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Introduction

Personal Statement:  This document discusses issues revolving around the relationship of the technology worker and you, the CEO or senior manager of a company.  Since I have never been a CEO, I cannot possibly understand these issues from that specific vantage point.  I must therefore make my case on the merits of the individual points presented in this document based on my many years of experience at most every level in an organization.  Given the fact that I am also a technology worker, I possess many of the characteristics and potential shortcomings indicated in this document, which in some ways limits my ability to communicate the points clearly.  For that, I apologize in advance.

Formal Introduction:  As technology continues its creep into everyday personal and professional activities, so does the need for understanding all issues that surround that journey.  This technology invasion dictates an understanding beyond mere physical or conceptual subject matter but to an understanding of the people who work creating the technology on a day-to-day basis.  People are the focus of this document, not technology.  The focus isn’t like all the newspaper articles, magazines and books whose purpose it is to enlighten ‘regular people’ like you on the intricacies and importance of a wired world.  Nor is it designed to impress you by predicting the future by making a strong case for what the next ‘killer app’ is going to be.  This document is about people, referred throughout as ‘technology workers.’

What is a Technology Worker?

A technology worker is anyone who works with technology as the principal focus of his or her corporate activity.  Specifically, technology workers are those individuals who create or maintain new and/or innovative technologies on a daily basis.  This focus is different from those of us who use technology as a tool to accomplish their primary work function. While technology is increasingly interwoven into everyone’s corporate activities, technology work is typically not the focus.  Again, most of us use technology as a tool to manage, sustain or grow our business but for technology workers, the technology is the business.

Specifically, technology workers include people who write software programs, design databases, administer computers, design hardware or maintain corporate technology infrastructure. They are the people who are re-inventing the state of your technology every day.  They are inventors, visionaries, engineers, technologists and artists all rolled up into one.  Managing them is difficult.  Understanding them – without being one of them – is going to be a huge challenge for you.

Why Read This Document?

Interacting with technology workers is different from interacting with most other groups of employees.  Since interactions are different, management of technology workers requires a different set of skills that involve differing communications.  Cultivating these new skills is becoming more and more critical because of the ever-increasing role technology plays in the success of your business.  In the “good ol’ days” you had but a few people running your mainframe and a huge maintenance contract with IBM to keep it running.  You rarely saw the technical staff and if you did, more than likely it was a passing hello at the office Holiday party.  Today, you probably have multiple technology departments and your business’s success is hinged on their success.  But technology is not independent of the people who run it.  Technology people require different skills to manage them than others in your corporation.  Gaining those skills will have a positive effect on your business because it will increase the effectiveness of your ever-increasing reliance on technologies for your company.

So…. Do you hold a technology edge with your competitors?  Do you know the state of your technology areas?  Is it well managed?  How well do you know the executive that runs it?  Surely that person is a little different, right?  Does this difference limit your interactions with them?  The technology departments appear to be doing a good job but given the limited interactions, are they really?  Its tough to know because you just don’t know how to communicate with them.  This why you should read on.

Realities & Traps

This section highlights opposing aspects of technology workers.  Think of it as a quick reference guide on what technology workers are and what they are not.  As with any summarized information, these are generalities and will not apply to every person in every situation.   Perhaps this information will motivate you to act on something unique for this group.  Maybe it the concepts will trigger some new insight, which may in turn alter your perspective for the betterment of the technology workers, yourself or your company.

Technology Worker Realities (that technology workers are…):

Assumption Traps (that technology workers are not…):

Likes & Dislikes

This section covers a list of things that technology workers like and things that they do not.  Again, the items mentioned here are generalities.  They are founded in personal experience, but do not apply to every department or every corporation.  Therefore, the information should be taken as the generalizations they are.

Likes

Dislikes

Environment

This is an entire chapter dedicated to the technology worker environment.  Why, you may ask yourself, does a simple subject of this nature garner its own chapter?  You could also be thinking, this subject has been covered a million times by people far more qualified than some geek writing a paper for CEOs.  Why is this document covering it too?

To these points I say – as I have said throughout this document – that the technology worker is unique.  Technology workers are unique in ways that make this subject even more important.  Technology workers are unique in ways that turn a straightforward subject like this into shark-infested waters.

