A simple answer should be - "Because in our society, we always think that salary and will be tied to the hierarchy of positions". However, this answer also reflects the fact that our salaries are based on what we understand as values, but this does not explain
- Why are PM (Project Manager) and BA (Business Analysts) at the top of the organization in many software companies?
- Why are software project teams always at the bottom?
These two questions are really worth asking and thinking about.
In general, there are two different organizational structures of software companies in this world. I call them Widget Factory and Film Crews .
Widget Factories wants to figure out how to inspire people influenced by Theory X. Theory X was proposed by McGregor. This theory is that the average person is lazy by nature, the less work the better, the more likely to avoid work, most people do not care about the goals of the group (company, institution, unit or organization, etc.), Therefore, managers need to motivate people to work with incentives such as coercion, threat of punishment, guidance, and monetary benefits. Therefore, the manager always has to do the work of his subordinates. Therefore, the management method thought out based on this premise is naturally that the entire team can be easily replaced by a manager alone, and everyone in this team can easily be replaced by others. In the team, the manager's work ability is continuously strengthened. Therefore, such companies generally use a tree-level organizational structure rather than horizontal job roles.
The Widget Factory management system operates on a certain assumption of software requirements that requires the BA to prepare the software specification in an environment that is well defined and requires a process supervised by the competent project manager. Such software manufacturing requires sufficient replaceable programming and testing resources for project placement. The entire work is driven by a pre-arranged budget, which is completed by the PM and BA when initializing the business case.
The management of a Widget Factory company can be identified by observing the way employees of the company talk. They like to talk about Resource resources (including those who do the work, also called resources), Process flow, Operating efficiency, uniformity consistency, repeatability, repeatability, strict control over the use of resources, distinct job roles and distinct processes Definition (inputs and outputs). They are indifferent to actual software development, and they want to turn the ideal software development operation into a picture they can see.
Film Crews. This kind of company believes that people have high intelligence and creativity, and they can inspire themselves (Chen Hao Note: Even if there is no external pressure and threat of punishment, they will work hard to achieve their goals - people have self The ability to regulate and self-monitor), people work hard, and can enjoy work (people are willing to work for collective goals, do their best at work, creativity, intelligence), just as children love to play. Film Crews believes that each individual's own professional ability is far superior to the ability to be organized and coordinated. Because managers no longer replace everyone, and tree hierarchies don't work well - people have to cooperate in more complex and formal ways to get things done. Job responsibilities have become very vertical - you need to have a broad range of capabilities from top to bottom (Chen Hao note: everyone needs to have management and technical capabilities), which is based on McGregor's Theory Y .
对于一个Film Crew 的Director（注：有总监和导演的意思），他了解把一个伟大的软件组合起来的每一个碎片，他需要组织一个无与伦比的团队，并且要帮助这个团队能凝聚在一起，团结在一起工作。他的角色是鼓舞大家，守护着构想（Vision），提供方向和集中大家的精力。团队里的每一个人都很关键，因为“Director”相信软件的结果来自所有的参与者，以及他们的那种独一无二团队工作方式。大家都知道自己是这个事的一个明星，明星效应可以增加成每个人的成功的机会。而他们的构想(Vision)驱动着项目的预算和拨款。
当我们用报酬来表示的话， Widget Factories 认为，有价值的东西总是从PM和BA派生出来的，所以他们常驻在管理层的上面，也有相应的报酬，而对于软件团队，只要他们正确地把需求变成可工作的代码后，软件团队就变得无所谓了。PM 和 BA 努力工作来维护他们的权位，他们通常不会让你能得到项目的原始信息。因为团队拿不到项目的原始信息，所以团队就要拼命地制造各种理由来让他们的方案变得有价值，程序员成为了只会从PM和BA那边听从命令的工人。而这种情况反而让Widget Factory 公司放大了他们的那种想法——程序员都是差不多的，就像车间里的工人一样，他们只不过在机械地干一些很复杂的但是很标准的事情。
与 Widget Factories 公司鲜明的对比，Film Crew 更主张的是平等的工作职能，每个成员都可以不受限制地获得主要的和原始的信息，其鼓励所有人形成自己的价值判断，并且可以自由地选择不同的方式来达到团队的构想。Leadership领导力结构基于人的能力而不是工作角色。报酬折射出这个人是怎么在这个项目中工作的，需要明白这个人为我们的软件创造了多大的价值和产生了怎么样的结果。 在这种环境里，PM的工作显得并不突出，他也许也不太可能是一个有创造力的领导者，工作角色被弱化成了一种行政管理上的支持者，以及团队外部的联系者。BA的部分工作直接被团队取代（在项目早期被Director取代）。
今天，我们一点也不奇怪，大多数的公司内的软件开发团队以及一些咨询工作运作于 Widget Factories ，其需要依赖于流程来不断地制造那些无聊的软件。在这种情况，惯例上来说，PM和BA要比程序员挣得更多，这是基本一种他们可以创造更多价值的假设。在这种组强架构和管理里，程序员们很难证明管理是错误的。
成功的软件公司都会趋于采用 Film Crew 的方式，任何其它的东西都会妨碍他们吸引牛人的能力，因为只有吸引了牛人，你才能创造出伟大的软件。 在这种公司里，一个好的程序员的收入会高过BA和PM很多。
from：http://coolshell.cn/articles/4951.html