It's funny this came up because I was about to create this throwaway account and post an Ask HN for advice anyway.
Me and my team are in the process of delivering a new infrastructure provisioning system that will bring 9 figures worth of equipment online this year. For the most part we're on time modulo the usual bobbles that come from a year-long project this size.
My upper management regularly says We're in a new safe space and there's room to fail, we're trying to be more like Silicon Valley, etc. My new manager told me in our last 1:1 'If you don't take your application stack you're delivering and turn it into a service in the next 60 days, I'll eliminate your job by year end.'
So we're right back to Go Big or Go Home pressure that the company has always exerted on people despite lip service to the idea we've shed our bad old ways. At least it feels that way to me. Maybe I'm overreacting. Maybe I should look for another job. LOL.
How I think about a situation like this is that your new manager has given you new information that you need to decide what it means.
Either:
1) You've never been in a safe space with room to fail, you've just been operating under this misunderstanding.
Now you know this, you can correct course and change the goal: instead of trying to deliver the best system possible, your team should focus on delivering the minimum required to meet the goal of having it in 60 days. You can cut scope and reduce quality to meet that goal. They are prioritizing the minimum, not the best long-term option for the company.
You also now know a new fact about the organization: you don't want to be there because it's the type of organization that will change the rules on you and fire you for not meeting (what sounds like) unreasonable goals. You now have a new goal: find a new job. Your manager has helped you re-prioritize, this is priority #1 and your project is relegated to #2. Even if you don't get fired in 60 days, you risk being fired in 65 or 90 days, you don't want to be there one day longer than necessary.
2) You are in a safe space, but your new manager is rogue. Even if this is the case, trying to discover that this is the case, and trying to remedy the situation if it is, has a huge personal risk to you with little benefit.
Your best bet is to look after yourself, not the organization, and start looking for a new job. If you go to upper management and they don't fire him, you're going to have somebody that has power over you that is going to be working against you.
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It might hard advice to hear, and hard to follow, but you should be less stressed about the situation. You now have a clear understanding of what you need to do.
Sorry for the long-winded reply. My contact details are in my profile, I'm happy to be a confidential sounding board if that helps.
Me and my team are in the process of delivering a new infrastructure provisioning system that will bring 9 figures worth of equipment online this year. For the most part we're on time modulo the usual bobbles that come from a year-long project this size.
My upper management regularly says We're in a new safe space and there's room to fail, we're trying to be more like Silicon Valley, etc. My new manager told me in our last 1:1 'If you don't take your application stack you're delivering and turn it into a service in the next 60 days, I'll eliminate your job by year end.'
So we're right back to Go Big or Go Home pressure that the company has always exerted on people despite lip service to the idea we've shed our bad old ways. At least it feels that way to me. Maybe I'm overreacting. Maybe I should look for another job. LOL.