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It's possible to do NVC well, and it's possible to do it poorly. It makes me wonder if this means that NVC is not inherently more useful. (ie, other methods may

It's possible to do NVC well, and it's possible to do it poorly. It makes me wonder if this means that NVC is not inherently more useful. (ie, other methods may of communication may also be useful, and so NVC can't be called an inherent good.) Someone using NVC can still be forceful and rude. I'm struggling with how to describe this. I suppose all it does it remove unrestrained emotion and moral blame from the interaction. Unrestrained emotion and moral blame are not a given. (ie, they may not be injected into a conversation, even if NVC is not implemented) And further, I suppose, it's possible to push somebody around and refuse to listen to their concerns while employing NVC. For example, under the guise of empathy a boss may "feel" your perfectly valid concern, equivocate it to the concern of others in the room, and then simply ignore your recommendations. It's possible that your recommendation was actually best, but instead of understanding the value of your idea, the boss has simply made sure not to trample your emotions. I can think of plenty of situations where I don't care if someone tramples my emotions, but I'd be pretty distraught if they adopted a flawed idea, or couldn't understand why one idea was superior and another was inferior. [edit] Just to clarify, I think I talked myself into a conclusion I feel comfortable with. Empathy is not inherently useful. An approach that focuses on the feelings a person might demean them (since their feelings are not actually so fragile) while also equivocating all the ideas in the room. (all ideas might not be created equal, but it is necessary to treat everyone -- and their feelings -- with the same respect.)

tome 8y ago
> I can think of plenty of situations where I don't care if someone tramples my emotions, but I'd be pretty distraught if they adopted a flawed idea, or couldn't understand why one idea was superior and another was inferior. Could you share some examples?
- everdrive 8y ago
  Almost any situation where we're trying to design a functional solution to a technical problem. I actually used to have a phrase for this: "You can't build a rocket ship with emotions." If my goal were really to successfully build a rocket ship (as noted in the maxim) then I'd be delighted to be proven wrong. Every correction would get us closer to our goal. Alternately, if someone were interested in empathizing with the team and protecting egos, we might navigate towards a worse solution. One which took into account everyone's feelings, instead of a cold calculation of method and results.
  - tome 8y ago
    That's an interesting maxim. Do you think NASA ran the Apollo program by ignoring the emotions of everyone on the project? If it didn't, should it have?
    - everdrive 8y ago
      I just think this is more of pendulum sort of thing. You can go too far in either direction. If I'm erring at all, it's because I've been in circumstances where a complex project suffered due to social agreement. But for certain, you could go too far in in the other direction: completely ignoring everyone's emotions. Specifically, if you're in an environment that's swung too hard in the direction of totally ignoring people's emotions, then my advice probably sounds awful.
  - gowld 8y ago
    You seem to be conflating "delivering criticim" with "hurting feelings", and I don't understand where that's coming from. Would you be delighted to be proven wrong if for every mistake your boss or peer told you that you were an incompetent idiot who doesn't belong on the team? Would that make you want to do more work? Would that make you feel comfortable proposing an idea that you aren't 100% sure ir correct and already known to your teammates to be correct? Nothing about respecting teammates and their emotions says you have to accept their pull request.
    - everdrive 8y ago
      I think this is a fair criticism, and I agree that if my boss publicly called me out and insulted me, I'd be pretty discouraged. I might not have made my point very well, but I certainly didn't mean to imply that being outright caustic was ok, either. I only meant to say that it's still possible offend and arrive at the wrong decision by employing NVC.
  - watwut 8y ago
    There is no contradiction between the two. You absolutely can emphathize with team and protect egos while also discuss efficacy of solutions or correctness. It is not even hard. Just keep it factual instead of using words like "stupid", "shitty", "crap" or passive aggressivity. Discuss issues before they become big. Listen when they disagree with your assessment - they might have reasons. I already met enough people who claim to criticise while actually venting their emotions and settle scores with those they dislike.
dragonwriter 8y ago
> I suppose all it does it remove unrestrained emotion and moral blame from the interaction. That's not all it does, and is arguably opposed to something important it does. It keeps honest emotion in and displaces the injection of description of “thoughts” that are really rationalizations for emotional responses. OTOH, in formalized transactional relationships, the assumption of mutual concern for the emotional state of the other that it rests on is not given.
gowld 8y ago
Programming can be done well, or poorly. Speaking English can be done well, or poorly. Agile methodology can be done well, or poorly. Cooking can be done well, or poorly. The possibility that something can be done poorly is not a strong argumetn that the thing should never be done.

tome 8y ago

> I can think of plenty of situations where I don't care if someone tramples my emotions, but I'd be pretty distraught if they adopted a flawed idea, or couldn't understand why one idea was superior and another was inferior. Could you share some examples?

everdrive 8y ago
Almost any situation where we're trying to design a functional solution to a technical problem. I actually used to have a phrase for this: "You can't build a rocket ship with emotions." If my goal were really to successfully build a rocket ship (as noted in the maxim) then I'd be delighted to be proven wrong. Every correction would get us closer to our goal. Alternately, if someone were interested in empathizing with the team and protecting egos, we might navigate towards a worse solution. One which took into account everyone's feelings, instead of a cold calculation of method and results.
- tome 8y ago
  That's an interesting maxim. Do you think NASA ran the Apollo program by ignoring the emotions of everyone on the project? If it didn't, should it have?
  - everdrive 8y ago
    I just think this is more of pendulum sort of thing. You can go too far in either direction. If I'm erring at all, it's because I've been in circumstances where a complex project suffered due to social agreement. But for certain, you could go too far in in the other direction: completely ignoring everyone's emotions. Specifically, if you're in an environment that's swung too hard in the direction of totally ignoring people's emotions, then my advice probably sounds awful.
- gowld 8y ago
  You seem to be conflating "delivering criticim" with "hurting feelings", and I don't understand where that's coming from. Would you be delighted to be proven wrong if for every mistake your boss or peer told you that you were an incompetent idiot who doesn't belong on the team? Would that make you want to do more work? Would that make you feel comfortable proposing an idea that you aren't 100% sure ir correct and already known to your teammates to be correct? Nothing about respecting teammates and their emotions says you have to accept their pull request.
  - everdrive 8y ago
    I think this is a fair criticism, and I agree that if my boss publicly called me out and insulted me, I'd be pretty discouraged. I might not have made my point very well, but I certainly didn't mean to imply that being outright caustic was ok, either. I only meant to say that it's still possible offend and arrive at the wrong decision by employing NVC.
- watwut 8y ago
  There is no contradiction between the two. You absolutely can emphathize with team and protect egos while also discuss efficacy of solutions or correctness. It is not even hard. Just keep it factual instead of using words like "stupid", "shitty", "crap" or passive aggressivity. Discuss issues before they become big. Listen when they disagree with your assessment - they might have reasons. I already met enough people who claim to criticise while actually venting their emotions and settle scores with those they dislike.

dragonwriter 8y ago

> I suppose all it does it remove unrestrained emotion and moral blame from the interaction. That's not all it does, and is arguably opposed to something important it does. It keeps honest emotion in and displaces the injection of description of “thoughts” that are really rationalizations for emotional responses. OTOH, in formalized transactional relationships, the assumption of mutual concern for the emotional state of the other that it rests on is not given.

gowld 8y ago

Programming can be done well, or poorly. Speaking English can be done well, or poorly. Agile methodology can be done well, or poorly. Cooking can be done well, or poorly. The possibility that something can be done poorly is not a strong argumetn that the thing should never be done.