Ask HN: maker and manager, is there a job where you are both?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6807634

by rittersport3 • 13 years ago

3 3 13 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

I am McKinsey consultant that is terribly bored with my current job, even if I am very good at it. On my weekends, I pull all-nighters programming and rejoice.

Before joining McKinsey I did my masters in electrical engineering and a couple of long (6+ months) internships (Sony, Daimler) as an engineer. It was great - but lacked a certain "business" fun to it - I was expected to come from 9 to 5 and develop whatever I was told to, not much responsibility, not much planning/working on the big picture.

I would like to do both (say, 6 hours of making and 6 hours of managing). Is such thing possible? In your experience, is someone that is not that specialized valuable for a startup? I've been looking through startup "hiring" pages and never saw a similar position...

Have you been in a similar situation? What did you do?

headsclouds2• 13 years ago

I would say that running a small consultancy with 1-4 employees can give you more than enough of juggling between managing and producing (designing, programming, etc.)

I am personally in the situation that you want to be in, and to be honest it's the hardest thing I've had to do in my life (this is obviously personal).

Having meetings with customers after X hours of design work in front of a screen is hard.

Sitting down to design for X hours after dealing with an endless stream of information you need to process and be aware of, before lunch is hard.

Worrying about payroll is hard.

Delivering good design/code is hard.

What I'm trying to say is these things are hard enough on their own, and I find myself overwhelmed often. And I'm not trying to dissuade you from giving it a go, I'm just trying to paint a clear picture for you, so you know how it is.

If you think you'll be able to divide your managing hours vs. your production hours — you're deluding yourself. It's a mess and as the saying goes: when it rains, it pours.

The main difficulty with balancing these two roles is time management, and stress caused by having to manage when you'd rather be producing and vice versa.

So, it's interesting, it keeps you on your toes, it beats working in a coal mine, but it's still hard work.

It has personally made me discover that I much prefer working with people that I do sitting in front of a computer all day, so I'm working on transitioning myself from a designer role, to a manager role.

rittersport3• 13 years ago

Thanks for the reply! - I am certain that it is definitely a challenging thing to do - but don't you see positive results from it, too? I mean, don't you think you are a better manager/maker?

headsclouds2• 13 years ago

Of course there's an upside, and I'm sorry if you got the impression that I'm unsatisfied with my work. That's not what I wanted to get across.

You get to see a more complete picture of projects you work on. You mature a lot as a person, and develop various skills you wouldn't otherwise. It toughens you up, that's for sure.

My main intention was to warn you that it — more often than not — actually means doing more than one job. Both physically and mentally.

I guess the reason I chose to do this is that I get nervous when I'm not in control, and I still like to be in touch with what I set out to do in life; which is to be a good interface designer.

Best of luck to you.