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Stop Telling Everyone What You Do for a Living
- robga 4y agohttps://archive.is/MDbhu https://archive.is/MDbhu I’m in the “introduces himself by his field, leaving out his title and firm name” camp. When possible, I leave out the field too.
- helsinkiandrew 4y agoIs that a vague "I'm in publishing" or more closer to what you do day to day: "I'm a book editor/printer/book publicist/typesetter" etc. - I find the latter is more of interest.
- deebosong 4y agoSame. Only people in my field will know the title (and whether they care or not is another story). If I keep it to the broad job function that layfolks will understand, the topic usually quickly shifts to the next thing if it doesn't strike a chord with the other party. And that's cool. It's all just small talk jumpoffs until something both clicks for the two people in the convo.
- croisillon 4y agoEspecially since, when I am more explicit, people start believing something else and correcting them is the most boring thing.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- blitzar 4y agoI'm in Waste Management.
- oesexe 4y agoCould you elaborate a bit on that? Personally I think waste management is one of the coolest things to do. Everyone generates waste, and it is fwcking so much up for us. An old Indian word for a sweeper (lowest caste sweeping roads with a broom) is Mahader - meaning ’the Greatest’. I’ve done work at waste water treatment facilities, land fills, incinerators, to name a few horrible places; and as terrible the surroundings may be, it grants a special self esteem, wealth and ‘ordinary’ status will never fully give you.
- blitzar 4y agoThe Sopranos: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FyvUFmm3h54 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FyvUFmm3h54
- fullsend 4y agoWe spend tons of time at work and it’s where we got a lot of our value in our lives. I recently went to a dinner party where there were lots of people like me who wanted to talk about work and it was refreshing after spending so long talking to people who hate their jobs. Grass is greener and all that.
- japanuspus 4y agoThink there are large regional differences here. My experience from living two years in Boulder, CO a while back was that the first intro question was always "what did you do in the weekend". I'm Danish, so it was not until I started discussing plans for moving to one of the coasts that I realized that I should expect another life there.
- j7ake 4y agoA better way to frame the question of “what do you do for a living” is “what do you for leisure?” Or “how have you been spending your free time lately ?” Or “what have you been up to lately?”
- Tor3 4y agoI for one wouldn't enjoy being asked any of those questions.
- moffkalast 4y agoNobody expects the Spanish inquisition.
- Starwatcher2001 4y ago“what have you been up to lately?” Be a little careful with this one. I asked a similarly worded question at an event over Easter got the answer "Burying my husband." Thankfully the lady was good natured about it and we managed to pull the conversation around, but for a minute or two I thought I'd stepped on a landmine. I think in future I might lead with, "what do you enjoy doing?"
- cbg0 4y agoTelling people what you do is more than just telling them your job title, it's also a great opportunity to tell them what motivates you about your job, and thus showing some of your values, which is pretty important when meeting new people and allows you to more easily form bonds with those that share similar values.
- Manjuuu 4y agoNo it's not, no one cares about your job. And having a job that reflect your values is not the norm. People want to know about YOU, not talk about what you do to get paid. Your hobbies for example are way more interesting.
- it_citizen 4y ago> No it's not, no one cares about your job. While I agree with the sentiment of this article, I strongly disagree that no one cares. As a curious person, I often have a ton of questions about someone's occupation. For me, it is fun to hear people talk about their job. I just don't like asking about occupation early-on in the conversation because it sometimes feel like socially categorizing people.
- Manjuuu 4y agoSure, I do too when meeting someone with a non-standard job or a job that could be interesting from some peculiar point of view, but most jobs are definitely not that interesting, most are really just an exchange of time for money.
- it_citizen 4y agoI don't know, I cannot think of a lot of jobs that would be completely uninteresting to me. What would they be? Even if the job doesn't have a technical angle that interests you, you can always talk about the human aspect of things: frustration with their management / the funny things that happened to them / stories they heard from their customers / something in their job they are passionate about / how they feel about their job / the things they have learnt while working in their domain. I think I am using those conversations to try to imagine what my life might have been if software engineer didn't exist. It is pretty much the only thing I was really good at. I am insecure about how much harder my life might have been without it.
