I would recommend watching GroundHog day with Bill Murray. The key takeaway from this film I think, was be the brightest light in the room, be your most attractive self, and everything/everyone else will sort itself out.
Ask HN: What people skills do you wish you learned earlier in your career?
311–320 of 438 posts
Re: Ask HN: What people skills do you wish you learned earlier in your career?
#312Three things...
1) The purpose of talking to people is not to figure out the right answer. The purpose is to figure out the next thing we can all agree is a decent idea.
2) Almost no one has bad motivations. When I think someone is trying to be a jerk, I now realize that I am probably misunderstanding a person who doesn't know how to be nice in a way that works for me. Probably, the person thinks he or she is doing the best they can.
3) Everyone is fighting battles, internal and external, that I cannot see. It is always right to be generous and sympathetic.
Re: Ask HN: What people skills do you wish you learned earlier in your career?
#313Don't be an asshole. I can't stress this one enough. I don't care how smart you are, if you are an asshole, your career is not gonna work out. Try really hard not to be negative, even when there is reason to be. Try not to be openly negative about the company or a particular employee. It's poison for you and your teammates and makes you feel worse. Don't get defensive when someone makes suggestions to your code (I st…
This is amazing advise through and through. Ticks all the boxes. For many of us we spend so much time at work that we perceive our colleagues as friends. This is a fallacy. I left a job after 15 years and have maybe 1-2 real friends out of that time. Drinking at company parties is so on point. If you need to drink a lot, make an appearance at the party and go drinking with trusted friends after.
I thought my similar position was unique, I'm glad to hear others can spend so long at a single place and have next to nothing to show for it as far as friendships are concerned. Who knows? Maybe it's the reason we we're able to stay in the same place so long?
Re: Ask HN: What people skills do you wish you learned earlier in your career?
#314“How to win friends and influence people” is an absolutely wonderful book I wished I’d read 10 or 15 years before I did. Some important ideas - Just, get along with people. A bit reductionist but if you don’t place a high priority on getting along with people you certainly won’t learn how. It really is a habit, and it’s incredibly effective to remember the Cognitive Behavior insight that when you don’t get along with…
Throw away for obvious reasons. I find almost everyone intensely boring. How am I supposed to get along with people without feeling like a complete fraud? Small talk, feigning interest in kids, in sports, in wine, in whatever useless dull, pedestrian thing a coworker is into. I find that anyone who isn't a PhD (or could easily have been if they hadn't gone into industry) might as well be a paper shell. I can put on a…
Hey I’ll respond not using a throwaway.
I feel that way too a lot of the time. When I was younger I was incredibly misanthropic in many aspects of my thinking, and hell ... even though I am less so as I age, there’s a certain realistic cynicism about human motivation that I’ve gained access to that means I actually have a worse picture of people than I did 20 years ago.
All I can say is, first have some empathy for yourself. Stuff is boring. People kinda suck. That realization is not profound and can’t be just willed away.
Second, there may be some aspects of yourself you haven’t developed yet, and if you really engage in developing your own wider potential, you will find commonality with far more people.
No one, no matter how smart, is pure intellect. Wishing all your interactions with people would happen on that level is a bad framework for enjoying people and for a rich human life.
I can think of any number of people who when I first met them I felt I had nothing in common with them, and really just didn’t like them, who became important figures in my life. Seriously.
I think high IQ low IQ or whatever ... any kind of nuerodivergence makes it more of a challenge to relate and empathize with people.
It’s possible to find richness in interaction. People are much less boring than you might think, when you learn how to conduct yourself in such a way that they feel safe talking to you frankly about their experience, their dreams, their passions. People can be ridiculously insightful when you least expect it.
Your challenge is to make people want to talk to you in a real way.
Start by removing the assumption that you are anywhere near as correct or as profound as you quite reasonably think you are. This self picture is an illusion. I don’t care who you are, it is an illusion.
I used to think humility and gratitude were just dumb concepts. You need humility. Not to “bring you down to other people’s level” but to enable psychological health and functioning, and ultimately happiness and connection and to become a more complete person.
Re: Ask HN: What people skills do you wish you learned earlier in your career?
#315Earlier quoted context omitted.
