When your coworker does great work, tell their manager (2020) • Hacker News Board

Re: When your coworker does great work, tell their manager (2020)

#91

Post by xen2xen1 » Thu, Aug 31, 2023, 6:09 PM UTC

BytesAndGears wrote: post #51

freedomben wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

to be clear, I fully agree with this and your broader point. It's the specific verbiage in your first example that I think is problematic, mainly because it feels disingenuous and insincere at best, manipulative at worst. Which is highly unfortunate because I think the vast majority of the time the motives are pure!

It’s funny because I still feel the opposite of you — I think the example where you say that you like their solution is a better approach, as long as it’s not horrible. It leaves open the possibility that you as the reviewer are actually mistaken, and they possibly have a good reason for doing it that way. I may be the senior reviewing the junior’s code, but they probably spent longer looking at the problem than me a…

It feels stilted and weird to me. My first thought was "OK, that sounds unnatural, I'd have to say it different." Good idea, but I could never let it come out of my mouth that was since no actual human being talks that way.

Re: When your coworker does great work, tell their manager (2020)

#92

Post by foobarian » Thu, Aug 31, 2023, 6:10 PM UTC

This is kind of exactly what various peer review processes are for. Managers usually solicit a report's peers' feedback (team members + whoever the report suggests) so it's really nice when there is an unsolicited feedback note. I try to give out at least a few every cycle.

I haven't done this for very long or at director level before so I'd love to know if managers with lots of reports end up with certain "frequent fliers" who either get a positive reputation for the extra notes, or tank their reputation by complaining too much. :-)

Re: When your coworker does great work, tell their manager (2020)

#93

Post by matwood » Thu, Aug 31, 2023, 6:12 PM UTC

user_named wrote: post #43

thenose wrote: post #15

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.

Are you 100% right every single time? The problem with not using simple communication niceties is that you not only put the other person on defensive, you put yourself on defensive when your opinions on the approach end up wrong.

Yes, there are clear times when some work doesn't meet standard and it's important to be very straight forward. But, most of the time we're dealing in shades of grey with different tradeoffs.

Re: When your coworker does great work, tell their manager (2020)

#94

Post by palata » Thu, Aug 31, 2023, 6:14 PM UTC

I had this team where during the retrospective we would each list good and bad points of the sprint (yes, it was agile, and that part of the whole religious process was the only one that I found useful).

After a while, we would all start the sentences with "I am happy because ..." and "I am not so happy because...", and it became customary to have some "happy" points to compensate for the complaints. And there we all started thanking colleagues of the team. "I am happy because Alexia helped me doing this", or simply "I am happy because Bernard is back from holiday". It was a post-it thing, so when coming back from holiday, you would usually get a post-it from everyone.

We were not collecting them, counting them or showing them to a manager, it was just internal to the team. We would quickly ignore them and move to the bad points (group them, vote for the 3 most important ones, and define actions to solve them). It just felt nice, and I think it was a nice (small but regular) team building moment.

I don't believe in managers: I imagine that they would probably just start counting the reviews, creating some bullshit metrics and ranking the employees. I don't want that. I thank my coworkers when I can to make them feel good, not to make them look good to the manager.

Re: When your coworker does great work, tell their manager (2020)

#95

Post by ori_b » Thu, Aug 31, 2023, 6:16 PM UTC

Angostura wrote: post #52

user_named wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 think you have a really good point here - but have you thought about being a little less abrasive in your phrasing? It can help your point gain acceptance.

This comes off as passive aggressive. I would avoid this kind of phrasing, unless your goal is to needle people while maintaining plausible deniability.

Re: When your coworker does great work, tell their manager (2020)

#96

Post by jfim » Thu, Aug 31, 2023, 6:17 PM UTC

Madmallard wrote: post #86

grey-area wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your assertion that this sort of linguistic hedge is a lie is itself based on a few false assumptions: 1. That there is one correct way to do something 2. That you know that way, and they don't 3. That they didn't consider and disregard that way in early planning due to something you're unaware of What you see as lying is intended to avoid an arrogant disregard for their time and thought, and also to avoid having ego…

nah people know when they’re sucking and you just look patronizing talking like that ever play any competitive games? theres nothing you can say directly to a person when they screw up. you have to just have to ignore and focus on the gameplay. saying anything to them raises the likelihood of a negative outcome.

Coworkers have different incentives than players in a game of Dota. In a competitive game, they'll skulk or grief until the game is over, then queue for another and likely will be matched with other people. That behavior doesn't really work in an office, since people are working with the same colleagues every day.

Re: When your coworker does great work, tell their manager (2020)

#97

Post by anon84873628 » Thu, Aug 31, 2023, 6:17 PM UTC

ori_b wrote: post #76

gabereiser wrote: post #4

>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…

> If you are calling out your colleagues for doing bad work, or not the way you would do it work, you should try to rephrase into praise w/ direction. “I really liked how you tackled this, have you thought about this approach?” Instead of “Why didn’t you do it this way?” I don't want to work with people that communicate this way.

Are you saying you don't want to work with the people who use praise w/ direction? That is my assumption about what you meant given that it seems like the contrary opinion and thus the reason for replying. If that's the case, care to elaborate why you don't like that style?

Re: When your coworker does great work, tell their manager (2020)

#98

Post by johnnyanmac » Thu, Aug 31, 2023, 6:17 PM UTC

whatshisface wrote: post #84

grey-area wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your assertion that this sort of linguistic hedge is a lie is itself based on a few false assumptions: 1. That there is one correct way to do something 2. That you know that way, and they don't 3. That they didn't consider and disregard that way in early planning due to something you're unaware of What you see as lying is intended to avoid an arrogant disregard for their time and thought, and also to avoid having ego…

"I think..." is a hedge, "I really liked," (when you didn't) is a lie.

But what if you did? No one is saying to lie. If you genuinely cannot find any good out of the code review (considerations for performance, easy to read, functional solution, time to execute, ability to reach out to proper peers), then maybe they shouldn't have been hired to begin with? Even a well picked intern these days should have one of those qualities.

Re: When your coworker does great work, tell their manager (2020)

#99

Post by koof » Thu, Aug 31, 2023, 6:18 PM UTC

realjohng wrote: post #18

Compliments should be easy. Too much forethought will reduce volume and I would keep it simple to encourage volume. Yes, Quantity over quality.

I can agree with the article's framing during performance reviews and periods of heightened scrutiny. But for the day to day, frequent collective appreciation and recognition has mattered a lot to me.

"You did well on this grunge work" is a death sentence only if it's contrasted by silence. Maybe I have a blind spot here, but even if the compliment had to stand alone, does the receiver really have so little agency to not reframe or rebut any unintended consequences of the compliment?

Does frequency cheapen compliments? Maybe. Does every piece of praise need to be so weighty? I don't think so. "Please" and "thank you" might not mean much but I still like it when people are polite. So too effort can be recognized.

Re: When your coworker does great work, tell their manager (2020)

#100

Post by skeeter2020 » Thu, Aug 31, 2023, 6:19 PM UTC

gabereiser wrote: post #24

rqtwteye wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“I really liked how you tackled this, have you thought about this approach?” I hate this because it’s usually just a shit sandwich. “Great work. Actually it sucked. Keep going.”

“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.

and while outcomes are... great it's the effort that should be prioritized because we want that brought to all initiatives, not just the ones where you're going to be successful. Every parent should know this; give feedback like "You worked really hard on X" (effort) vs. "You're so smart!" (outcome)