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Hi, Author here, I can see why you have these questions. I tried to keep the moments short so left out some details. For the first one, it was the passive agg

by fredwu 11y ago

Hi, Author here, I can see why you have these questions. I tried to keep the moments short so left out some details. For the first one, it was the passive aggressive tone and the fact that it was posted in a public channel. This person in one other occasion, stormed out of a meeting room whilst another colleague was trying to explain something. For the second one, later on through mutual colleagues I realised that he essentially thought very little of me because at the time I was a junior developer so I made lots of mistakes in my code base. In my defence though, I was on my own and I had to learn Rails myself. For the third one, I put the "non-technical" part in to indicate that my manager does not have the technical capability to determine whether my findings were biased. It was more so that he had his agenda and just wanted me to confirm his approach from the technical perspective. Hope that clears things up a little bit. :)

ownagefool 11y ago
These stories kinda make it sound like you keep getting reprimanded for shelling into servers and installing random packages. If you aren't somehow resonsible, keep your chin up, not everywheres filled with those kinds of people.
repomies691 11y ago
To be honest I think you should give people a little slack and relax. You are taking things too personally. Everyone has a bad day now and then. Based on your descriptions to me it looks like "not treating people poorly" would require almost superhuman capabilities from managers and coworkers. They probably have also lot of other stuff to worry about as well.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- fredwu 11y ago
  I think I do, hence I put this sentence in the article: "There are a few of these moments that I still find hard to swallow, but most of them I simply chuckle whenever I think about them. ;)" For most of these moments, it was more a reflection of my personality if anything - under the same circumstances, I know I _wouldn't_ treat others the same way I was treated back then. I much prefer to use softer tones and more positive ways to start those conversations.
- repomies691 11y ago
  "under the same circumstances, I know I _wouldn't_ treat others the same way I was treated back then" I wouldn't dare to make that claim. Every situation is different and also everyone's mood varies from day to day. It is very difficult to be that nice guy all the time.
  - bakeryOnMain 11y ago
    It should not be difficult to be a nice person all the time. We are building software, and/or managing a product/team. It's a communal effort that requires empathy, kindness, and love. If you are one of the few who can't love your fellow coworker/subordinate/boss then you are toxic. Unfortunately, bullies existed on the playground and they exist in the software industry too.
    - aninhumer 11y ago
      > It should not be difficult to be a nice person all the time. There's a huge difference between most of the time and all of the time. I'm a strong advocate of empathy in the workplace, but part of that is recognising that sometimes people are just in a bad mood. Someone who snaps at you because they're really stressed that day is in no way a bully.
      - lbn 11y ago
        If you snap at someone because you are having a bad day you should apologise to that person or at least clarify that it's not personal. Having a bad day is not an excuse to be rude to someone, especially if they are not aware of that.
      - awinder 11y ago
        What do you do when you're in a bad mood and you blow up on someone? You apologize the next day / whenever you calm down. And then that out-of-character event doesn't end up being someone's lasting impression of you.
      - spdionis 11y ago
        As always, the last 5% is the hardest part.
pc86 11y ago
> I put the "non-technical" part in to indicate that my manager does not have the technical capability to determine whether my findings were biased. In what way were your finding supposedly biased? Why is it necessary for the manager to be technical in order to detect that bias? Even presuming that you would need to be technical (a big assumption, non-technical people aren't necessarily idiots because they're non-technical), how do you know a senior technical person didn't already talk to them and warn that bias of a certain type could result in $YOUR_FINDINGS?
tangus 11y ago
I thought the first one was the other way around: that he was being treated poorly, with people having him put out fires all day and not giving him time to do his real work. I see nothing bad in his response.
atirip 11y ago
Im curious, if someone thinks very little of you and you try to start a conversation and that someone does not want to talk you ever - then what would be the correct behaviour for you? Because the "i need only coffee" seems to me quite neutral.
kdamken 11y ago
Well to be honest, anytime people are asked to work on something new at 5pm it typically represents a monumental failure on management's part. If reviewing those code tests was important, you should have made time for them to do that during the day. It sounds like they were constantly getting hit with new "top priorities" that needed to be handled "right away" on top of their new duties.
mfukar 11y ago
It seems like you're attempting to form an opinion about circumstances based on knowledge you acquired past the time they happened. At any rate, I don't see how either #1 or #2 constitute poor professional treatment. I can see how it can be a bad experience - I've been on both ends of such behaviour, frankly - but I don't think it's unprofessional. #1 actually points out a serious problem, too! #3 and #4 from the blog post, however.. I would be livid.
matwood 11y ago
This is mostly normal stuff from people who are stressed and work with each other all day. Being short is simply needing to get things done. I have seen things that are huge problems though. Years ago at this little company I saw the CTO punch the CEO and basically knocked him out. The CTO walked out and we never saw him again. Keep in mind, these were grown men (I was still in college). I've seen full on yelling and screaming with personal insult after personal insult. This was a normal occurrence on how IT and the business communicated. I never really got used to it, so luckily I worked from home 99% of the time. I was in a meeting once with a bunch of contractors from different companies, all were yelling at each other about whose fault something was. The gov. PM could not get control and I finally stood up and said it was my fault personally so can we move on now. And these only scratch the surface. One guy I worked with would always storm out of meetings saying he was going to get you fired if you disagreed with him on anything. That was almost comical though :)

by fredwu 11y ago

ownagefool 11y ago

These stories kinda make it sound like you keep getting reprimanded for shelling into servers and installing random packages. If you aren't somehow resonsible, keep your chin up, not everywheres filled with those kinds of people.

