7 ms·

Why are social skills always focusing on the positive? A lot of programmers often seem to be more nice guys than anything else, and need to be able to be more a

by wisty 7y ago

Why are social skills always focusing on the positive? A lot of programmers often seem to be more nice guys than anything else, and need to be able to be more assertive / aggressive. Everyone tries to distinguish these two, it's mostly just in the eye of the beholder - IMO aggression is just assertion when it's judged to be inappropriate or incompetently done - a drill instructor being assertive looks different to a police officer in a stand-off which is different to how you talk to co-workers - the distinction is highly contextual and subjective. I think a lot of people with poor social skills thinks the aggression / assertion line is all about being angry or shouty or rude. Assertion uses a bunch of tools (including potentially - a louder or quieter voice, appearing angry, threats, manipulations, etc) to achieve a goal. Doing so in an inappropriate way is seen as aggressive (e.g. threatening to quit over a minor issue). Overusing any given tool (e.g. swearing a lot instead of realising a different tool is needed) is seen as incompetent (or losing control) thus it's seen as aggressive. But fundamentally there's no real objective difference.

yters 7y ago
Optimal is nice aggression: push forward for the goal in the nicest way possible, and resort to more confrontational style only when absolutely necessary.
- wisty 7y ago
  If you do it right it will be labeled "assertion" not aggression.
- swagasaurus-rex 7y ago
  Resort to confrontation if you are justified. Being justified in a social setting means other people need to agree with you. It involves directly addressing the matter at hand; why it is you are justified in confronting somebody. It can also be tactful if you get the person you are confronting to be very specific on the details and why they did something worth being confronted about. The crowd will decide on their own, but if you truly are justified in confronting somebody then you should have solid foundation for debate. Now, certain crowds practice mob justice, but that's another thing entirely.
ntsplnkv2 7y ago
I find people who are normally not assertive/aggressive overcorrect and lose even more respect. Just advocate for yourself and the things you care about. It's not always easy, but that doesn't necessarily mean aggression.
- wisty 7y ago
  It's not just "overcorrect" it's also doing so in an incompetent way. It's like asking out someone on a date. If you have less experience, you'll probably do so in a dumb way and are more likely to seem like you're harassing them. There's a lot of gaslighting that the line is aggression / assertion line is primarily about your internal state (mind reading arguments are often a good sign people are wrong), but the line is often about competence. Pretending people should never be assertive means we aren't letting them develop competence except through experience. Developing competence through experience (without any clear direction) is like letting people learn to drive by letting them crash a bunch of times and learn from it which is hardly optimal.
kempbellt 7y ago
I agree with this. I value high-friction environments where people are encouraged to compete and fight to support their ideas, where they feel valued for fighting for themselves, rather than patronized... The real world doesn't coddle you. Work should reflect that to some degree - with some respect to being a decent person in general. Just knowing that you know your shit, and it's okay (preferred even), if you fight to be your own advocate. There's a balance between negative and positive reinforcement. We can't simply look at being "nice" to each other all the time as an optimal solution. It's a great way to get completely side-swiped by someone who is even only slightly aggressive. If I have a terrible idea, I'd rather hear someone tell me that it's a shit idea than patronizingly tend to my "feelings" on the matter.
- notJim 7y ago
  In my experience, the problem with environments like that is that the best fighters win, not the best ideas. The best fighters are usually the people who can project the most confidence, talk the loudest, and who are the most popular. By contrast, environments that provide psychological safety enable people who may have better ideas, but may not be as brash and overconfident to contribute.
  - kempbellt 7y ago
    I understand your perspective. Unfortunately, however idealistic, I don't see that being a great benefit in the long term for anyone. I prefer environments that teach you how to advocate for your ideas. Build you up as a good self-advocate. Environments that say "Hey everybody! It's Timmy's turn to speak. Pass him the talking stick" are patronizing and disgust me at the onset. Better to have someone by your side saying, "Timmy, speak up! You have a great idea. Tell everyone"
    - throwaway0xb 7y ago
      Pretty incredible exchange you are having with people right now where you are just straight up ignoring valid points or sweeping them aside as idealism...
solatic 7y ago
> IMO aggression is just assertion when it's judged to be inappropriate or incompetently done One can be assertive without being aggressive and aggressive without being assertive. They are different characteristics. Assertive and not aggressive - deciding to speak up instead of being silent. "Excuse me, can you explain this decision to me?" Aggressive and not assertive - being passive-aggressive, giving people the silent treatment / cold shoulder / "cancel culture", and similar behaviors.
