ZA/UM expanded from 30 to 100 employees following the release of Disco Elysium
They had some success with their little over-hyped game, so they thought they had found an infinite money glitch, more than tripled their staff, and managed it into the ground. Apparently learning nothing from the hugely public failures of... 95% of every tech/gaming startup? I guess it's good news for whoever picks up their overpriced office furniture at surplus.
I'm no middle manager, but I don't understand why a small team, intimately familiar with how their success was earned, would immediately think "let's spread this windfall as thin as possible across people who did nothing for it."
Why not just give everyone a fat bonus and use the rest of the cash to give yourself a slightly longer dev time on the next project?
Middle management thinking is "With X resources, we created Y content in Z time. With 3X resources, we can do 3Y content in Z time or Y content in Z/3 time." This fails to consider the inefficiencies of bureaucracy and the pitfalls of team member overspecialization.
I see you too are familiar with The Mythical Man-Month. But yes. This is how managers think. If 5 people made a great product in a year, then 150 people should be able to make the exact same product in a month with the same margin. Then we can get the same ROI in 1/12 the time. Not only will that compound, we'll be profitable every quarter!
Middle managers have a lot in common with commies when it comes to understanding work and productivity.
Buried the lede so deep.
They had some success with their little over-hyped game, so they thought they had found an infinite money glitch, more than tripled their staff, and managed it into the ground. Apparently learning nothing from the hugely public failures of... 95% of every tech/gaming startup? I guess it's good news for whoever picks up their overpriced office furniture at surplus.
I'm no middle manager, but I don't understand why a small team, intimately familiar with how their success was earned, would immediately think "let's spread this windfall as thin as possible across people who did nothing for it."
Why not just give everyone a fat bonus and use the rest of the cash to give yourself a slightly longer dev time on the next project?
Middle management thinking is "With X resources, we created Y content in Z time. With 3X resources, we can do 3Y content in Z time or Y content in Z/3 time." This fails to consider the inefficiencies of bureaucracy and the pitfalls of team member overspecialization.
I see you too are familiar with The Mythical Man-Month. But yes. This is how managers think. If 5 people made a great product in a year, then 150 people should be able to make the exact same product in a month with the same margin. Then we can get the same ROI in 1/12 the time. Not only will that compound, we'll be profitable every quarter!
Middle managers have a lot in common with commies when it comes to understanding work and productivity.
They think that 9 women can make a baby in a month if they just work together