Simply put, what makes technology workers unique is that in order for them to be good at their jobs, much of what they do is volunteer work.  Mediocre technology departments don’t volunteer; they put in their 40 hours and they leave for the day.  If something is broken, it will still be broken tomorrow so why bust butt and fix it now.  High quality technology departments – and workers in those departments specifically – are volunteers because they tend to work well beyond the strict definition of their job description.  They are reading current trade publications at home, surfing the Internet for juicy technology tidbits to take into work, waking up in the middle of the night because a problem is really bothering them and staying late because there is a problem that only they can fix.  Many other departments in your organization will do things like this at their option.  For technology workers, this is not optional behavior.  It’s a requirement.  It’s a requirement because the subject matter is particularly difficult.  It’s a requirement because many other corporate technology departments have many people who do this in order to keep up, so must your department to compete effectively.  It’s a requirement because, well, technology workers like it like that.  They are really jazzed by what they do and wouldn’t have it any other way!

So why is the work environment for technology workers so important?  Because you run a big risk setting an environment that detracts from their enthusiasm.  Think of it this way, if you are hiring the right people, the day they set foot in the doors of your offices, they are ready to do great work.  Their passion may grow in time like other department personnel.  My experience is however is that a poorly structured environment will slowly erode natural passion.  After a few years of erosion, the department is way behind the competition and no one knows what hit them.  It just happened.  Don’t let that happen to your department.

What is Environment

For the sake of this paper, think of the technology worker’s environment to include the following:

Top down

All aspects of a worker’s environment are set from the highest level in your organization.  Aspects such as work ethic, worker discourse, corporate ambition and interaction between co-workers are among the things that are conveyed from the top.  Don’t be lulled to sleep assuming that the technology area will be able to set its own environment and have it stick.  While they can and do strive to set their environment, the tone of the organization will supersede whatever positive strides any specific department can make on their own.

Take, for example, the concept of trust.  Trust is the cornerstone of any good organization.  Posses it, and all is well.  Loose it and trouble is on the horizon.  The technology group will gravitate toward the most trust they can uncover.  If that is not you or your most trusted leaders, this could cause differing messages to percolate around the company.  This in turn will create inefficient and probably ineffective communication of the core ideals you want received by your constituency.

Technologists have a need to trust the people in charge as compensation for all those long hours pumping out the good stuff, ignoring corporate politics.  Now, suppose that all the technology management has done the right things.  These people have been managing with a soft touch, telling the truth, keeping promises, etc.   In this hypothetical situation, along comes a senior manager with a significant contradiction to something previously established with the workers or simply a significantly contrasting communication’s method.  The technologists sense this contradiction and all of a sudden, they feel they cannot trust management.  Let’s be clear, the technology workers’ immediate management may not have done anything wrong, it was the people on top that did something that was perceived as untrustworthy.  Justified or not, this situation causes unrest within the group.

Technology workers have an inclination to ignore the corporate political landscape.  This situation taken at face value is problematic but if put in context probably is not.  Most of your staff has already spent hours thinking about what senior staff agendas.  When one of them says something, it will be put into the proper context.  This should not be advocated but it’s the reality of most organizations.  The nugget here is that the technology workers are inclined to take it at face value and draw conclusions based on those observations.  If there is a contradiction, then there is trouble.  Given that technology workers are insular by nature, senior management may not even find out there is a problem brewing until it is too late to act effectively.

The solution to many of these types of problems is communication.  Clear top-down communication with technology leadership will solve the majority of issues around leadership.  The nugget here is the subtlety of these situations are often lost on technologists.  They most often do not understand or care about the necessities of business.  In the “real world” of course, things change all the time.  This reality brings on the need for things to change and change fast.  The perception that senior management contradicts middle management is a way of life.  The problem this unearths is that the technology worker no longer feels empowered by what their immediate management says.  For this particular situation, it is imperative that insight be provided as to why decisions are being made.  Indicate what was important to the organization and the significant factors.  Technology workers do not always figure these things out by themselves nor do they spend time trying to understand them.  They don’t think that way so you must help them understand.  Helping them understand requires clear and effective communication.

In summary, the tone of an organization is set from the top.  Individual departments can and will establish steady state.  Upper management has the largest effect on the organization so any departmental environment can and will be altered by a single act from someone in the upper echelon of the organization.  Since technologists usually lack significant amounts of empathy for the needs of senior management or corporate necessity, they tend not to give the upper manager the benefit of the doubt.

Atmosphere

I have seen some really cool executive office areas complete with snazzy furniture, antiques, high-hat lights instead of florescent, cool and/or impressive desks and fancy doors.  Technology people can appreciate this stuff, even desire it.  They don’t need it in the same way you might since external folks will not typically see where they work.  What they do need however is their own right atmosphere.  An atmosphere that fits their job necessities in the same way that an impressive executive suite is dictated by corporate needs.