- bl4ckm0r3 4y agoTo be honest I have experienced this a lot in San Francisco, where people ask first what do you do, second where do you work and then what's your name...in Europe it really isn't the central part of the conversation and most likely the job doesn't even get mentioned in a dinner or a normal conversation with someone you met in a bar/club/wherever. It always shocked me how "what you do" defines the start of the conversation over there.
- andreiii 4y agoI think that depends on the city. In very international cities like London or Brussels you usually start the conversation with "so what brought you hear?" knowing that most of the time is the job. So you try to understand what someone is doing. I find that a very common opener with someone you're just meating.
- johnchristopher 4y agoOT: Somehow, the spellchecker made a very ominous number on your comment.
- eloisant 4y agoI'm going to use the verb "to meat with someone" from now on.
- beambot 4y agoI like that! Given how commonplace virtual "meet"ings are these days, I rather like the idea of a new homophonic homonym for in person "meat"ings.
- B1FF_PSUVM 4y agoBring there ear. (Yes.)
- tgv 4y agoIt definitely is part of the conversation in (parts of) Europe, but not very central. I see it as part of finding common ground to continue the conversation.
- danjc 4y agoIdeally, at some point in life you've reached "self-actualisation" and what you do for work is meaningful and important to you.
- Manjuuu 4y agoIf you are someone that tells other people what he does for a living and talk about work when meeting new people, stop doing that and reflect on why it's so hard to come up with something alternative[1]. No, it's not because a good chunk of your time is devoted to work or something about values reflected in the work you do(there is not enough "space" for that at work). Only insufferable humans cares about your title or the company you work for. [1] I tried, it's hard.
- krisoft 4y ago> there is not enough "space" for that at work It sounds like you are over generalising from a limited set of experiences. > reflect on why it's so hard to come up with something alternative Same with this one. I for one find it easy to talk about things other than my work, but also find it that people enjoy when I tell them about my field and have a ton of questions. The key is to live an interesting life and be a good story teller. These are both things which can be improved on step by step if that is your desire.
- Manjuuu 4y ago> It sounds like you are over generalising from a limited set of experiences. Definitely not, having a job where your values can shine is not the norm. And I don't know what your field is but most jobs, especially in the software development space are nothing to write home about or worthy of discussion with people outside the software bubble. As always, individual experiences could sometimes deviate from the norm but that doesn't change the fact that most jobs are of little interest to other people. And reflect negatively on one's character when used to project status, like a lot of people do.
- rationalfaith 4y ago[dead]
- medion 4y agoI stopped asking people what they do, and instead ask ‘what are you about’ - always gets an interesting answer, after the initial perplexity of the question.
- cout 4y agoI like to say "tell me a story". What kind of story, you ask? Any story. I like true stories, but you can make something up too. The conversation ends up a lot less awkward than going off script after talking about what you do for a living.
- SturgeonsLaw 4y agoI would hate this lol. Something about the way my brain works is that I just can't come up with something when put on the spot like that. I've done all sorts of interesting shit over my lifetime, some of which I think only a very small percentage of the population would have done, my mind is constantly running along tangents and my thoughts straddle the technical, the creative, the dreamlike, the concrete, and everything in between, but if I was asked to come up with a story out of the blue, the wheels would grind to a halt and I'd be a stammering mess. However I know some people with whom this opener would really light a spark.
- rationalist 4y agoTo me, asking for a story would come off as being asked to entertain you. If you asked, "Anything interesting going on?" It sounds like that would accomplish what you're seeking and still be open-ended.
- Irishsteve 4y agoIn my experience this is something that pops up where people emigrate for high paying jobs; (Relative to average salary). It involves stating the type of position someone has, the tier company someone works at, which somehow demonstrates the persons value = (position * tier). Then because this is the norm people this is how people befriend each other, or how they attract love interests. I'd just chalk it up to human nature.
- andrewstuart 4y agoI like telling people I’m a programmer. There’s lots of less exciting jobs.
- sc2862 4y agoWhen I tell people that, they assume I'm somewhere on the deeper end of the autism spectrum.
