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Sounds like Atlassian have reached the size where enough incompetents have been hired that they try to drive out the useful people because they make them look b

Sounds like Atlassian have reached the size where enough incompetents have been hired that they try to drive out the useful people because they make them look bad.

gurkendoktor 7y ago
Nobody ever got fired for choosing Jira and Confluence. It seems rather inconsequential which people Atlassian chooses to employ at this point.
- TeMPOraL 7y ago
  It kind of does if this turns into a trend that caches on in the industry.
  - gurkendoktor 7y ago
    Good point. I always hope that when one company doubles down on open offices, bizarro hiring practices, Agile, etc., that other companies will do the opposite and we developers can partition ourselves by how we want to work. But that never seems to happen.
- ps101 7y ago
  It's never inconsequential who you employ, regardless or your position in the market.
cryptica 7y ago
I wonder what 'brilliant jerk' means? For me the worst kind of jerk is a 'fool with authority'. I'd much rather work under a brilliant jerk than a hypocritical fool.
- sgift 7y ago
  > I'd much rather work under a brilliant jerk than a hypocritical fool. Good news: There are people who are neither. I prefer to work for competent non-jerks. A team of good people will always outperform a brilliant jerk that drives everyone else away.
  - cryptica 7y ago
    >> Good news: There are people who are neither. True, but from my experience, companies are shockingly terrible at identifying and promoting those. Instead, they tend to promote the foolish but politically correct loud mouths. High intelligence which is unrewarded tends to leave signs of trauma in a person. So they might seem like greedy selfish jerks, but in fact, they're frustrated for good reasons and we should listen to them and tolerate their harsh but accurate views about reality. Jerks are fine so long as they're not afraid to criticize you to your face and give you a chance to improve. Not all jerks are sociopaths. For example, Linus Torvalds has described himself as a jerk - I'd be honored to work for such person. Altruism is about actions, not about choice of words or tone of speech.
  - wolfgke 7y ago
    > Good news: There are people who are neither. I prefer to work for competent non-jerks. A team of good people will always outperform a brilliant jerk that drives everyone else away. I prefer to work with brilliant people and love to learn from them.
- fhy45678 7y ago
  Typically, it means anybody who has an iota of knowledge, cares about the product and company and is not like the benchwarmer whose claim to fame is B.S. and jargon. He is that stupid sincere guy in a tide of mediocrity. It is easy to cut and normalize one guy than bring up the level of the rest
- gingabriska 7y ago
  It means a person who is knowledgeable, experienced but can't work in a team without trashing someone other team or all members or need to vent often by humiliating one or another I am pretty sure, Linus qualifies as one in past, not sure about the current developments there.
  - throwaway3627 7y ago
    "Jerk" isn't a quality of people, but a maladaptive pattern of negative behavior that often harms the morale and well-being of others. It's a choice of interaction patterns. It's possible to be brilliant, honestly call out deficiencies without making it personal and seek excellence without being a dick... often, it's just a shortcut that leaves much trauma and bitterness along the way.
- pllbnk 7y ago
  From personal experience 'brilliant jerks' from articles like this and popular culture are people who are criticising everything and everyone as if they know better and are often seen as brilliant by less savvy colleagues (e.g., their managers) but have nothing to show for it and are often seen as impostors by their more savvy peers. I personally know several truly brilliant people at what they do and none of them are jerks. I have yet to see this 'brilliant jerk' everyone seems to be taking about.
  - ashwinaj 7y ago
    I'm not sure where you are located but come to the SF Bay area. You'll find tons of them in every company.
    - throwaway3627 7y ago
      At workplaces without civility, jerks are often rewarded if they deliver results, and management tolerates them because they make them look good. OTOH, not separating out punishment of the brilliance from the jerk is an equally-damaging lack of nuance.
      - ashwinaj 7y ago
        Throwaway account, cool. You're talking as if most, if not all, companies are engaging in R&D at the level of the Apollo 11 space mission. You don't need brilliant people in most cases, merely having honest, diligent, persistent normal human beings can get the job done.
  - throwaway3627 7y ago
    Dunning-Kruger
- repolfx 7y ago