Atmosphere comes in a variety of packages.  There is the physical atmosphere like desks, cubes, proximity to windows, etc.  There is the decorative atmosphere such as color scheme, tone of the furniture, how ‘tech’ it looks, etc.  And there is the intangible atmosphere such as the age of the other employees, noise level, outside view, inside view, dress code, etc.  All of the attributes mentioned above constitute a work atmosphere.  This, I am sure, is not news to you.

How does one achieve the right atmosphere?  No one really knows because there are so many factors that go into atmosphere and for every organization the winning combination is different.  Here however are some rules of thumb:

n         Noise is usually not a good thing.  Don’t put your technologists in low cubes.  Don’t locate them next to sales reps. There are a couple of exceptions, really young, entrepreneurial organizations like to pipe in loud music all the time.  It’s incredibly distracting but its what works for them.  Chances are this is working for a company whose average age is 19 ½.

n         High quality cubicles work great.  Technology people do not expect offices.  Cubes are their home and even long-time talented technologists work in cubes for years at a time.  Getting right to the point, if you are going to put them in cubes, at least make them quality ones.  Plenty of counter space, a comfortable place to put all their tech gear, a good chair, lots of file space so they can ignore it, etc.  The most essential element in a cube is the proper placement of the computer or computers along with their associated parts.  I have seen many company executives choose a style of cube that looks the best but neglect to purchase the options that make them appropriate as computer stations.  Sales and marketing people get the nice office stuff because they entertain the outside world.  Technologists should get the same level of quality but translated for their type of work.

n         Go for cool.  Technology people like uniqueness.  Not trendy but unique.  The same old corporate layout should be changed a bit for techies.  Change the color scheme to something outrageous, expose the HVAC, put a simple high-tech gadget in a few places; be creative.  Let the technologists take part in a redesign of their space.  Ignore the inevitable stupid stuff but keep the core suggestions.

n         Ditch the PA system.  If you have one, rip it out.  Anyone who really needs to be reachable should wear a call phone.

n         Interruptions should be kept to a minimum.  Technology workers often must think uninterrupted for extended periods of time.  A good rule of thumb is to consider even a short single minute interruption of a technology worker costs about 15 minutes in their brain time.  That 15 minutes is the time it takes to get back on track after the interruption is over.

Playfulness

You probably have read the stories in various trade magazines or even mainstream press about people at those young start-up companies partaking in such shenanigans as playing NerfÔ games in the hallways at work.  Perhaps your first impression of such nonsense is to consider it just that, nonsense.  Well on one hand you are probably right.  It is nonsense, but it’s just that kind of nonsense that builds a strong team.  If your technology workers are playing games together then they probably really enjoy each other’s company.  Rarely do they engage in this type of activity to avoid work so you shouldn’t assume this is detracting from their productivity.  In fact, it’s probably a productivity enhancement.  Technology workers do not socialize in the same way you are used to.  Many don’t drink.  If they do, most do not feel comfortable in a bar setting.  A company happy hour or barbecue is a typical team building activity.  Why can’t Nerf basketball be that too?

Conclusion

Technology workers are different than the mainstream employees in your company.  These differences are typically born from their professional experiences and the training received over the years.  Sometimes they realize they are different but mostly you just notice the difference.  Chances are good that at some point you thought about doing “something” to bridge the difference gap.  If this paper has been effective, you should now know they are different and there are definitive things you can do to more effectively lead these individuals.  After all, understanding and dealing with these personnel issues will take much less effort than addressing the manifestation of the issues after long periods of neglect.  A situation further exacerbated by the continuing increase in your company’s dependency on technology.

Another point about the difference in technology workers is that the difference is marginal, not huge.  Understanding and dealing with this doesn’t take a giant task force, millions of dollars in psychology consultants and years of hard work.  What it takes is a bit of empathy and a willingness to deal with the differences head on.  I have suggested various approaches to recognizing technology worker needs and even made recommendations on how to address them.  The extent to which change is made within your organization will depend heavily on your corporate philosophies and practices.  Each company has its own approach to how employees are treated so changes directed at the technology worker should stay within those boundaries.  If this cannot be done, then perhaps a change in policy may benefit the company as a whole.  Again, this is a corporate management decision.  One point to stress in conclusion is that the corporate environment is set at the top.  If the top is genuinely sensitive to worker’s needs, this positive attitude will have positive effects throughout the organization.