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Ask HN: Why do some people not communicate clearly?

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Re: Ask HN: Why do some people not communicate clearly?

#231

Post by BeetleB »

f1shy wrote: post #222
BeetleB wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with the parent. When there is confusion like this, switch to open ended: "OK, we both agree there appears to be a problem with the transmission. How do you propose we investigate?" From the dialog it appears you were two steps ahead of the person and what he really needed was time to think it through. Asking the open ended question gives him space to think.

Interesting example... You propose I use an open ended question, where the discussion could easily go sideways, when I clearly stated: "In this case is my subordinate." "I already had asked him to do the measurement. My question started more to be sure he actually is going to do it." I do not see how an open question would help here. Nice example of communication going wrong here...

Yeah, it really depends on context.

It makes sense to give a subordinate a directive. That he is a subordinate, however, doesn't mean a direct question will lead to effective communication.

I've worked with both types of managers - the ones that ask direct, pointed questions and the ones that ask open ended ones. I think the latter are more effective, but it really depends on the role (you don't want open ended discussions in emergencies).

For me, though, "We have problem X. What are the options for resolving it?" has a better chance at success than "We have a problem X. Can you look into Y?"

Re: Ask HN: Why do some people not communicate clearly?

#232

Post by awillen »

BeetleB wrote: post #205
janj wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't read this as expecting simple answers to questions, but as the question being simple and instead of the person being asked giving a direct answer to that question, instead they give an answer to a tangential question. I've worked with people who do this consistently. Know this I would try to formulate as simple and direct a question as I could, but always the answer would be to a tangential, often more basic…

There are no shortage of such people - I've encountered a bunch. And yes, it's always a pain in the workplace. In my experience, this strategy: > Know this I would try to formulate as simple and direct a question as I could, but always the answer would be to a tangential, often more basic question. Always fails with them. At some point, you have to become humble enough to realize that your approach is flawed and look…

Or just keep hammering away with the same question until you get an answer.

"What's 2+2"? In response, the person explains how addition is. "Okay, thanks for that context, but I don't think we ever actually got to the original question - what's 2+2?" The person tells you a story about something cute their kid did when learning addition. "Again, I think we're getting off track - can you please tell me what 2+2 is?"

If they continue long enough, you need to start cutting them off or addressing the issue more directly.

"I've asked four times what 2+2 is, and you've told me several stories about addition but haven't answered the question. Is there some reason you're not able to tell me what 2+2 is?"

Repeat until you either get an answer to the question or an explanation of why the person you're asking can't answer the question.

Re: Ask HN: Why do some people not communicate clearly?

#233

Post by willcipriano »

dr_orpheus wrote: post #128
willcipriano wrote: post #11

Lots of people are afraid to say "I don't know" in my experience. Although, sometimes people ask me a question where I have to work out in my head what the answer is and it feels weird to sit there in silence for 15 seconds as I do so.

> Although, sometimes people ask me a question where I have to work out in my head what the answer is and it feels weird to sit there in silence for 15 seconds as I do so. I've had to train myself to actually respond in this situations "let me think about that for a second". Because although the silence is awkward it is way better than rambling off and getting something wrong or having someone interrupt your train of…

I'll try that out.

Re: Ask HN: Why do some people not communicate clearly?

#235

Post by thwayunion »

SoftTalker wrote: post #226
thwayunion wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Right now I'm relatively new in my position, and it was a real torture to understand the system, because nobody seems to be able to explain it in a linear way. This is... not surprising at all? Are you new to industry? Have you only worked at greenfield startups? Particularly true for products with significant R&D components, btw. > Ok, where I'm now it seems a PhD can be bought around the corner for 2 cents. Some…

> The masters degree itself is not a good signal. Especially in CS, MS programs are viewed as pure revenue streams and explicitly treated differently from other programs in terms of rigor and signalling value I discovered this recently. Working in the CS department at a large state school, the masters students are not respected. I have had professors tell me they don't care if they cheat (they mostly do) or share sol…

> but I've come to interpret a masters degree in any computer-related subject to only mean that the person had the funds to pay for it.

Sadly, immigration is a major pull into MS programs, and it's not always the case that the student can actually afford the program... especially if the immigration plan doesn't work out.

Re: Ask HN: Why do some people not communicate clearly?

#236

Post by epgui »

unsupp0rted wrote: post #59
awb wrote: post #27

Here are some altruistic reasons these events might occur: > - don't directly address the point of your question / provide a much complex answer (or even worse, a non-answer) to a simple question > - don't stay focused to the point of the discussion I often dive deeper if the question itself raises suspicions that the question asker might not fully understand the topic. For example, if someone asked: "can you unbatch…

Sure, some people are not native English speakers, but in OP's case that didn't affect the clarity of their question, even with a couple inferred missing words.

Even grammatically correct text leaves tons and tons of room for misunderstanding. English is not my first language either, and I make tons of mistakes... but because of my experience with more than one language I really do see the importance of grammar.

Don't make the mistake of thinking that the way we interface with each other (the API of language) is purely stylistic and of little consequence. Every little aspect of language shapes our thoughts and impacts our ability to think clearly... Let alone our ability to transmit thoughts to each other through speech or text (conversion to and from which is very lossy).

Re: Ask HN: Why do some people not communicate clearly?

#237

Post by bawolff »

eXpl0it3r wrote: post #147
lightbendover wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would go further and say that "yes" and "no" are never the only acceptable answers to most questions unless you are able to prove the answer is deterministic. "will you have the project complete by Friday?" -> you may be able to state "no," but there are certainly caveats to any "yes" answer. "will you try to have the project complete by Friday?" - in this case, "yes" is most likely an acceptable answer, but you st…

The problem for me for cases like your example is, that I need an answer that I can work with. If the answer to that question doesn't start or end with "yes" or "no", I'm then left with having to read between the lines of whatever rambling answer I received to determine, whether they're more likely to be finished by Friday or not. "Well I started with this module and Bob is still doing stuff, but it seems like some w…

I guess there are different types of questions. If i needed someone's permission to do x and they didnt answer yes/no, thar would indeed be annoying.

I think what i was reacting to was more the types of questions like "can the site scale to 50,000 users? Yes or no" where the real answer is, well it depends on how active they are, what they do on the site, are they are logging in at 9am monday, or a million different factors and there is no reasonable yes or no answer.

Re: Ask HN: Why do some people not communicate clearly?

#238

Post by pmarreck »

I have a liberal-arts degree but I code for a living. I'd describe my skill as "would have difficulty writing my own compiler, but can handle pretty much anything below that". I don't have a communication problem as you describe, but I've seen other engineers that do. It's just a rarer ability among them, unfortunately. Brains taken up by highly-complex problems often do not have bandwidth for careful or clear written or verbal communication lol

Re: Ask HN: Why do some people not communicate clearly?

#239

Post by nerf3000 »

A couple of challenging communication and behavior patterns I've experienced are:

* Didn't clarify requirements. Didn't outline or discuss potential solutions and tradeoffs to different approaches up front. Instead spent days writing an overcomplicated implementation based on their understanding of the problem in isolation. Typical code review feedback triggers a defensive response citing sunk cost fallacy and will not engage with non-syntactical questions, for example "why did you choose approach it this way instead of that way" is ignored or called out of scope

* Didn't prepare or share meeting agendas ahead of time. Instead tries to explain meeting context verbally on the fly. Monologues for 10-15 minutes touching unrelated points, outlining different ways we could structure the meeting, gives random bits of anecdotal context, then says "what do you think?". Is met with crickets. Attendees are confused and very little is established or clarified. Rinse and repeat at the next meeting.

These left me pretty much stumped and negatively affected my future efforts with the individuals.

I wonder how other people would approach these situations?

Re: Ask HN: Why do some people not communicate clearly?

#240

Post by mola »

I'm fairly associative and I tend to wonder off like you describe. When someone asks me a question it lights up tons and tons of context and information which I start to describe. My mind wonders a lot, so a lot of the time I'll have an answer already there and at these times I'll usually be very eloquent. But sometimes a lot of details and caveats pop in to my mind and I feel compelled to include them in my answers.

On the flip side this sort of thinking enables me to be very creative in my job and often I am the go to guy when you need solutions for difficult problems.

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