repomies691 11y ago

To be honest I think you should give people a little slack and relax. You are taking things too personally. Everyone has a bad day now and then. Based on your descriptions to me it looks like "not treating people poorly" would require almost superhuman capabilities from managers and coworkers. They probably have also lot of other stuff to worry about as well.

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
fredwu 11y ago
I think I do, hence I put this sentence in the article: "There are a few of these moments that I still find hard to swallow, but most of them I simply chuckle whenever I think about them. ;)" For most of these moments, it was more a reflection of my personality if anything - under the same circumstances, I know I _wouldn't_ treat others the same way I was treated back then. I much prefer to use softer tones and more positive ways to start those conversations.
repomies691 11y ago
"under the same circumstances, I know I _wouldn't_ treat others the same way I was treated back then" I wouldn't dare to make that claim. Every situation is different and also everyone's mood varies from day to day. It is very difficult to be that nice guy all the time.
- bakeryOnMain 11y ago
  It should not be difficult to be a nice person all the time. We are building software, and/or managing a product/team. It's a communal effort that requires empathy, kindness, and love. If you are one of the few who can't love your fellow coworker/subordinate/boss then you are toxic. Unfortunately, bullies existed on the playground and they exist in the software industry too.
  - aninhumer 11y ago
    > It should not be difficult to be a nice person all the time. There's a huge difference between most of the time and all of the time. I'm a strong advocate of empathy in the workplace, but part of that is recognising that sometimes people are just in a bad mood. Someone who snaps at you because they're really stressed that day is in no way a bully.
    - lbn 11y ago
      If you snap at someone because you are having a bad day you should apologise to that person or at least clarify that it's not personal. Having a bad day is not an excuse to be rude to someone, especially if they are not aware of that.
    - awinder 11y ago
      What do you do when you're in a bad mood and you blow up on someone? You apologize the next day / whenever you calm down. And then that out-of-character event doesn't end up being someone's lasting impression of you.
    - spdionis 11y ago
      As always, the last 5% is the hardest part.

pc86 11y ago

> I put the "non-technical" part in to indicate that my manager does not have the technical capability to determine whether my findings were biased. In what way were your finding supposedly biased? Why is it necessary for the manager to be technical in order to detect that bias? Even presuming that you would need to be technical (a big assumption, non-technical people aren't necessarily idiots because they're non-technical), how do you know a senior technical person didn't already talk to them and warn that bias of a certain type could result in $YOUR_FINDINGS?

tangus 11y ago

I thought the first one was the other way around: that he was being treated poorly, with people having him put out fires all day and not giving him time to do his real work. I see nothing bad in his response.

atirip 11y ago

Im curious, if someone thinks very little of you and you try to start a conversation and that someone does not want to talk you ever - then what would be the correct behaviour for you? Because the "i need only coffee" seems to me quite neutral.

kdamken 11y ago

Well to be honest, anytime people are asked to work on something new at 5pm it typically represents a monumental failure on management's part. If reviewing those code tests was important, you should have made time for them to do that during the day. It sounds like they were constantly getting hit with new "top priorities" that needed to be handled "right away" on top of their new duties.

mfukar 11y ago

It seems like you're attempting to form an opinion about circumstances based on knowledge you acquired past the time they happened. At any rate, I don't see how either #1 or #2 constitute poor professional treatment. I can see how it can be a bad experience - I've been on both ends of such behaviour, frankly - but I don't think it's unprofessional. #1 actually points out a serious problem, too! #3 and #4 from the blog post, however.. I would be livid.

matwood 11y ago

This is mostly normal stuff from people who are stressed and work with each other all day. Being short is simply needing to get things done. I have seen things that are huge problems though. Years ago at this little company I saw the CTO punch the CEO and basically knocked him out. The CTO walked out and we never saw him again. Keep in mind, these were grown men (I was still in college). I've seen full on yelling and screaming with personal insult after personal insult. This was a normal occurrence on how IT and the business communicated. I never really got used to it, so luckily I worked from home 99% of the time. I was in a meeting once with a bunch of contractors from different companies, all were yelling at each other about whose fault something was. The gov. PM could not get control and I finally stood up and said it was my fault personally so can we move on now. And these only scratch the surface. One guy I worked with would always storm out of meetings saying he was going to get you fired if you disagreed with him on anything. That was almost comical though :)