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Brilliant Jerks in Engineering

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Re: Brilliant Jerks in Engineering

#101

Post by wccrawford »

zzzeek wrote: post #93
pm90 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah it doesn't help that a lot of programmers are traditionally "nerds" who have grown up being bullied by others (I did). It is possible to understand how to handle this kind of behaviors though. I would wager that most software engineers could certainly learn a bit more about behavioral psychology. In particular, although it is still a little taboo, I would recommend talking to a therapist even if one doesn't seem…

> In particular, although it is still a little taboo, I would recommend talking to a therapist even if one doesn't seem to exhibit any explicit pathologies. it is? wow that's sad. there's all kinds of therapists and lots are pretty crappy but I don't see the benefit to society by creating a "taboo" around the entire concept of talking about your personal problems to a paid advisor.

Admitting that you have a weakness has always been taboo, if for not other reason than than it gives people a way to attack you.

If people were all nice, then it wouldn't be a problem. But there are far too many opportunistic jerks out there to not worry about exposing your vulnerabilities.

Re: Brilliant Jerks in Engineering

#102

Post by protomikron »

8_hours_ago wrote: post #29
whataretensors wrote: post #19

This doesn't pass the Torvald test. i.e. Would your startup hire Linus if he hadn't yet created linux and git?

"We need you to set up recurring billing for our new feature X" "Hmmm... that would be easier if we had a custom OS... I'm going to start on that first. Also, custom version control software would really boost our productivity..."

> How long does it take you to write the VCS?

"Hm, I can do it in 2 weeks."

> Too long. Work on the feature X.

Re: Brilliant Jerks in Engineering

#103

Post by wccrawford »

meheleventyone wrote: post #69
mars4rp wrote: post #53

I am an Alice and I need some feedback as why is it a bad thing! I work in an environment when very small percentage of people know what are they doing. and people that know what is going on do not speak up because they are frustrated and know probably nothing will change. in this environment I do speak up whenever I get a chance and I've been in arguments with managers 3 4 level above me. everybody else wants to be…

Acting without tact and diplomacy is probably hurting your end goal. You want to build allies in a common cause rather than alienate people that can help.

This is ridiculously good advice for so many situations. And in almost all of them, the person won't listen and will have claim some other reason that their behavior is warranted, no matter how ineffectual it ends up being in the end.

It's so depressing.

Re: Brilliant Jerks in Engineering

#104

Post by vemv »

tbrownaw wrote: post #75
vemv wrote: post #31

I'd add that from an engineering perspective, 'brilliant' jerks aren't even that brilliant. An actually intelligent person is happy to prove his thinking via truthful argumentation (and unit tests, documentation, and so on), and also happy to get his points refuted by similarly reasonable peers. Anything other than that approach is noise.

An actually intelligent person is happy to prove his thinking via truthful argumentation (and unit tests, documentation, and so on), and also happy to get his points refuted by similarly reasonable peers. That has nothing to do with intelligence. It's a particular culture that is taught and learned.

Intelligence is (among other things) about reasoning - proving and disproving things. Also about communicating facts.

How else could we exchange ideas? And in case of disagreement who would win?

Re: Brilliant Jerks in Engineering

#105

Post by lazyasciiart »

vemv wrote: post #31

I'd add that from an engineering perspective, 'brilliant' jerks aren't even that brilliant. An actually intelligent person is happy to prove his thinking via truthful argumentation (and unit tests, documentation, and so on), and also happy to get his points refuted by similarly reasonable peers. Anything other than that approach is noise.

Imagine that every time you implemented a new feature in your existing Java codebase, everyone asked you to explain Java. Would you be happy to prove the value of Java to your colleagues constantly? Would you start thinking that your peers maybe weren't similarly reasonable to you? At what point does explaining things become frustrating to you?

Re: Brilliant Jerks in Engineering

#106

Post by digi_owl »

grandalf wrote: post #33

The situation I've encountered is a jerk who was actually fairly mediocre in his abilities but whose bully characteristics and brash confidence had led many of the non-technical people in the company to believe he was extremely skilled. I think one reason people become bullies is because they know they can't back up their decisions with skill. Linus is brash, but is quite able to work well with people and has the res…

Linus Torvalds have gotten an undeserved reputation because it is oh so easy for the online tech media to take emails out of context.

