Steve Ballmer Doles Out His Top 5 Management Tips

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Ballmer giving out his top five management tips? This ought to be interesting.

While there are some who would argue that outgoing Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer isn't someone to whom others should be listening for management advice, I disagree. I'm not saying Ballmer didn't make mistakes during the last 13 years he occupied the Microsoft CEO hotseat. (Nor would Ballmer himself make that claim.) But I'd also say there's a reason the Microsoft board wasn't encouraging him to abandon the CEO post until fairly recently. Microsoft still makes money, and a lot of it.
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Good riddance to Steve "Fat dancing sweating monkey" Ballmer. He forced out Microsoft's top executives (including the iconic Ray Ozzie) for his yes-men and produced some of the biggest flops ever (Vista/8).

It always baffles me how idiots like him and Jack Welch (the genius who popularized the epic failure known as stack ranking) are considered influencers.
 
"Make sure you see the whole playing field" and "Know your limits". The rest won't matter if this can't be done and is not known.
 
Where was "ignore feedback and tell the customer what they want"? Or is that just a given these days?
 
Super-D said:
Where was "ignore feedback and tell the customer what they want"? Or is that just a given these days?
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Actually, from my experience, it is this.

1. Make asinine decisions with absolutely no customer/employee input.
2. Tell the customers/employees that it is their only choice.
3. Once the customers/employees start raising hell, go into damage control mode.
a. Blame everybody else for your stupidity.
b. Act like you are trying to make it better, and that you had no control over #1.
c. Take all credit for any and all "fixes" to #1.
 
The world will do better by ignoring what Steve says. He turned a leading tech giant into a "me too" company by constantly missing trends and following competition instead of leading it. Also the infighting that he founded within Microsoft has created an atmosphere that has killed innovation and inter-company cooperation. A good example is the Windows Phone division keeping there apps from the RT division to screw that product over. This is not speculation, but I worked at MS for 6 years and I have seen this BS first hand over and over, and this starts at the top.
 
I'm curious to know because I honestly don't have an answer to this; I'm being honest. But what I do know is many of you guys are passionate about stuff like this, so basically what I"m asking, who is your favorite TECHNOLOGICAL ceo and why are they so successful?

─Gabe New excluded of course; for devil worshiping reasons.
 
1. throw chairs
2. chant stupid slogans
3. sweat profusely
4. make buckets of money
5. throw chairs
 
Ski said:
I'm curious to know because I honestly don't have an answer to this; I'm being honest. But what I do know is many of you guys are passionate about stuff like this, so basically what I"m asking, who is your favorite TECHNOLOGICAL ceo and why are they so successful?

─Gabe New excluded of course; for devil worshiping reasons.
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I have a lot of respect for Elon Musk. Some of the tech projects that have been able to be accomplished under his leadership have been things that traditionally were thought to be undoable, like successfully launch a new car company, or private sector space travel.

I also have a great amount of respect for Bill Gates. Admittedly not so much for his tech leadership, but rather for his amazing philanthropic contributions in the world.
 
Zarathustra[H];1040461229 said:
I have a lot of respect for Elon Musk. Some of the tech projects that have been able to be accomplished under his leadership have been things that traditionally were thought to be undoable, like successfully launch a new car company, or private sector space travel.
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That, and he's an Engineer turned CEO, which means he really understands the business his companies are in, which is actually relatively rare in the U.S.

Here, most CEO's are either lawyers or finance guys with no technical expertise, very limited understanding of the industry they operate in, treating products and services like fungible financial instruments, which they most certainly are not.

There are few things as dangerous as ignorant people who believe they know everything, especially when you put those people in leadership roles. And we wonder why we have so many corporate failures in the U.S.

IMHO, no one without a technical degree and experience has any business running a tech firm, just like no one without an advanced engineering degree has any business running an auto company.

Lawyers and Finance guys can be great leaders... ....of law Firms and Banks...
 
You'd need at least an MBA, too. Being an engineer doesn't qualify you to run a company.
 
rflcptr said:
see also; Hector Ruiz :D
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Ruiz is just incredibly smart. You'd typically still need some sort of business management degree. Some people will obviously not need it, but nothing about being an engineer makes you business savvy.
 
From the brilliant mind that gave us:

Vista
Windows 8
Office 365 (and soon to be Windows blue or whatever - basically turning your OS and Office into yearly editions of Madden)
Windows Phone.... all versions
And how about the Windows XP "tablet" that was killed off in it's infancy YEARS before Apple even had a brainfart about iPads....
 
Edit.... Why can't I edit my post? Is this 1998?

Almost forgot, the death of Technet. Thanks a lot for that one, hosers.
 
LeninGHOLA said:
You'd need at least an MBA, too. Being an engineer doesn't qualify you to run a company.
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Tell that to Bill Gates.. or Larry Ellison.. or Mark Zuckerberg... or Gabe Newell.. the list goes on and on and on.
 
shade91 said:
Tell that to Bill Gates.. or Larry Ellison.. or Mark Zuckerberg... or Gabe Newell.. the list goes on and on and on.
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Sure, but saying that all you need to lead a company is an engineering degree is false. Like I said, being an engineer is not qualification for CEO. You need to know how to run a company, too.

(Hint - the vast majority of CEO's have an MBA and/or relevant experience)
 
As a chess player I find that his tips are spot of for a chess game as well:

  1. Make sure you see the whole playing field
  2. Don't pin hopes on a single individual or "dream team"
  3. Realize there's no perfect business model perfect for every era
  4. Don't place only long-term or only short-term bets
  5. Know your limits

Translated to chess:

  • Make sure you look at the entire board
  • Attack with all your pieces, do not try to go on queen raid
  • Know the difference between the opening, middle, and end game
  • You need long term strategy and positional play not just tactics
  • Know your limits
 
cyclone3d said:
Actually, from my experience, it is this.

1. Make asinine decisions with absolutely no customer/employee input.
2. Tell the customers/employees that it is their only choice.
3. Once the customers/employees start raising hell, go into damage control mode.
a. Blame everybody else for your stupidity.
b. Act like you are trying to make it better, and that you had no control over #1.
c. Take all credit for any and all "fixes" to #1.
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Which was how we got Windows 7 out of the mess that was Vista. Maybe MS can take a lemon and make lemonade all over again with Windows 9. That should be easier with this assclown out of the way.
 
Burticus said:
And how about the Windows XP "tablet" that was killed off in it's infancy YEARS before Apple even had a brainfart about iPads....
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Microsoft never killed off Windows XP Tablet PC Edition. Starting with Vista all of the features of the XP Tablet PC version, along with the XP Media Center, were merged into the main Windows SKUs, except versions like Starter and Home. In fact Microsoft has added tablet features to every version of Windows starting with XP Tablet PC. XP Tablet added pen, ink and handwriting recognition technology. Vista added multi-touch support at the driver level. 7 added multi-touch at the OS level and added some touch optimization to the desktop, the task bar, fuzzy hit detection. And of course the tablet features added to 8.x are no infamy to some. The concept of the Tablet PC, a full desktop OS that's capable of running on a tablet, might actually be gaining some real traction for the first time. Cost, heat, performance, battery life and a desktop only UI and apps have plagued x86 tablet PCs since the beginning. Starting with the arrival of Bay Trail two months ago, virtually all of these problems have been solved.
 
Here's my tips to CEO's.

Don't fuck it up.
Treat your people well, and compensate them appropriately.
Don't tolerate bullshit artist and ass kissers.
Treat your customers better than they expect to be treated - always.
Trust the experts you hired.
 
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