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From an European perspective, this has not exactly been my experience working with an international team. The US collective mentality is sometime overly optimi

by kakwa_ 6y ago

From an European perspective, this has not exactly been my experience working with an international team. The US collective mentality is sometime overly optimistic specially in public. This is sometimes a positive since it removes almost any inhibition regarding challenges, but it can lead to things blowing-up spectacularly, and then having to put in place hacks and brute force to make it kind of work relatively inefficiently and inelegantly. But it also leads to great successes (biggest economy in the world, lots of major companies, very attractive country for talents) and innovations never seen before. This positivism is prevalent in public statement but in private cracks start to appear. It gives me the impression that this positivism is pretty much a cultural obligation, so while not authoritarian, the group mentality is geared toward not talking to much about possible difficulties out of fear of being seen as too negative by the group.

viklove 6y ago
In my experience Americans are pretty blunt, and will not hesitate to point out flaws and make cynical jokes about them openly in the presence of their team.
- wahern 6y ago
  Cynical or sarcastic jokes are arguably the opposite of blunt. They're a way to acknowledge or broach a subject which the person, and most often the group, is uncomfortable or incapable of articulating more clearly. For example, because they're being forced to do the impossible, or because the character, cause, or resolution of an issue is poorly understood. People from cultures where sarcasm isn't common don't understand this nuance and seem to find this kind of dialogue abrasive and unconstructive. Perhaps the sentiment is that if you can't articulate it clearly, then the issue is non-existent, for better or worse, or you're just being lazy and unhelpful.
  - cuddlybacon 6y ago
    I think cynical and sarcastic jokes are blunt, and are something that arises when the culture is open about discussing problems but people don't have the agency to solve them.
  - austincheney 6y ago
    As I have discovered direction and attitude make a huge difference in the understanding and comfort of sarcasm to persons with no familiarity of the concept. If the target of the sarcasm is a third party the communication comes out clearly absurd but both the speaker and listener can understand and appreciate the absurdity together, which is less confusing. If the direction of the sarcasm is something about the listener it can come out as a clever rhetorical hostility that takes getting used to. If the sarcasm is approached with an uplifting tone and positive body language it is much more likely to be take as a joke even if the content of the communication doesn’t immediately parse as a joke and even though the content may be completely disparaging. What also helps, counter intuitively, is providing multiple sarcastic statements in quick succession. People listen to spoken words at set rate but the nonverbal parts of communication are instantly clear. This allows the listener the opportunity to consider the extended thought in a single context allowing for a richer sample of sarcastic communication to think over.
    - bigiain 6y ago
      Yes. Sarcasm + empathy for those around you dealing with the problem = powerful form of communication. Sarcasm + being an asshole = being an asshole. (Note: This is from my Australian background/culture/point-of-view, and I don't for a moment think it applies cross culturally - we are the culture where calling someone a cunt can be either a sign of deep profound friendship, or a reason to be punched in the face. When in the US, I need to be careful with that sort of instinctive interaction/language...)
  - monksy 6y ago
    It must be said that there has been a counter-culture that has been militant in trying to get rid of this. They're enforcing speach codes via code of conducts. (I.e. look at some of the recent examples including Linus Torvald (and the number of people who piled on), donglegate guys, etc)
    - bigiain 6y ago
