3 ms·

Ugh. This reeks of "safe space" nonsense. Part of working in a team is receiving comments and criticism from others. If you take these negatively and as attack

Ugh. This reeks of "safe space" nonsense. Part of working in a team is receiving comments and criticism from others. If you take these negatively and as attacks to you, rather than collective construction towards the final goal, then you have a problem and need to consider changing job. I find that when I design something I become accustomed to early design choices and then eventually become blind to them. I need someone to come along with a fresh pair of eyes, see the whole thing and nitpick it. It's absurd to suggest that it's either perfect or needs to scrapped entirely.

luke_s 10y ago
Well, I was going to downvote, but figured it's better to comment. > Ugh. This reeks of "safe space" nonsense. What? I have very little idea what you are talking about, so I looked it up on wikipedia: "In educational institutions, safe-space (or safe space), safer-space, and positive space originally were terms used to indicate that a teacher, educational institution or student body does not tolerate anti-LGBT violence, harassment or hate speech, thereby creating a safe place for all lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender students." Which frankly sounds like a good idea, but doesn't seem like it has much to do with this blog post about managing members of your team. > Part of working in a team is receiving comments and criticism from others. If you take these negatively and as attacks to you, rather than collective construction towards the final goal, then you have a problem and need to consider changing job. Yes, except the point of the blog post is that managers should be aware that comments and criticism they would have been happy to offer as co-workers suddenly start to look a lot more like commands when they are coming from a boss. It's a good idea for new managers to be aware of this changed dynamic.
- torrent-of-ions 10y ago
  > > Ugh. This reeks of "safe space" nonsense. > What? I have very little idea what you are talking about, so I looked it up on wikipedia: "In educational institutions, safe-space (or safe space), safer-space, and positive space originally were terms used to indicate that a teacher, educational institution or student body does not tolerate anti-LGBT violence, harassment or hate speech, thereby creating a safe place for all lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender students." It was originally something like that but "safe spaces" just turned into echo chambers where everyone is only allowed to agree and encourage people and dissenting opinions are considered "unsafe".
- wccrawford 10y ago
  That's how it started, but now anything negative is met with "This is supposed to be a safe space!" whining. Unsurprisingly, some people either can't or won't make the distinction between things that matter (harassment) and things that don't (words like 'moist' or references to a phobia they have such as 'spiders'). You can imagine that it gets rather annoying to be told that you can't say "moist" in some place because it's supposed to be a 'safe place'. These are extreme examples, but you get the idea.
- cyphar 10y ago
  > Which frankly sounds like a good idea, but doesn't seem like it has much to do with this blog post about managing members of your team. The "safe space nonsense" grandparent was referring to is that when you attempt to stop people from being offended or thinking they don't own their work (or otherwise treating adults like children) by saying "just don't say this" results in a chilling effect that just makes everyone's lives worse. Nobody will come up with legitimate criticisms in fear of "being too mean" or "stealing your thunder", and people who need feedback will never get it as a result. I believe that's the effect that the grandparent was referring to. You get the exact same problem with univeristy campuses, where people wanted to be shielded from alternate views by claiming that you're offending them and that you're violating their safe space.
ZoFreX 10y ago
The article is not saying that teams should avoid comments and criticism, nor is it saying that there is no middle ground between perfection and needing scrapping. The article is pointing out that it is _particularly dangerous_ to give criticism if you are the boss, because whereas peer feedback will be weighed on its own merits, even casual feedback from a boss will frequently be interpreted as a command.
thenomad 10y ago
You may be missing the authority dynamic here. If your co-worker looks at a designed object and says "needs more blue, change the word "giant"", that's feedback which you can then incorporate, but can also reject if you think it doesn't help the project. If your direct boss says the same thing, and you don't have the understanding with them that you are totally free to ignore their feedback, you'll have somewhere between strong pressure and absolute requirement to implement their changes. At that point, the pressure in many ways is actually on your boss. If your boss has come up with good changes that you agree with, you'll probably be OK with it if you're as positive toward criticism as you say. (And if, say, your boss hasn't chosen the time when you've already been working on this thing all day, it needs to go out in an hour, and you thought you were ready to go home.) But if your boss's changes are ones you don't agree with, and you do feel forced to implement them, then you'll probably start getting annoyed. If that happens a lot you're likely to, as you say, change jobs. And if you happen to be very skilled, that's a problem for your organisation - one that could have been avoided if your boss had avoided dropping in his $0.02, or at least had chosen another way to do it.
- torrent-of-ions 10y ago
  OK, I agree that the boss's opinion is different. But then this should be more about how a boss can deliver criticism in a way in which it is not taken as a command. Because the article is pretty much saying that the boss cannot offer any criticism at all which is ridiculous.
  - edmccard 10y ago
    >Because the article is pretty much saying that the boss cannot offer any criticism at all FTA: "What if the work is all wrong? Obviously, if there’s more than “2 cents” worth of stuff that needs to change, then this rule does not apply."
  - nimblegorilla 10y ago
    The article deals with this: "Obviously, if there’s more than “2 cents” worth of stuff that needs to change, then this rule does not apply."
ww520 10y ago
It's not safe space nonsense. It's power play. Acceptance to the change suggestion from boss is often based on power rather than merit. Managers often is oblivious to this. The blog simply reminds managers to be aware of the potential pitfall.

