#A blog series

Intro

Achieving cooperation and delivering is a priority for IT companies. Their bread and butter too !

Missed timelines, delayed projects, stretching programs, over-budgeted portfolios are common. Equally so within the IT industry.

To solve these problems organizations create systems. Like –

●Bonuses

●Performance reviews

●HR practices

●Team exercises

●Parties, excursions, etc.

These are all to build teams. And so co-operation.

As part of this blog series, we look at “systematic” concepts that achieve cooperation. Or ought to.

We start with … what DOESN’T work.

Bonuses

Bonus : A monetary incentive for a certain behaviour.

Let us start with few questions:

●What behaviour should an IT company reward ?

○Faster delivery – even if with some bugs.

○Quality delivery ( zero P1 bugs ) – even if delayed.

○Scaleable design – with added development cost.

○More lines of code – even when it’s repeated.

○Meeting timelines ?

○Documentation ??

Answering the above questions is NOT easy. Because, companies go through cycles where the desired behaviour changes.

A startup needs fast delivery, whereas a large organization prefers quality. Furthermore …

●The startup might mature into a large organization.

●And a large organization might have a new project that needs a startup-type handling.

●Fast delivery might mean zero-documentation. On the other hand …

●A handover or attrition might need loads of documentation.

In such changing scenarios, how do you give the bonus ? Do we reward a different behaviour each time ?

Appraisal reviews

Performance review months at IT companies are the most unusual times.

●English suddenly becomes the language of communication.

Especially with folks from the vernacular languages. You see – vernacular is the casual mode of communication. ( but not during appraisal season )

●Unlike regular meetings that stretch unnecessarily, ‘review’ meetings are short. ( they are discomforting for both the appraisee and the appraiser. )

●Eye contacts are avoided. ( lest they tell the truth )

Like the Autumn months, the greenery in the office landscape dries and starts to die. In anticipation of the upcoming winters !

●A lot of HR meetings happen.

●Coffee time gossip floats in the air.

●Folks of the same designation huddle with hushed voices.

●A curtain builds between the “us” and “them”.

It’s a time for revenge, grievances, proving and other things. Many times it is NOT for PERFORMANCE REVIEWS, and is for everything else.

But why ?? Here are some reasons appraisal systems give us heartburns.

●Virtual Nature of a Software

We cannot see, touch, smell, taste or feel software. This puts us at an immediate disadvantage while evaluating a piece of code or a techie.

This is a MAJOR reason performance reviews are difficult.

A detailed blog on the topic @ Why IT industry is fertile ground for Cheatcodes

●Human Variables

Humans are complex creatures. With our experiences and preferences, we are a recipe for imperfection.

Here are some factors that add to the broken system.

○Being Judged is Discomforting

An Indian girl dresses up to be “seen” by a guys’ family. Ask her how she feels. Anxiety, stress, tense, pressure would be some of the words used.

Being judged in a professional environment is not very different. It creates anxiety.

○Comparison

“Apples to Oranges” do happen. ( and wastefully so )

○Biases

People bring their biases into performance discussions too. Dress code might become more important than the actual code.

○Only Critiques, No Suggestions

Critiquing is easy and recommending is difficult. Many a time – with only criticism and no help. Appraisals turn into a humiliation exercise.

○One Sided

○Standard/ Bureaucratic

○Phony Feedbacks

And IT companies depend on such systems for their growth. A system with so many flaws is at best – unhelpful, and at worst a hypocrisy.

Team Building – Parties, Excursions

We pick the next tool set – from the HR’s playbook. A team bowling event, a dine-out, paintball battles, secret santa, treasure hunts, cultural events and more.

I admit – these do build camaraderie. Just like going to the gym, once a quarter builds our body !!

While the events help. They are too few and far between, to achieve any reasonable result.

I submit – team building events delay any upcoming attrition at an organization. That’s it. Raising a team’s productivity is too far-fetched a goal for these events to be able to achieve.

To BE or Not To Be – tis the question

With all the flaws of – bonuses, appraisal systems or team building systems. Do we abandon them ?

I disagree. Abandoning such systems would create a “socialist” structure. One with no disincentive to be lazy, and NO incentive to work hard.

No software company can survive such neglecting techies.

During Soviet Union times, everyone stood the same risk of going to the Gulags. So, everyone stopped working.

You see – when everyone stands the same chance of being imprisoned. Being lazy and sent to Siberia sounds better than working hard and going there !

Same would happen at an IT organization.

.The answer then is – redesign the systems with some important characteristics.

The Pillars of a Cooperation Achieving System …

This is where our blog series begins. In the next set of blogs we talk about pillars of a cooperation achieving system.

As always … I speak only about the tech industry. Let’s begin …

Pillar 1 : Quick Detection of Behaviour

Achieve Co-operation at IT Companies