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If someone asks you "are you good", you should say "yes" or even better "very good". Humility gets you nowhere. edit: Assuming you are actually good, but also

If someone asks you "are you good", you should say "yes" or even better "very good". Humility gets you nowhere. edit: Assuming you are actually good, but also recognizing that on the bell curve of competency, most people aren't noticeably better than one or another, despite a generally held belief otherwise.

agumonkey 5y ago
Tell me about this, after an egotistic crisis I went full humility, I'm now at the bottom of the ladder, watching lazy, vaguely competent people whining about why 2-3x the average salary is not enough for their performance. Thing is, I cannot let myself play politics and mental games just to swim warmer waters. I find it even sadder.
makeitdouble 5y ago
Except when you’re not in a toxic environment. Those are rare, but should be recognized very fast if one wants to stay there. Throwing away humility is a sure way to be paired with one-uppers for the rest of one’s life (and then say with utter confidence that nobody cares about humility)
- marcosdumay 5y ago
  The "are you good" question is toxic anyway, so unless it's some "are you good at X" where X is not the work you are assigned to do, if people are asking you it it's because the environment is toxic. On "are you good at X", it actually means "are you capable and willing to do X from now on?", so treat it accordingly.
- spywaregorilla 5y ago
  Disagree. It's hard to compare the merit of two people, especially if they work in fields that you're not an expert in. Asking someone their own self evaluation opinion is reasonable. If A is confident about their competency and B says "I could be better"... you're going to go with A. That is how humans work. No toxicity required. Humility is nice and all but it blends deeply with insecurities and a lack of confidence
  - makeitdouble 5y ago
    I like marcosdumay’s point very much. In itself asking people to boast is a recipe for disaster. I make the parralel with your “A is confident about their competency”: have they more to say about their confidence ? what did they actually do and do you have trust they did it well ? Digging further, if you end up at a point where both A and B did roughly the same things at the same level but B shows critical sense about what they did and trusts you enough to talk about it, B is to me the obvious choice. When shit hits the fan, you don’t want people who’s first principles are to cover themselves. But this is all based on you going past confidence displays and caring enough to dig further. Which concede is not something we’ll do all the time; if I need to buy some coffee I actually don’t care much if it’s from A or B, and could easily go with A (or choose B by pure curiosity or any other reason, who knows)
baud147258 5y ago
depends if that gets you more work or get asked work you couldn't yet do
- spywaregorilla 5y ago
  On the contrary I find if you're perceived as the most competent person you have the most authority in declining a request. You don't say "I can't do this", you say "We can't do that, but we can do this instead".

agumonkey 5y ago

Tell me about this, after an egotistic crisis I went full humility, I'm now at the bottom of the ladder, watching lazy, vaguely competent people whining about why 2-3x the average salary is not enough for their performance. Thing is, I cannot let myself play politics and mental games just to swim warmer waters. I find it even sadder.

makeitdouble 5y ago

Except when you’re not in a toxic environment. Those are rare, but should be recognized very fast if one wants to stay there. Throwing away humility is a sure way to be paired with one-uppers for the rest of one’s life (and then say with utter confidence that nobody cares about humility)

marcosdumay 5y ago
The "are you good" question is toxic anyway, so unless it's some "are you good at X" where X is not the work you are assigned to do, if people are asking you it it's because the environment is toxic. On "are you good at X", it actually means "are you capable and willing to do X from now on?", so treat it accordingly.
spywaregorilla 5y ago
Disagree. It's hard to compare the merit of two people, especially if they work in fields that you're not an expert in. Asking someone their own self evaluation opinion is reasonable. If A is confident about their competency and B says "I could be better"... you're going to go with A. That is how humans work. No toxicity required. Humility is nice and all but it blends deeply with insecurities and a lack of confidence
- makeitdouble 5y ago
  I like marcosdumay’s point very much. In itself asking people to boast is a recipe for disaster. I make the parralel with your “A is confident about their competency”: have they more to say about their confidence ? what did they actually do and do you have trust they did it well ? Digging further, if you end up at a point where both A and B did roughly the same things at the same level but B shows critical sense about what they did and trusts you enough to talk about it, B is to me the obvious choice. When shit hits the fan, you don’t want people who’s first principles are to cover themselves. But this is all based on you going past confidence displays and caring enough to dig further. Which concede is not something we’ll do all the time; if I need to buy some coffee I actually don’t care much if it’s from A or B, and could easily go with A (or choose B by pure curiosity or any other reason, who knows)

baud147258 5y ago

depends if that gets you more work or get asked work you couldn't yet do

spywaregorilla 5y ago
On the contrary I find if you're perceived as the most competent person you have the most authority in declining a request. You don't say "I can't do this", you say "We can't do that, but we can do this instead".