luke_s 10y ago

Well, I was going to downvote, but figured it's better to comment. > Ugh. This reeks of "safe space" nonsense. What? I have very little idea what you are talking about, so I looked it up on wikipedia: "In educational institutions, safe-space (or safe space), safer-space, and positive space originally were terms used to indicate that a teacher, educational institution or student body does not tolerate anti-LGBT violence, harassment or hate speech, thereby creating a safe place for all lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender students." Which frankly sounds like a good idea, but doesn't seem like it has much to do with this blog post about managing members of your team. > Part of working in a team is receiving comments and criticism from others. If you take these negatively and as attacks to you, rather than collective construction towards the final goal, then you have a problem and need to consider changing job. Yes, except the point of the blog post is that managers should be aware that comments and criticism they would have been happy to offer as co-workers suddenly start to look a lot more like commands when they are coming from a boss. It's a good idea for new managers to be aware of this changed dynamic.

torrent-of-ions 10y ago
> > Ugh. This reeks of "safe space" nonsense. > What? I have very little idea what you are talking about, so I looked it up on wikipedia: "In educational institutions, safe-space (or safe space), safer-space, and positive space originally were terms used to indicate that a teacher, educational institution or student body does not tolerate anti-LGBT violence, harassment or hate speech, thereby creating a safe place for all lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender students." It was originally something like that but "safe spaces" just turned into echo chambers where everyone is only allowed to agree and encourage people and dissenting opinions are considered "unsafe".
wccrawford 10y ago
That's how it started, but now anything negative is met with "This is supposed to be a safe space!" whining. Unsurprisingly, some people either can't or won't make the distinction between things that matter (harassment) and things that don't (words like 'moist' or references to a phobia they have such as 'spiders'). You can imagine that it gets rather annoying to be told that you can't say "moist" in some place because it's supposed to be a 'safe place'. These are extreme examples, but you get the idea.
cyphar 10y ago
> Which frankly sounds like a good idea, but doesn't seem like it has much to do with this blog post about managing members of your team. The "safe space nonsense" grandparent was referring to is that when you attempt to stop people from being offended or thinking they don't own their work (or otherwise treating adults like children) by saying "just don't say this" results in a chilling effect that just makes everyone's lives worse. Nobody will come up with legitimate criticisms in fear of "being too mean" or "stealing your thunder", and people who need feedback will never get it as a result. I believe that's the effect that the grandparent was referring to. You get the exact same problem with univeristy campuses, where people wanted to be shielded from alternate views by claiming that you're offending them and that you're violating their safe space.

ZoFreX 10y ago

The article is not saying that teams should avoid comments and criticism, nor is it saying that there is no middle ground between perfection and needing scrapping. The article is pointing out that it is _particularly dangerous_ to give criticism if you are the boss, because whereas peer feedback will be weighed on its own merits, even casual feedback from a boss will frequently be interpreted as a command.

thenomad 10y ago

You may be missing the authority dynamic here. If your co-worker looks at a designed object and says "needs more blue, change the word "giant"", that's feedback which you can then incorporate, but can also reject if you think it doesn't help the project. If your direct boss says the same thing, and you don't have the understanding with them that you are totally free to ignore their feedback, you'll have somewhere between strong pressure and absolute requirement to implement their changes. At that point, the pressure in many ways is actually on your boss. If your boss has come up with good changes that you agree with, you'll probably be OK with it if you're as positive toward criticism as you say. (And if, say, your boss hasn't chosen the time when you've already been working on this thing all day, it needs to go out in an hour, and you thought you were ready to go home.) But if your boss's changes are ones you don't agree with, and you do feel forced to implement them, then you'll probably start getting annoyed. If that happens a lot you're likely to, as you say, change jobs. And if you happen to be very skilled, that's a problem for your organisation - one that could have been avoided if your boss had avoided dropping in his $0.02, or at least had chosen another way to do it.

torrent-of-ions 10y ago
OK, I agree that the boss's opinion is different. But then this should be more about how a boss can deliver criticism in a way in which it is not taken as a command. Because the article is pretty much saying that the boss cannot offer any criticism at all which is ridiculous.
- edmccard 10y ago
  >Because the article is pretty much saying that the boss cannot offer any criticism at all FTA: "What if the work is all wrong? Obviously, if there’s more than “2 cents” worth of stuff that needs to change, then this rule does not apply."
- nimblegorilla 10y ago
  The article deals with this: "Obviously, if there’s more than “2 cents” worth of stuff that needs to change, then this rule does not apply."

ww520 10y ago

It's not safe space nonsense. It's power play. Acceptance to the change suggestion from boss is often based on power rather than merit. Managers often is oblivious to this. The blog simply reminds managers to be aware of the potential pitfall.