have ever worked at a fast food restaurant in your past you can quickly understand why management treated their employees the way they did. It was almost a universal mind-set that was very difficult for them to overcome even though they were now dealing with people that had good educations and technical expertise. I have met many managers in the past that tend to talk very condescendingly to most IT people like they are stupid. Sometimes, I think it is simply a power issue kind of like "I don't care how many people in this department think you are the smartest thing since sliced bread, I am going to show you who is in charge." Others, I think it is more an issue with just being kind of "technophobic" too at times. When you have come from the fast-food restaurant industry managing teenagers right out of high school, sometimes it is very difficult for them to now relate to brilliant educated professionals and/or technical consultants like Paul S, Randall for example, fixing your on-site million dollar corrupted databases. I once had a manager that had a very simple mind-set "I am not interested in knowing what you do or what you want to do. I am only interested in you filling out your needed paperwork and timesheets on time and doing exactly what I tell you to do, period." You would be very surprised how much of this "neanderthal" management attitude is still very prevalent out there in the IT industry. Like I said, alot of it depends on the environment of where the manager came from. A good friend of mine went to her manager once to discuss her career growth and path since she had been doing the same thing for over 5 years. She was not even 5 minutes into the meeting with her manager when the manager abruptly interupted her and said quite succintly "What keeps you here at this company? If you don't like the way things are here you can leave anytime." Well that pretty much took care of that conversation, and she did ultimately leave six months later. The thing to remember here is that some, not all, but some management is not always on the same page as their technical staff. Some of them could care less what we think. I am not saying that all managment is like this in the IT industry. All I am saying, it is a lot more prevalent than you might think. 🙂 Travis.