      To be fair, Linus has admitted to and shown himself capable of being an asshole, and the donglegate guys are people I would not want working with my sister. You can be cynical and sarcastic without being personally abusive or a sexist troglodyte. The "militant counter culture" you speak of definitely does exist. But codes of conduct didn't start appearing out of thin air, they exist because they need to exist. Anyone who doesn't recognise that is almost certainly coming from a place of oblivious privilege. (Hell, I admit to being obliviously privileged a lot of the time, and _I_ can see the very real need for codes of conduct to exist so that assholes and troglodytes can't continue saying "It's a joke, calm down", or "I'm just being blunt, you can't handle the truth" or all the other gaslighting bullshit they so often get away with...)
      - monksy 6y ago
        Your sister can't handle nsfw language? I don't think that should be endorsed in the work place. (That was at a conference function between 2 people). They exist because projects have been bullied into doing that. On top of that the conditions were pushed in. Do you really need to have a thing to say "don't deadname"? Expectations of conduct have, and continued to, existe(d) before that and they were enforced. The only thing this does is to try to give people who don't like how a group is run room to bully the people running it.
salawat 6y ago
Can confirm this is a problematic aspect of our culture. I'm one of the people who's entire professional niche is being the counterweight to this positivism. Endemic to the way things are done is the understanding that forgiveness is often easier to attain than permission, and unfortunately putting your foot down and holding otherwise is rather frowned upon, or at least gets you marked as needing to be handled delicately. This leads to, if left unchecked, potential efforts to perception manage away obstacles to keep awareness of the problem suppressed such that it never gets dealt with until the inevitable blowing up down the road with the hope things have progressed far enough, sunk cost will keep you going forward. It is an infuriating challenge to deal with, especially when you're faced withacompletely passivebusiness interface only committed to answering exactly the question you ask, not taking the question and doing the bit of contextual fill-in and translation one would expect. As a result, to cope with that, you have to ask heavily qualified, context bearing questions to Get to the bottom of anything; which after a certain point becomes unintelligible if you don't have someone actively willing to follow along, which manydon'tsee the value of, because they don't see it as doing anything of value. It's a vicious cycle really.
- WrtCdEvrydy 6y ago
  I've spent my entire career being told that pointing out problems doesn't help the situation, having these problems blow up and having the same people say they wish they had listened... and being told that pointing out problems doesn't help the situation. I had a real heart-to-heart with the CTO where I worked since he only gets along with one of the managers and doesn't like his directors. He said the only reason he approved my promotion was because he was tired of hearing Yes Men telling him things were fine right until they blew up in his face. He's a tech guy, not a business guy so probably outside the norm.
  - benjohnson 6y ago
    >>pointing out problems That's the first step. Proposing a complete solution that takes in the needs of the various stakeholders and doesn't just move the problem and does so in a way that makes the whole situation easier is the hard part. If you've done that and nobody is listening, it's time to change the culture or leave.
lowdose 6y ago
In this case positivism is a self fulfilling prophecy. A lot of times we are on local not a global maximum. Last weekend Elon Musk put a couple of people in space at a fraction of the costs NASA originally spent. I think and hope many industries can still be disrupted in a similar way.
- zaphirplane 6y ago
  I don’t know much about that and could be off the mark. You seem to be comparing the cost of doing something the first time with doing it 40 years of technology later Perhaps it’s wording and I’m sure private companies are more cost effective compared to government

