5 ms·

How do you have integrity when you throw your own engineers under the bus?

CapitalistCartr 5y ago
Telling the truth isn't throwing anyone under the bus. If "they" are better than "us", that's the truth. Personally, I'd have bought the guy's company just because that's the right sort of engineer I want. Having said that, he wasn't under any obligation to tell Jerry anything.
- vsareto 5y ago
  He compared engineers he's worked with to engineers he hasn't worked with (Viaweb) and said they were better. How did he know they were better? Is he just better at assessing engineering talent than the rest of us? You're assuming he knew they were better. Based on all of us (esp. here) not trusting technical interviews to determine engineer quality, I suspect he did not know they were better and was simply trying an off-the-cuff comparison to get Yahoo to acquire both of the companies. What he really gave was an opinion. It wasn't truth.
  - crate_barre 5y ago
    Dude he didn’t literally mean they were better. He gave a sincere compliment to Viaweb (an exaggerated one) as a compelling counterpoint to shift the other’s view. I dunno, the Yahoo guy seemed a little sociopathic for doing this. Reminds me of when Paul McCartney told Michael Jackson he wanted to buy The Beetles catalog, only to have MJ go ahead and buy it instead. Douchey to say the least.
    - vsareto 5y ago
      >I once killed a $125M deal by being “too honest” >“They are hands down better than us." Uh, I'm pretty sure he meant what he said, with the second being a solid assertion. He didn't dance around it, he literally meant they were better.
      - deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
coldtea 5y ago
Integrity is about telling the truth (as you see it), not about doing stuff for the benefit of "your own". In fact the latter can lead to exactly the opposite of integrity.
- vsareto 5y ago
  I wonder how many times there were pep-talks with the LinkExchange engineering team about how everyone was great. Idk, maybe the twitter OP told their engineering team they were worse than Viaweb every day via automated, department-wide emails.
- corpdronejuly 5y ago
  Integrity involves placing our duties to others in the proper order. Sometimes that means doing stuff to benefit "your own." sometimes that means blowing the whistle on something. It really depends on the context.
- torstenvl 5y ago
  Not exactly. Having integrity means being whole, united, and indivisible. That certainly can involve telling the truth, but it's much broader than that. Someone who leads a double life, even if they don't make any commitments about their private behavior and even if they don't lie about it, lacks integrity. Integrity means the opposite of being two-faced. In this case, OP's behavior lacked integrity, even though it was likely honest. Although he was at the Yang meeting as a representative of LinkExchange, he advocated in favor of Viaweb. The forcefulness with which he argued ("your guys are wrong") definitely crossed the line into advocacy, not just an off-hand honest opinion. This set up a conflict within himself (his feelings toward Viaweb vs. his own interests and duties to his partners) as well as a conflict within the LinkExchange team. https://insighttimer.com/consciousleadershipgroup/guided-meditations/creating-wholeness-through-integrity https://insighttimer.com/consciousleadershipgroup/guided-med... https://www.commonsensemedia.org/character-strengths-and-life-skills/what-is-integrity https://www.commonsensemedia.org/character-strengths-and-lif... "the standards of integrity involves regarding internal consistency as a virtue, and suggests that parties holding within themselves apparently conflicting values should account for the discrepancy or alter their beliefs." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrity

Telling the truth isn't throwing anyone under the bus. If "they" are better than "us", that's the truth. Personally, I'd have bought the guy's company just because that's the right sort of engineer I want. Having said that, he wasn't under any obligation to tell Jerry anything.

vsareto 5y ago
He compared engineers he's worked with to engineers he hasn't worked with (Viaweb) and said they were better. How did he know they were better? Is he just better at assessing engineering talent than the rest of us? You're assuming he knew they were better. Based on all of us (esp. here) not trusting technical interviews to determine engineer quality, I suspect he did not know they were better and was simply trying an off-the-cuff comparison to get Yahoo to acquire both of the companies. What he really gave was an opinion. It wasn't truth.
- crate_barre 5y ago
  Dude he didn’t literally mean they were better. He gave a sincere compliment to Viaweb (an exaggerated one) as a compelling counterpoint to shift the other’s view. I dunno, the Yahoo guy seemed a little sociopathic for doing this. Reminds me of when Paul McCartney told Michael Jackson he wanted to buy The Beetles catalog, only to have MJ go ahead and buy it instead. Douchey to say the least.
  - vsareto 5y ago
    >I once killed a $125M deal by being “too honest” >“They are hands down better than us." Uh, I'm pretty sure he meant what he said, with the second being a solid assertion. He didn't dance around it, he literally meant they were better.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]

coldtea 5y ago

Integrity is about telling the truth (as you see it), not about doing stuff for the benefit of "your own". In fact the latter can lead to exactly the opposite of integrity.

vsareto 5y ago
I wonder how many times there were pep-talks with the LinkExchange engineering team about how everyone was great. Idk, maybe the twitter OP told their engineering team they were worse than Viaweb every day via automated, department-wide emails.
corpdronejuly 5y ago
Integrity involves placing our duties to others in the proper order. Sometimes that means doing stuff to benefit "your own." sometimes that means blowing the whistle on something. It really depends on the context.
torstenvl 5y ago
Not exactly. Having integrity means being whole, united, and indivisible. That certainly can involve telling the truth, but it's much broader than that. Someone who leads a double life, even if they don't make any commitments about their private behavior and even if they don't lie about it, lacks integrity. Integrity means the opposite of being two-faced. In this case, OP's behavior lacked integrity, even though it was likely honest. Although he was at the Yang meeting as a representative of LinkExchange, he advocated in favor of Viaweb. The forcefulness with which he argued ("your guys are wrong") definitely crossed the line into advocacy, not just an off-hand honest opinion. This set up a conflict within himself (his feelings toward Viaweb vs. his own interests and duties to his partners) as well as a conflict within the LinkExchange team. https://insighttimer.com/consciousleadershipgroup/guided-meditations/creating-wholeness-through-integrity https://insighttimer.com/consciousleadershipgroup/guided-med... https://www.commonsensemedia.org/character-strengths-and-life-skills/what-is-integrity https://www.commonsensemedia.org/character-strengths-and-lif... "the standards of integrity involves regarding internal consistency as a virtue, and suggests that parties holding within themselves apparently conflicting values should account for the discrepancy or alter their beliefs." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrity