October 19, 2017 at 6:38 am
Not sure I'd have put myself in the "top talent" box at my last job, but quite a few of the reasons listed in the Forbes article pretty much sum up why I left.
My current employer (so far) does seem to value my contributions rather more (both by expressing their appreciation for my work and monetarily) and there's more opportunities to move up and around to other areas.
Of course, there's also downsides to the workplace, a mindless following of guidelines, arguably throwing roadblocks up to getting work done because of the previous statement, and a massive case of siloing with no way to resolve it.
(Yes, I work in government...)
October 19, 2017 at 7:27 am
There is nothing wrong with an employee deciding to move on another opportunity or an employer choosing to let someone go, so long as the motivation is rational and the underlying assumptions are correct. It's this dynamic that drives the technology industry. I do believe there should be a series of meaningful discussions between the employee and employer prior to the decision to leave or let go. Lack of communication or bad presumptions can lead to bad choices.
"Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the wise. Instead, seek what they sought." - Matsuo Basho
October 19, 2017 at 8:36 am
This made me think about previous jobs and reasons for leaving. Ignoring casual labouring and very short term jobs there have been four where I have stayed for periods between 18 months and seventeen years. The two where I left because I felt undervalued, was not getting any training, etc. were the shortest (in terms of employment) and the longest. The eighteen month one was odd as they recognised that I had ability (they put me in accounts as a trouble-shooter for two weeks when the end-of-year figures did not add up - can accountants think out of the box?) but kept using me for dross! The long term one went downhill when the original MD was replace by one that had started as an account. After a few years of broken promises (re courses, etc.) and being stuck in a rut (his view was it brought in more money for the company; mine was that it was boring and did not challenge me) I left. One mid-term one I was made redundant from just as my career was really on the up! A new chairman, whose alleged expertise was managing change, changed direction and lost many good people. The company no longer exists! The final one lost focus and I was job hunting when a new, more visionary CEO, came on board. However, it was too little too late and the company collapsed shortly after.
A couple of times I was sub-contracted to Europe where I found the management far better than the UK. But then France and Germany still make cars - we assemble kits!
October 19, 2017 at 11:22 pm
I think "Bad Managers" are considered as "You don't want to leave but you have to" type of problem in a company. I remember a time when I have this kind of manager, which expects us to create a full payroll system and Time keeping system for two(2) months, ignoring user testing, data capture reliability and data transformation for night shifts, its like he wishes to create something out of magic, do take note that this manager is not a IT professional, he is a Accountant, what support do you expect from something like him btw? he provides food.
Left that company and am happy I did.
October 21, 2017 at 12:29 pm
During the early years in the company,y where I worked longest, the first MD, who had worked his way up, was quite visionary and shortly after I started the company started to introduce quality systems and proper documentation for all stages of the software lifecycle. The ethos became "right first time". When he was replaced (shareholders wanted to increase profits rather than profitability) by a former accountant one of the new MD's actions was to make the quality manager redundant and then introduce "short format" documentation. On the accountancy side it became invoice early for hardware/software not yet delivered. He even invoiced software support contracts three months before expiry and chased up two before. This annoyed many customers/clients. And in the end there was no company!
For some reason many Financial Directors also take on responsibility for IT. I cannot help but feel this contributes to many data breaches as the cost rather than the threats are focused on!
October 25, 2017 at 5:15 pm
Three years on I can't understand why I got sidetracked into commenting (irrelevantly) in response to probably irrelevant comments. My first comment was on topic, the next two were a waste of space. So now I'll try to comment on the editorial and on the article that it references.
I think the 10 things raised in the articleby Mile Myatt that Steve referenced are all important. But the idea that two of them are critical while the others are not is quite wrong, Steve suggest that the things numbered #7 and #10 are critical, but they are no more important than some of the others.
If a company fails on 1, 2 and 3 it will get nowhere and no-one competent will stay there who might make a decent contribution that could help a company to survive (not even before it starts going down the tubes). If it fails on 4, 5 and 6 it will rapidly go broke paying recruiters to find candidates to replace any of its staff who can actually do anything useful (others may remain, and paying them to do nothing will just accelerate the company's fall). If it fails on 8 and 9 it will go broke a bit more slowly. And as Steve said, if it fails on 7 and 10 it's in big trouble.
The reality is that the company has to retain competent people, and competent peope tend to require rather a lot from the company that employs them. A company which hits all ten points will win; a company which which hits none of them will fail; and in between is chancey. And if you interpret "win" and "fail" as "keep the people who matter" and "lose them" you will be exacly as right as if you interpret then as "survive" and "go bust".
Tom
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