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I prefer working with "Alices". It's refreshing to see people actually called on their bullshit. IMHO there's also a limit to how much you can spare everybody'

I prefer working with "Alices". It's refreshing to see people actually called on their bullshit. IMHO there's also a limit to how much you can spare everybody's feelings and still be effective at that ^^. I think the OP believed that there isn't a limit. I think he's wrong. In a corporate environment, there's almost no value in actually being one though. Linus Torvalds would almost never be promoted and would frequently be unceremoniously terminated - as advocated for by Brendan Gregg.

mamoswined 9y ago
Yeah I'll always be an Alice at heart. And around people I trust. But as you said, it's no longer an Alice world. I was involved in Drupal and they kicked out their own Alice, chx, who was a major contributor.
internetman55 9y ago
Many of us who work in large corporations have worked on stupid projects that waste hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars in company funds. Oftentimes, these failures happen because no one is willing to call his manager a moron.
gcommer 9y ago
Most of the "Alice" types I know come from a background in academia, which strongly selects for these types of people who can leave their emotions at the door and iterate on ideas quickly and rationally. None of the complaints raised in this article apply to teams composed entirely of "Alice" types (and the most productive labs I've worked in demonstrate this; and towards this goal I actively practice to become more "Alice"-like)
- mamoswined 9y ago
  I once had a 100% Alice team (all women too!) and it was awesome until we were forced to work with contractors who were 0% Alice. We offended them, turned out their boss was friends with some higher up at our company, and we got pretty much screwed.
  - Chris2048 9y ago
    How did you offend them?
mfringel 9y ago
Do you like the act, or the result? That is, do you like "seeing people actually called on their BS"? Or, do you like people stop doing BS things as a result? IMO, the latter is much more interesting than the former. Being a 100% Alice guarantees the former, but does not guarantee the latter.
- AstralStorm 9y ago
  Nothing guarantees the latter ever.
s73ver_ 9y ago
One can "call someone on their bullshit" without being mean. And, quite frankly, if someone in my organization said that someone should be 'retroactively aborted' for a tech choice they made, I'd argue for their termination too.
- crdoconnor 9y ago
  >One can "call someone on their bullshit" without being mean. I don't think you can, actually. You can do it without being gratuitously mean, but one way or the other somebody's feelings are going to get hurt. >And, quite frankly, if someone in my organization said that someone should be 'retroactively aborted' for a tech choice they made, I'd argue for their termination too. Is what you make as technically impressive as linux?

mamoswined 9y ago

Yeah I'll always be an Alice at heart. And around people I trust. But as you said, it's no longer an Alice world. I was involved in Drupal and they kicked out their own Alice, chx, who was a major contributor.

internetman55 9y ago

Many of us who work in large corporations have worked on stupid projects that waste hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars in company funds. Oftentimes, these failures happen because no one is willing to call his manager a moron.

gcommer 9y ago

Most of the "Alice" types I know come from a background in academia, which strongly selects for these types of people who can leave their emotions at the door and iterate on ideas quickly and rationally. None of the complaints raised in this article apply to teams composed entirely of "Alice" types (and the most productive labs I've worked in demonstrate this; and towards this goal I actively practice to become more "Alice"-like)

mamoswined 9y ago
I once had a 100% Alice team (all women too!) and it was awesome until we were forced to work with contractors who were 0% Alice. We offended them, turned out their boss was friends with some higher up at our company, and we got pretty much screwed.
- Chris2048 9y ago
  How did you offend them?

mfringel 9y ago

Do you like the act, or the result? That is, do you like "seeing people actually called on their BS"? Or, do you like people stop doing BS things as a result? IMO, the latter is much more interesting than the former. Being a 100% Alice guarantees the former, but does not guarantee the latter.

AstralStorm 9y ago
Nothing guarantees the latter ever.

s73ver_ 9y ago

One can "call someone on their bullshit" without being mean. And, quite frankly, if someone in my organization said that someone should be 'retroactively aborted' for a tech choice they made, I'd argue for their termination too.

crdoconnor 9y ago
>One can "call someone on their bullshit" without being mean. I don't think you can, actually. You can do it without being gratuitously mean, but one way or the other somebody's feelings are going to get hurt. >And, quite frankly, if someone in my organization said that someone should be 'retroactively aborted' for a tech choice they made, I'd argue for their termination too. Is what you make as technically impressive as linux?