- mordae 4y agoThat's part of the fun, isn't it? If they can't appreciate my job, I will simply did into their so deep that by the end of the conversation, I have rough idea of what function does their job perform and where are the pain points for them. I usually weave in some personal job-related stories for them to relate to my job a little bit better. Usually they are left stumped, because nobody ever digs and then gets them. Especially not an Aspie programmer. It's also easy to find some of their efforts you appreciate and then compliment them on those.
- moffkalast 4y agoWell they're usually probably not wrong in that assumption.
- Tor3 4y agoIn my (at this time very long) experience people don't know what a programmer does, unless they're programmers themselves. In fact, whatever I say about my work ("programmer", "data processing", "computer-based analysis", "(whatever)" they really have no idea anyway. It's much easier to answer "I'm a carpenter".
- sh4rks 4y agoIn my experience, anything computers related = "IT guy" or "Computer Guy" I think it's better to state the field you're in rather than your job title. For example, if you work for a bank, say "finance".
- adrianh 4y agoI stopped doing this when a person here in Amsterdam bluntly responded: "You Americans! That's all you ever talk about is work!" Haven't asked anybody an open-ended "So what do you do" in the five years since, and it feels refreshing.
- jackstraw14 4y agoAgreed that non-work stuff is usually better for casual discussion, but I really dislike this position of "work? surely you can talk about something more interesting!" because for some people that is all they want to talk about, and everyone's definition of "work" is different. It's more important to listen to people than criticize their general topic of conversation, imo. Based on personal experience this is probably nicer in theory than practice, but it's still what I tend to work toward these days.
- gitanovic 4y agoInstead of "So what do you do" you can always ask "So what do you like doing" ... that might give the person the chance to still talk about work if he/she/they/it/es want to :)
- dangwhy 4y ago> "You Americans! That's all you ever talk about is work!" What do they talk about instead?
- iamben 4y agoI don't think the biggest problem is leading with the "what do you do?" question, or even being a person that somewhat defines their life around their work or career. I think the bigger problem is a lot of people are inherently selfish. "What do you do" or even "what do you do for fun" tends to be a leading question because you want to talk about yourself, what you do, what you like or understand what you can get out of it. I don't think there's anything wrong with being at a conference, say, where we're all somewhat defined by a subject or interest and someone asks what you do. It's just very dull when it feels like they're aching for you to finish so they can explain how great they are. Or they're immediately angling for the opportunity to pitch to you, or make money from you, or tell you how further ahead in life they are. IMO, by all means lead with a question about someone's work. But take a genuine interest in their job and their life. Ask questions. See if you can go for ten minutes without mentioning yourself. If they're not a fan of their role and you're genuinely taking an interest in them, it's incredibly easy to pivot into "what do you do when you're not studying gorillas in the Congo?!"
- dogb3rt 4y agoVery often those people just wait until you finish talking to start talking about themselves. Once I attended a party with my brother's group of friends. I decided to do a little experiment. I asked people about them and I listened to get to know them, but i talked about myself only when asked directly. For two days no one bothered to ask me what I do for a living or what are my hobbies.
- theshrike79 4y agoThis is pretty much an American thing, the rest of the world don't build their identity on their profession or their political party affiliation that much. I've got close friends I've known for 20 years and I don't really know what they do for a living except for a vague idea of the field they're in. I don't care, since that doesn't define who they are.
- oh_sigh 4y agoThis is pretty much a European thing, thinking if Americans do it and you don't, the rest of the world doesn't either. I'm 100% positive, through first hand experience, that both Indian and Chinese society put a heavy emphasis on the type of work one does. To the point where marriage may simply be out of the question for an individual if they don't hold a good enough job.
- 8jef 4y agoFair point. Maybe we could correlate _people caring to prominently mention job in casual conversations_ with _people living in highly competitive environments_ and be done with it. Or maybe, instead of trying to immediately show off next time one meets some new possibly interesting person, one could just listen first. And punctuate its own silences with smiles, and kind gestures.
- theshrike79 4y agoYou're right. I didn't think about Chinese or Indian cultures at all. I stand corrected.
