Idk, it seems like agreeable people get into management faster, it just depends on the type. There are the agreeable people that do everything they can and go with the flow, but aren't visible because they don't stand out. Then there is agreeable that say things and do things to appear productive but really are faking competence. It's a little more cunning. Then they get into management where they don't need to be technically competent and their people pleasing pushes them higher, based on relying on others to do the work, or outright lying about the status of things.
Disagreeable people can get to low management I think because if they stick around for years they're probably very competent and are willing to say the unpopular correct thing. But they stop rising because they don't play the game for the sake of playing the game. Unless they are adept at politicing. But the agreeable people seem to rise faster because they don't have friction. The problem is when they have issues delivering, but if there are things to blame besides themselves, it helps take the heat off them.
Disagreeable personalities do not have an advantage in power at work (2020)
11–20 of 131 posts
Re: Disagreeable personalities do not have an advantage in power at work (2020)
#12> If disagreeableness does not help individuals attain power, why do so many people believe that nice guys (and gals) finish last? Given our studies focused on the attainment of power, does disagreeableness help people maintain power once they possess it? This study seems like common sense. Extroverted people who are agreeable climb the fastest. People confuse disagreeable with “asshole”. Most assholes can be agreeab…
Let's take it a step further: agreeable people don't care about good engineering. They can't, by definition. Standing up for an idea or principle makes one disagreeable. An engineer who is just "going with the flow" is not bringing any expertise to the table. To be clear, there are limits to how much and when one should stand-up for an idea or principle (i.e. pick your battles). Someone who fights every battle is, on…
>Let's take it a step further: agreeable people don't care about good engineering. They can't, by definition.
this sounds like another way of saying there is ever only one right way of doing something?
If on the other hand you believe that engineering is about tradeoffs, then being agreeable might be a willingness to work out what tradeoffs to make.
Re: Disagreeable personalities do not have an advantage in power at work (2020)
#13> If disagreeableness does not help individuals attain power, why do so many people believe that nice guys (and gals) finish last? Given our studies focused on the attainment of power, does disagreeableness help people maintain power once they possess it? This study seems like common sense. Extroverted people who are agreeable climb the fastest. People confuse disagreeable with “asshole”. Most assholes can be agreeab…
Let's take it a step further: agreeable people don't care about good engineering. They can't, by definition. Standing up for an idea or principle makes one disagreeable. An engineer who is just "going with the flow" is not bringing any expertise to the table. To be clear, there are limits to how much and when one should stand-up for an idea or principle (i.e. pick your battles). Someone who fights every battle is, on…
No, that's massively oversimplified. 'disagreeableness' is not literally about how often you disagree, it's about how you disagree. The OP defines it in the first sentence as 'behaving in aggressive, selfish, and manipulative ways' which is much more than simply disagreeing. It's quite possible to be an agreeable person, and still push through major changes.
Re: Disagreeable personalities do not have an advantage in power at work (2020)
#14Counterargument: There are a lot of nice people that end up in early graves, as they often forgo taking care of their own needs in life due to a misplaced sense of obligation.
Corollary: if the Good do tend to die younger, than they cannot rise to positions of power.
Happy 2023 =)
Re: Disagreeable personalities do not have an advantage in power at work (2020)
#15There are different degrees of power and influence.
I've found that people who are disagreeable to management indeed might have trouble getting promoted and climb the corporate ladder, but at the same time they might be tremendously influential among their peers.
This is also a common effect that can be observed in anti-establishment/opposition structures, both in work-related (e.g leaders of trade unions) and political manners (e.g opposition parties). The leaders of said organizations can often be hugely influential within, but at the same considered highly disagreeable/assholes by the people on the other side.
> Let's take it a step further: agreeable people don't care about good engineering. They can't, by definition.
This! However, that generally leads to disagreeable engineers being very popular with their peers, and not so popular with management, unless the company is inherently engineer/dev focused.
Re: Disagreeable personalities do not have an advantage in power at work (2020)
#16Unless they're your boss. They may be too obnoxious to rise any higher, but they'll still make your days extremely unpleasant.
Tip: if anyone brings up "Minders, Finders, and Grinders"... than ponder which one they think you are... There is zero respect in some firms. =)
Re: Disagreeable personalities do not have an advantage in power at work (2020)
#17> If disagreeableness does not help individuals attain power, why do so many people believe that nice guys (and gals) finish last? Given our studies focused on the attainment of power, does disagreeableness help people maintain power once they possess it? This study seems like common sense. Extroverted people who are agreeable climb the fastest. People confuse disagreeable with “asshole”. Most assholes can be agreeab…
Let's take it a step further: agreeable people don't care about good engineering. They can't, by definition. Standing up for an idea or principle makes one disagreeable. An engineer who is just "going with the flow" is not bringing any expertise to the table. To be clear, there are limits to how much and when one should stand-up for an idea or principle (i.e. pick your battles). Someone who fights every battle is, on…
I agree (ha!)
If you make everybody happy, you're a politician and you're not being effective in your role. With the caveat that many people don't fully understand their role within an organization. A given person is more likely to have been hired to go with the flow than to provide, say, technical rigor or sanity checks.
Re: Disagreeable personalities do not have an advantage in power at work (2020)
#18"being disagreeable-that is, behaving in aggressive, selfish, and manipulative ways" - am I the only one finding this definition incorrect? I think a disagreeable person is one not willing to accept an opinion they find incorrect. None of the attributes they listed seem relevant :) Or maybe I'm just being disagreeable
Re: Disagreeable personalities do not have an advantage in power at work (2020)
#19As a layman, possibly under the distant influence of Jordan Peterson, I thought "disagreeable" meant strong-willed, principled, uncompromising (on what one considers important), direct, etc., i.e. what the article probably designates as "combative"; and was surprised to see "selfish", "manipulative", and "deceitful" also lumped into this category. These seem to be so different personality traits...
Re: Disagreeable personalities do not have an advantage in power at work (2020)
#20Earlier quoted context omitted.
Let's take it a step further: agreeable people don't care about good engineering. They can't, by definition. Standing up for an idea or principle makes one disagreeable. An engineer who is just "going with the flow" is not bringing any expertise to the table. To be clear, there are limits to how much and when one should stand-up for an idea or principle (i.e. pick your battles). Someone who fights every battle is, on…
>Let's take it a step further: agreeable people don't care about good engineering. They can't, by definition. this sounds like another way of saying there is ever only one right way of doing something? If on the other hand you believe that engineering is about tradeoffs, then being agreeable might be a willingness to work out what tradeoffs to make.
exactly, seems like a big oversimplification. I'm "agreeable" at work, as in, let's see if you are correct about your way, and if not, we'll correct it based on the data. Rarely there is a predictable binary decision about how to build stuff, at least in software.