- wisty 7y ago
  So is a polite legal threat assertive or aggressive? edit: I'm saying - where you draw the line is about things like whether it's competent, and whether it's "OK" within the contex. A polite "excuse me" is both competent and almost always "OK". A polite legal threat might not be "OK" (and it might not be competent either) so whether you judge it to be aggressive will depend on your point of view.
  - solatic 7y ago
    It's not a line. Something can also be both aggressive and assertive. That they are different does not make them mutually exclusive. One can also be awkward but not polite, polite but not awkward, and politely awkward. They're just different characteristics.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
geoffreyhale 7y ago
Aggression is violent and seeks to harm or at least disregards the recipient's well-being. Assertiveness is considerate and has compassion for the recipient, considers how our assertion may affect the recipient, may offer understanding and empathy for their situation, then asserts our need by taking personal ownership and using "I" language, etc.
- jugg1es 7y ago
  This is a curious statement. Assertiveness does not require that you be explicitly or even implicitly empathetic nor does it require you to use "I" statements. In fact, deliberately using language where you are making a topic personal (by using "I" language) is the opposite of assertive in this context.
gherkinnn 7y ago
Yes. That’s why I find dev.to and to be a rather uninteresting place. It’s 90% niceties and explaining .map over and over again. Similar things can be observed in many meetups and some companies. Everything is awesome. Everybody is nice. People shy away from deciding anything. Even the simple act of two people wanting to go through the same door at the same time is an impossible conundrum. No matter how important psychological safety is (and it really is), a constant state of coddling serves nobody.
- darkmighty 7y ago
  I think the main danger is when truth and improvement is compromised in favor of niceness. Sometimes you are wrong, and that's definitely not a comfortable position to be in. It's not going to feel good to have it pointed out. And yet it's imperative that it is communicated. Wise individuals should not attribute the discomfort to the person pointing things out, but to mistakes themselves of course. There are cases where marking errors is done to belittle, offend, portray incompetence, etc.; however it shouldn't be too hard to avoid those perils -- it's just a matter of showing how mistakes are (mostly, and to a measure) inevitable, not disqualify the person for the mistake (i.e. recognize it's something that is not inherent and can be fixed). Avoid broadcasting mishaps (communicate one-to-one), be supportive when pointing things out, and the environment is going to be better for everyone. Superficial niceness might be worse than sincere harshness indeed. But the best is bold sincerity and support, which ultimately creates trust and robust, enduring relations.
- TeMPOraL 7y ago
  > Even the simple act of two people wanting to go through the same door at the same time is an impossible conundrum. Tangential, but I hit this issue very often with couple of friends during university years; two of us wanted to go through a door, and get stuck in a "you go", "no, you go", "I insist" loop. At some point I said, "you know what, let's do rock-paper-scissors, if you lose you go first". It immediately caught on with my friends, and ever since that, when attempting to go through a door at the same time, we'd just exchange looks, and immediately play a wordless round of rock-paper-scissor to resolve the conflict, while the rest of the class looked at us and asked "WTF just happened?!".
127 7y ago
Yes, this is pretty much it. Learning how to be assertive without looking weird, creepy or a lunatic. It's just a lot of practice. Most advice given to men how to be more socially adaptive is actually advice how to best be taken advantage of. It has nothing to do with their own best interest.
- buckminster 7y ago
  This is true of pretty much all such advice to anybody. Society's interests and your interests are often unaligned.
  - hoseja 7y ago
    Succinctly put. Realizing this is very painful if one has been raised idealistically.
CPLX 7y ago
Being assertive and aggressive are not variations on the same thing. In fact if you observe people with actual power they tend to rely less and less on aggressive behavior, and more on suggestions and persuasion. I think it would be a mistake to characterize assertiveness as just a subset of aggression, defined as all aggressive acts less the inappropriate ones, or the reverse, as you seem to be arguing here. I think it's more accurate to say there's a very small set of cases where they overlap.
chalupa-man 7y ago
I've always thought of aggression as something qualitatively different. To me assertive behaviour is behavior in pursuit of some objective, whether or not it's sensible or effective, while aggressive behaviour is about the experience of aggression itself, not needing a goal. Things like road rage, school bullying, wrecking stadiums and yelling at players after football matches, where the behaviour isn't intended to achieve anything except the direct effects of being aggressive (expression of anger, feeling big, making others suffer or feel afraid). I would say that someone can be incompetently and rudely assertive, or quietly and competently aggressive.