by kakwa_ 6y ago

viklove 6y ago

In my experience Americans are pretty blunt, and will not hesitate to point out flaws and make cynical jokes about them openly in the presence of their team.

wahern 6y ago
Cynical or sarcastic jokes are arguably the opposite of blunt. They're a way to acknowledge or broach a subject which the person, and most often the group, is uncomfortable or incapable of articulating more clearly. For example, because they're being forced to do the impossible, or because the character, cause, or resolution of an issue is poorly understood. People from cultures where sarcasm isn't common don't understand this nuance and seem to find this kind of dialogue abrasive and unconstructive. Perhaps the sentiment is that if you can't articulate it clearly, then the issue is non-existent, for better or worse, or you're just being lazy and unhelpful.
- cuddlybacon 6y ago
  I think cynical and sarcastic jokes are blunt, and are something that arises when the culture is open about discussing problems but people don't have the agency to solve them.
- austincheney 6y ago
  As I have discovered direction and attitude make a huge difference in the understanding and comfort of sarcasm to persons with no familiarity of the concept. If the target of the sarcasm is a third party the communication comes out clearly absurd but both the speaker and listener can understand and appreciate the absurdity together, which is less confusing. If the direction of the sarcasm is something about the listener it can come out as a clever rhetorical hostility that takes getting used to. If the sarcasm is approached with an uplifting tone and positive body language it is much more likely to be take as a joke even if the content of the communication doesn’t immediately parse as a joke and even though the content may be completely disparaging. What also helps, counter intuitively, is providing multiple sarcastic statements in quick succession. People listen to spoken words at set rate but the nonverbal parts of communication are instantly clear. This allows the listener the opportunity to consider the extended thought in a single context allowing for a richer sample of sarcastic communication to think over.
  - bigiain 6y ago
    Yes. Sarcasm + empathy for those around you dealing with the problem = powerful form of communication. Sarcasm + being an asshole = being an asshole. (Note: This is from my Australian background/culture/point-of-view, and I don't for a moment think it applies cross culturally - we are the culture where calling someone a cunt can be either a sign of deep profound friendship, or a reason to be punched in the face. When in the US, I need to be careful with that sort of instinctive interaction/language...)
- monksy 6y ago
  It must be said that there has been a counter-culture that has been militant in trying to get rid of this. They're enforcing speach codes via code of conducts. (I.e. look at some of the recent examples including Linus Torvald (and the number of people who piled on), donglegate guys, etc)
  - bigiain 6y ago
    To be fair, Linus has admitted to and shown himself capable of being an asshole, and the donglegate guys are people I would not want working with my sister. You can be cynical and sarcastic without being personally abusive or a sexist troglodyte. The "militant counter culture" you speak of definitely does exist. But codes of conduct didn't start appearing out of thin air, they exist because they need to exist. Anyone who doesn't recognise that is almost certainly coming from a place of oblivious privilege. (Hell, I admit to being obliviously privileged a lot of the time, and _I_ can see the very real need for codes of conduct to exist so that assholes and troglodytes can't continue saying "It's a joke, calm down", or "I'm just being blunt, you can't handle the truth" or all the other gaslighting bullshit they so often get away with...)
    - monksy 6y ago
      Your sister can't handle nsfw language? I don't think that should be endorsed in the work place. (That was at a conference function between 2 people). They exist because projects have been bullied into doing that. On top of that the conditions were pushed in. Do you really need to have a thing to say "don't deadname"? Expectations of conduct have, and continued to, existe(d) before that and they were enforced. The only thing this does is to try to give people who don't like how a group is run room to bully the people running it.

salawat 6y ago

Can confirm this is a problematic aspect of our culture. I'm one of the people who's entire professional niche is being the counterweight to this positivism. Endemic to the way things are done is the understanding that forgiveness is often easier to attain than permission, and unfortunately putting your foot down and holding otherwise is rather frowned upon, or at least gets you marked as needing to be handled delicately. This leads to, if left unchecked, potential efforts to perception manage away obstacles to keep awareness of the problem suppressed such that it never gets dealt with until the inevitable blowing up down the road with the hope things have progressed far enough, sunk cost will keep you going forward. It is an infuriating challenge to deal with, especially when you're faced withacompletely passivebusiness interface only committed to answering exactly the question you ask, not taking the question and doing the bit of contextual fill-in and translation one would expect. As a result, to cope with that, you have to ask heavily qualified, context bearing questions to Get to the bottom of anything; which after a certain point becomes unintelligible if you don't have someone actively willing to follow along, which manydon'tsee the value of, because they don't see it as doing anything of value. It's a vicious cycle really.

WrtCdEvrydy 6y ago
I've spent my entire career being told that pointing out problems doesn't help the situation, having these problems blow up and having the same people say they wish they had listened... and being told that pointing out problems doesn't help the situation. I had a real heart-to-heart with the CTO where I worked since he only gets along with one of the managers and doesn't like his directors. He said the only reason he approved my promotion was because he was tired of hearing Yes Men telling him things were fine right until they blew up in his face. He's a tech guy, not a business guy so probably outside the norm.
- benjohnson 6y ago
  >>pointing out problems That's the first step. Proposing a complete solution that takes in the needs of the various stakeholders and doesn't just move the problem and does so in a way that makes the whole situation easier is the hard part. If you've done that and nobody is listening, it's time to change the culture or leave.

lowdose 6y ago

In this case positivism is a self fulfilling prophecy. A lot of times we are on local not a global maximum. Last weekend Elon Musk put a couple of people in space at a fraction of the costs NASA originally spent. I think and hope many industries can still be disrupted in a similar way.

zaphirplane 6y ago
I don’t know much about that and could be off the mark. You seem to be comparing the cost of doing something the first time with doing it 40 years of technology later Perhaps it’s wording and I’m sure private companies are more cost effective compared to government