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I beg you to follow Crocker's Rules, even if you will be rude to me

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Re: I beg you to follow Crocker's Rules, even if you will be rude to me

#191

Post by rahimnathwani »

jpdb wrote: post #183
rahimnathwani wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"I want to be perceived as someone who is effective _and_ pleasant to work with." That seems like a good reason to adapt your communication to your audience. If x finds preamble unpleasant, but you use unnecessary preamble when communicating with x, that won't help you be perceived as pleasant to work with.

> If x finds preamble unpleasant, but you use unnecessary preamble when communicating with x, that won't help you be perceived as pleasant to work with. Absolutely! But OP isn't suggesting preamble is unpleasant, they are saying there is little or even no value and to remove it altogether. Even if OP did in fact mean to suggest this when speaking to them directly, it is unbelievably selfish to ask (let alone _beg_) s…

"But OP isn't suggesting preamble is unpleasant, they are saying there is little or even no value and to remove it altogether."

I'm not sure about this. OP said:

"When you ... [SNIP] ... you are making the recipient wade through noise to get to signal."

So it seems like OP wants other people to:

- not waste their time and energy, but

- is happy to take any emotional cost that comes with that.

Re: I beg you to follow Crocker's Rules, even if you will be rude to me

#192

Post by avilay »

pardon_me wrote: post #179
jcalvinowens wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Communication is mind control. The point isn't the words, it is literally trying to get a person to do something. You're describing manipulating people, not communicating with them. The point of communication between engineers is usually to establish a mutual understanding, not make them do something you want. Through that mutual understanding you both come to agree on what should be done. Often, coming to that mut…

> Being able to be brutally honest with each other about our misunderstandings Being specific to misunderstandings is an element that's overlooked. This advice tends to be taken onboard (often to extremes) by those who take it as a free pass to just say whatever comes to their mind, whenever they like, without explaining how they arrived there. Any excuse to avoid putting in effort to be understood or be conscious of…

Totally agree with this! Being "kindly honest" is way better than being "brutally honest". Being honest and direct is important of course. I have often found that delivering constructive criticism in the so-called sandwich manner often obfuscates the message, so delivering it directly is much better. However, being kind to the receiver of the feedback by having empathy for them and supporting them as they process that feedback will help land that message far more effectively than being "brutal" about it.

Re: I beg you to follow Crocker's Rules, even if you will be rude to me

#193

Post by wat10000 »

jcalvinowens wrote: post #167
jmward01 wrote: post #142

The writer asks for it, so I will be blunt. They are demanding people have perfectly formed thoughts crafted in a way to give them just the information they wanted with no consideration for the process of thinking or consideration for the person speaking. It is selfish and impossible. Articles like this, I think, expose how bad we have gotten at both speaking and listening. "I personally value directness, so when som…

> Communication is mind control. The point isn't the words, it is literally trying to get a person to do something. You're describing manipulating people, not communicating with them. The point of communication between engineers is usually to establish a mutual understanding, not make them do something you want. Through that mutual understanding you both come to agree on what should be done. Often, coming to that mut…

The point of communication in general is to alter the recipient’s mental state in certain ways. Maybe you want to alter their mental state such that they understand a technical problem. Maybe you want it to be a state that causes them to explain something. Maybe you want to alter their mental state such that they pick you up from the airport.

The key thing is that there is a particular goal, and if you want to achieve that goal, you need to work with people as they are, not as you wish them to be.

Re: I beg you to follow Crocker's Rules, even if you will be rude to me

#194

Post by ubertaco »

lr0 wrote: post #153
mcherm wrote: post #134

Many people are taking what I believe to be the wrong message here. I believe the author's intent was (or should have been) to describe how THEY wanted to receive communication, not how EVERYONE should. A skilled communicator will craft their message for the audience. Some want "just the facts" with no social lubricant. Others want the banter to build person-to-person relationships. Some want a quick statement of con…

> I believe the author's intent was (or should have been) to describe how THEY wanted to receive communication, not how EVERYONE should I thought that would be too obvious to state.

Interesting, perhaps the message was too narrowly, directly-focused and was missing necessary social context?

This feels like a koan about the subjectivity of which details are important to include.

Re: I beg you to follow Crocker's Rules, even if you will be rude to me

#195

Post by dwroberts »

tombert wrote: post #176
dwroberts wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Calling that out to that persons face, in that moment, is also inappropriate and rude. You can give that feedback some other time.