by wisty 7y ago

yters 7y ago

Optimal is nice aggression: push forward for the goal in the nicest way possible, and resort to more confrontational style only when absolutely necessary.

wisty 7y ago
If you do it right it will be labeled "assertion" not aggression.
swagasaurus-rex 7y ago
Resort to confrontation if you are justified. Being justified in a social setting means other people need to agree with you. It involves directly addressing the matter at hand; why it is you are justified in confronting somebody. It can also be tactful if you get the person you are confronting to be very specific on the details and why they did something worth being confronted about. The crowd will decide on their own, but if you truly are justified in confronting somebody then you should have solid foundation for debate. Now, certain crowds practice mob justice, but that's another thing entirely.

ntsplnkv2 7y ago

I find people who are normally not assertive/aggressive overcorrect and lose even more respect. Just advocate for yourself and the things you care about. It's not always easy, but that doesn't necessarily mean aggression.

wisty 7y ago
It's not just "overcorrect" it's also doing so in an incompetent way. It's like asking out someone on a date. If you have less experience, you'll probably do so in a dumb way and are more likely to seem like you're harassing them. There's a lot of gaslighting that the line is aggression / assertion line is primarily about your internal state (mind reading arguments are often a good sign people are wrong), but the line is often about competence. Pretending people should never be assertive means we aren't letting them develop competence except through experience. Developing competence through experience (without any clear direction) is like letting people learn to drive by letting them crash a bunch of times and learn from it which is hardly optimal.

kempbellt 7y ago

I agree with this. I value high-friction environments where people are encouraged to compete and fight to support their ideas, where they feel valued for fighting for themselves, rather than patronized... The real world doesn't coddle you. Work should reflect that to some degree - with some respect to being a decent person in general. Just knowing that you know your shit, and it's okay (preferred even), if you fight to be your own advocate. There's a balance between negative and positive reinforcement. We can't simply look at being "nice" to each other all the time as an optimal solution. It's a great way to get completely side-swiped by someone who is even only slightly aggressive. If I have a terrible idea, I'd rather hear someone tell me that it's a shit idea than patronizingly tend to my "feelings" on the matter.

notJim 7y ago
In my experience, the problem with environments like that is that the best fighters win, not the best ideas. The best fighters are usually the people who can project the most confidence, talk the loudest, and who are the most popular. By contrast, environments that provide psychological safety enable people who may have better ideas, but may not be as brash and overconfident to contribute.
- kempbellt 7y ago
  I understand your perspective. Unfortunately, however idealistic, I don't see that being a great benefit in the long term for anyone. I prefer environments that teach you how to advocate for your ideas. Build you up as a good self-advocate. Environments that say "Hey everybody! It's Timmy's turn to speak. Pass him the talking stick" are patronizing and disgust me at the onset. Better to have someone by your side saying, "Timmy, speak up! You have a great idea. Tell everyone"
  - throwaway0xb 7y ago
    Pretty incredible exchange you are having with people right now where you are just straight up ignoring valid points or sweeping them aside as idealism...

solatic 7y ago

> IMO aggression is just assertion when it's judged to be inappropriate or incompetently done One can be assertive without being aggressive and aggressive without being assertive. They are different characteristics. Assertive and not aggressive - deciding to speak up instead of being silent. "Excuse me, can you explain this decision to me?" Aggressive and not assertive - being passive-aggressive, giving people the silent treatment / cold shoulder / "cancel culture", and similar behaviors.

