Willingness to look stupid • Hacker News Board

Re: Willingness to look stupid

#401

Post by jorgeleo » Thu, Oct 21, 2021, 3:53 PM UTC

mywittyname wrote: post #360

andrewla wrote: post #338

This has happened to me frequently at my current company. I get pulled into a meeting about something that I have no context on because it touches my area of expertise, and the discussions have apparently been stalling out. I brace myself to be the idiot. I'm going to waste everyone's time asking questions that everyone knows the answer to, and I just got looped in, so everyone's going to feel like they need to walk…

One of the best people I've ever worked with used this approach. "I'm going to ask stupid questions now." and "Just so I'm understanding the problem, ." were two phrases she used all the time . I am surprised at how difficult it has been to emulate her technique. Feeling comfortable asking the obvious questions is one half of the battle, but the other, more difficult half, is knowing what obvious questions to ask. Mo…

https://www.indeed.com/career-advice/career-development/acti...

When you active listen, even if the question might feel stupid, the feeling gets lost in the fact hat the other person is receiving your attention. This technique is also teach for other contexts like counseling, or debating using the Socratic method.

Re: Willingness to look stupid

#402

Post by akath20 » Thu, Oct 21, 2021, 3:53 PM UTC

Asking for the computer in the smallest box ruined the rest of the article for me... that isn't the same as asking a silly question when trying to learn, that's just making things unnecessarily difficult. There were otherwise good points though such as willingness to ask what a question means, but that first example really threw off the rest of it for me.

Re: Willingness to look stupid

#403

Post by keeptrying » Thu, Oct 21, 2021, 3:54 PM UTC

There's a difference between willingness to look stupid and intentionally trying to flip the bozo-bit on others to figure out their boundaries.

You can actually make this a habit and it becomes hard to fix!

If you ever want to start a company, you have to make it a habit to look impressive.

Re: Willingness to look stupid

#404

Post by khalilravanna » Thu, Oct 21, 2021, 3:55 PM UTC

andrewla wrote: post #338

This has happened to me frequently at my current company. I get pulled into a meeting about something that I have no context on because it touches my area of expertise, and the discussions have apparently been stalling out. I brace myself to be the idiot. I'm going to waste everyone's time asking questions that everyone knows the answer to, and I just got looped in, so everyone's going to feel like they need to walk…

IMO this is the hallmark of a good engineer. One of my absolute favorite engineers/mentors did this. Having just one of these people in the room can be a huge differentiator in problem solving in a group setting.

Re: Willingness to look stupid

#405

Post by davidivadavid » Thu, Oct 21, 2021, 3:55 PM UTC

jszymborski wrote: post #371

cycomanic wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have to say this part (and quite a few other parts of the post) come across as quite arrogant. I mean if he really wants the computer with the smallest box, why can't he explain why. I agree with the general gist of the post: don't be afraid to ask stupid questions. However, the post has an underlying "feeling" of "my questions are not really stupid, I'm just so smart that others don't realise". I know that I ask p…

I frankly had the same impression. It felt it was less about the willingness to look to stupid, but rather the stupidity of people who surrounded him and their inability to see this individual's brilliance. Perhaps this is an unkind reading, but particularly the laptop scenario felt telling that this person might feel above explaining why they might prefer a laptop which comes in a smaller box. On the surface that is…

Yeah, this looks like a typical case of the "XY problem" where it's really hard to tell if the person making the request is framing that request wrongly/with unnecessary constraints to satisfy what they actually want.

Re: Willingness to look stupid

#406

Post by ravenstine » Thu, Oct 21, 2021, 3:55 PM UTC

andrewla wrote: post #338

This has happened to me frequently at my current company. I get pulled into a meeting about something that I have no context on because it touches my area of expertise, and the discussions have apparently been stalling out. I brace myself to be the idiot. I'm going to waste everyone's time asking questions that everyone knows the answer to, and I just got looped in, so everyone's going to feel like they need to walk…

This is a useful skill to employ, though at the same time the frequent need of it is a sign of a dysfunctional system. Not always, but a lot of the time, I think. For one, many of these issues would be avoided if, for example, engineers were included in meetings with decision makers and designers during early phases of development, rather than introduce engineers to effectively tell them what to do now that all the decisions have been made absent any shared knowledge of how things can work under the hood. Not only could this result in reduced time spent, but it could result in less time performing re-iterations once engineering concludes that a request/feature is impractical. Impracticalities or better alternatives should be discovered as early in the process as possible, not later, because inevitably wasted time will be made up for via shortcuts and duct tape. Unless a company really cares about good craftsmanship and not releasing something until it's in an adequate state, quality will almost certainly be sacrificed.

Playing dumb, if you will, has served me well, yet it is also odd to me just how often it needs to be employed in the field of software.

Re: Willingness to look stupid

#407

Post by bad_good_guy » Thu, Oct 21, 2021, 3:56 PM UTC

mywittyname wrote: post #360

andrewla wrote: post #338

This has happened to me frequently at my current company. I get pulled into a meeting about something that I have no context on because it touches my area of expertise, and the discussions have apparently been stalling out. I brace myself to be the idiot. I'm going to waste everyone's time asking questions that everyone knows the answer to, and I just got looped in, so everyone's going to feel like they need to walk…

One of the best people I've ever worked with used this approach. "I'm going to ask stupid questions now." and "Just so I'm understanding the problem, ." were two phrases she used all the time . I am surprised at how difficult it has been to emulate her technique. Feeling comfortable asking the obvious questions is one half of the battle, but the other, more difficult half, is knowing what obvious questions to ask. Mo…

I've had PMs always lead questions like that, using "this is probably a stupid question..." and alternatives and I came to dread discussions with them, as I knew this meeting would involve loads of wasted time constantly 'excusing' their question instead of just asking it.

Re: Willingness to look stupid

#408

Post by t0mmyb0y » Thu, Oct 21, 2021, 3:57 PM UTC

It is great to have others think you are stupid, which I am. They don't ask for anything.

Re: Willingness to look stupid

#409

Post by davidivadavid » Thu, Oct 21, 2021, 3:57 PM UTC

joeberon wrote: post #295

dangerface wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

> Non technical people only have the patience to learn / listen to very basic concepts. What a stupidly arrogant comment. Have you not heard of philosophy, for example?

Or any non-STEM field...

Re: Willingness to look stupid

#410

Post by speedgeek » Thu, Oct 21, 2021, 4:00 PM UTC

I have this theory that there is an direct relationship between intellect and doing really stupid things. A genius will sometimes do the most idiotic things. Take comfort the next time you do something really dumb because it indicates you are generally very smart.