Managing difficult developers can frustrate even veteran supervisors. Here's advice from four managers on how to handle the "problem child."
If Shakespeare were alive in 2002, he'd be a technical writer, and his motto would be: -Kill all the developers."
Whether they deserve it or not, developers are often stereotyped as having big egos and being hard to get along with. If you're a project lead or development manager, chances are you've had to deal with a talented developer who had a less-than-pleasant demeanor. The challenge lies in finding a way to keep the star player in the lineup without alienating the other players on the team.
We asked four technical managers to tell us how they deal with difficult developers. The advice they gave us may surprise you.
Hard skills, soft skills
Mark Kimbell, president of Kimbell Associates, a training and consulting company, makes a living teaching people how to be better managers and employees. Kimbell, who has a background in programming and technical management, illustrates the relative importance of hard and soft skills with the -root canal" story. -I needed an emergency root canal on a tooth that was hurting so badly I couldn't stand the pain," Kimbell said. -My regular dentist found a specialist who could work me in that day. I drove straight to this total stranger's office, plopped down in the chair, and emphatically said, 'Ahhh!' without asking a single question about his soft skills. All I cared about at that instant was fixing the problem and stopping the pain."
Many development managers feel like Kimbell in that dentist's chair. You just need a particular problem fixedâ€"now. That may mean hiring (or retaining) a developer who has the hard skills you need but who lacks soft skills such as communication or a teamwork ethic. But ignoring the latter part of the equation can have a major negative impact on the rest of the team.
The effect of bad behavior on the team
According to Guy Wathen, who manages the programming department for a Midwestern manufacturing company, you can't let soft-skills problems go unresolved. -If someone is causing problems within the team, you have to deal with the problem head-on. Talk to that person and try to get the conflicts resolved. Good coders aren't worth keeping if they're causing all sorts of other problems."
Wathen once managed a developer who, knowing the people around her hated country music, would turn up the radio on a country station just to annoy her teammates. -It definitely affected her job performance and the performance of the other developers. People didn't want to talk to her, so they wouldn't go to her. The work wasn't getting done."
When confronted about the problems within the team, the country-music lover threatened to quit. -That's like a hostage situation," Wathen said. -I'm not going to let an employee hold me hostage. I had to let her go."
