A story of obscene PM bloat at Microsoft 🤷🏻‍♀️😱

My former org in the Windows and Devices Group (commonly shortened to WDG) had a ratio of almost 1 PM to 1 Dev as recent as mid-2017. This was a fairly large org and supposed to be one of the more prestigious ones. While there were a few clueless level 59 new grads with no idea what they had got themselves into, most PMs were 10-25 year veterans with little to no experience outside Microsoft in their career. If you look at their LinkedIn it’s just a long column of colored Microsoft squares. Most days they were either out playing golf or not in the office because they were “doing X with their kids” (where X was some new bullshit activity every day). Based on their tenure, title, and sports cars in the parking garage these guys had to be making decent compensation. None of them had any real work responsibility except for being a warm body in meetings with other PMs like them. Their duties included occasionally making a semi-interesting comment in those meetings. They often seemed to know each other outside of work and made comments about drinking wine in Woodinville or something they did in Bellevue. One had a particularly annoying habit of referring to me as “sweetie” when downplaying my attempts to define a new feature or opportunity. These guys (and yes, they were overwhelmingly older white guys living on the Eastside) did fine on their Connects because their manager was either their buddy outside of work or had known them from a past org at Microsoft and pulled them along. You scratch my back, I scratch yours kinda stuff. I was told these guys were practically untouchable and could not be fired even if they did no work at all for years on end. Completely obscene but honestly not very rare at Microsoft so I’m told. How long can this continue and how is this sustainable? After about 7 months of trying to keep my head up and hope for the best I couldn’t take it anymore and got out. My team did not ship a single feature of any size in that time. We also did not have any measurable impact on customers or the bottom line. I felt like I was in a real-life dystopian nightmare. Worst of all I didn’t gain any applicable experience because my org talked a lot about doing things and had lots of meetings about doing things... but never actually did anything!!

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Microsoft Hooligan16 Feb 2, 2018

lol, been at microsoft longer than that and in Windows. Pure fantasy story telling.

Amazon m37uj8 OP Feb 2, 2018

If only it were a fantasy and I didn’t just waste 7 months of my life and career... unfortunately it was not a fantasy. Even as much as I wish it was 😕

Cruise Automation Cruising90 Feb 2, 2018

This is 100% true, Microsoft is bloated with PM. I could never understand what the job profile of a PM actually is or what value do they actually bring.

This comment was deleted by the original commenter.
Amazon m37uj8 OP Feb 2, 2018

I’m not a guy and no I didn’t steal coconut water.

This comment was deleted by the original commenter.
Microsoft NhMR62 Feb 2, 2018

Can confirm, in AI/R there seem to be very few PMs and the few I know are really good

Microsoft DrSheik Feb 2, 2018

+1 to AI/R. Just moved there from WDG. Feels like a new company where people actually care about technology

Amazon nWep84 Feb 2, 2018

I am a guy, in the eastside, in my 40s and have many Microsoft friends - looking at the long hours and weekends they work, it sounds like you ended up in one of the 70% of the orgs in MS. Heard that’s how all orgs were in the past. Satya is changing that so people get to do more fulfilling work and save Microsoft from a slow death. I’ve been at Amazon for over 4 yrs and can never imagine joining such a group. Although MS is getting better. Watch out at Amazon as well - it’s all about the leadership.

Amazon m37uj8 OP Feb 2, 2018

Thank you! This is helpful perspective. I am very afraid of running into another org like that in my career, even outside of Microsoft.

Nvidia zVEC05 Feb 2, 2018

This is pretty standard at Microsoft. Though most groups don't have that many PMs, but 95% of them are equally useless. Most of the good PM's I've met told me they found the less they do & the more they bullshit with their manager & skip the better their career goes. One showed me a doc once: "The Art of Project Management at Microsoft"; one of it's golden rules: "don't help people"; the logic was if you helped people they would ask you to do work & then might expect help in the future. It was best to ignore requests until they went away.

Microsoft Flander Feb 2, 2018

And hence why wdg is a sinking ship. Thanks for trying.

Aon Hewitt qTXq04 Feb 2, 2018

Wow that's a horrible experience, in the consulting world is similar in terms of signing deals at their levels and then they bring in their minions to do the work 😬

Microsoft BigNail Feb 2, 2018

TL;DR please, AH?

Adobe photoslop Feb 2, 2018

2 paragraphs?? Damn, thanks for reinforcing the MSFT stereotype.

Microsoft BigNail Feb 2, 2018

Thanks for reinforcing the Oracle paradigm: lots of BS, no value

Microsoft Heifbfis Feb 2, 2018

Which group were you in?

Amazon m37uj8 OP Feb 2, 2018

UST

Microsoft Heifbfis Feb 2, 2018

That partially explains your pain. Microsoft is HUGE. Each org is comparable to a diff company in the valley. Culture and situation varies from team to team. Reorg also plays a critical role and often costs one release cycle.

Microsoft Wxkycgx Feb 2, 2018

Sounds a bit exaggerated but I had similar experience as far back as 15 years ago when I worked in Office. Up until recently it was the same old boys running the show