wisty 7y ago
So is a polite legal threat assertive or aggressive? edit: I'm saying - where you draw the line is about things like whether it's competent, and whether it's "OK" within the contex. A polite "excuse me" is both competent and almost always "OK". A polite legal threat might not be "OK" (and it might not be competent either) so whether you judge it to be aggressive will depend on your point of view.
- solatic 7y ago
  It's not a line. Something can also be both aggressive and assertive. That they are different does not make them mutually exclusive. One can also be awkward but not polite, polite but not awkward, and politely awkward. They're just different characteristics.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]

geoffreyhale 7y ago

Aggression is violent and seeks to harm or at least disregards the recipient's well-being. Assertiveness is considerate and has compassion for the recipient, considers how our assertion may affect the recipient, may offer understanding and empathy for their situation, then asserts our need by taking personal ownership and using "I" language, etc.

jugg1es 7y ago
This is a curious statement. Assertiveness does not require that you be explicitly or even implicitly empathetic nor does it require you to use "I" statements. In fact, deliberately using language where you are making a topic personal (by using "I" language) is the opposite of assertive in this context.

gherkinnn 7y ago

Yes. That’s why I find dev.to and to be a rather uninteresting place. It’s 90% niceties and explaining .map over and over again. Similar things can be observed in many meetups and some companies. Everything is awesome. Everybody is nice. People shy away from deciding anything. Even the simple act of two people wanting to go through the same door at the same time is an impossible conundrum. No matter how important psychological safety is (and it really is), a constant state of coddling serves nobody.

darkmighty 7y ago
I think the main danger is when truth and improvement is compromised in favor of niceness. Sometimes you are wrong, and that's definitely not a comfortable position to be in. It's not going to feel good to have it pointed out. And yet it's imperative that it is communicated. Wise individuals should not attribute the discomfort to the person pointing things out, but to mistakes themselves of course. There are cases where marking errors is done to belittle, offend, portray incompetence, etc.; however it shouldn't be too hard to avoid those perils -- it's just a matter of showing how mistakes are (mostly, and to a measure) inevitable, not disqualify the person for the mistake (i.e. recognize it's something that is not inherent and can be fixed). Avoid broadcasting mishaps (communicate one-to-one), be supportive when pointing things out, and the environment is going to be better for everyone. Superficial niceness might be worse than sincere harshness indeed. But the best is bold sincerity and support, which ultimately creates trust and robust, enduring relations.
TeMPOraL 7y ago
> Even the simple act of two people wanting to go through the same door at the same time is an impossible conundrum. Tangential, but I hit this issue very often with couple of friends during university years; two of us wanted to go through a door, and get stuck in a "you go", "no, you go", "I insist" loop. At some point I said, "you know what, let's do rock-paper-scissors, if you lose you go first". It immediately caught on with my friends, and ever since that, when attempting to go through a door at the same time, we'd just exchange looks, and immediately play a wordless round of rock-paper-scissor to resolve the conflict, while the rest of the class looked at us and asked "WTF just happened?!".

127 7y ago

Yes, this is pretty much it. Learning how to be assertive without looking weird, creepy or a lunatic. It's just a lot of practice. Most advice given to men how to be more socially adaptive is actually advice how to best be taken advantage of. It has nothing to do with their own best interest.

buckminster 7y ago
This is true of pretty much all such advice to anybody. Society's interests and your interests are often unaligned.
- hoseja 7y ago
  Succinctly put. Realizing this is very painful if one has been raised idealistically.

CPLX 7y ago

Being assertive and aggressive are not variations on the same thing. In fact if you observe people with actual power they tend to rely less and less on aggressive behavior, and more on suggestions and persuasion. I think it would be a mistake to characterize assertiveness as just a subset of aggression, defined as all aggressive acts less the inappropriate ones, or the reverse, as you seem to be arguing here. I think it's more accurate to say there's a very small set of cases where they overlap.

chalupa-man 7y ago

I've always thought of aggression as something qualitatively different. To me assertive behaviour is behavior in pursuit of some objective, whether or not it's sensible or effective, while aggressive behaviour is about the experience of aggression itself, not needing a goal. Things like road rage, school bullying, wrecking stadiums and yelling at players after football matches, where the behaviour isn't intended to achieve anything except the direct effects of being aggressive (expression of anger, feeling big, making others suffer or feel afraid). I would say that someone can be incompetently and rudely assertive, or quietly and competently aggressive.