- netfortius 4y agoAfter over a year and a half in Europe, traveling through quite a few countries, East and West alike, I can say that I have not had one single instance when - unlike the US, from where I was coming - anyone would ask me this type of question, especially at the beginning of a conversation, and unless necessary for some prior discussion justifiable reasons. In fact, in the first few months, lacking this American way of introduction, I was inadvertently delivering a professional "elevator speech", myself, just to embarrassingly realize how out of place such topic was, if not purposely asked for.
- seydor 4y agoPretty much every other kind of question is politically loaded. Your love for roasted lamb may be repulsive to a vegan. Your job being a job provided plausible deniability for anything.
- BigCryo 4y agoI don't do anything for a living.. I'm retired. I Make little videos and I rejoice that I'm no longer in this rat race
- rcme 4y agoWow... I had no idea people put so much thought into the most basic, mundane small talk.
- johndunne 4y agoIt’s actually a craft… the Brits are masters of it… small talk to fill a moment, small talk to sniff your status, small talk to gauge how tolerant you are to off colour banter…
- plaguepilled 4y agoSo if I have this right, its bad to tell people what you do for a living, but its OK to tell people to stop telling people what they do for a living? What I find especially annoying is that the fact that 'what do you do' is being asked by someone else - so it follows that if they were not interested in that topic, they would ask another question. Which means it's not the social responsibility of the person answering. But wait, also, there's nothing cringey about someone having a hard time relaxing and talking more broadly. Everyone has a hard time in SOME social setting, and its not a big deal. This article reads like a designer clothes ad - making you feel bad to make you buy (or do) something. Now I'm done whining, I think a much more constructive framing would be a title/topic like "Asking what people do for work isn't always best. Here are some alternative icebreakers". Or "Fit the mood - making smalltalk without work". That would have been a much better article.
- jiggawatts 4y ago[flagged]
- kollayolla 4y ago[flagged]
- 8jef 4y ago> Cavemen who weren't curious about the capabilities and fitness of other men in their group didn't get to pass on their genes to us. Source please.
- astrange 4y agoAs usual for evo psych, this is clearly just made up, since not every country asks each other what their job is. (America does, I think China might, but other first world countries don't.)
- ogou 4y ago"What's the nature of your excellence?" I don't use it very often, but when I do I always get a great response.
- subroutine 4y agoInstead you should ask what don't you do for a living? Anything is better than talking about my job at MIT studying the black hole physics of advanced NLP models tasked with designing CRISPR experiments for enhancing woolly mammoth meat. I also collect rare trinkets and enjoy seeing the sights of different places.
- russnes 4y agoWhat people do for a living takes up about half of their waking life (and they probably dream about it too), so it will tell you so much about the person. Personally I love my job and what I do, so I really want to talk about matters at least related to it because my life does revolve around it indeed. So establishing some common ground with the other person can really help to start the conversation. But of course the conversation doesn't have to specifically be about either job through progression.
- JohnFen 4y ago> it will tell you so much about the person But only if you know the person well enough to have the context of it. What a person's job says about them is very different, for example, if they love their job vs hating their job.
- DougN7 4y agoLove or hate the job, knowing what it is gives you insights/guesses into skillsets, education level, economic level, possibly the type of people they mingle with, etc, etc.
- strken 4y agoSecret life hack: you don't have to answer "what do you do?" by talking about your job. You can talk about literally anything else that you do, preferably something that seems relevant to the person in front of you, and turn it into a more interesting two-sided conversation.
- flybrand 4y agoMy wife and I’s favorite game when meeting new people is to try and go as long as possible without talking about our work or asking about theirs. It makes it so much more interesting when careers / jobs finally enter the dialog.
- clnq 4y agoAround a decade ago, I stopped asking people the basic questions, like what they do, where they're from, how old they are, or their gender and pronouns when that is unclear. I find that it's irrelevant and will bias the relationship for no good reason. I had a good friend with whom I mostly kept in touch over the phone and online for many years, and I didn't know their name until they died and I got a call from their relatives. I still don't know what their profession was. Just connect and engage with people, and have fun. It's a lot easier to make friends when you drop these arbitrary filters of age, profession, place of origin, gender, and so on. And in some ways, in the time I've spent not trying to get those details anymore, they have become irrelevant to me.
