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Just don’t

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Re: Just don’t

#421

Post by ArcMex »

unsupp0rted wrote: post #7

I get a lot more mileage out of "have you tried..." than "why don't you just...". As a recent example, I wrote a system that auto-generates PDF packing slips from an order form, to send to a warehouse for picking and packing. Yesterday a client told me to "just make it landscape" while I was explaining why "just making it landscape" won't solve the problem of giving the warehouse whitespace to pencil stuff in, becaus…

Have you tried mirroring?

For context, see Chris Voss’s ‘Never Split the Difference’

Never Split the Difference: Negotiating As If Your Life Depended On It

https://www.amazon.com/Never-Split-Difference-Negotiating-De...

Re: Just don’t

#422

Post by PeterisP »

imgabe wrote: post #399
adenozine wrote: post #360

Alternatively, if you’re not fit for work, then don’t be at work? I mean, at what point is it over the line to be useless at a job you’ve agreed to do, and that you demonstrated competence for and interviewed for? Many times I’ve said things like “just restart the cronjob for this” or “just tag this issue to so-and-so if you can’t get it, they wrote the original” etc. I’m all for taking care of yourself, but if you c…

I’m also a little put off by this article, but in all those examples you could remove the word just and still have the same meaning. It’s not really adding anything.

The way I read it, the parent post does add extra meaning with that word "just", that meaning being "if you don't know how to do X, this is not considered acceptable here", going beyond just the particular problem to the 'meta-level', asserting what the expectations are from people in this role.

Re: Just don’t

#423

Post by scotty79 »

I think it's not about 'just'. It's more about how unsolicited is the advice. How strongly the person in trouble is looking for a solution.

I had a few times the experience that when I had a programming problem it was immensely helpful to tell about it other person, even non-programmer, because it forced me to state what the problem is so clearly that in theory this person should be able to understand. This made me notice some things about the problem I didn't notice before which sometimes enabled me to either find a solution or slightly, acceptably alter the problem so its solution is way easier.

And even if after explaining my problem I'm still stuck, then the advice the person who listened to it gives me, while not being the solution, will activate my mind even further, because trying to explain why this solution won't work can point me out in the direction of how this solution or the problem itself could be developed or adjusted so that it could possibly work. This thinking might reveal to me completely different solution.

So by all means, please say to me "why don't you just ..." when I'm asking. I probably won't do what you say, but it might lead me somewhere and I really do appreciate listening to me and your input as it might be the key factor that will enable me to find solution.

Re: Just don’t

#424

Post by donatj »

moolcool wrote: post #377
adenozine wrote: post #360

Alternatively, if you’re not fit for work, then don’t be at work? I mean, at what point is it over the line to be useless at a job you’ve agreed to do, and that you demonstrated competence for and interviewed for? Many times I’ve said things like “just restart the cronjob for this” or “just tag this issue to so-and-so if you can’t get it, they wrote the original” etc. I’m all for taking care of yourself, but if you c…

I couldn't disagree more. OP is about a good way to improve your communication skills, which makes more people on the team feel included and productive. This isn't some "kids these days" culture war BS, Dale Carnaige was saying similar things back in 1936.

I think there’s also a pretty big chunk of people who need to work on their interpretation skills. A sentence means to you what you have interpreted it to mean.

Re: Just don’t

#425

Post by titzer »

switchbak wrote: post #365
titzer wrote: post #348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to know someone who would constantly use phrases like "I'm not sure we really understand what is going on here..." but it took me many iterations to decode that in fact, they meant "I'm not sure you really understand what is going on here..." With that decoder ring whole conversations turned decidedly more uncomfortable as it was clear this person was not actually working together for mutual understanding or t…

Do you know that's what they were thinking though? Lots of mistrust can build up when we don't regularly check our assumptions.

I witnessed them do it to other people who were outside "the know" and the joking around in the debriefing made it clear what they thought of them.

Re: Just don’t

#426

Post by grappler »

This brings to mind a coworker a decade and a half ago. A web designer who decorated his door with drawings and quotes.

My favorite among the things on his door, and the one I can still recount now, read as follows:

    “Can you just…”
    no.

Re: Just don’t

#427

Post by imgabe »

PeterisP wrote: post #422
imgabe wrote: post #399

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m also a little put off by this article, but in all those examples you could remove the word just and still have the same meaning. It’s not really adding anything.

The way I read it, the parent post does add extra meaning with that word "just", that meaning being "if you don't know how to do X, this is not considered acceptable here", going beyond just the particular problem to the 'meta-level', asserting what the expectations are from people in this role.

That is one way to interpret it, another is “it won’t be hard to do this”. You do not have to leap to the conclusion that something is a personal attack.

Re: Just don’t

#428

Post by actionablefiber »

TaylorAlexander wrote: post #352
actionablefiber wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I go with "my first impulse is to suggest..." which IMO adds the diplomatic nuance of admitting an incomplete understanding of the problem and/or the person experiencing the problem. You either get a "good suggestion, I'll try that" as a response or you get "you might think it's a good idea but I already considered it and XYZ problems occurred" and you can work from there.

Everyone here is looking for ways to make unsolicited suggestions in a diplomatic way. Even with extra language this can be irritating to reply to. I’ve learned to first ask if there is anything I can do to help, rather than immediately making suggestions. Often times people are doing just fine working through a problem, and may want to communicate the status without receiving advice on how to solve it. For interpers…

This is certainly sometimes true, but when someone is explicitly asking for help, making suggestions that are too "obvious" may come off as condescending or, if the other person hadn't tried it, put them on the defensive. For instance you might suggest something like "turn it off and on again" and the other person might say "duh, I already tried that and it didn't work, I wouldn't have come to you otherwise" or worse they might not have tried it but the way you suggest it as a blindingly obvious course of action makes them feel bad for not having tried it.

Re: Just don’t

#429

Post by Communitivity »

I'll go one further. 'Just' is never appropriate (except in irony, such as Mr. Bray's article), in my opinion. It signifies some combination of frustration, an opinion of the speaker's mental superiority, and an opinion of the listener's mental inferiority. For these reasons it also often causes listeners to focus on the speaker's opinion or the listener's underlying emotional response, rather than the solution or message you are trying to convey.

Re: Just don’t

#430

Post by chousuke »

I've learned that sometimes, there's literally nothing you can do to directly solve a problem; you might not even know what the problem is, so how could you come up with solutions to it.

In those cases it helps me to then think that maybe there's something in my circumstances that is creating my problem, rather than it being a problem with me directly.

For example, if your problem is that it's difficult to get out of the house for a daily walk, a solution to "just do it" will not accomplish anything. It's extremely difficult to just start wanting something out of thin air.

However, if instead of focusing on "how do I go for a walk" you think about "what am I doing when I go for a walk", you immediately open up questions that are very easy to act on: Are you dressed comfortably? Is the path you take for your walk enjoyable, or do you have options? Is there too much noise? Maybe headphones would help.

These are things that are easy to try and change, and free you from having to blame yourself for lacking some ill-defined quality of "having willpower" that no-one can even measure.

If there's something you can easily change, but don't want to, then you know it's a problem with you, and you need to deal with it accordingly. But many things are not a problem with you.

I use the walking example because I literally solved my own "I don't want to go for walks" problem by realizing that I was habitually walking along a noisy road and I hated that and not the walking itself; once I found a more pleasant path, the "chore" became something that I could enjoy instead. My problem wasn't "I'm lazy and I hate walking", it was "cars are noisy and the environment is too grey"

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