  I think "brilliant jerk" is loaded with subtext that can only be detected by reading the rest of the justification. Everything Bek Chee says is illogical: is she really claiming Atlassian previously never cared about jerks? That's an astonishing claim that would require astonishing evidence, like the CEO having explicitly said "it's OK to be a jerk if you make us lots of money". No such evidence is provided. Instead it's very clear this is the result of 'wokeness' winning a culture war inside Atlassian: a giant red flashing warning sign to not work there or use their products. It starts with this phrase: We recognise things are not the way they used to be, yet companies haven’t evolved (from) 30 years ago when they were primarily made up often of white men. Tech standards have evolved, we have new ways of working, new demographics and generational change. There's a dead comment on this thread pointing out that Atlassian are engaging in blatant and shameful racism and sexism here. It's based in Australia, a country full of white people, and is a software company - developers are mostly men. Demographics haven't actually changed as any quick consultation of computer science courses will show, so this statement is not only racist and sexist but also a blatant lie. What might motivate a change to ensure that 2/3rds of job performance is no longer defined by skills? The explanation is quite obvious - if jobs are allocated based on ability then Atlassian will always be dominated by white men, simply because that's overwhelmingly the Australian demographic that learns computer programming, the most relevant skill to a software company. There's simply no way around that. But if performance is assessed based on "how they bring their whole self to work", "how they live the company values" and how they "impact others on their team" then suddenly anyone can be promoted, anyone can be hired, and most importantly anyone can be fired by random employees asserting that they're a "brilliant jerk". There's no defence against such an accusation - it's entirely subjective and arguing with it would require effectively saying, your emotional reaction to this person is invalid. That would itself be taken as evidence of jerkhood! This change will allow the "millenials", as Chee puts it, to completely purge the company of anyone who isn't a fanatical hater of white men. After all, actually being good at your job is no longer a defence against a colleague who doesn't like your politics. There's another important message being sent by this article - Atlassian no longer cares about their customers (like my firm). Customers don't care about how much of their own self Atlassian employees bring to work, or whether its employees live their company values. These things might matter to some of their employees or their HR team, but it's irrelevant to the users. What does matter to users is whether the software is any good i.e. if it was written by people who are "brilliant". If actual skill is only considered of 1/3rd importance relative to the feelings of their employees, it seems clear that Atlassian staff prioritise their own feelings more than the needs of the people who buy their products. Not a good sign!
fit2rule 7y ago
Australians tend to be very susceptible to sub-conscious application of the nations "tall poppy syndrome" cultural effect. To me, this story just indicates that Atlassian is trying to be as "Australian" a company as it can be. However, I may just be a small poppy in this thought. I'm willing to entertain the idea that I'm critical of Atlassian for their tall-poppy ideology simply because I am in fact a white male, however ..
jakobegger 7y ago
To me it sounds like Atlassian is sick of people who behave like assholes and justify it with their belief that they are smarter than everyone else.
- tus88 7y ago
  Sounds more like they are defining the extrovert as the ideal and the introvert to be shunned and fired.
  - jacques_chester 7y ago
    Extraversion-introversion is a different personality axis from agreeableness. It's also distinct from sociopathology.
    - defertoreptar 7y ago
      That's not to say there aren't differences in communication styles. Generally speaking, an extrovert will do better in a meeting environment and is comfortable talking out loud and talking through a problem. An introvert is more comfortable with a one-on-one interaction, thinks to themselves before speaking about the problem, and prefers communicating it through text/email. Introverts can have a disadvantage in social perceptions not because they are actually a jerk but instead because they come off as a jerk due to lacking the practice and confidence of social interaction.
- xHAS 7y ago
  It seems that the decision to "ditch jerks" was made by a racist who is against "white men". That qualifies as a jerk.
mcphage 7y ago
Atlassian has been writing bad software for years. I'm fine with them trying almost anything to turn the ship about.
- t0mbstone 7y ago
  Yeah... it's mind boggling how terrible it is! The user interface is cluttered and inconsistent, and you have to memorize all sorts of anti-patterns just to be able to use it effectively.
throwaway3627 7y ago
Yep. The incompetents can now use "jerk" to paint anyone who GTD, while the second-stringers can ease-back and do a whole lot of nothing.