Whenever he brings out the harsh words, it is because someone has been stalling and deflecting about breaking some core rule for kernel development.

Torvalds never pounce on someone out on tail end of the patch chain. He comes down hard on those that have been in charge of maintaining major sections of the kernel for years, and should know what is expected of them.

Re: Brilliant Jerks in Engineering

#107

Post by Veelox »

mars4rp wrote: post #53

I am an Alice and I need some feedback as why is it a bad thing! I work in an environment when very small percentage of people know what are they doing. and people that know what is going on do not speak up because they are frustrated and know probably nothing will change. in this environment I do speak up whenever I get a chance and I've been in arguments with managers 3 4 level above me. everybody else wants to be…

It might be helpful to change your style a little to accomplish the same goal with less conflict.

Always always give people a way to save face, this applies doubly in meetings. If people feel like the choices are being right or being responsible for an error they will fight to be right. If you give them a third option (past inexperience, blame someone that left, poor testing, changed requirements) that doesn't hurt their reputation, they no longer have to fight to be right.

Try to teach people the principal behind why something is wrong/broken/bad. This applies to things like code health that there are more subjective. Instead of saying "That method should not be 300 lines." Teach that you want small understandable functions that do only one thing. This gives them a metric to use in the future and makes your comment seem more well thought out.

Be helpful when you can be. If you are always causing problem people will remember that. People also will remember when you go out of your way to help them. A little bit of oil could help the other interactions run smoothly.

I hope these little bits help some.

Re: Brilliant Jerks in Engineering

#108

Post by crdoconnor »

MBCook wrote: post #51
grandalf wrote: post #33

The situation I've encountered is a jerk who was actually fairly mediocre in his abilities but whose bully characteristics and brash confidence had led many of the non-technical people in the company to believe he was extremely skilled. I think one reason people become bullies is because they know they can't back up their decisions with skill. Linus is brash, but is quite able to work well with people and has the res…

This is certainly a problem I’ve seen. One employee was hated by almost all the technical people because he was a jackass and couldn’t work with others. He wanted everything done his way and wasn’t interested in the opinions of others (except as they may bolster how great his ideas were). The truth is he wasn’t very good, at least not to the degree he tried to present. Some of management loved him because he worked s…

95% of the time I've seen this toxic behavior it's been from a manager, and their behavior was tacitly encouraged by their superiors.

Re: Brilliant Jerks in Engineering

#109

Post by digi_owl »

wccrawford wrote: post #101
zzzeek wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In particular, although it is still a little taboo, I would recommend talking to a therapist even if one doesn't seem to exhibit any explicit pathologies. it is? wow that's sad. there's all kinds of therapists and lots are pretty crappy but I don't see the benefit to society by creating a "taboo" around the entire concept of talking about your personal problems to a paid advisor.

Admitting that you have a weakness has always been taboo, if for not other reason than than it gives people a way to attack you. If people were all nice, then it wouldn't be a problem. But there are far too many opportunistic jerks out there to not worry about exposing your vulnerabilities.

Especially as tech has picked up more and more of a "jock" approach to things as the salaries kept going up up up.

Re: Brilliant Jerks in Engineering

#110

Post by joering2 »

MBCook wrote: post #51
grandalf wrote: post #33

The situation I've encountered is a jerk who was actually fairly mediocre in his abilities but whose bully characteristics and brash confidence had led many of the non-technical people in the company to believe he was extremely skilled. I think one reason people become bullies is because they know they can't back up their decisions with skill. Linus is brash, but is quite able to work well with people and has the res…

This is certainly a problem I’ve seen. One employee was hated by almost all the technical people because he was a jackass and couldn’t work with others. He wanted everything done his way and wasn’t interested in the opinions of others (except as they may bolster how great his ideas were). The truth is he wasn’t very good, at least not to the degree he tried to present. Some of management loved him because he worked s…

Well what happened at the end?
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