5 ms·

> If this atmosphere of harsh personal criticism does yield better results but does it?

by andylei 11y ago

sssilver 11y ago
With me it does.
- tonyarkles 11y ago
  Just to make sure we're on the same page... Consider these two options: 1. "sssilver, you are a fucking moron. I'm amazed your ancestors managed to not only crawl out of the primordial soup, but to reproduce successfully enough times to bring you into existence. Christ, think about your code before submitting your pull request." 2. "This code has several memory leaks. Function bar_baz() returns a pointer to a stack-allocated data structure. On line 32, you've got a likely null-pointer dereference. There are several other problems as well. Go find some reference material or someone to help you improve." You'd prefer to get #1 as feedback rather than #2? #2 is direct and blunt, but not full of personal insults.
  - zeveb 11y ago
    #1 is far more likely to make an emotional impression than #2. That might be for good (one avoids making such bad mistakes again) or bad (one avoids making any contributions again). It's certainly more memorable.
    - tonyarkles 11y ago
      I came up with it trying to think of something vicious that contained absolutely no insight about how to be better. It doesn't actually have any information about what the bad mistakes might be. I'm still trying to wrap my head around the whole idea that that'd work for some people.
      - zeveb 11y ago
        Well, a real-life example would contain both disrespect and information about the mistakes, and how to do better. Something more like, 'How could you possibly be so stupid as to use the same memory location to store the car's current radio station and the desired fuel-injection rate, controlled only by a flag in another piece of memory? Didn't it occur to you that someone working on the entertainment system code might never even think of checking for a flag related to speed & safety? Dear God, Smith, do you realise how many people you could have killed? I can only hope that your other mistakes have prevented idiots like you from being born and placed into positions of trust, you sorry misbegotten excuse for an engineer!' Harsh, but I bet Smith would remember that moment well, and be more careful in the future. Or he might quit, and never write automotive-safety-impacting code again.
      - mst 11y ago
        Which is, I think, a mistake; by and large, the best of harsh feedback is more 'both' than 'either/or' - i.e. it might include a fair chunk of yelling but there's also actionable criticism therein. Certainly if you look at Linus' rants the ranting is to emphasise the criticism, not to act as a substitute for insight.
  - sssilver 11y ago
    I would perform better with #1, because it'd motivate me a lot more. With #2, the only thing that's at stake is the particular problematic code. With #1, my whole ancestry and evolution is being questioned, and I'm gonna make damn sure I perform well enough to justify my very existence. I know it sounds creepy, but that's how it works with me. Especially if the feedback is coming from someone I have immense respect for.
    - tonyarkles 11y ago
      I hope you don't get downvoted. That is an exceptionally fascinating answer for me! I wouldn't call it creepy at all, just... unusual. It took a fair bit of effort for me to come up with at all, given that #2 is my typical feedback approach. I have a feeling that giving #1 as feedback on a student's assignment would result in a disciplinary hearing. :) Very fascinating! Thanks for giving me something to chew on!
      - sssilver 11y ago
        I also don't represent the western culture. That might be a culprit.
      - wpietri 11y ago
        For me, there are different kinds of "works" at play here. If the question is what produces dramatic, short-term improvement, an abusive approach quite often works wonders. But over the long term, that's thoroughly corrosive. Fear isn't a sustainable motivation when people have other options. (Which is why serial abusers also end up being very controlling; they need to eliminate the options.)
    - chasing 11y ago
      sssilver, you are a fucking moron. I'm amazed your ancestors managed to not only crawl out of the primordial soup, but to reproduce successfully enough times to bring you into existence. Christ, take a moment to realize that just because you have a masochistic desire to be abused by your coworkers doesn't mean everybody else feels the same way. And your stupid desire to suffer assholes is just setting yourself up for a life of being shit upon. (Is that more to your taste? ;-) )
  - MichaelGG 11y ago
    I'd like both. #1 adds some levity and humour; #2 gives me the technical details. Perhaps if it was personal, like pointing out that I consistently do terrible work and really am not cut out to be a dev, then yeah that might hurt. Though more because the intent is that I shouldn't contribute, full stop, not just improve my work. Though I suppose it's because there aren't any impersonal insults that'd bother me. Whereas being a member of another group that gets sincere bigotry aimed at it - yeah that might be incredibly frustrating. No one believes Linus wants to actually travel through time and perform abortions, nor would it make anyone think to do such a thing. But a "this proves women should really avoid engineering and stick to cooking" is something that many people actually believe and reinforces that thinking. Edit: Though it'd need to be clear that this is the environment, that such strong feedback is not personal. If this was just delivered to some new hire with no warning, then it might come off the wrong way.