Sounds like Atlassian have reached the size where enough incompetents have been hired that they try to drive out the useful people because they make them look bad.

gurkendoktor 7y ago

Nobody ever got fired for choosing Jira and Confluence. It seems rather inconsequential which people Atlassian chooses to employ at this point.

TeMPOraL 7y ago
It kind of does if this turns into a trend that caches on in the industry.
- gurkendoktor 7y ago
  Good point. I always hope that when one company doubles down on open offices, bizarro hiring practices, Agile, etc., that other companies will do the opposite and we developers can partition ourselves by how we want to work. But that never seems to happen.
ps101 7y ago
It's never inconsequential who you employ, regardless or your position in the market.

cryptica 7y ago

I wonder what 'brilliant jerk' means? For me the worst kind of jerk is a 'fool with authority'. I'd much rather work under a brilliant jerk than a hypocritical fool.

sgift 7y ago
> I'd much rather work under a brilliant jerk than a hypocritical fool. Good news: There are people who are neither. I prefer to work for competent non-jerks. A team of good people will always outperform a brilliant jerk that drives everyone else away.
- cryptica 7y ago
  >> Good news: There are people who are neither. True, but from my experience, companies are shockingly terrible at identifying and promoting those. Instead, they tend to promote the foolish but politically correct loud mouths. High intelligence which is unrewarded tends to leave signs of trauma in a person. So they might seem like greedy selfish jerks, but in fact, they're frustrated for good reasons and we should listen to them and tolerate their harsh but accurate views about reality. Jerks are fine so long as they're not afraid to criticize you to your face and give you a chance to improve. Not all jerks are sociopaths. For example, Linus Torvalds has described himself as a jerk - I'd be honored to work for such person. Altruism is about actions, not about choice of words or tone of speech.
- wolfgke 7y ago
  > Good news: There are people who are neither. I prefer to work for competent non-jerks. A team of good people will always outperform a brilliant jerk that drives everyone else away. I prefer to work with brilliant people and love to learn from them.
fhy45678 7y ago
Typically, it means anybody who has an iota of knowledge, cares about the product and company and is not like the benchwarmer whose claim to fame is B.S. and jargon. He is that stupid sincere guy in a tide of mediocrity. It is easy to cut and normalize one guy than bring up the level of the rest
gingabriska 7y ago
It means a person who is knowledgeable, experienced but can't work in a team without trashing someone other team or all members or need to vent often by humiliating one or another I am pretty sure, Linus qualifies as one in past, not sure about the current developments there.
- throwaway3627 7y ago
  "Jerk" isn't a quality of people, but a maladaptive pattern of negative behavior that often harms the morale and well-being of others. It's a choice of interaction patterns. It's possible to be brilliant, honestly call out deficiencies without making it personal and seek excellence without being a dick... often, it's just a shortcut that leaves much trauma and bitterness along the way.
pllbnk 7y ago
From personal experience 'brilliant jerks' from articles like this and popular culture are people who are criticising everything and everyone as if they know better and are often seen as brilliant by less savvy colleagues (e.g., their managers) but have nothing to show for it and are often seen as impostors by their more savvy peers. I personally know several truly brilliant people at what they do and none of them are jerks. I have yet to see this 'brilliant jerk' everyone seems to be taking about.
- ashwinaj 7y ago
  I'm not sure where you are located but come to the SF Bay area. You'll find tons of them in every company.
  - throwaway3627 7y ago
    At workplaces without civility, jerks are often rewarded if they deliver results, and management tolerates them because they make them look good. OTOH, not separating out punishment of the brilliance from the jerk is an equally-damaging lack of nuance.
    - ashwinaj 7y ago
      Throwaway account, cool. You're talking as if most, if not all, companies are engaging in R&D at the level of the Apollo 11 space mission. You don't need brilliant people in most cases, merely having honest, diligent, persistent normal human beings can get the job done.
- throwaway3627 7y ago
  Dunning-Kruger
repolfx 7y ago
I think "brilliant jerk" is loaded with subtext that can only be detected by reading the rest of the justification. Everything Bek Chee says is illogical: is she really claiming Atlassian previously never cared about jerks? That's an astonishing claim that would require astonishing evidence, like the CEO having explicitly said "it's OK to be a jerk if you make us lots of money". No such evidence is provided. Instead it's very clear this is the result of 'wokeness' winning a culture war inside Atlassian: a giant red flashing warning sign to not work there or use their products. It starts with this phrase: We recognise things are not the way they used to be, yet companies haven’t evolved (from) 30 years ago when they were primarily made up often of white men. Tech standards have evolved, we have new ways of working, new demographics and generational change. There's a dead comment on this thread pointing out that Atlassian are engaging in blatant and shameful racism and sexism here. It's based in Australia, a country full of white people, and is a software company - developers are mostly men. Demographics haven't actually changed as any quick consultation of computer science courses will show, so this statement is not only racist and sexist but also a blatant lie. What might motivate a change to ensure that 2/3rds of job performance is no longer defined by skills? The explanation is quite obvious - if jobs are allocated based on ability then Atlassian will always be dominated by white men, simply because that's overwhelmingly the Australian demographic that learns computer programming, the most relevant skill to a software company. There's simply no way around that. But if performance is assessed based on "how they bring their whole self to work", "how they live the company values" and how they "impact others on their team" then suddenly anyone can be promoted, anyone can be hired, and most importantly anyone can be fired by random employees asserting that they're a "brilliant jerk". There's no defence against such an accusation - it's entirely subjective and arguing with it would require effectively saying, your emotional reaction to this person is invalid. That would itself be taken as evidence of jerkhood! This change will allow the "millenials", as Chee puts it, to completely purge the company of anyone who isn't a fanatical hater of white men. After all, actually being good at your job is no longer a defence against a colleague who doesn't like your politics. There's another important message being sent by this article - Atlassian no longer cares about their customers (like my firm). Customers don't care about how much of their own self Atlassian employees bring to work, or whether its employees live their company values. These things might matter to some of their employees or their HR team, but it's irrelevant to the users. What does matter to users is whether the software is any good i.e. if it was written by people who are "brilliant". If actual skill is only considered of 1/3rd importance relative to the feelings of their employees, it seems clear that Atlassian staff prioritise their own feelings more than the needs of the people who buy their products. Not a good sign!

