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How you are being perceived is based on the assumptions and character of your manager. Early in my career I remember had a manager that brought it up to me in

by makach 3y ago

How you are being perceived is based on the assumptions and character of your manager. Early in my career I remember had a manager that brought it up to me in a 1-2-1 that I was "the negative nancy", which I found strange because I strive to be honest and try to do what is best for the projects I am working on, I never thought of myself as someone like that. I didn't change despite getting those comment, and it kept being brought up in my 1-2-1. I was producing beyond my expectations so nothing was formally written down. It was just the impression. After a while my manager moved on and a new manager stepped in. And from then on in my following 1-2-1 I was getting feedback contrary to my usual feedback. Now I got told that I was a very positive(!) and valuable member of the team making a positive impact. You yourself rarely change, but the first impression you give away combined with your managers capabilities and characteristics can very much color how other perceive you. Managers need to stop using words such as difficult and use their tools and skills to do their job and work with understanding and resolving challenges.

agentultra 3y ago
This, 100%. To use a malapropism: impressions are 9/10ths of the law. If you give your manager an impression that you are one of these stereotypes, you’ll never shake it. You’ll always be seen that way. And because people rarely change, or at least it takes a while, the only real way to escape such an impression is to find a different manager.
coffeefirst 3y ago
Yes. I hate this article. It presupposes "the norm" doesn't need anything special and everyone else is "difficult." But supporting people is the manager's job. You can't do that if you pathologize literally everything messy or nuanced. Some of these categories are people learning to estimate for the first time, or responding to pressure to say "yes" to impossible things by saying "yes" to impossible things. Also notably absent is any mention of air cover. There's usually a reason people get burned out or start sounding the alarm about a project. But rather than get to the bottom of that and help with the root causes, in every single of one of these cases he assumes the problem is basically their personalities.
- commandlinefan 3y ago
  > everyone else is "difficult." Programmers find themselves in the position of "managing" the most difficult possible sort of subordinate - the computer itself. It doesn't care what you want. It doesn't care about your deadlines. It does _exactly_ what you told it to do, and if you told it the wrong thing, it will do that anyway and it's entirely your problem to figure out which part was wrong. No "people manager" could put up with such an obstinate employee, but doing so is literally our job description, and occasionally we have to report back up that we still haven't figured out why the computer is being "difficult" - and then we get blamed for that difficulty.
wink 3y ago
I think there's a different problem with exactly this stereotype and people throwing it around a bit, even if you are not just being negative, but offering criticism including some solutions. I've been called that at times, but if it's not your job to solve the problem, just to add some input as a reviewer, what can you do if all you see is problems? You may argue that it's easy to criticize and not fix it, but if fixing it takes time you don't have, should you just not say anything?
pengaru 3y ago
It's not even necessarily a first impression anything. Some managers just feel the need to criticize _something_, and when you're killing it, they can always be critical of something nebulous like "you're not enough of a cheerleader". It's not quantified in any objective manner, no jira ticket counts, no commit counts, there's no limit to how much more positivity one can ask for. It's equivalent to asking you to smile more, this manager belongs in a Starbucks. I'm reminded of [0], "you're doing great, but let's just do it with more energy, alright?" [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7qrL6dWnoQ&t=88s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7qrL6dWnoQ&t=88s

by makach 3y ago

agentultra 3y ago

This, 100%. To use a malapropism: impressions are 9/10ths of the law. If you give your manager an impression that you are one of these stereotypes, you’ll never shake it. You’ll always be seen that way. And because people rarely change, or at least it takes a while, the only real way to escape such an impression is to find a different manager.

coffeefirst 3y ago

Yes. I hate this article. It presupposes "the norm" doesn't need anything special and everyone else is "difficult." But supporting people is the manager's job. You can't do that if you pathologize literally everything messy or nuanced. Some of these categories are people learning to estimate for the first time, or responding to pressure to say "yes" to impossible things by saying "yes" to impossible things. Also notably absent is any mention of air cover. There's usually a reason people get burned out or start sounding the alarm about a project. But rather than get to the bottom of that and help with the root causes, in every single of one of these cases he assumes the problem is basically their personalities.

commandlinefan 3y ago
> everyone else is "difficult." Programmers find themselves in the position of "managing" the most difficult possible sort of subordinate - the computer itself. It doesn't care what you want. It doesn't care about your deadlines. It does _exactly_ what you told it to do, and if you told it the wrong thing, it will do that anyway and it's entirely your problem to figure out which part was wrong. No "people manager" could put up with such an obstinate employee, but doing so is literally our job description, and occasionally we have to report back up that we still haven't figured out why the computer is being "difficult" - and then we get blamed for that difficulty.

wink 3y ago

I think there's a different problem with exactly this stereotype and people throwing it around a bit, even if you are not just being negative, but offering criticism including some solutions. I've been called that at times, but if it's not your job to solve the problem, just to add some input as a reviewer, what can you do if all you see is problems? You may argue that it's easy to criticize and not fix it, but if fixing it takes time you don't have, should you just not say anything?

pengaru 3y ago

It's not even necessarily a first impression anything. Some managers just feel the need to criticize _something_, and when you're killing it, they can always be critical of something nebulous like "you're not enough of a cheerleader". It's not quantified in any objective manner, no jira ticket counts, no commit counts, there's no limit to how much more positivity one can ask for. It's equivalent to asking you to smile more, this manager belongs in a Starbucks. I'm reminded of [0], "you're doing great, but let's just do it with more energy, alright?" [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7qrL6dWnoQ&t=88s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7qrL6dWnoQ&t=88s