Let's start by mentioning my manager has half the industry experience I have, but has just been longer (around 3-4 years) in the company than me. He comes from a data science background, while I come from CS/software engineering. He's been a manager for almost a year now, during which he's just proven over and over how incompetent he is at motivating employees to do great work. He has done and said the following (I know no-one is perfect, but knowing the standards Apple requires from engineers I just think it is too permissive with its managers) we’ve had conflict over some presentation slides, where he corrected all my slides (presenting my project from a technical point of view) and insisted I read his exact notes on the matter ( like a secretary ). His points were - he knows the subject better than I do period, he has the final say since it’s a director level presentation . I’ve asked what the requirements are for the next level (was underleveled anyway at hiring ) and he bluntly said for me it might take 4 years - if I’m already mid-senior why should I wait that much inside the company to be given opportunities to grow faster ?! I could just take the next job as a senior/staff etc. and be on my way … Talking to other colleagues they’ve said something different : you can go faster but it depends on the projects you’re assigned (impact etc.), so again my career depends on the projects he assigns me to. I’ve been treated like a junior since joining the company - yes I’ve changed tech stack for this job but it doesn’t make me a noob. Also during meetings with other teams- he (the manager) and his “rockstar” would remind me loudly of keyboard shortcuts (simple things like ctrl + F ) which pissed me off because I’ve perceived it as mockery not helpfulness by trying to “motivate” me he’s actually insulting my intelligence every time : for ex. he’s all of a sudden trying to convince me I wouldn’t get better opportunities than I get at Apple “look you get to train an ML model, you can only do this at Apple” - absolutely hilarious, given the multitude of companies that are in the AI field these days … I’ve avoided going to HR with these matters because I don’t feel like I have solid evidence, at the same time I despise working with him What kind of managers do you have or have encountered and what’s your opinion about this ? I would have expected Apple managers to be a bit brighter and self-conscious.

Given the power difference between you and the manager it is likely a lost cause to try and bring matters to HR or to try and confront him directly. You will likely not come out on top in that battle, even if you do, how much worse do you think your relationship will be after you have a battle with him that involves HR. Best option in my opinion is to find a way to switch teams. Try and maintain a decent relationship with him for a while so that he doesn't try to sabotage your efforts to move to a new team. It seems like your skills would be appreciated in another team. Worst case is you switch companies and with Apple on your resume yo can get call from other FAANG companies. I have a little anecdote for you. During my first internship, my team lead was often rude and disrespectful. I tolerated his behavior for a while, but eventually, it became too much, and I reported his conduct to my skip manager (his supervisor). The next day, my skip manager called him in for a meeting first thing in the morning and had a conversation with him. After that, he rarely spoke to me, only interacting with me on a minimal, professional level. At the end of my internship, he had to complete an evaluation of my performance, and guess what? He gave me the worst evaluation possible, which led to the lowest grade from my university for my internship. I am certain this wouldn't have happened if I hadn't reported his behavior. You are unlikely to completely overhaul your manager's behavior and conduct so either switch teams/managers or companies. Wish you the best of luck!

doubts about my manager

Mid-Level Software Engineer [ICT3] at Apple4 months ago

Apple

Mid-level Engineer

Let's start by mentioning my manager has half the industry experience I have, but has just been longer (around 3-4 years) in the company than me. He comes from a data science background, while I come from CS/software engineering. He's been a manager for almost a year now, during which he's just proven over and over how incompetent he is at motivating employees to do great work. He has done and said the following (I know no-one is perfect, but knowing the standards Apple requires from engineers I just think it is too permissive with its managers)

we’ve had conflict over some presentation slides, where he corrected all my slides (presenting my project from a technical point of view) and insisted I read his exact notes on the matter ( like a secretary ). His points were - he knows the subject better than I do period, he has the final say since it’s a director level presentation .
I’ve asked what the requirements are for the next level (was underleveled anyway at hiring ) and he bluntly said for me it might take 4 years - if I’m already mid-senior why should I wait that much inside the company to be given opportunities to grow faster ?! I could just take the next job as a senior/staff etc. and be on my way … Talking to other colleagues they’ve said something different : you can go faster but it depends on the projects you’re assigned (impact etc.), so again my career depends on the projects he assigns me to.
I’ve been treated like a junior since joining the company - yes I’ve changed tech stack for this job but it doesn’t make me a noob. Also during meetings with other teams- he (the manager) and his “rockstar” would remind me loudly of keyboard shortcuts (simple things like ctrl + F ) which pissed me off because I’ve perceived it as mockery not helpfulness
by trying to “motivate” me he’s actually insulting my intelligence every time : for ex. he’s all of a sudden trying to convince me I wouldn’t get better opportunities than I get at Apple “look you get to train an ML model, you can only do this at Apple” - absolutely hilarious, given the multitude of companies that are in the AI field these days …
I’ve avoided going to HR with these matters because I don’t feel like I have solid evidence, at the same time I despise working with him

What kind of managers do you have or have encountered and what’s your opinion about this ? I would have expected Apple managers to be a bit brighter and self-conscious.

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Discussion

(3 comments)

4
Supportive Tarodactyl
•Taro Community
4 months ago
Given the power difference between you and the manager it is likely a lost cause to try and bring matters to HR or to try and confront him directly. You will likely not come out on top in that battle, even if you do, how much worse do you think your relationship will be after you have a battle with him that involves HR.

Best option in my opinion is to find a way to switch teams. Try and maintain a decent relationship with him for a while so that he doesn't try to sabotage your efforts to move to a new team. It seems like your skills would be appreciated in another team. Worst case is you switch companies and with Apple on your resume yo can get call from other FAANG companies.

I have a little anecdote for you. During my first internship, my team lead was often rude and disrespectful. I tolerated his behavior for a while, but eventually, it became too much, and I reported his conduct to my skip manager (his supervisor). The next day, my skip manager called him in for a meeting first thing in the morning and had a conversation with him. After that, he rarely spoke to me, only interacting with me on a minimal, professional level. At the end of my internship, he had to complete an evaluation of my performance, and guess what? He gave me the worst evaluation possible, which led to the lowest grade from my university for my internship. I am certain this wouldn't have happened if I hadn't reported his behavior.

You are unlikely to completely overhaul your manager's behavior and conduct so either switch teams/managers or companies.

Wish you the best of luck!
3
Alex Chiou
•Tech Lead @ Robinhood, Meta, Course Hero
4 months ago
I'm really glad you didn't go to HR as HR is there to protect the company, not you. It's painful to say this as I actually know a lot of very nice people in HR, but it's hard for them to do what's right given HR's messed up incentives.

As Supportive Tarodactyl mentioned, it's almost certainly best for you to change managers, either with an internal team switch (I'm sure there's many awesome teams at Apple) or a company switch. We need to make a course on how to choose a good team, but in the meantime, I recommend these:

[Masterclass] What Software Engineers Should Look For In Their Engineering Manager

[Masterclass] How To Choose A Good Company And Team As A Software Engineer

For future promotion conversations, I recommend going through the "Set Up Success Criteria" section of my promotion course here: https://www.jointaro.com/course/nail-your-promotion-as-a-software-engineer/step-0-establish-yourself/
2
Rahul Pandey
•Tech Lead/Manager at Meta, Pinterest, Kosei
4 months ago
It's clear from your bullet points that you're on bad terms with your manager. You should switch teams. Involving HR or waiting for your manager to improve is almost certainly going to be a waste of time.

As an aside, this is why bad managers are so dangerous to a company. The blast radius of a bad manager is that 10+ engineers become ineffective and leave the company.

I also left a pretty detailed response here: How do I give critical feedback to my manager?