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Ugh, I had a recruiter approach me a couple of years ago to work for some company that had a "radical openness" culture or something like that. The idea was su

Ugh, I had a recruiter approach me a couple of years ago to work for some company that had a "radical openness" culture or something like that. The idea was supposedly that everyones ideas were valid and hierarchy didn't matter and that everyone should challenge anything no matter who they were in the organisation. The way they sold it sounded a bit culty to me, and the potential for abusive behaviour seemed high. Didn't make me want to work for them.

paulddraper 3y ago
Could it be "radical candor?" [1] [1] https://www.radicalcandor.com/ https://www.radicalcandor.com/
- MattPalmer1086 3y ago
  I honestly can't remember, it's possible. It sounded like the kind of idea that would either be awesome if done well, or sheer hell if people did what people often do with otherwise good ideas...
- liveoneggs 3y ago
  https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Way_of_Absolute_Candor https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Way_of_Absolute_Candor
whatshisface 3y ago
I would have tried to challenge it during the interview, so that if they hired me I'd know they were legitimately pluralistic.
htrp 3y ago
Radical Openness is definitely Bridgewater
lubutu 3y ago
When I was looking for work back in 2016 there was a company who advertised their way of working as "infrared", if I remember correctly. It was all about total openness and autonomy. For example, they asked one employee to decide how many hours everyone should work per day, and they decided on something, which was then applied company-wide. This was apparently "democracy in action". Quite odd. I think they've since dropped that whole thing.
com2kid 3y ago
> The idea was supposedly that everyones ideas were valid and hierarchy didn't matter and that everyone should challenge anything no matter who they were in the organisation. On the engineering side, ideally this is how things are done anyway. I've never had a problem digging into the ideas presented by engineers more senior than me, and I've always encouraged junior engineers to question any ideas I present. Everyone, independent of seniority, is blind to giant gaping flaws in their own ideas. People also don't know what they don't know. If I have a gap in my knowledge, any plans I come up with are not going to take what I don't know into consideration if I don't know that I don't know something.
- MattPalmer1086 3y ago
  Most good places I've worked are like this naturally. Good ideas can come from anywhere, it just needs respect. What put me off about this company was how they sold this as the central idea of their company. It made me wonder what made them think this needed to be pushed so strongly. I tend to be suspicious of overriding ideologies.
- throwawaaarrgh 3y ago
  Just because you are in engineering does not mean politics, culture, psychology stop applying. It's really no different than any job at all. Engineers will often think they're in some kind of meritocracy, when in reality they're just as trapped by social constructions as anyone else.
  - JohnFen 3y ago
    This. I've never worked at a place that could reasonably be broad-brushed as a meritocracy. Every company employs humans, and humans bring their humanness to their jobs. Some places are closer to a real meritocracy than others, but ones that think they are tend to be further from it than ones that don't.
  - strken 3y ago
    Not a meritocracy, no, but when you're dealing with an instrumented system you're better able to prove whether an idea is good or bad. Compared to e.g. a teacher, an engineer can prove the impact of a piece of work much faster. Engineers in practical fields also have the advantage of decades of safety culture and strong institutions that will protect them if they report a problem that will literally kill people. I agree that an engineer is still trapped by social concerns, but not that they're as trapped as anyone else, because anyone who can easily demonstrate that they're right, even if they aren't listened to and even if they can only demonstrate it in some specific areas, has an advantage over someone who can't.
ilaksh 3y ago
That's a completely different thing from constantly rating each other in public with more senior people's ratings being given more weight.
LegitShady 3y ago
valve?
lispisok 3y ago
> The idea was supposedly that everyones ideas were valid and hierarchy didn't matter and that everyone should challenge anything no matter who they were in the organisation. Treating all ideas as valid is fine if that means all ideas get evaluated. For hierarchy you need somebody who can be the decision maker when a consensus cannot be reached otherwise the most stubborn opinionated people become the de facto decision makers. I experienced that situation before and resulted in some very bad implementations and massive tech debt and the people who stuck us with those bad decisions got to avoid responsibility and leave other people cleaning up the mess they created.

paulddraper 3y ago

Could it be "radical candor?" [1] [1] https://www.radicalcandor.com/ https://www.radicalcandor.com/

MattPalmer1086 3y ago
I honestly can't remember, it's possible. It sounded like the kind of idea that would either be awesome if done well, or sheer hell if people did what people often do with otherwise good ideas...
liveoneggs 3y ago
https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Way_of_Absolute_Candor https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Way_of_Absolute_Candor

whatshisface 3y ago

I would have tried to challenge it during the interview, so that if they hired me I'd know they were legitimately pluralistic.

htrp 3y ago

Radical Openness is definitely Bridgewater

lubutu 3y ago

When I was looking for work back in 2016 there was a company who advertised their way of working as "infrared", if I remember correctly. It was all about total openness and autonomy. For example, they asked one employee to decide how many hours everyone should work per day, and they decided on something, which was then applied company-wide. This was apparently "democracy in action". Quite odd. I think they've since dropped that whole thing.

com2kid 3y ago

> The idea was supposedly that everyones ideas were valid and hierarchy didn't matter and that everyone should challenge anything no matter who they were in the organisation. On the engineering side, ideally this is how things are done anyway. I've never had a problem digging into the ideas presented by engineers more senior than me, and I've always encouraged junior engineers to question any ideas I present. Everyone, independent of seniority, is blind to giant gaping flaws in their own ideas. People also don't know what they don't know. If I have a gap in my knowledge, any plans I come up with are not going to take what I don't know into consideration if I don't know that I don't know something.

MattPalmer1086 3y ago
Most good places I've worked are like this naturally. Good ideas can come from anywhere, it just needs respect. What put me off about this company was how they sold this as the central idea of their company. It made me wonder what made them think this needed to be pushed so strongly. I tend to be suspicious of overriding ideologies.
throwawaaarrgh 3y ago
Just because you are in engineering does not mean politics, culture, psychology stop applying. It's really no different than any job at all. Engineers will often think they're in some kind of meritocracy, when in reality they're just as trapped by social constructions as anyone else.
- JohnFen 3y ago
  This. I've never worked at a place that could reasonably be broad-brushed as a meritocracy. Every company employs humans, and humans bring their humanness to their jobs. Some places are closer to a real meritocracy than others, but ones that think they are tend to be further from it than ones that don't.
- strken 3y ago
  Not a meritocracy, no, but when you're dealing with an instrumented system you're better able to prove whether an idea is good or bad. Compared to e.g. a teacher, an engineer can prove the impact of a piece of work much faster. Engineers in practical fields also have the advantage of decades of safety culture and strong institutions that will protect them if they report a problem that will literally kill people. I agree that an engineer is still trapped by social concerns, but not that they're as trapped as anyone else, because anyone who can easily demonstrate that they're right, even if they aren't listened to and even if they can only demonstrate it in some specific areas, has an advantage over someone who can't.

ilaksh 3y ago

That's a completely different thing from constantly rating each other in public with more senior people's ratings being given more weight.

LegitShady 3y ago

valve?

lispisok 3y ago

> The idea was supposedly that everyones ideas were valid and hierarchy didn't matter and that everyone should challenge anything no matter who they were in the organisation. Treating all ideas as valid is fine if that means all ideas get evaluated. For hierarchy you need somebody who can be the decision maker when a consensus cannot be reached otherwise the most stubborn opinionated people become the de facto decision makers. I experienced that situation before and resulted in some very bad implementations and massive tech debt and the people who stuck us with those bad decisions got to avoid responsibility and leave other people cleaning up the mess they created.