- tpoacher 4y agoYou still need a topic though. It's one thing to advise people what to avoid, and a completely different thing to give ideas what they could talk about to break the ice instead. Otherwise it's like: "So, do you like coffee?" "No." "Ah. ... [tumbleweed] ... so, what do you do for a living?"
- cj 4y agoNot to sound insensitive, but how is it possible to consider someone a good friend without knowing the person’s name?
- latexr 4y agoAaron Swartz proposed “what have you been thinking about lately” as the smalltalk question. http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/smalltalkq http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/smalltalkq
- ModernMech 4y agoThat’s a pretty invasive question to ask a stranger though. I don’t like to share my thoughts with strangers, as they are much too personal. Someone asks me what I’m thinking lately, and I immediately have to deflect or think of lies to tell in order to not have to say what I’ve been thinking. I don’t want to stand there lying or telling the truth. Much easier to talk about something that isn’t so personal.
- latexr 4y agoFrom Aaron’s post: > [T]he question is extremely open-ended. The answer could be a book, a movie, a relationship, a class, a job, a hobby, etc. Notice how “job” is in there. You can still give a non personal answer if you wish.
- ModernMech 4y agoI appreciate it's open ended, and one can answer however they please. But faced with this question, I can honestly say I would have to lie. It's like answering the question "How's it going?" with "fine, how about you?" Sure, one can go into how it's really going with a stranger, or they can just respond with pleasantries and small talk. So if you want to get deep into a conversation with someone about what they've really been thinking about lately, it's not going to happen as a repones to this conversation starter. At best, I think this kind of conversation starter is so open-ended, it's on par with "what's up?" "What have you been thinking about lately?" "Eh. Not much, you?"
- TRiG_Ireland 4y agoA lot of people in the comments are suggesting alternative small talk, like "tell me what you did this weekend" or "tell me what you're about (?!)". I don't understand the need for any of that. You're meeting in some social environment: talk about that. If it's a dinner, talk about the food, or the host. If someone has just given a speech, talk about that. If you're at a sporting event, or a mediaeval reenactment event, talk about that. In extremis, talk about the weather. There's no need to either deliver or request an elevator pitch of any sort, on any subject, is there?
- nemo44x 4y agoFinally, a normal comment. Reading these intricate strategies on how to talk with someone - it’s like being at a recovering social recluse convention sponsored by Social Neurotics Inc.
- impendia 4y agoI moved from San Francisco, where it was common to ask people "wnat do you do?", to South Carolina, where it's considered a little bit rude. For me, it was a painful transition; I no longer find it easy to get into enjoyable conversations with new people. I've always found it difficult to talk about, e.g. food. "Isn't this food great?" "Yeah, it's delicious"! Similarly with the weather, or any other conversation where you're basically just repeating what's obvious to both of you. Of course some people prefer it this way, and genuinely enjoy small talk -- they don't feel a need to be talking "about something". Far be it from me to piss on their parade. But if you don't understand this need, consider yourself lucky.
- TRiG_Ireland 4y agoGenerally, small talk serves to get people started: it makes the conversational juices flow. More interesting subjects may well then arise. (Or not, in which case, the brief conversation comes to a natural end, and you talk to someone else.)
- leroy-is-here 4y agoHere’s a trick: allow yourself to notice things and then comment on them. That’s what people want. A few examples: * Damn, she made these biscuits big as hell. Love these biscuits. * Not sure what 36 is doing on the sideline like that. * Hey man, that hat looks baller. * Yeah, last weekend I saw a dude in stilts
- retube 4y agoCouldn't agree more. I absolutely hate being asked what I do for a living. I spend a large part of my life doing it, I don't want to spend my free time talking about it, or trying to explain it. It doesn't define me. It doesn't mean anything, I do it to get paid. The end. I always make a point of never asking people what they do for the same reason. Indeed there are people I have now known for years and I have no idea what they do for a living.
- austin-cheney 4y agoI write software. The end. Its boring, even to other people that write software. At previous employers I was more specific about what I do for a living: walk around a park, go to phone meetings, stare out a window. In those cases I generally only wrote software as a personal hobby.