> If this atmosphere of harsh personal criticism does yield better results but does it?

by andylei 11y ago

> If this atmosphere of harsh personal criticism does yield better results but does it?

sssilver 11y ago

With me it does.

tonyarkles 11y ago
Just to make sure we're on the same page... Consider these two options: 1. "sssilver, you are a fucking moron. I'm amazed your ancestors managed to not only crawl out of the primordial soup, but to reproduce successfully enough times to bring you into existence. Christ, think about your code before submitting your pull request." 2. "This code has several memory leaks. Function bar_baz() returns a pointer to a stack-allocated data structure. On line 32, you've got a likely null-pointer dereference. There are several other problems as well. Go find some reference material or someone to help you improve." You'd prefer to get #1 as feedback rather than #2? #2 is direct and blunt, but not full of personal insults.
- zeveb 11y ago
  #1 is far more likely to make an emotional impression than #2. That might be for good (one avoids making such bad mistakes again) or bad (one avoids making any contributions again). It's certainly more memorable.
  - tonyarkles 11y ago
    I came up with it trying to think of something vicious that contained absolutely no insight about how to be better. It doesn't actually have any information about what the bad mistakes might be. I'm still trying to wrap my head around the whole idea that that'd work for some people.
    - zeveb 11y ago
      Well, a real-life example would contain both disrespect and information about the mistakes, and how to do better. Something more like, 'How could you possibly be so stupid as to use the same memory location to store the car's current radio station and the desired fuel-injection rate, controlled only by a flag in another piece of memory? Didn't it occur to you that someone working on the entertainment system code might never even think of checking for a flag related to speed & safety? Dear God, Smith, do you realise how many people you could have killed? I can only hope that your other mistakes have prevented idiots like you from being born and placed into positions of trust, you sorry misbegotten excuse for an engineer!' Harsh, but I bet Smith would remember that moment well, and be more careful in the future. Or he might quit, and never write automotive-safety-impacting code again.
    - mst 11y ago
      Which is, I think, a mistake; by and large, the best of harsh feedback is more 'both' than 'either/or' - i.e. it might include a fair chunk of yelling but there's also actionable criticism therein. Certainly if you look at Linus' rants the ranting is to emphasise the criticism, not to act as a substitute for insight.
- sssilver 11y ago
  I would perform better with #1, because it'd motivate me a lot more. With #2, the only thing that's at stake is the particular problematic code. With #1, my whole ancestry and evolution is being questioned, and I'm gonna make damn sure I perform well enough to justify my very existence. I know it sounds creepy, but that's how it works with me. Especially if the feedback is coming from someone I have immense respect for.
  - tonyarkles 11y ago
    I hope you don't get downvoted. That is an exceptionally fascinating answer for me! I wouldn't call it creepy at all, just... unusual. It took a fair bit of effort for me to come up with at all, given that #2 is my typical feedback approach. I have a feeling that giving #1 as feedback on a student's assignment would result in a disciplinary hearing. :) Very fascinating! Thanks for giving me something to chew on!
    - sssilver 11y ago
      I also don't represent the western culture. That might be a culprit.
    - wpietri 11y ago
      For me, there are different kinds of "works" at play here. If the question is what produces dramatic, short-term improvement, an abusive approach quite often works wonders. But over the long term, that's thoroughly corrosive. Fear isn't a sustainable motivation when people have other options. (Which is why serial abusers also end up being very controlling; they need to eliminate the options.)
  - chasing 11y ago
    sssilver, you are a fucking moron. I'm amazed your ancestors managed to not only crawl out of the primordial soup, but to reproduce successfully enough times to bring you into existence. Christ, take a moment to realize that just because you have a masochistic desire to be abused by your coworkers doesn't mean everybody else feels the same way. And your stupid desire to suffer assholes is just setting yourself up for a life of being shit upon. (Is that more to your taste? ;-) )
- MichaelGG 11y ago
  I'd like both. #1 adds some levity and humour; #2 gives me the technical details. Perhaps if it was personal, like pointing out that I consistently do terrible work and really am not cut out to be a dev, then yeah that might hurt. Though more because the intent is that I shouldn't contribute, full stop, not just improve my work. Though I suppose it's because there aren't any impersonal insults that'd bother me. Whereas being a member of another group that gets sincere bigotry aimed at it - yeah that might be incredibly frustrating. No one believes Linus wants to actually travel through time and perform abortions, nor would it make anyone think to do such a thing. But a "this proves women should really avoid engineering and stick to cooking" is something that many people actually believe and reinforces that thinking. Edit: Though it'd need to be clear that this is the environment, that such strong feedback is not personal. If this was just delivered to some new hire with no warning, then it might come off the wrong way.