41–50 of 371 posts
It is a fun exercise to think of all the interesting ways the 2nd order effects of these feedback hacks can be weaponized in office politicks.
If you have something nice to say, you should say it. Any workplace that penalizes you for that, you should leave--maybe with a parting act of sabotage.
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> “I really liked how you tackled this, have you thought about this approach?” Instead of “Why didn’t you do it this way?” That crosses the line by lying, I think it would be better to say "I think it would be better if you did it this way." It's bad to call them stupid or make a superfluous claim of objectivity, but you don't need to pretend to smile and praise.
Not at all. The trick is to force yourself to find something about their approach that you liked. There's almost always something likable. It's also the trick to being liked in general. Not everyone cares about that, but I've found it more of an asset than a distraction.
I disagree with the angle on this about asking and how to go about things but mostly because complimenting in context is helpful. When someone does great work, tell everyone, not just their manager. Do it in public and clearly in standups after they talk about what they did last day/week. "I just want to mention, that work that Joe did on that module is fantastic, thanks!" It is so easy to be a force for good. Being…
I never understood the "correct in private" stance. How can others learn who did not do the mistake? The argument to have critique in private only is probably because of ego and honor culture where people feel personally attacked in topics where it's not about them at all but about the actions they have taken in a professional context with rules and expectations. But I fully agree on not talking to the manager, but p…
I think a missing element in what I said is that I also fully believe that if I fail at something, it is my responsibility to inform the team rather than wait for someone else to levy blame. ("My apologies, I realized I misread the ticket and wrote the logic expecting X when it should be expecting Y." or "I created the typo there, I'm sorry, will fix by XX AM.") If the team works in that context, then you don't need to correct in front of the team as the person who failed would inform others and use it as a learning moment for all. This also kills the ego problem a little.
I also think failures tend to be systematic in nature and are rarely owned by a single person once you get to the bottom of the 5 "whys". We use Github BATS in PRs now, this fully killed the whole rubber duck of shame culture in our engineering division. While someone breaking the build used to be a singular responsibility, now it is a shared responsibility of the reviewer and tooling and nobody else's build gets broken by bad code. It is easy to blame the person who wrote the code but that excuses those that create the systems and culture.
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Not at all. The trick is to force yourself to find something about their approach that you liked. There's almost always something likable. It's also the trick to being liked in general. Not everyone cares about that, but I've found it more of an asset than a distraction.
No, it's absolutely horrible. It means you think the person you're talking to is dumb and can be manipulated with this phrasing. They see through you.
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“Great work” is an outcome. “Great effort” is an effort praise. It can still suck and you can still have great effort. You can’t have Great Work and it sucks.
what's the difference between "Great work" and "I really liked how you tackled this" ? I assume it's a sports analogy for american football or similar. If you try to tackle an opposing player and you miss or do a bad job, "I really liked how you tackled " is clearly talking about the work, not the effort. If you were talking about the effort, it should be something like, "that was a good attempt!" It's kind of like,…
I’d say it’s not derived from American football.
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No, it's absolutely horrible. It means you think the person you're talking to is dumb and can be manipulated with this phrasing. They see through you.
It's not about phrasing, it's about being genuine and also choosing to have a certain perspective which builds the other person up. There's nothing to see through.
I think this is an incredibly important lesson. Don't lie, _actually_ find something good to say. It's a goddamned super power, and it's also very good for your own mental health.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not at all. The trick is to force yourself to find something about their approach that you liked. There's almost always something likable. It's also the trick to being liked in general. Not everyone cares about that, but I've found it more of an asset than a distraction.
No, it's absolutely horrible. It means you think the person you're talking to is dumb and can be manipulated with this phrasing. They see through you.
I interpret this as, not that you should lie, you should just NOT focus 100% on the negative aspect. At the very least you can thank them for taking the time & effort to implement this solution & test it or w/e (I assume they did "some" work & put in some amount of well meaning effort).
If I can't genuinely find anything to praise about something I want to criticism, it's a sign that it's pretty bad (or I have a bad working relationship with this person) and that is a bigger, separate problem
>Ask if it’s ok first… This is very astute. Not everyone likes getting praise in public settings or they might not want their micromanaging manager to know they helped you outside the scope of their work. You should be cognizant of when praise should be given (i.e. when is it appropriate) and in what context as mentioned in the article. That said, if you aren’t thanking and praising your colleagues for doing good wor…
> “I really liked how you tackled this, have you thought about this approach?” Instead of “Why didn’t you do it this way?” That crosses the line by lying, I think it would be better to say "I think it would be better if you did it this way." It's bad to call them stupid or make a superfluous claim of objectivity, but you don't need to pretend to smile and praise.