fit2rule 7y ago

Australians tend to be very susceptible to sub-conscious application of the nations "tall poppy syndrome" cultural effect. To me, this story just indicates that Atlassian is trying to be as "Australian" a company as it can be. However, I may just be a small poppy in this thought. I'm willing to entertain the idea that I'm critical of Atlassian for their tall-poppy ideology simply because I am in fact a white male, however ..

jakobegger 7y ago

To me it sounds like Atlassian is sick of people who behave like assholes and justify it with their belief that they are smarter than everyone else.

tus88 7y ago
Sounds more like they are defining the extrovert as the ideal and the introvert to be shunned and fired.
- jacques_chester 7y ago
  Extraversion-introversion is a different personality axis from agreeableness. It's also distinct from sociopathology.
  - defertoreptar 7y ago
    That's not to say there aren't differences in communication styles. Generally speaking, an extrovert will do better in a meeting environment and is comfortable talking out loud and talking through a problem. An introvert is more comfortable with a one-on-one interaction, thinks to themselves before speaking about the problem, and prefers communicating it through text/email. Introverts can have a disadvantage in social perceptions not because they are actually a jerk but instead because they come off as a jerk due to lacking the practice and confidence of social interaction.
xHAS 7y ago
It seems that the decision to "ditch jerks" was made by a racist who is against "white men". That qualifies as a jerk.

mcphage 7y ago

Atlassian has been writing bad software for years. I'm fine with them trying almost anything to turn the ship about.

t0mbstone 7y ago
Yeah... it's mind boggling how terrible it is! The user interface is cluttered and inconsistent, and you have to memorize all sorts of anti-patterns just to be able to use it effectively.

throwaway3627 7y ago

Yep. The incompetents can now use "jerk" to paint anyone who GTD, while the second-stringers can ease-back and do a whole lot of nothing.