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Toxic Workers Are More Productive, But the Price Is High

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Re: Toxic Workers Are More Productive, But the Price Is High

#181

Post by chatmasta »

crimsonalucard wrote: post #33
goodpoint wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the most dominant hen, that pecked its way to the top of the pecking order at the expense of other hens. Individual selection doesn't necessarily work to the benefit of the group but wait... our entire economical system is based on this.

It's not just our economy. It's the duality of human nature. We function better as a group yet we are competitive at the same time. As a result in practice a hybrid system of capitalism and communism tends to work the best aka socialism. See Scandinavia.

Work best according to whom?

Just because something works in a tiny and homogenous country, under the shadow of a few hegemonic superpowers, does not mean that same thing will work in a super power like the US, which is larger, more heterogenous, and already contributes expenses to world society that benefit Scandinavia.

Take the military for example. In any real world war, Scandanavia would depend on the help of NATO; and yet their contributions to NATO are significantly smaller than those of the larger countries.

Would the Scandinavian system work if any of the Scandinavian countries had a population as large and heterogenous as the US? Or if Scandinavia did not save costs by relying on the power projection of larger allied countries?

Re: Toxic Workers Are More Productive, But the Price Is High

#182

Post by FiddlyPack »

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #172
rjf72 wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's imagine you and I play Roshambo - rock, paper, scissors. The game theory optimal solution here is easy - I randomly pick one. This means I will never score better than 50% (in the longrun), but I will also never score worse than 50%. Now if I actually tried to play and beat you then I could, in theory, win every single time if I somehow I just managed to really get into your head. But at the same time, I now op…

"Probably" applied to catastrophic outcomes isn't particularly reassuring. It also requires a certain wilful denial of the mounting evidence that catastrophic outcomes - including starvation, oppression, and worse - have already happened for many people , and are likely to happen for many more people in the near/medium future. Having said, it's true that this is the Number One problem that humanity has to fix now - h…

Its like we’ve forgotten the lessons of Standard Oil.

Re: Toxic Workers Are More Productive, But the Price Is High

#183

Post by zawazzi »

aaavl2821 wrote: post #137
goodpoint wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the most dominant hen, that pecked its way to the top of the pecking order at the expense of other hens. Individual selection doesn't necessarily work to the benefit of the group but wait... our entire economical system is based on this.

I don't think that's entirely true. I think the idea that the only way to "win" in business is by pushing others aside is incorrect. This thinking assumes that the economy is a zero sum game and there's plenty of reason to question that assumption. There are certainly elements in the economy that take value from others without creating any value in the process, but there are also people / companies that get wealthy b…

US Productivity grows by 2% a year which suggests in aggregate, most people are playing a zero sum game.

Re: Toxic Workers Are More Productive, But the Price Is High

#184

Post by gwbas1c »

move-on-by wrote: post #39
gwbas1c wrote: post #16

I liked the article, but I find the definition of a toxic worker difficult. It's more like the article defines a toxic worker by the result, not the symptom. In reality, what are the symptoms of a toxic worker? What are the causes? What are the situations where someone might be labeled "toxic" but the real problem is something else?

This is a good question. I think I was labeled the toxic worker in my previous job. I was a team lead and kept bring up concerns to my manager: * 'this deadline is unrealistic' * 'we can't continue at this pace, we have to have time to address some serious technical debt' * 'I heard marketing saying that we can do X, but it isn't true and to add feature X would destroy our timeline' * 'Adding more contractors isn't g…

That's why sometimes you just need to go around your manager's head and talk to people up the chain.

If they're all doofuses, it's time to leave!

But, if they're reasonable people, things will change for the better.

Re: Toxic Workers Are More Productive, But the Price Is High

#185

Post by commandlinefan »

happytotoss wrote: post #58

I have recently been labeled a “brilliant jerk” at a FAANG company and threatened with termination. In actuality I now know that I have acted like this (not always but sometimes) and I take ownership of it. In trying to come to terms with it, I’ve been doing a lot of research and I think the research is overly simplistic particularly when it comes to motivation. I am not a psychopath and I am not purely self interest…

> I have recently been labeled a “brilliant jerk”

Nobody's ever come right out and labelled me that way, but I suspect there are at least a few people in my past who probably would describe me that way (they'd probably backtrack and say, "well, he wasn't all that brilliant - he just knew a lot of stuff is all. But boy was he a jerk!"). Not all, not even most, but at least some. Like I said, this could all be in my head, but I don't think so - see, I've had co-workers who really didn't know how to do their job, and basically demanded my help. I'm not talking about interns who I was in charge of training, I'm talking about people with 10 years experience who had the same title, benefits and perks as I had. And they were completely incompetent. I have to work hard to keep my patience with those people, and I usually give them hints as to what to do (have you tried loading it in a debugger? Have you checked to make sure you're pointed at the right database?), but yeah, I have some disdain for these people and in spite of my best efforts to hide it, they sometimes seem to pick up on it. What's unfair about the "brilliant jerk" label (or the "competent jerk" to be less self-aggrandizing) is that the more competent you are, the more likely you're going to get the label, no matter what you do.

