The Key to Microsoft's Success (or A Kind of Book Review: Joel on Software)
A couple days ago, I bought a copy of
Joel on Software at a swell neighborhood book store that specializes in computer titles. I also bought
Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman: Adventures of a Curious Character by Richard Feynman (why the
Edmonton Computer Book Source had this on the shelves is a little curious). I figured I'd get drawn into the Feynman title first, before
another software title, but after a few minutes flipping through what is effectively a collection of essays by Joel Spolsky, I got sucked in. I only recently (well, 6 months or so ago) started aggregating Joel's feed into my FeedDemon, and have found it mostly entertaining.
The book, taken from his blog over the last 6 or so years, is a scream. It's engaging, entertaining, inspiring, maddening, and even educational. I'm almost done in the space of 2 days--- this could be a record for any Apress, Microsoft Press, or almost any other tech publisher title I've bought.
One essay in particular,
Two Stories, illustrated an idea that for a few years now, I've been expressing to coworkers, bosses, my wife, and anyone who will listen:
the key to a companies success is the empowerment of it's workers. Here's the excerpt that really jumped out at me-- he's referring to how some management saw some bureaucracy getting in the way of his progress and decisively dismantled it:
I was blown away, of course. At Microsoft, if you're the Program Manager working on the Excel macro strategy, even if you've been at the company for less than six months, it doesn't matter - you are the GOD of the Excel macro strategy, and nobody, not even employee number 6, is allowed to get in your way. Period.
This sends a really strong message. For one, it makes everyone that much more conscientious about their jobs. They can't hide behind the idea that "management approved their spec," since management really didn't look too closely at their spec. All management did was hire smart people and gave them something to do. For another, it makes for an extremely nice place to work. Who doesn't want to be king of their own domain? Software, by its nature, is very easy to divide into smaller and smaller components, so it's always possible to divide up responsibility among people and let people own an area. This is probably THE reason why software people love working at Microsoft.
I'm nowhere near as smart as Joel, or some of the other people he knows, but I'm a business person before I'm a developer or architect, and this is (IMO) precisely why Microsoft is so successful and why so many good people would LOVE to work there (me included). Look at Scoble and Balmer for example… in so many other organizations, the commander in chief would NEVER let some marketing plebe (with all due respect to Robert) stand up and speak his mind about the company. I think this is a pure reflection of Balmer's excellence… he either doesn't have an egotistical NEED to try to control things, or he knows better than to try (my money is on the latter).
So, to me, this is the moral of the "Joel on Software" story… if you're a knowledge worker, make things happen--- if you're a manager, let them.