181–190 of 243 posts
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Why should everything be terrible forever? The article is talking about people who are systematically bad for organizations, not people who have a bad day sometimes.
Amen! what’s wrong with confronting them directly without the careful parsing demanded by our self-limiting ideas of being well behaved.
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Why should everything be terrible forever? The article is talking about people who are systematically bad for organizations, not people who have a bad day sometimes.
Things can be terrible because some people don't know how to act. Things can also be terrible because some people don't know how to do the job properly. It is a lot easier to find a yes-man/woman than a brilliant anyone. Companies are ruined by mediocrity far more than they're ruined by 'brilliant jerks' bullying the company into non-existence. Who'd you rather have as your surgeon - a brilliant jerk the nurses have…
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The problem is non-brilliant jerks are usually a lot easier to get rid of. They can be replaced. When the jerk is brilliant and necessary (or at least perceived so) management can be much more hesitant. ‘Yes he’s horrible but we can’t operate without him’ or ‘we don’t have the slack to pick up that work’ or ‘it will take too long to train someone new right now’. They get extra excuses that a medium or low performer w…
Sadly, that extends to behavior far worse than being a jerk.
I've worked with someone who ticks almost all of the Bob traits. He would actively try to get people fired who he didn't like, spending time gaslighting everyone around them until enough people disliked his victim where it was possible to fire them. He turned entire teams against each other, causing organizational issues that lasted years after he was eventually fired.
The problem is that he was legitimately brilliant, and he was incredibly productive. This made his gaslighting all the more effective. When we spoke about things and people, people listened. He was charismatic, funny, and had a long-standing reputation.
After firing this person, we found out he has a history of being abusive and getting fired. It's hard to know this because he's in leadership positions in a few important open source communities.
Thankfully this org is numerous years in my past and I've eventually moved past the stress associated with it, but it's an experience that stuck with me for a long time.
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Not really. In what context is saying that someone should be 'retroactively aborted' a perfectly fine thing to say?
I've known Linus for a long time and don't believe him to be malicious. Do you have context for that statement? Linus has a sly sense of humor, I bet it was either directed at some code or it was in jest.
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Not really. In what context is saying that someone should be 'retroactively aborted' a perfectly fine thing to say?
I've known Linus for a long time and don't believe him to be malicious. Do you have context for that statement? Linus has a sly sense of humor, I bet it was either directed at some code or it was in jest.
https://lkml.org/lkml/2012/7/6/495
Actually, after reading it a few more times, I can't find any jest in it tbh
The situation I've encountered is a jerk who was actually fairly mediocre in his abilities but whose bully characteristics and brash confidence had led many of the non-technical people in the company to believe he was extremely skilled. I think one reason people become bullies is because they know they can't back up their decisions with skill. Linus is brash, but is quite able to work well with people and has the res…
Linus Torvalds have gotten an undeserved reputation because it is oh so easy for the online tech media to take emails out of context. Whenever he brings out the harsh words, it is because someone has been stalling and deflecting about breaking some core rule for kernel development. Torvalds never pounce on someone out on tail end of the patch chain. He comes down hard on those that have been in charge of maintaining…
I don't think that's necessarily good enough. Even if he is personally restrained in whom he acts like a jerk towards, his behaviour establishes norms within the project and contributes to how other people behave.
Project leaders need to set good examples.
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You are wrong because the vast majority of people take criticism personally. It turns out that when you tell people they are wrong and present them with reasons they are wrong, a surprising number of people double down. I'm sure you have heard this before, but you have to make them think it was their idea. Edit Source: I make this mistake all the god damn time, and never realize it until the person breaks and finally…
> but you have to make them think it was their idea. The best way I've found to do this is to them you don't understand something and have them explain the solution to you. Plus it's humility practice -- you might even turn out to be wrong!
But, you know, sometimes it turns out that I was actually the one not seeing some things clearly and by not coming out of the gate as a jerk about things we can both walk away having come to a collaborative solution and everyone feels good.
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You're right that productive people are productive despite being jerks, not because they're jerks. And sure, cast as much judgement on jerks as you feel is proper. But most people are pretty set in their ways. Everyone who yells at cashiers when they're 40 has done so before, they've probably faced some consequences for their actions and the behavior persists so either you need to be more persuasive than the totality…
Yes, old jerk have often been young jerks. But the reason why behaviour escalates is that it is rewarded or at least tolerated. In an environment where yelling at cashier is not socially accepted, yelling at cashier happen less often. If senior cuts junior and then manager/leader address behavior and let junior speak, then the team work entirely different then if leader makes fun of half heard junior proposal. 1.) Ma…
Management hires jerks and puts people into situations with the jerks they hired.
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> why am I wrong ? I'll bite. Does it work? Is your approach effective? In your engagement with the senior folk, do you just complain? Or do you suggest changes that you know are affordable and achievable? Are you arguing so you feel better about trying or are you genuinely attempting to affect change? Also, has it occurred to you that the higher ups might not be the fools and cowards they appear? Is it possible that…
"Does it work? Is your approach effective?" not all the times, but I had some success here and there! but not as much as I hoped for. "has it occurred to you that the higher ups might not be the fools and cowards they appear?" I am not that arragont to think I am the smartest person in a big organization or I am right all the times and others are always wrong! but those constrains are coming from somewhere and I beli…
But, for what it’s worth, you’re almost definitely wrong in your analysis. Senior people at large organisations do routinely make poor decisions but it’s usually for either external factors, empire building or blame shifting. It’s hardly ever for genuine stupidity or laziness.