Effective Software Managers

Here's a link to a little blurb on being an effective software manager:
Effective Software Manager Blurb

and here's a link to the article the blurb also references:

What Makes an Effective Software Manager?

The author in the first link writes about his manager getting rid of ineffective people. This is really interesting because it's exactly the first thing Jim Collins writes about in "Good to Great": First, get the right people on the bus!

I also feel "Making the Call" [referenced in the two articles above] is incredibly important. I've found 'making the call' and 'taking ownership' go hand-in-hand. I'm seeing real-life examples where people who don't do so lead their employees in circles, running only to stand still and never without any sense of completion.

An example:

There is a service provided to us by an outside party and the contract was never signed. The service was executed nevertheless and the first quarter invoice for 2007 is still yet to be paid. Myriad attempts to get this invoice paid has led nowhere. I'm not sure who was responsible for dropping the ball. I do know there were many attempts by IT to pay the invoice. In addition, the contract was never signed for this service and this has been outstanding for almost a year. An email that I had sent out regarding the matter was never responded to. It would be amazing for a change to hear someone say, "OK, great. Let me look at that contract, sign it and hand it right back to you" and for them to actually do it. Instead, unreturned emails and phone calls are the norm. If my business user would 'make the call' or 'take ownership' this would make mine and many employees' lives easier. Instead, the issue gets buried until the next go-round.

I think in an environment like the bank where IT serves its business users and IT has traditionally acted subservient to the business, making the call is especially important. Many IT people I've seen don't want to challenge their business users and state their terms. Instead, they're led astray by business users who have no IT knowledge. I've actually found that when I grab the reigns and state unequivocally what the options are and what the challenges are of each option, then usually the business will comply. After all, we serve their interests. Why shouldn't they trust us? In fact, IT can be in a position where we can actually LEAD the business. However, when we are too eager to please or afraid to be clear about our intent, communication breaks down and we (IT) can be sent off on wild goose chases; goose chases, we might be resentful about, because we weren't clear from the get-go and because we were afraid to be straight with our users.