It’s actually not “inappropriate”. Are you saying that instead of directly pointing out something that really bothered me, I should instead of reported him to someone higher up? Should I have bitched on Glassdoor? Oh, I guess I could have complained to the to recruiter where there is a zero percent chance that my complaint actually gets sent to them. It’s “rude” in that I embarrassed the person for a minute, but it’s…

I think it is inappropriate in an interview situation 100%. If you can’t hold your tongue on some slight discomfort or perhaps talk about in a more diplomatic way (eg not singling out the specific person but rather just stating your upset at the interview being delayed) how are you going to react if clients/customers make you uncomfortable on conference calls? Are you going to be tactful and polite, or are you going to be direct and rude to them?

Obviously I don’t know the role you were going for etc. this is just an example, but I think doing this gives a bad impression that goes beyond just whether that specific person was irritated for you calling them on their lateness

Re: I beg you to follow Crocker's Rules, even if you will be rude to me

#196

Post by manofmanysmiles »

tracerbulletx wrote: post #177

The idea that how your audience receives the communication is their problem and not yours is entirely why some engineers are shit communicators and seem lost when facing the realities of human culture and politics. You might wish the world would all just think exactly like you but the moods, interest, and preferences of the people around you are YOUR PROBLEM and you need to engage with them if you want to accomplish…

Are you implying other people's emotional immaturity is exclusively my problem to solve?

Also when you state an absolute like the word of God, how do you expect it to be received?

The article seems to imply to me: form relationships where direct truth is welcomed while acknowledging that people do have emotions.

Facts can be true and the feelings can be strong at the sam time. Attaching emotions to facts intentionally is intentionally adding a non-factual dimension to the conversation.

If you consider emotions as facts, and are communicating with me, I prefer if you express them as directly and honestly as possible so they can be included in the discussion.

Intentionally not expressing emotions clearly while using them to communicate is inherently without integrity. Specifically the words are not aligned with the emotions. The lack of integrity is structural (as opposed to some ambiguous moral ideal.)

Re: I beg you to follow Crocker's Rules, even if you will be rude to me

#198

Post by rkomorn »

tombert wrote: post #175
ggggffggggg wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Didn’t your momma teach you that two wrongs don’t make a right?? If someone is a jerk to you, and then you’re a jerk to them… you’re still a jerk.

I do not concede that what I did was “wrong”. Pointing out something that was objectively douchy isn’t “wrong”. Yes I was a little snarky, and maybe I am a “jerk”, but considering that this person was happy to just waste my time like it was nothing I do think he was entitled to a little embarrassment.

> I do think he was entitled to a little embarrassment

This is exactly the kind of signal that would make me not want to hire someone.

Tit-for-tat? Spite? No thanks.

Re: I beg you to follow Crocker's Rules, even if you will be rude to me

#199

Post by mayhemducks »

tombert wrote: post #176
dwroberts wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Calling that out to that persons face, in that moment, is also inappropriate and rude. You can give that feedback some other time.

It’s actually not “inappropriate”. Are you saying that instead of directly pointing out something that really bothered me, I should instead of reported him to someone higher up? Should I have bitched on Glassdoor? Oh, I guess I could have complained to the to recruiter where there is a zero percent chance that my complaint actually gets sent to them. It’s “rude” in that I embarrassed the person for a minute, but it’s…

Would you want to work with you? Maybe yes. But if I am making a choice about who to work with, I would prefer someone who has enough empathy and awareness to realize that it's possible that the interviewer might be running behind through no fault of their own. I would extend that to the my team members, and I hope they would in-turn, extend that to me.

You sound to me like someone who sees "please be direct and straight forward" as a free pass to nit-pick every little thing. Like maybe it's your duty to criticize even when it has little to no bearing on future success.

Re: I beg you to follow Crocker's Rules, even if you will be rude to me

#200

Post by helterskelter »

ectospheno wrote: post #186
tracerbulletx wrote: post #177

The idea that how your audience receives the communication is their problem and not yours is entirely why some engineers are shit communicators and seem lost when facing the realities of human culture and politics. You might wish the world would all just think exactly like you but the moods, interest, and preferences of the people around you are YOUR PROBLEM and you need to engage with them if you want to accomplish…

While “perception is reality” is indeed a thing in life so is respecting diversity. If this person prefers to be spoken to in a certain way then it is polite to respect their wishes. You can have your own preference and they should likewise respect yours.

It's polite to try and meet somebody half way, but I've dealt with people who want to lay out all the rules for communication and it typically boils down to a one-sided arrangement where the world is supposed to work for them, but they're unwilling to do the same for the world. Unless somebody has a real limitation (like ESL or a mental handicap), I just ignore these kinds of requests. Make a good faith effort to not be an asshole, but don't give an inch to petty dictators; they have damaged egos and get satisfaction from having people comply with arbitrary requests or demands, and asking for changes to your language is often just the beginning.
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