Working From Home

[clearedforlanding]

As a CEO I completely disagree with you.

A managers first objective is to establish control of the situation he has been placed in. Respect & trust are secondary. This does not mean that establishing control has to be a combative experience that destroys the prospect of building respectful, trusting relationships.

Maybe I should have used the phrase "Establishing his Authority".

Absolute bulltulip. CEO of what? A cleaning company with migrant workers? - CIO with 1200 downstream reports here.

OK let's be thorough about this.

Objectives of a Manager.

1. Set clear expectations with the CEO or your manager

You’ve been hired to fill a hole, and there will be organizational pressure for you to contribute immediately. Review your objectives with the CEO to make sure they have the right expectations for what you’ll be doing. Your primary goal for the first month is to effectively join a team.

2. Schedule a one-on-one with everyone on the team

Depending on the size of the company, this may take a few hours or the entire first month. Find time to meet with everyone individually.

I prefer walking one-on-ones – there’s something focusing and invigorating about walking together and looking ahead as opposed to staring at each other across from a conference room table.

3. Ask everyone this question

“What can I do to make your life easier?”

You’re showing that you’ve here to help, not to command. How they answer is almost as important as what they say. You’ll get a true indication for how they perceive the PM role, and what they need from you.

4. Take a load off their back

Hopefully you’ll walk away from the meeting with something you can take from them that’s cutting into their productivity. Maybe an engineer would love for you to take over bug triage.

5. Schedule time with your lead engineer to walk through the product’s technical architecture, in deep detail

Don’t shy away from asking questions or drilling down on things that didn’t quite make sense.

Too often PMs try to impress their engineers with their technical acumen, but in my experience engineers are much more impressed with PMs who are willing to ask questions and say “I don’t understand that.”

6. Resist the urge to jump in and start changing things

You’re going to want to start making changes to the product and the development process. I recommend holding back a bit in the beginning.

Your ideas and thoughts will be better formed after you’ve had a chance to settle in, gain credibility, and absorb all of the nuances. You’ll also be demonstrating that you’re a listener.


etc ....

(Text from Ken Norton, Google Ventures)

[psychocandy]

I disagree as well. The agent is meant to be representing you and negotiating on your behalf. We all know that's largely cobblers and they mostly do bugger all, but if you're not getting anywhere by yourself then approaching the agent seems entirely sensible. The client is their paymaster, but on the other hand they're potentially losing their cut of your work and the client may well replace you with a contractor from a different agency. And the latter is what scares them the most.

The agent may also be able to talk to someone higher up in the organisation who perhaps wouldn't talk to you.

True. I've had an agent once or twice who would have sorted something like this. They seemed to look at the bigger picture and know that peeing off the contractor would not have ended well either.

Unfortunately, a lot I wouldn't have trusted with this info.

[psychocandy]

my personal take on it.

I'd ask for a meeting with him/her, outline the previous situation, explain you understand his/her views and why and want to be accommodating, then outline your track record/examples of where you haven't spent your day at home on contractorUK, and explain how you are happy to attend the office more regularly but that you really value working from home and so would like to find a way forward which meet both his management needs, and your needs.

If you go in there with the view you have posted up here - that basically the good old days have been ruined by an a55hole of a new manager...your only going to get one result.

But it might not be the good old days have been ruined. The OP could have only accepted this contract on the basis of the WFH arrangement...

I've had similar. My Mrs went back to work doing shifts so there was childcare to think about so before accepting an extension I sat down with the client and, out of courtesy, said look do you have a problem with me coming in late some days, leaving early other days etc. To be honest, I generally used to come in whenever was appropriate anyway but thought this was the friendly way to do it. I even agreed to let them know in advance so they knew where I was (if for example I'd be in late). Yes no problem they said.

A month or two later, some other manager decreed that everyone, especially contractors had to be onsite at a certain time. So I arranged a meeting. Explained that yes I understood but did they remember our previous discussion? I explained that, not being awkward but things just wouldn't work out for me if this now changed. I'd try my best to fit in but I wasnt going to tell my mrs she now had to quit her new job because of childcare issues. And, no hard feelings and all the best like but come next extension, I would be forced not to accept.

Change or heart resulted and we went back to how it was.

Point is I could have steamed in there and said, I'm a contractor, you're not allowed to control me (after all, this was a decent attempt at D&C from them), I can turn up when I want etc. Wouldn't have ended well I fear.

[northernladuk]

I disagree, I have experienced a very competent agent resolving a similar issue early in my contracting career. He didn't contract wave, he was simply a more experienced negotiator than I.

I don't know whether to agree or disagree with so much of it going around but....

Just because one agent out of the 1000's helps does not mean it's the standard. You are disagreeing with a statement that is broadly correct based in a one off and pretty rare situation. Not the most helpful argument.

[northernladuk]

All this CIO and CEO Willy waving is quite entertaining....

[clearedforlanding]

I don't know whether to agree or disagree with so much of it going around but....

Just because one agent out of the 1000's helps does not mean it's the standard. You are disagreeing with a statement that is broadly correct based in a one off and pretty rare situation. Not the most helpful argument.

Fair point. But what is there to lose?

[clearedforlanding]

All this CIO and CEO Willy waving is quite entertaining....

Oh, it's silly and embarrassing.



I just get irritated when people think that the best way to manage highly skilled professionals (who can walk at any moment) is through dominance. A clear indicator of an experienced manager to me is one who realises and demonstrates that a significant component of his job is upstream management. Those that talk about establishing control are often team leaders with the title 'manager'.

[TheFaQQer]

CIO with 1200 downstream reports here.

So why are you pissing about on CUK then?

[SlipTheJab]

So why are you pissing about on CUK then?

[clearedforlanding]

So why are you pissing about on CUK then?

You think we work?

I have answered this before, ex-contractor on a large recruitment drive of contract resources. Logical place to hang out while listening to conference calls on mute.

The real question is why are all the contractors pissing around on CUK during invoicing hours?