- HeyLaughingBoy 4y agoA little more context can make it interesting to others though. I used to struggle to explain embedded software to non-technical people (and even to technical ones!), so instead I started saying "I write software that controls mailing machines" or "I write software for medical instruments." Having a real-world "anchor" that they can relate to helps others understand what you do and if they want to continue a conversation along those lines.
- Cxckers 4y agoI don't mean to be antagonistic, but could this just be due to poor job satisfaction on your side. There is nothing wrong with not loving your job. Maybe you use it as a means to an end but I personally really enjoy talking about what I do for a job because I love my job
- somewhereoutth 4y agoIn the UK we do this as part of status negotiation - the second question anyone asks (after whats your name?) is what do you do? Then we can decide whether we are above or below the other person in the status hierarchy, which is roughly as follows: - Architect - Artist/Designer/Creative - Lawyer/Doctor/Teacher - Executive/Manager - ... - ... - Bar staff - Engineer - Software Engineer - Waiter - Driver - Cleaner
- morelikeborelax 4y agoYou forgot brain surgeon. Of course it's not rocket science is it.
- somewhereoutth 4y agoProbably with Doctor. An actual scientist might come above Lawyer/Doctor (and below Artist/Designer), but this is a rather recent upwards move, as it became cooler to be smart (note this does not apply to engineers, who are looked down upon by scientists anyway)
- hotpotamus 4y agoIt's a reference to a Mitchell and Webb sketch about the status games that people play around employment. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=THNPmhBl-8I https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=THNPmhBl-8I
- somewhereoutth 4y agoOh I missed the reference! Yes great sketch, and exactly what we are talking about here.
- ry8806 4y agofantastic reference! made me chuckle
- Manjuuu 4y ago
- rationalfaith 4y ago[dead]
- version_five 4y agoWhen I did my PhD I hated it when (most) people asked about my research. It's not because I wasn't interested, it's because I'm really interested and was (still am) bad at giving concise summaries, so I felt like people who really didn't care and wouldn't listen to the answer were asking me to embark on a long explanation that required a bunch of preamble etc, just in order to make conversation. Anyway, I feel largely the same about work. I love talking about what I do, but not with people who aren't listening and who are just asking to form an opinion of my social status. So 9 times out of 10 I just sort of mumble something and talk about something else, just like in grad school.
- chakintosh 4y agoI'm in the same boat. But I usually just say I draw rectangles on a screen.
- johndunne 4y agoTell me more…
- chakintosh 4y agoWell, I'm a UX Designer.
- dspillett 4y agoMy go-to answer for “what do you do for a living?” is “as little as I can get away with”.
- icedchai 4y ago"I'm a professional Zoom meeting attender. Occasionally I write code."
- HeyLaughingBoy 4y agoTo this day, my wife reminds me that was the first question her mother ever asked me and my answer was "as little as possible."
- Gordonjcp 4y agoYou can learn social skills. This will allow you to scale your response to the general tone of the conversation. Let me pick three examples from my own job: "So what do you do?" 1 - "I work for the fire brigade, in the technical bit, I'm not a firefighter. It's good fun though, you get to go and play in the fire station every day!" 2 - "I work on communications equipment for the fire brigade, all the radios, phones, networking stuff, that kind of thing" 3 - "I look after all the paging, radios, phones, networking, control rooms and anything else with a network connection for the third biggest Fire and Rescue Service in the world. It's pretty involved, with a lot of responsibility."
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- Havoc 4y agoAs a side note WSJ making you agree to their cookie/data collection stuff before you can see the banner saying it's paywalled seems very dark pattern-y
- xn 4y agoI wish people would talk about their work more. There's so much to learn about how different industries function that's invisible to outsiders. I don't want to hear about office politics, but I want to hear about your suppliers and customers, how do you decide what to sell, what to buy vs build, what weird regulations or norms exist in your industry, who are the experts in your industry and how did they become experts. The productive part of our days are at least as interesting as the leisure parts.
- rationalist 4y agoIIRC, the first season of Undercover Boss was more about what workers did behind the scenes, but then it devolved into emotional stories (which office politics would probably fall under). The crowds don't want to be enlightened, they want to be entertained.
