Of course jerks are everywhere in IT. It leads to failed or overshot projects, personal crisis because of bad leadership, excessive investment in hardware and little in human resource -- "one technology is all we need" mentality. Know-it-all attitude basically is a killer. Just to name a few. But I think project failure or delays is a huge part of it, be it overpromising on capacity or underdelivering.

Many IT decisions require a certain amount of risk taking—especially when it comes to trying to anticipate where technology is going. An example is working a project whose product will be fielded in a year or two. Should the target IT environment be what's there today, or where we think it will be in 1, 2, 3 years?

The answer is often the latter, but that sometimes turns out to be wrong. A jerk boss, depending on the type type of jerk, can put the kibosh on such risk taking, which is usually necessary to move an organization forward. Why take risks if the jerkface will punish you for it? Instead, take the safe path and implement a solution that, when implemented, will turn out to be yesterday's technology. Then watch your organization slowly die because the person at the helm is a jerk.

I general agree with GRShman, but he left out the direct opposite of the species he describes. The flipside of the proverbial coin are CIOs that take outrageous risks against all attempts by staff to do proper risk/reward. These people are usually experts at making sure that every other manager is left "holding the bag" while they move on free and clear of management wrath.

Geeks with power! Imagine the most socially inept people having the heart and lungs and innards of a whole firm to play with! And little accountability by creating indecipherable mumbo-jumbo when things get tough, then blame storming all who are in their crew.

After 35 years in the industry I have seen many good and several horrid examples of poor leadership and terrible decisions.

The "Dilbert" Effect is not so named without reason. If people in IT did not have the pointy-haired boss to laugh at, they would be right up there with postal employees. Reference the film "Office Space" for a fairly decent account of life in and IT operation. One might laugh if it weren't so spot on.

IT has its fair share. IT organizations are power-structure hierarchies, with the CTO/CIO at the top and fiefdoms underneath. You will find them when you see how they use their power due to their position -- not competence or influence, and if you look at the way they collaborate within IT and across borders. That is why "network" is so important in IT -- who you know is more important than what you know.

They exist. The worst ever was a VP appointed to bring IT spend back under control after a failed early client-server project.

He regarded spending less on projects year-on-year as a virtue. The problem is that this meant that he required all project estimate to be adjusted to his view of reality but when they took exactly as long as originally estimated we got the flak for not being able to bring our projects in on-time or on-budget.

When all the projects ate up all the contingency that the users thought would be available for new dev for some reason it was the dev team's fault.

I left, and in short succession so did the whole team.

I've seen jerks be quite effective at pulling the work force out of the chaos and making the efforts of the employees finally stick.

Negative impact on productivity can be caused by any number of jerk behaviors.

Poor morale leads to lower productivity in several ways, with people not going the extra mile, and higher turnover with the requisite loss of knowledge.

Some jerks are empire builders who measure their value not by what they and their team get done but by how many people they have beneath them. The result is of course a lower paid staff made up largely of people who aren't fully qualified to fulfill the responsibilities of their job title.

Some jerks are old-fashioned yes-men who promise things that can't be delivered because they don't have the courage to say no and don't involve their technical resources before making commitments.

With so many IT professionals having disorders along the autism spectrum (e.g. Asperger's), some like to use their positions to act as cruel bullies and humiliate people, supposedly under a justifiable guise.

Probably not last and certainly not least are the credit-takers and blame-throwers.

IT people tend to be highly analytical and as a result are suspicious of any attempts at emotional manipulation. Jerks frequently try to use tactics unsuited to IT professionals to manage them rather than be honest and provide the information and tools needed to get the job done, which is what the IT professional really wants.

The main reasons for the IT spend is to maintain existing business, win new business and contain costs. The good IT pros understand this. The jerks don't.

I often wonder what prompted my CIO to name our jr. financial officer his deputy CIO. For the last year and half, this guy has looked over my shoulder and impeded me from making my own recommendations in strategic planning and set direction. I'm an IT enterprise architect with 41 years in this business; nothing to brag about, but I have good reputation setting sound system architectures at the enterprise level.

Everything I have to offer must have a financial reason (of course) but it shouldn't be an overriding factor as he wants it to be. Not all of our initiatives have a financial motive, but most of the time it is a rear-end covering because someone screwed up years before.

Every attempt to streamline must have his OK. He suggests this or that to be tweaked with an attitude for presentation purposes and three or four months later, the project is shelved and start in another venue. Never realizing that all the effort put forth is of value; the investment in time alone is worthless.

It may sound like I'm dumping on you guys, but this is what I call being a jerk. Don't use the position to get nothing done.

Y'know what comes out of the back of a chicken? Not the eggs; the other stuff. That's how I succinctly describe my last supervisor. He was a graduate of the school of autocratic management. Therefore:

- If I am the boss then, I am always right.
- Either you do what I say or your replacement will.
- Your attitude is a greater determinant of competence than your results.
- Your reputation always exceeds your ability to improve.
- It is cheaper to replace you than to improve you (eh, ........what?).

This is entirely impressionistic, but I would say there are fewer jerks per capita running IT than in other parts of business. IT people tend to be relatively rational, so decisions have to be justified on rational criteria. And pure power doesn't get you quite as far in a function like IT as in other functions--IT people don't respond well to that. Of course, there are exceptions...

This is such a great topic to discuss. I'm an IT manager myself. Luckily our current company's CIO is more concerned about the bottom line than what the hell we do every day. In other words, he does not micromanage. How does this trickle down to the rest of the IT department? The creativity, drive and motivation by individuals is not stifled. We have a business culture where we truly feel it is a team effort to meet the company's goals. More than that, we believe in hiring from within first. What a concept, right?

Since we have an excellent CIO at the helm who makes clear and concise goals for us to reach, the implementation is well planned and discussed beforehand. If a staff member sees a problem or conflict with the goal, there is no punishment for his/her viewpoint. Instead, this open feedback helps us determine if we are headed for a successful path to a project's full fruition and catch problems before they become bigger ones. Admitting that a project is heading for disaster early is better than wasting more resources until it fails. If your company CIO does not see that, you will be forced into a corner and become his/her scapegoat for a failed project. It's the law of the jungle.

If you do have a jerk of a boss who sees you just as a subordinate and not as a vehicle to success, I'd follow GRShman's advice. Although it will not give you professional growth, let the risk taker be your boss. I'd also document everything you have done and learn from the jerk's mistake. When she/he's is fired, you can always guide the next boss on why the project failed and he/she will be eternally grateful. I know I owe a lot to my right-hand man when I started as the IT manager.

There is nothing admirable or intellectual about breeding a love-hate relationship with management. In fact, low morale is the worst plague you can contribute as a manager.