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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

#211

Post by rawgabbit »

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…

”What it means in practice is that your colleague can write "this approach is wrong, here's why" instead of "hey, hope you're doing well, I had some time to look at your PR and I just wanted to shared a few small thoughts, please take these as just one perspective, and of course you know the codebase better than I do, but I was wondering if maybe we could potentially consider [useful thing here]" and then bury the actual point six paragraphs deep. Both messages contain the same information, however one of them respects time.”

The author argues brevity is more efficient even if it is rude so he argues for brevity. This is why engineers suck at politics and relationships. Brevity and efficiency is a false mantra to live by. It is better to be effective and get what you want without pissing off everyone. The authors’s example is a non starter. When he writes this approach is wrong…, he is starting a flame war even if he argues he isn’t. It would be better to say something like I disagree with this approach, then give your assumptions and reasoning. Even if you don’t get your way, you got it off your chest and came across as professional.

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

#213

Post by Twey »

thyristan wrote: post #203
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…

> The better a person is at communication the more they will fit their message to the audience to get the action intended. If 'direct' really works then over time it will be used but the fact that direct isn't used often implies strongly that it doesn't work for most people or it has secondary effects that are too negative. Demanding the exception is a pretty big ask especially if your aren't willing to meet half way…

The Gladwellian direct/indirect dichotomy (or continuum) is a misapprehension of how language works. All communication is indirect in some sense because we don't have mind control powers over our fellow humans. Even saying ‘I want to buy this bread’ is indirect in a sense: you're not causing the baker to sell you the bread, nor even explicitly instructing them to, but just stating your personal internal desires. It is a cultural construct that being told someone's internal desire is supposed to function as a ‘direct’ instruction to satisfy it, and even in that there is a lot of room for ambiguity depending on context etc. For example, if I were speaking not to the baker but to my friend as we peruse the bakery together, ‘I want to buy this bread’ could have a variety of intended impacts on their actions. It could mean ‘let's come to an agreement about whether we should collectively buy this bread’. It could mean ‘pass me my wallet so I can pay for the bread’. It could mean ‘go and find me a shopkeep who can legally sell me the bread’. It could just mean ‘you are my friend and I'm telling you my internal monologue so that you can understand me better’.

If you interpret the language of a different culture (separated by space or time — try reading the ‘flowery’ language of Victorian or Elizabethan literature) too literally, it reads as ‘indirect’. But that doesn't mean that the native speakers from that culture consider it so. You're simply missing the cultural context that makes their phrasing as ‘direct’ to them as ‘I want to buy this bread’ is to you.

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

#214

Post by tombert »

mayhemducks wrote: post #199
tombert wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 stra…

If I showed up late halfway through the interview, I would almost certainly not get an offer, and if the hiring manager called me out on that fact then no one would call that manager an asshole.

I am not “nitpicking every little thing” and I feel like there’s a lot of extrapolation going on there. I do think it’s extremely disrespectful to schedule a meeting and show up very late so that the interviewee doesn’t have time do do the full interview. In fact I think it is categorically more disrespectful than a snarky comment about lateness.

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

#215

Post by tombert »

dwroberts wrote: post #195
tombert wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

No, it really isn’t inappropriate. The listing that the recruiter sent me said that they “value directness”.

If I had shown up fifteen minutes late for the interview they would likely not make an offer, and if they had called me out for being late then no one would call them an asshole.

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

#216

Post by tombert »

mayhemducks wrote: post #201
tombert wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He actually did not! He just proceeded like it was nothing.

Because it was. Was probably this person's 10th interview of the day. They probably only need the simplest of infractions to weed someone out given the absurd volume of applications they receive.

If I had shown up fifteen minutes late for the interview then they likely wouldn’t make an offer and they likely would have called it out during the interview. No one seems to call out companies when they do this shit.

They wouldn’t care if I had a really bad day beforehand, and they certainly wouldn’t assume that I had a good excuse for it.

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

#217

Post by jcalvinowens »

castillar76 wrote: post #210
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…

> The point of communication between engineers is usually to establish a mutual understanding... I tried to let this pass in the discussion, I really did, but since it came up in various other replies I felt like I just couldn't. We need to get the hell over ourselves as a profession: the fact that someone is an "engineer" says nothing about their communications styles, needs, or preferences as a person. There is abs…

You read far too much into my word choice. I think you could substitute any technical profession (I would include everything you mentioned explicitly) for "engineer" and what I wrote would be equivalently true. I just happen to have the most direct experience with engineers, and the original article was about engineers.

It's true of the technical aspects of art too: professional musicians rehearsing, for example. It's less true when you get into the ingantible parts of art, though... taste is inherently personal.

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

#218

Post by tombert »

rkomorn wrote: post #198
tombert wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

“Tit for tat” and “spite” feel like they are very strong words for what amounted to a justified smartass comment.

If I had shown up fifteen minutes late for the interview I wouldn’t have gotten an offer and the interviewer might have made a comment about it during the interview and people generally wouldn’t call them an asshole for it.

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

#219

Post by dpark »

manofmanysmiles wrote: post #196
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 intentionall…

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

Ignoring others emotions is not a sign of emotional maturity.

The inability to empathize with others and make meaningful predictions about how their emotions will affect communications is specifically a lack of emotional maturity.

This kind of sentiment comes up every time this topic is raised. This idea that we should be able to treat people mostly like logical robots is not grounded in fact. The fact is that human emotions have a huge impact on the way they communicate and receive communications.

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

Case in point. You had an emotional reaction to the parent comment, and you responded with an attempt to shame the communication style rather than address the factual content of the communication.

Your emotions dictated your response here, not the facts, and your response was emotional in content as much as factual. Hyperbole is specifically an appeal to emotion.

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

#220

Post by tombert »

InsideOutSanta wrote: post #92
tombert wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure that I'm a "culture fit" for most companies. I should probably start buying lottery tickets instead.

"Culture fit" is an euphemism for "did the interviewer like you?" If most interviewers don't like you, that's something for you to think about. It's not necessarily bad, if you have a very specific personality that most people find disagreeable, then it's a good idea to look out for companies that cater to your personality, and where you will fit in. But it is something to think about.

I think most people generally like me well enough, I just have a low tolerance for certain bits of corporate hypocrisy.
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