- fxtentacle 4y ago"I approximate high-dimensional continuous probability distributions, and you?" (which, BTW, is training neutral networks to predict float numbers) I always thought it's a great question to ask because if someone is doing something for 8 hours a day, I'd assume (or hope?) that they'll at least enjoy parts of it. Or else they would have switched jobs a long time ago - or so I thought.
- snapcaster 4y agoi hope you don't actually say this. Cringed really hard just reading it
- t43562 4y agoWhy are you talking to them? Is it to have a pleasant time? I'm going to assume that. This means you both go away feeling slightly positive about your chat. There's no way of knowing for sure that your question will be one the other party wants to answer so it's always going to be some kind of stab in the dark and you just have to interpret the reply and move the conversation on to other more neutral things (in the UK weather is one) until you find something they like talking about. You encourage them to talk about that a bit and talk a bit yourself. The main thing is not to persist with a subject that they dismiss - or any subject about yourself too long. Then let other people into the conversation. If you go into a conversation with someone and you have any prejudicial reaction to their looks or what they say then you'll probably mirror it. If you make yourself internally respect them regardless of what they do or look like (or earn) then it will show in your words. Disrespect will show and screw it all up.
- barrysteve 4y agoWhy is the WSJ telling me what to do? You stop telling people to do stuff! I come for news, not to be preached AT. The news has this authoritative Father-like tone lately. It's unearned and patronizing.
- cuttysnark 4y agoPersonally, I can't think of a more likely-to-tell-everyone-in-the-room profession than a journalist.
- barrysteve 4y agoYeah, news. If I want a priest to govern my behaviour, I know where the Cathedral is. A journalist is not filling in part time for a Bishop.
- cafard 4y agoA housemate many years ago was laid off from a government agency. He said that it was a sure conversation-killer when someone would ask what he did and he would reply, Nothing. I don't talk about work--theirs or mine--with my neighbors, yet curiously I know what an awful lot of the adults on my block do for a living.
- no1groyp 4y agoWagies are not okay
- schwartzworld 4y agoMy favorite party game is getting couples to explain what each other does for a living. Not just the title, but the actual day-to-day job. You'd be surprised how many people don't really know what their partner does all day long.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- throwaway22032 4y agoIf someone asks me what I do, then I respond with the primary focus in my life outside of family. If that's work for you, that's work for you. It's not for everyone. If you're not proud of what you do for most of the time - I'm sorry. That sounds like a really horrific, genuinely awful place to be in.
- greenhearth 4y ago"Like, uhh... computer stuff"
- mock-possum 4y agoIf you don’t want to talk about work then that’s on you. Plenty of people are fine with it.
- bradlys 4y agoI don’t tell everyone but I still ask the question. Often, it’s a good signal if we’re going to get along. Also, as someone who is in the dating market - it’s one of the first questions I ask because outside of physical attraction, how much money they make is the easiest dealbreaker to filter on. If they’re not even remotely close in my socioeconomic bracket - there’s no point in pursuing anything romantic and I’ll make sure to push the interaction into a more friendly area when that comes up. I’m a man btw. Money matters when you’re buying $3m homes.
- kashunstva 4y agoI’m about as evasive as possible when people seem to be transitioning to asking that question. It doesn’t come from a place of genuine interest but from status negotiation. The interlocutor is trying to sort out relative status.
- 1letterunixname 4y agoI hate people asking what I do for a living, especially women, because it's code for "If you're rich, I'll pretend to like you." To reveal the real character of a person, there are 3 ways: go to war with them, let them believe they have an untouchable advantage, or alcohol. 5 years after my mom had a stroke, he moved out and served her papers while she was visiting her dying mother. Shortly after and during the pandemic, his mother was dying and he stole roughly $1m USD from his family. I blame myself for not being more suspicious of him and allowing my mom to rush into retirement and cohabitation out of the area. --- I'm also annoyed by the assumption that I must work for someone other than myself: it's orthodoxy of the meek who play it safe while handing piles of treasure over to others. Outside of work, who really wants to be reminded of or talk about it? It's one of the problems of attempting to socialize with coworkers: they can't leave the office at the office. When I'm not working, I don't want homework. --- PS: Never get involved with investors, cofounders, or spouses you don't completely trust and know for years. It's marriage. Keep liabilities away at arm's reach at least.