No offense, but I mean this, earnestly: get over yourself. If you talk to a person, and the conversation is dull, they might be a boring person. If most of the people you talk to seem boring, then you are the boring person . You bemoan that you find almost everyone a "paper shell". And yet you are the one who has restricted your opinion of interesting people and topics with a PhD attached to it. You dismiss pursuits…
Not sure how this is helpful to the parent comment. > If you talk to a person, and the conversation is dull, they might be a boring person. If most of the people you talk to seem boring, then you are the boring person. And I don´t really understand how you can come to that conclusion. That´s like 2+2 = duck In fact, > have limited relevant context outside your very limited definition of what is interesting If the per…
Before I respond to you, I will say that I have been on both sides of this argument. Especially early in college, there was so much to learn, and so many unknown unknowns. I craved the conversations with PhDs, postdocs, and researchers because everything they talked about was brand new to me. Being constantly immersed in new lines of human inquiry was beautiful. But after a while, the spaces of unknown unknowns became harder to find. But I have found that the things that I used to find pedestrian are much more interesting than I used to think they were. I just hadn't dug far enough.
> Some people are not interested in those pursuits and they are, in comparison, very "pedestrian" in terms of complexity.
No, they are not pedestrian.
* Sports - I have become much more interested in endurance sports. If you have never wondered what it takes to be a top endurance athlete, I'd say, it's something you should wonder about. Lots of people have asked the question "How far is the human body capable of being pushed?", and the answer to that question is fascinating and complex. The difference between top athletes is hugely psychological. Much of endurance sports is just "how much pain can you put up with?". Here's a different, but related question. If people are really pushing themselves as hard as they can, why don't they die more often? If you are talking more about team sports, personally, I like soccer. Ask yourself, how is each player observing the field to maximize outcomes? Every player on the team is playing a live-action RTS to be in the right place at the right time. And every opposing player is doing the opposite. There is a ton of depth in sports. Humans who play sports are not dumb or pedestrian.
* family - What philosophies of family have been most useful over human history? How did native americans' views of family differ from stereotypical modern families? Which do you think is better? If you really don't care about peoples' individual families, take them as data points to learn about how humans build structures of multiple humans. Why does/doesn't polyamory work for some people/cultures? What things does the human brain learn at different times (i.e. how are your kids doing from a learning perspective?) People love talking about how their kids are growing, and the ways that humans grow is fascinating.
> food - Nutrition. What makes good food? What parameters are good chefs optimizing for (hint: it's more than taste, texture, and presentation)? Can you do it? If you think you can cook as well as a professional chef, I challenge you to try. The thing that's difficult about this is that I needed to try some really good food to understand how far short I fall. Cooking is chemistry, and it is equally interesting.
* religion - How can you possibly say that religion is pedestrian? That's mind boggling to me. Religion has been one of the longest running, most universal organizing structures of human experience. This, to me, makes it totally fascinating. How have religions changed over time? What did independently invented religions look like? Why are many so similar? How did humans explain inexplicable phenomenon. I believe that humans have been as smart as we are today for basically as long as there has been written or oral history. The difference was that the didn't have the mental abstractions and information to come up with the solutions that we have today. Religion fills a lot of voids in human understanding over history, and provides a fascinating window into human history. Talking to people about their religion will make your life richer.
> The parent comment clearly enjoys pursuits that are of higher complexity and feels as if people in general do not share that interest and hence to him they seem boring
This exactly reinforces the initial comment of the parent:
> If you talk to a person, and the conversation is dull, they might be a boring person. If most of the people you talk to seem boring, then you are the boring person.
Basically, if you cannot find the complexity in "pedestrian" concepts, it's not because they are not there. It's because you're not able to find them. Maybe you're not being curious enough, maybe you're being arrogant, maybe you're just tired, and can't be bothered on that day.
I have a favorite saying relevant to this:
If you want to be interesting, be interested.
Give others the benefit of the doubt, and see how deep the rabbit hole goes. Lots of very talented humans have dedicated their entire lives to studying your so-called "pedestrain" topics, and they learned interesting things. I think it would be worth it for everyone to try to figure out the things that they discovered - at least some of them.
Re: Ask HN: What people skills do you wish you learned earlier in your career?
