My little brother is autistic and admits he's wrong all the time. The title of this is trash.
“Autistic people can’t acknowledge when they’re wrong”
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Re: “Autistic people can’t acknowledge when they’re wrong”
#52It’s not clear in the article, but if this is all from the same company, this sounds like a really bad company to work for. The author is probably right that they’re being treated unfairly because of their autism (which is wrong), but I’d bet that the neurotypical engineers at the company also have experiences of being dismissed by management.
The example that stuck out to me was “should we migrate our website to React”. The questions the author wanted to ask seemed like very normal questions to ask, and good questions that any good engineer would ask before answering a question like that (unless they already have a lot of context about the website in question).
I don’t have autism, but I’ve worked with people with autism, and at my job I think they were treated more respectfully than what the author describes. It’s possible that they’re being mistreated but I’m just not seeing it though.
I guess what I’m trying to say is that although I can’t directly relate to the author’s experience, I would still recommend that they try to find a new job with a less toxic workplace culture.
Re: “Autistic people can’t acknowledge when they’re wrong”
#53The issue with this article is how the author is approaching all of these discussions. There is no attempt to see the other person's perspective, or evaluate how the author should be approaching the discussion. This is very common among us Engineers but is a massive failure. If a manager comes over and suggests something to you, you need to understand their perspective for coming to that discussion, not asking questi…
> If a manager comes over and suggests something to you, you need to understand their perspective for coming to that discussion
Isn't that exactly what the author did, at least in the React discussion? They tried to establish what potential benefits the manager hoped to get from the React rewrite. It was the manager who immediately gave up on the discussion, not the author.
Re: “Autistic people can’t acknowledge when they’re wrong”
#54It's called narcissistic entitlement to expect the whole world to change their behaviour because of ones own inability to fit in. I'm not saying it is fair. Life is never fair. The only one who has the ability to influence those situations is oneself. You can't rely on other to change - it won't work anyways. You have to be the one that improves those interactions. For your own good.
Neuro diverse people can't necessarily change their behaviour because it's how their brain is wired. It's like asking a visually impaired person to just see better. Many neuro diverse people have to force themselves to "fit in" causing untold stress and trauma. That's not for their own good, it's forcing their brains to work in a way that they don't.
Re: “Autistic people can’t acknowledge when they’re wrong”
#55I read this as being strongly opinionated and egocentric.. I want to call it "ausplaining", this tendency to go "no no, YOU don't understand ME (because I'm special, not because I'm wrong)" whenever we get ourselves into situations like the exemplified. I do this A LOT as well, and when people do stick with me for long enough, I often find that I'm either getting my point across by re-framing my explanation, or disco…
> The author may also benefit from investing some of their mental capital (I'm not being sarcastic, they're obviously very intelligent) into learning how to play the games
I am not aware of any good systematic textbooks on this topic.
(of course not the author)
Re: “Autistic people can’t acknowledge when they’re wrong”
#56Oof. This is black and white thinking at its worst.
The author perceives only two possible outcomes, one where things go Right (correct according to his perceptions) and where they go Wrong (correct according to the other party's perceptions).
There's so much missing from this view of the world it's hard to know where to begin.
- The author could be missing some key facts.
- The author could be unaware of other priorities.
- The author could actually be wrong. It happens to the best of us.
- The author may have a history of being Right, getting others to go along with it, and then changing his mind to a different Right. That burns social capital really fast.
There are some algorithms for convincing others in a way that allows them to save face. Nemawashi is a good one to start with. "Disagree and commit" is another.
Best of luck to the author in developing some workplace skills. Once you're out of school, collaboration is more important than getting things Right all the time.
Re: “Autistic people can’t acknowledge when they’re wrong”
#57> I care more about doing good work than office politics.
Interacting well with other people (what the derisive “office politics” actually is) is good work.
Re: “Autistic people can’t acknowledge when they’re wrong”
#58I read this as being strongly opinionated and egocentric.. I want to call it "ausplaining", this tendency to go "no no, YOU don't understand ME (because I'm special, not because I'm wrong)" whenever we get ourselves into situations like the exemplified. I do this A LOT as well, and when people do stick with me for long enough, I often find that I'm either getting my point across by re-framing my explanation, or disco…
> The author may also benefit from investing some of their mental capital (I'm not being sarcastic, they're obviously very intelligent) into learning how to play the games I am not aware of any good systematic textbooks on this topic. (of course not the author)
This is a classic for good reasons: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_Win_Friends_and_Influen...
Re: “Autistic people can’t acknowledge when they’re wrong”
#59I can’t imagine dedicating this much time analyzing whether or not I can acknowledge when I’m wrong. It’s almost like this entire piece is an elaborate rationalization the author is making rather than admitting they are wrong.
Just because you can't imagine a perspective doesn't mean it isn't real, my assumption is that you aren't on the spectrum.
Re: “Autistic people can’t acknowledge when they’re wrong”
#60> I needed to understand why our checkout had to be improved; I explained that technology choices made no difference to the user. However, the manager interpreted my words as outright rejecting their idea. That's an exceptionally patronising position to take. The manager almost certainly isn't a fool, and likely understands the author's point already. It's much more likely that the manager was actually asking if the…
Author here, thanks for reading. That is exactly the first question I would ask. If you ask me to make something better, I need to know what you mean by “better”. That’s where a productive discussion start, when we align the goals (and I don’t really care about them, they all turn into interesting technical challenges) and then discuss strategy (amongst which there is technology). If me asking what the goal is is per…
I think that this approach limits leadership. Often people are asked to solve both technical and nontechnical problems. People can reasonably ask you both to define "better" and to achieve it. If you expect requirements for everything then you'll place a limit on your influence.