Re: Toxic Workers Are More Productive, But the Price Is High

#186

Post by andrei_says_ »

rjf72 wrote: post #160
andrei_says_ wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe “So I decide to start hiring prioritizing these characteristics along with individual ability?” As for capitalism and productivity I highly recommend Dan Lyons’ Lab Rats exposing the complete chaos that human management is in. People dynamics are complex and well, dynamic. Changes and rules carry potential for difficult to predict outcomes. Humans are not hens and capitalism has turned out to be extremely unpro…

Let's imagine you and I play Roshambo - rock, paper, scissors. The game theory optimal solution here is easy - I randomly pick one. This means I will never score better than 50% (in the longrun), but I will also never score worse than 50%. Now if I actually tried to play and beat you then I could, in theory, win every single time if I somehow I just managed to really get into your head. But at the same time, I now op…

This is an interesting viewpoint, thank you for taking the time to outline it.

I do very much appreciate the premise of being free to try different approaches within the framework of capitalism.

However all these approaches compete with actors who do not comply to good behavior and often use highly predatory tactics both internally and toward competitors.

Also, capitalism fails to account for external factors. Selling gas pollutes everyone’s air for free. Producing billions of plastic bags and bottles affects everyone’s oceans and rivers and surroundings, for free. Maximizing exploitation and squeezing one’s workers in an employer’s market creates dangerous levels of equality, chronic diseases and destroys families, for free. Extracting and exploiting attention from a full generation of children will cripple said generation in unpredictable ways, and is still allowed, for free. Same with the destruction of privacy, worldwide.

Capitalism is good at extracting and turning resources into money. It is not good in a world of limited resources.

And I’m not even mentioning the acts of lobbying and collusion which allow corporate entities to change the environment to suit them better than it does living human beings, not unlike a colonizing force.

Re: Toxic Workers Are More Productive, But the Price Is High

#187

Post by dasil003 »

zawazzi wrote: post #183
aaavl2821 wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think that's entirely true. I think the idea that the only way to "win" in business is by pushing others aside is incorrect. This thinking assumes that the economy is a zero sum game and there's plenty of reason to question that assumption. There are certainly elements in the economy that take value from others without creating any value in the process, but there are also people / companies that get wealthy b…

US Productivity grows by 2% a year which suggests in aggregate, most people are playing a zero sum game.

That just suggests disposable income is a zero sum game. Within GDP you can have massive disparities in value generated.

Re: Toxic Workers Are More Productive, But the Price Is High

#188

Post by zeroname »

Can't you just have team made up of only "toxic" people? Do "toxic" people negatively affect the productivity of other "toxic" people?

I personally wouldn't want want to give up entirely on all the socially inept assholes whose in-depth knowledge on crap that I don't care to know about (but rely on) seemingly knows no bounds. More specifically, I do want to keep the IT department.

Re: Toxic Workers Are More Productive, But the Price Is High

#189

Post by noir_lord »

username90 wrote: post #164
jedberg wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having worked at Netflix, I can tell you the difference: An experienced person says "In my experience, this is the best way to go because of X, Y, and Z". A jerk says, "The best option is my way and if you do it any other way you're wrong and I don't have to justify myself to you because I'm that good." In both cases what the person is suggesting is in fact the right way to go most of the time. The difference is whet…

Being the smartest person in a room puts a lot of extra pressure and stress on you. Proving certain kinds of people wrong is hard. Doing it without upsetting them is even harder. After a while you just give up and either stop teaching people making you "toxic because he only cares about himself", or you give up trying to explain properly making you "toxic because he think we should just listen without proper explanat…

If you are the smartest person in the room consistently, you are in the wrong room!.

Re: Toxic Workers Are More Productive, But the Price Is High

#190

Post by noir_lord »

Zimahl wrote: post #142
leroy_masochist wrote: post #40

Just read the study itself and am kind of scratching my head. I think the authors really just fail to consider the concept that the real problem with toxic employees is that they usually figure out to have their productivity measured very positively. The authors build their thesis around a dichotomy between "toxic employees" and "superstars" (not "rock stars" as claimed in the article summarizing the study). The auth…

In college I worked at an environmental testing company. I worked there for 3 summers. The first summer I worked there I worked closely with a woman named Shawn (name not changed because fuck her). I'm not saying she was bipolar, but she would wildly swing from having good days and having bad ones. Good days were fine sometimes really great, the entire department would be productive. Bad days were fucking terrible, s…

The one thing I value in co-workers is consistency, I'd sooner someone be a consistent dick than wildly swing about the place like a wrecking ball, I can route around dickheads when I know where they'll be at that point in time..
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