#316“How to win friends and influence people” is an absolutely wonderful book I wished I’d read 10 or 15 years before I did. Some important ideas - Just, get along with people. A bit reductionist but if you don’t place a high priority on getting along with people you certainly won’t learn how. It really is a habit, and it’s incredibly effective to remember the Cognitive Behavior insight that when you don’t get along with…
Throw away for obvious reasons. I find almost everyone intensely boring. How am I supposed to get along with people without feeling like a complete fraud? Small talk, feigning interest in kids, in sports, in wine, in whatever useless dull, pedestrian thing a coworker is into. I find that anyone who isn't a PhD (or could easily have been if they hadn't gone into industry) might as well be a paper shell. I can put on a…
> It's like you try to peel back a single layer of why people believe what they believe and there's nothing there. No reflection, no relevant context, no mirror provided by an intimate knowledge of history or literature ... just nothing.
NAILED IT
Re: Ask HN: What people skills do you wish you learned earlier in your career?
#317Always be constructive with your feedback or don't give any at all.
Re: Ask HN: What people skills do you wish you learned earlier in your career?
#318Earlier quoted context omitted.
Throw away for obvious reasons. I find almost everyone intensely boring. How am I supposed to get along with people without feeling like a complete fraud? Small talk, feigning interest in kids, in sports, in wine, in whatever useless dull, pedestrian thing a coworker is into. I find that anyone who isn't a PhD (or could easily have been if they hadn't gone into industry) might as well be a paper shell. I can put on a…
No offense, but I mean this, earnestly: get over yourself. If you talk to a person, and the conversation is dull, they might be a boring person. If most of the people you talk to seem boring, then you are the boring person . You bemoan that you find almost everyone a "paper shell". And yet you are the one who has restricted your opinion of interesting people and topics with a PhD attached to it. You dismiss pursuits…
Spoken like a true paper shell. No attempt at empathy, just hollow tropes regurgitated without thought.
Sure you might find it threatening that others see themselves as vastly more intelligent than yourself. Suck it up, its true.
Re: Ask HN: What people skills do you wish you learned earlier in your career?
#319Earlier quoted context omitted.
No offense, but I mean this, earnestly: get over yourself. If you talk to a person, and the conversation is dull, they might be a boring person. If most of the people you talk to seem boring, then you are the boring person . You bemoan that you find almost everyone a "paper shell". And yet you are the one who has restricted your opinion of interesting people and topics with a PhD attached to it. You dismiss pursuits…
Not sure how this is helpful to the parent comment. > If you talk to a person, and the conversation is dull, they might be a boring person. If most of the people you talk to seem boring, then you are the boring person. And I don´t really understand how you can come to that conclusion. That´s like 2+2 = duck In fact, > have limited relevant context outside your very limited definition of what is interesting If the per…
>Some people are not interested in those pursuits and they are, in comparison, very "pedestrian" in terms of complexity. Now I enjoy all things related to food for example, but I would stab myself in the ears if I had to talk to people about their eating habits for more than 30 seconds once every 13 years.
You are confusing enjoyment and complexity. You enjoy food, which is only natural because you are a living being person. I could walk up to anyone on the street and they would tell me they "like food". However that is so much different from deeply exploring the topic. EVERYONE enjoys those topics you mentioned in some way, that doesn't mean they have mastered it however. Low barrier to entry, high barrier to expertise.
All of the things you mentioned are deeply complex and take skill and expertise to get right. There is complexity there, you just don't want to engage in it. Thus they are sour grapes to you.
Re: Ask HN: What people skills do you wish you learned earlier in your career?
#320Earlier quoted context omitted.
Throw away for obvious reasons. I find almost everyone intensely boring. How am I supposed to get along with people without feeling like a complete fraud? Small talk, feigning interest in kids, in sports, in wine, in whatever useless dull, pedestrian thing a coworker is into. I find that anyone who isn't a PhD (or could easily have been if they hadn't gone into industry) might as well be a paper shell. I can put on a…
You can get along with people without liking them. In particular at work, being able to work well and effectively with people you don't like is practically required. And that doesn't mean you have to engage in small talk. Just avoid being actively hostile, and cooperate with them. I'd also recommend trying to respect that people may disagree with you on what is important. It is quite possible for someone to have exam…
In US business culture, if you don’t engage in small talk you are probably coming across as hostile, or at least aloof. It doesn’t need to be a lot, but you definitely need to at least go through the motions of “Good morning! How are you?”, etc.