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Impressive: this managed to be wrong in the first paragraph. He needs to consider the enemy within. I did not resign because "my shields dropped," I got shot

Impressive: this managed to be wrong in the first paragraph. He needs to consider the enemy within. I did not resign because "my shields dropped," I got shot in the back by the folks inside my "shield." Nobody presented me with an opportunity, I went looking for one when I realized that my loyalty was misplaced and my efforts wasted. At no point am I kidding myself about "curiosity:" I wanted out. Then investigation happened, I did not receive an email about coffee. It's a strange take: we as employees are supposed to resist temptation like some kind of monk beset by lasciviousness. Let's go with this metaphor he loves: somehow, the burden falls upon us. Imagine standing there, day after day, holding a thirty pound shield before you. Tiresome. The saying goes that people tend to quit bosses, not jobs, and this shields concept is a coping mechanism to not face the idea that bosses can screw up and frequently rely upon employee inertia instead of trying to tamp down their screwing-up frequency.

mlyle 7y ago
Impressive-- you had such a visceral reaction to the way it was phrased that you don't realize the whole point of what he was saying was what you yourself are talking about: > The reason this reads cranky is because I, the leader of the humans, screwed up. Something in the construction of the team or the company nudged you at a critical moment. When that mail arrived gently asking you about coffee, you didn’t answer the way you answered the prior five similar mails with a brief, “Really happy here. Let’s get a drink some time!” You think you thought Hmmm… what the hell. It can’t hurt. What you actually thought or realized was: > You know, I have no idea when I’m going to be a tech lead here. > Getting yelled at two days ago still stings. > I don’t believe a single thing senior leadership says.
- at_a_remove 7y ago
  No, that's putting the effect before the cause. Nobody sent me any emails about "hey come have coffee." That did not happen. I went looking. The shields concept has this idea behind it that employees are constantly awash in opportunities, splashing away as we diligently oar toward the latest corporate goal, headhunters on the phone, friendly requests in LinkedIn, and that the shield upheld turns away these opportunities which are apparently corrosive to the body of the company. This was not true for me. I went looking in the complete absence of offers. I cannot emphasize that enough. I wasn't going anywhere out of "curiosity" and deceiving myself as to the point of meeting with someone at another company. I had no shield to raise in defense of these offers because they did not happen. It's a terrible metaphor on so many fronts and the use of it suggests that it is my duty to hold my shield up. I didn't have a shield and I have no duty to hold it up even if I had one. I'm not some soldier in a phalanx who presses on for the glory of the Roman Empire, my shoulder straining to protect my fellows even as I fall to my knees, spear in my gut; I did not let my guard down and an "offer" slipped into my tender heart because I was almost willfully unaware. The concept is a distraction from bosses screwing up because it suggests that an employee let their guard down.
  - mlyle 7y ago
    > The shields concept has this idea behind it that employees are constantly awash in opportunities, splashing away as we diligently oar toward the latest corporate goal, headhunters on the phone, friendly requests in LinkedIn, and that the shield upheld turns away these opportunities which are apparently corrosive to the body of the compan Well, many of us are. > This was not true for me. I went looking in the complete absence of offers. I cannot emphasize that enough. Sorry that you find that one way offensive, but that is just one way he poses the question. He alternatively poses it as "when did you start looking". No matter how passive or active the job search is initially, most employees tend not to do it when they're happy. > I didn't have a shield and I have no duty to hold it up even if I had one. No one implies you have a duty. But we are pretty adept at brushing off entreaties and avoiding spending the energy looking when we're fulfilled. That is his point, and it's a reasonable one that isn't affected at all by the semantic quibbles.
  - gknoy 7y ago
    Right, and the reason you went looking was because you felt wronged by your employer -- whether it be office politics, backstabby coworkers, a manager you did't like, etc, you would not have gone looking for another job (in the same way) had you felt valued, happy, and safe at your job. "shields down" is just Rands' way of saying "decided to even consider another job". It doesn't have to be defensive. It just means that that was the point where you realized that _maybe_ this job isn't the best one for you. You might come to that realization on your own (as you did), or after seeing things happen to other people, or even from a recruiter cold-calling you. The "shields down" moment was before when you started looking, or when you set LinkedIn to "I'm looking ...".
    - at_a_remove 7y ago
      What I'm getting at is that Rand's "way of saying" is not simply a metaphor, but one which comes with certain implications and that those implications matter to the entire essay. The first implication is I, as an employee, should keep my shields up. It sounds dutiful. If Ensign Crusher didn't have the shields up, that's pretty bad news. The second implication is that it is defensive. It does not have to be defensive but if you select "shield" as your metaphor, you're bringing "defensive" along for the ride. To suggest the use of a shield without the defensive concept is disingenuous at best. Both of these implications are distractions from the "what did I do as an employer do wrong?" and the essay as a whole would be cleaner and more honest without the shield in the essay or the title. Listen to this part: "The moment happened a long time ago when you received a random email from a good friend who asked ..." No. That did not happen. He hits it again: "The moment happened the instant you decided, 'What the hell? I haven’t seen Don in months and it’d be good to see him.'" Again, that's not the moment. He does it again: "When you are indirectly asked to lower your shields ..." Blame again on the employee. All of this is a distraction from the actual moment of employers making that final poor decision. He keeps using "you" (as an employee) rather than "what did the employer do?" Cross out every bit about shields and refocus the essay on employer mistakes, it is fine. But he follows that hint of acknowledgement ("If I’m sitting here talking with you it means two things: I don’t want you to leave and, to the best of my knowledge, you didn’t want to leave either but here you are leaving. It didn’t just happen.") with an impulse to push it back on the employee (" You chose. Maybe you weren’t looking, but once your shields dropped, you started looking." It's a metaphor that leads to a dishonest way of thinking about the situation he, as an employer, is in. Someone else chose, they dropped their shields because they were indirectly asked, and maybe I as a boss was involved somehow but the choice was still the employee's and all because they, in a momentary lapse of vigilance, dropped their shields. That's what I find rather grating about this essay.

mlyle 7y ago

Impressive-- you had such a visceral reaction to the way it was phrased that you don't realize the whole point of what he was saying was what you yourself are talking about: > The reason this reads cranky is because I, the leader of the humans, screwed up. Something in the construction of the team or the company nudged you at a critical moment. When that mail arrived gently asking you about coffee, you didn’t answer the way you answered the prior five similar mails with a brief, “Really happy here. Let’s get a drink some time!” You think you thought Hmmm… what the hell. It can’t hurt. What you actually thought or realized was: > You know, I have no idea when I’m going to be a tech lead here. > Getting yelled at two days ago still stings. > I don’t believe a single thing senior leadership says.

at_a_remove 7y ago
No, that's putting the effect before the cause. Nobody sent me any emails about "hey come have coffee." That did not happen. I went looking. The shields concept has this idea behind it that employees are constantly awash in opportunities, splashing away as we diligently oar toward the latest corporate goal, headhunters on the phone, friendly requests in LinkedIn, and that the shield upheld turns away these opportunities which are apparently corrosive to the body of the company. This was not true for me. I went looking in the complete absence of offers. I cannot emphasize that enough. I wasn't going anywhere out of "curiosity" and deceiving myself as to the point of meeting with someone at another company. I had no shield to raise in defense of these offers because they did not happen. It's a terrible metaphor on so many fronts and the use of it suggests that it is my duty to hold my shield up. I didn't have a shield and I have no duty to hold it up even if I had one. I'm not some soldier in a phalanx who presses on for the glory of the Roman Empire, my shoulder straining to protect my fellows even as I fall to my knees, spear in my gut; I did not let my guard down and an "offer" slipped into my tender heart because I was almost willfully unaware. The concept is a distraction from bosses screwing up because it suggests that an employee let their guard down.
- mlyle 7y ago
  > The shields concept has this idea behind it that employees are constantly awash in opportunities, splashing away as we diligently oar toward the latest corporate goal, headhunters on the phone, friendly requests in LinkedIn, and that the shield upheld turns away these opportunities which are apparently corrosive to the body of the compan Well, many of us are. > This was not true for me. I went looking in the complete absence of offers. I cannot emphasize that enough. Sorry that you find that one way offensive, but that is just one way he poses the question. He alternatively poses it as "when did you start looking". No matter how passive or active the job search is initially, most employees tend not to do it when they're happy. > I didn't have a shield and I have no duty to hold it up even if I had one. No one implies you have a duty. But we are pretty adept at brushing off entreaties and avoiding spending the energy looking when we're fulfilled. That is his point, and it's a reasonable one that isn't affected at all by the semantic quibbles.
- gknoy 7y ago
  Right, and the reason you went looking was because you felt wronged by your employer -- whether it be office politics, backstabby coworkers, a manager you did't like, etc, you would not have gone looking for another job (in the same way) had you felt valued, happy, and safe at your job. "shields down" is just Rands' way of saying "decided to even consider another job". It doesn't have to be defensive. It just means that that was the point where you realized that _maybe_ this job isn't the best one for you. You might come to that realization on your own (as you did), or after seeing things happen to other people, or even from a recruiter cold-calling you. The "shields down" moment was before when you started looking, or when you set LinkedIn to "I'm looking ...".
  - at_a_remove 7y ago
    What I'm getting at is that Rand's "way of saying" is not simply a metaphor, but one which comes with certain implications and that those implications matter to the entire essay. The first implication is I, as an employee, should keep my shields up. It sounds dutiful. If Ensign Crusher didn't have the shields up, that's pretty bad news. The second implication is that it is defensive. It does not have to be defensive but if you select "shield" as your metaphor, you're bringing "defensive" along for the ride. To suggest the use of a shield without the defensive concept is disingenuous at best. Both of these implications are distractions from the "what did I do as an employer do wrong?" and the essay as a whole would be cleaner and more honest without the shield in the essay or the title. Listen to this part: "The moment happened a long time ago when you received a random email from a good friend who asked ..." No. That did not happen. He hits it again: "The moment happened the instant you decided, 'What the hell? I haven’t seen Don in months and it’d be good to see him.'" Again, that's not the moment. He does it again: "When you are indirectly asked to lower your shields ..." Blame again on the employee. All of this is a distraction from the actual moment of employers making that final poor decision. He keeps using "you" (as an employee) rather than "what did the employer do?" Cross out every bit about shields and refocus the essay on employer mistakes, it is fine. But he follows that hint of acknowledgement ("If I’m sitting here talking with you it means two things: I don’t want you to leave and, to the best of my knowledge, you didn’t want to leave either but here you are leaving. It didn’t just happen.") with an impulse to push it back on the employee (" You chose. Maybe you weren’t looking, but once your shields dropped, you started looking." It's a metaphor that leads to a dishonest way of thinking about the situation he, as an employer, is in. Someone else chose, they dropped their shields because they were indirectly asked, and maybe I as a boss was involved somehow but the choice was still the employee's and all because they, in a momentary lapse of vigilance, dropped their shields. That's what I find rather grating about this essay.