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This comment is pure gold. I found Scott Adams' recent books and Daniel Kahneman's work profoundly influential in changing my "observed personality" (i.e. the
by reactspa 7y ago
This comment is pure gold.
I found Scott Adams' recent books and Daniel Kahneman's work profoundly influential in changing my "observed personality" (i.e. the psychology I project to the world), and making me an order of magnitude more effective in dealing with work issues/co-workers.
Please share a few books (or perhaps authors/youtubers) that you learned from. Thank you.
- abledon 7y agowhich scott adams books? loserthink?
- reactspa 7y agoStart with "How to fail...", then "Win Bigly", then "Loserthink". "How to fail..." is the most important IMHO. Also, read up on this: https://www.ribbonfarm.com/the-gervais-principle/ https://www.ribbonfarm.com/the-gervais-principle/
- PhaedrusV 7y agoSecond "How to fail.." and "Gervais"; didn't find "Win Bigly" or "Loserthink" very useful.
- zzzcarrot 7y agoCan you elaborate on the observed personality thing? How do you do this?
- mindcrime 7y agoNot the parent poster, and this may or may not be what they were referring to, but FYI, there is an entire field of thought called "Impression Management" which may be of interest: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impression_management https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impression_management
- reactspa 7y agoE.g.: I'm a jeans & t-shirt kinda guy. However, I now dress a little more formally (business casual) because it leads to better outcomes. I've not gotten around to wearing suits even though that would be even better. A little more strategic: I usually wear at least one item of clothing with my employer's logo visible on it. (Gives off a "corporate citizen" vibe.) A far cry from the recent past when I'd carry a laptop-bag with my ex-employer's (and a competitor of my current employer's) logo on it.
- rl3 7y agoWhat if you're at an overly-corporate place being the jeans & t-shirt person? Throughout modern history tech founders used this to great effect against suits. My theory is that radically different dress from the norm (whether dressing up or down) can be advantageous provided you remain utterly confident and bring value to the table.
- JimboOmega 7y agoBeing utterly confident means people will assume you bring a lot of value to the table, whether or not you do. The signals you give are usually the first and some of the strongest ones that people look at. Of course, if you're a total charlatan, you'll be exposed eventually; but you'll get much farther with excellent confidence in mediocre work than you will with wavering confidence in excellent work. That said, I almost always stand out in my manner of dress, and it's bought me no particular advantages. It would surprise me if "the tall girl with the great outfits" was not a good enough description to get most people in my area to identify me. Still, being visually recognizable confers no immediate advantage, beyond that whenever I meet people they remember me and have seen me around before. (I just love fashion, so I do it for me more than anything else)
- bob33212 7y agoTaleb talks about this in Anti-fragile. Rock Stars can wear whatever they want and it doesn't hurt them in their career. In contrast a lawyer or accountant could seriously hurt their career showing up to work with an unusual outfit on. In the Software world you can have it both ways. Showing up in sweatpants and a vulgar t-shirt may cause people to think you are so good that you don't have to care. But also to think that you will never be in management