Discuss a time when you clashed with your manager.

Question

Anonymous · Accepted Answer

In my current project, we received a new requirement to add a multiline ship
set. My manager asked me to complete this new requirement within the existing
timeline. I raised a concern, explaining that it was not feasible to achieve
within the given timeframe. However, he disagreed.
To address this, I collaborated with the development and QA teams to gather
detailed data. We analyzed the complete workflow to identify the required
changes and testing efforts. Given the existing commitments and workload, it was
evident that the development and QA teams would struggle to accommodate this
change within the original timeline.
I worked with the team to determine how many PL/SQL packages would be impacted,
how many regression scenarios needed to be executed, and how many new scenarios
had to be added. With these data points and estimations in hand, I approached my
manager again. This time, the detailed information helped him understand the
situation, and he agreed to revise the timeline.
I believe that starting a discussion with clear data points can significantly
help resolve conflicts more effectively and efficiently.

Anonymous · Answer

Although I work well with all levels of management.  I did have a conflict with
my manager.  The manager requested a statement from an associate on my team
regarding avoiding calls. The decision had been made to terminate employment.
 Being that  I worked closely with this associate,  the behavior in question did
not seem like the associate character.  My manager and I agreed to sit down with
the associate to understand what caused the reports to indicate he was not
taking his fair share of calls throughout the day.  During the discussion we
learned the associate split up his breaks into 5 minute breaks which led to him
showing up unavailable on the report.  The finding was presented to HR and the
associate employment was not terminates. I explained the reason he was on the
report and reassured the associate his explanation provided clarity and thanked
Jim for being understanding and patient through the process.  My manager met
after and agreed to understand action in the future to avoid any wrongful
terminations. The manager was grateful I did the additional research  to address
the concern.

Anonymous · Answer

Last year, while leading a technical migration, I proposed adopting a new tool
to streamline deployment. My manager was hesitant, concerned about resource
allocation and training. I scheduled a meeting to present a detailed benefits
analysis and shared data from pilot tests. I also listened to her concerns and
suggested a phased rollout to minimize risk. After several discussions, we
agreed to run a small-scale pilot, which led to improved deployment efficiency
and team adoption. This experience strengthened our mutual trust and illustrated
the value of open, respectful communication in resolving differences

Anonymous · Answer

There's a time where I had a disagreement on a root cause of an issue with my
manager. We were experiencing burst of missing frames in our real time decoder.
My manager thinks it is an issue with our code and asked us to investigate.
After a week of investigation, which goes nowhere. I suggested to my manager
that it could be caused by the Camera RTSP streaming. In order to support my
hypothesis, I reviewed a handful of clips recorded by the camera during the
burst of missing frames. I showed him that these occurred mostly in the dark
with night improvement turned on. Then explained to him that will saturate the
CPU and jeopardizing the RTSP output as it doesn't have any GPU. To prove this
concept, I have turned night improvement of for a couple of cameras and straight
away, the missing frames has dropped significantly.

Anonymous · Answer

S（Situation）：在2024年9月底，我所在团队灰度上线了一个重要新功能。上线不久后，我们注意到产品的 NPS
分数出现了明显下滑。我的老板非常担心这个变化是由我们新功能引起的，因此建议我们暂停功能的进一步上线。
T（Task）：考虑到我们灰度期间已经收到不少正向的用户反馈和行为数据，我担心贸然暂停功能会影响节奏，并可能误判问题根源。我希望找出 NPS
下滑的真正原因，并用更稳妥的方式推进问题解决。
A（Action）：我首先分析了 NPS
下滑的时间节点，发现其发生在我们功能上线之前。结合用户评价存在滞后性的特点，我判断两者未必直接相关。随后我深入分析了近期的低分评价和客服
ticket，发现主要问题集中在打印出错、页面崩溃等历史遗留的功能性 bug。
我将这些发现整理成文档分享给老板，建议我们先优先修复这些问题，并继续观察 NPS
变化。同时，我也请他指出是否存在新功能相关的反馈痛点，以便一并跟进优化。我们快速完成了 hotfix，并验证后上线。
R（Result）：两周内，NPS 分数从 xx 回升到 xx（如能填具体更好），我们功能也顺利推进至全量发布，后续使用量增长了
xx%。老板也认可了我们以数据驱动决策的方式，对我在这件事中的判断力和推进力给予了肯定。

Anonymous · Answer

We were analysing a user problem and issues with churn. When my manager brought
the "average" KPI for the segment we were analysing, the fact that the averages
did not contain standard deviation was a big disagreement. Once I was able to
calculate the standard error, it was obvious that the average had a big spread.
Through data I was able to overcome this misalignment with my manager and was
able to further segment the problem user persona into two and pinpoint solutions
for one hyper focused persona to reduce scope of solution space

Anonymous · Answer

I would not call it a conflict per say but we had a disagreement over my career
development. By 2016 I wanted to transition to the management ladder but my
manager thought my technical leadership and technical contributions were more
valuable than having me as manager in the team.
We had long conversations over a couple of weeks exposing that moving to the
management ladder would give me more visibility and the ability to exponentially
increase my impact and my manager exposing my leadership was needed more on the
engineering side than in product. At the end we found common ground. I was
included in more product related meetings giving me the visibility I was looking
for without having to move to the management ladder which was a win win for me
and my manager.

Anonymous · Answer

There was a time when I had a disagreement with my manager regarding a promise
he made about a new feature. My manager wanted to be able to update some datas
on any event which i think was making the code too complex and the process
unstable.
To address the disagreement, I scheduled a one-on-one meeting with my manager to
discuss our differing perspectives. During the conversation, I presented my
rproposal for a simpler plan, emphasizing the potential risks and benefits of
each approach.
Although we initially had differing opinions, we were able to find common ground
through open communication and a shared commitment to the project's success. In
the end, we discussed with stakeholders and and convinced them to accept a
degraded solution.
This experience taught me the importance of effective communication and
collaboration in resolving conflicts and finding mutually beneficial solutions
in the workplace.

Anonymous · Answer

I had recently launched a project and the downstream system had reliability
issues. I was trying to push for reliability improvements when my manager
disagreed. He wanted me to deliver a new feature because it was critical from
business and had revenue impact. I used data to show how the reliability was
important. I also arrived at a middleground so a small capacity can be spent on
the new feature to give the confidence to business.

Anonymous · Answer

I would not call it a conflict per say but we had a disagreement over my career
development. By 2016 I wanted to transition to the management ladder but my
manager thought my technical leadership and technical contributions were more
valuable than having me as manager in the team.
We had long conversations over a couple of weeks exposing pros and cons of me
moving to the management ladder. At the end we found common ground. I was
included in more product related meetings giving me the visibility I was looking
for without having to move to the management ladder which was a win win for me
and my manager.

Anonymous · Answer

I had a major difference with my manager about the review of one of my direct
reports. My manager wanted to give a more negative review and I wanted to
highlight their accomplishments over the last review period. I worked hard on
enumerated all the positives about the individual and presented to my manager.
He allowed me to proceed with my review because I made a convincing argument on
the facts. I kept the discussion strictly based on facts. It is key to never get
emotional and only used facts and make a decision based on solid data.

Anonymous · Answer

I am an innovative person while my manager always focus on current delivery.
while this is no wrong, but applying innovative solutions can be a plus and
potentially expand our team's scope in my mind. In one project discussion, i
mentioned we should apply for optimal approach while my manager thinks it's too
risky and we should deliver first, so we list down the pros and cons for the
applying different approaches and agreed on phase1 and phase2 approaches

Discuss a time when you clashed with your manager.

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