3 ms·

In my view, admitting that you "might have a stupid question" is not disingenuous, it's a form of self-depreciation that disarms people and relaxes the room. I

by gitgud 5y ago

In my view, admitting that you "might have a stupid question" is not disingenuous, it's a form of self-depreciation that disarms people and relaxes the room. It's important to treat yourself with respect, but people also respect when you admit that you don't know something simple.

perl4ever 5y ago
It's "self deprecation", depreciation is something different. I'm not sure what kind of audience you think it works on. I tend to get (particularly from people under 40) one of two inappropriate reactions to reflexive self deprecation - either exaggerated sympathy for my plight, or treating it as an exposed weakness to attack.
- gitgud 5y ago
  Whoops, yes I meant self-deprecation (I added an 'i' by accident) Yes, some people will pity you, or treat it as a weakness. But having the courage to admit when you don't know something is a valuable trait that most people (in my experience) respect. Also if you demonstrate your knowledge in other areas and contribute value to the meeting, people tend to forgive a few stupid questions in another area.
  - perl4ever 5y ago
    But "courage" is exactly the sort of response that bugs me. It's not courage, or passive-aggressiveness, it's etiquette. Responding with praise, or pity, or a put-down, it's all a failure to appreciate the formula for what I consider basic etiquette. It's like when I'm having a meeting with my manager and I want to talk, so I start, they stop, I apologize for interrupting, and they say no, no, go on. I assume there is no emotional drama going on. If they really want to continue talking, they can do so. That's why I apologize and pause. I'm not sorry, but I need to show appropriate deference. It would be unfortunate if someone was building up resentment because they're not on the same wavelength about appropriate behavior. The purpose of etiquette seems to me to provide a formula to negotiate common situations without having to navigate emotional complexities. But when different people have different rules, there's not much that can be resolved.
- Gareth321 5y ago
  It's all about reading the room. If you're talking to a hostile crowd you're not going to expose weakness. I hope that most of these internal alignment meetings are not hostile, and are instead conducted with the intent to best deliver value to the business. In these instances, I have found comments like "I'm sorry to ask a basic question here..." work well to explain that I probably don't have as much domain experience as the others in the room; that I'm not trying to school them on their domain; and that I'm simply trying to gain understanding so that I can contribute.
  - cutemonster 5y ago
    "Basic questions" sounds nice :-) more nice than "stupid questions" I think. (Probably the questions aren't literally stupid, or the person maybe would never have been hired in the first place)
  - perl4ever 5y ago
    "I'm sorry to ask a basic question here..." Sure...but I think that an insight that I've gained is that this is an example of a formula which doesn't really communicate or explain all the things you mention. You aren't sorry, you don't know that your question is basic, and you don't think you're wasting peoples' time. In effect, it's a "pointer" to a bunch of things, so it only works with people that are conditioned to such things and have them in their memory. One of the things you mention, "not trying to school them" sounds to me like deference, and I don't think deference can be quickly established without a formula. Like a salute, you have to do something arbitrary in a mutually understood way.
- gmac 5y ago
  I think some of this might be cultural. For example, I think self-deprecation may be in general more widely appreciated in the UK than the US (though perhaps this is gradually changing). I’m reminded of Arthur Dent (British) in the Hitchhiker’s Guide telling Zaphod, modestly, “oh, it was nothing” about something great he did, and Zaphod responding along the lines of “oh, it was nothing? In that case forget it then”, which was not at all what Arthur intended.
  - perl4ever 5y ago
    Well, I'm American, and there were definitely bits in that book that totally failed to translate for me. For instance, "Ford Prefect" seemed like a perfectly normal name - IMO the American edition should've changed it to "Ford Escort". But being self-deprecating was not one of them. I feel like I'm surrounded by Zaphods, or something, and I'm not sure when it happened.

by gitgud 5y ago

perl4ever 5y ago

It's "self deprecation", depreciation is something different. I'm not sure what kind of audience you think it works on. I tend to get (particularly from people under 40) one of two inappropriate reactions to reflexive self deprecation - either exaggerated sympathy for my plight, or treating it as an exposed weakness to attack.

gitgud 5y ago
Whoops, yes I meant self-deprecation (I added an 'i' by accident) Yes, some people will pity you, or treat it as a weakness. But having the courage to admit when you don't know something is a valuable trait that most people (in my experience) respect. Also if you demonstrate your knowledge in other areas and contribute value to the meeting, people tend to forgive a few stupid questions in another area.
- perl4ever 5y ago
  But "courage" is exactly the sort of response that bugs me. It's not courage, or passive-aggressiveness, it's etiquette. Responding with praise, or pity, or a put-down, it's all a failure to appreciate the formula for what I consider basic etiquette. It's like when I'm having a meeting with my manager and I want to talk, so I start, they stop, I apologize for interrupting, and they say no, no, go on. I assume there is no emotional drama going on. If they really want to continue talking, they can do so. That's why I apologize and pause. I'm not sorry, but I need to show appropriate deference. It would be unfortunate if someone was building up resentment because they're not on the same wavelength about appropriate behavior. The purpose of etiquette seems to me to provide a formula to negotiate common situations without having to navigate emotional complexities. But when different people have different rules, there's not much that can be resolved.
Gareth321 5y ago
It's all about reading the room. If you're talking to a hostile crowd you're not going to expose weakness. I hope that most of these internal alignment meetings are not hostile, and are instead conducted with the intent to best deliver value to the business. In these instances, I have found comments like "I'm sorry to ask a basic question here..." work well to explain that I probably don't have as much domain experience as the others in the room; that I'm not trying to school them on their domain; and that I'm simply trying to gain understanding so that I can contribute.
- cutemonster 5y ago
  "Basic questions" sounds nice :-) more nice than "stupid questions" I think. (Probably the questions aren't literally stupid, or the person maybe would never have been hired in the first place)
- perl4ever 5y ago
  "I'm sorry to ask a basic question here..." Sure...but I think that an insight that I've gained is that this is an example of a formula which doesn't really communicate or explain all the things you mention. You aren't sorry, you don't know that your question is basic, and you don't think you're wasting peoples' time. In effect, it's a "pointer" to a bunch of things, so it only works with people that are conditioned to such things and have them in their memory. One of the things you mention, "not trying to school them" sounds to me like deference, and I don't think deference can be quickly established without a formula. Like a salute, you have to do something arbitrary in a mutually understood way.
gmac 5y ago
I think some of this might be cultural. For example, I think self-deprecation may be in general more widely appreciated in the UK than the US (though perhaps this is gradually changing). I’m reminded of Arthur Dent (British) in the Hitchhiker’s Guide telling Zaphod, modestly, “oh, it was nothing” about something great he did, and Zaphod responding along the lines of “oh, it was nothing? In that case forget it then”, which was not at all what Arthur intended.
- perl4ever 5y ago
  Well, I'm American, and there were definitely bits in that book that totally failed to translate for me. For instance, "Ford Prefect" seemed like a perfectly normal name - IMO the American edition should've changed it to "Ford Escort". But being self-deprecating was not one of them. I feel like I'm surrounded by Zaphods, or something, and I'm not sure when it happened.