5 ms·

One of the top things that I want in a job is coworkers who care obsessively.

jjtheblunt 3y ago
That’s such a great observation
roenxi 3y ago
Well, y'know. You're likely to be better off if you put that desire to one side and focus within. Consider a soup kitchen vs a supermarket checkout. The people working at the soup kitchen arguably care a lot more. The person at the supermarket checkout can be as glassy eyed as they feel and still be part of feeding more people in absolute terms. Humans seem to have some sort of emotional heuristic to focus on care (really, focus on motivation of others I think). That works in small groups but it is highly misleading in large ones. In large groups, the only factors that matter are incentives and competence. If the incentives are good and the people are competent, good results will happen. If the reverse, corruption. The motivation heuristic actually does a lot of harm because it causes a huge amount of noise in the discourse where people whinge about this person or that having bad character to no avail. It is often true that people have impure motivations, but at scale that is true of effectively everyone. There are the devils you know and the devils waiting to become known. We can get great outcomes regardless; our politicians are cut from the same cloth as the Nazi and Communist parties but look at the difference in outcomes. One of the most peaceful insights I ever stumbled across was that of the people in the workplace who cared less than me, there were a significant and productive subset who were just doing more good than me through competence and being thoughtful about what work to pick up.
- ozr 3y ago
  I've been on large and small teams of people that cared and didn't care. It feels noble and reasonable and right to tie it to a greater purpose; like your soup kitchen vs supermarket example. It's not that type of care the OP is getting at. It's closer to a craftmanship kind of care. Being proud of what you're putting into the world. Caring that it works well, not because the purpose is important, but because it's something you're doing and you want to do it well.
  - roenxi 3y ago
    If someone wants high personal standards then ok, that'll be good for them in the long term. But if we're talking about colleagues that care then that is just a cover for bad management. And fair enough bad management is endemic in the software industry so teams pick up the slack. But it is management's job to decide on software quality standards and provide feedback to devs. Expecting the developers to be responsible for quality as a baseline is just a path to burnout for those devs; because then they are going to go mad because everyone on the team has different personal standards. The person with the highest standards on the team will never be satisfied. You can't reasonably expect teammates to cover for bad managers, it is much cleverer to learn to identify good managers and try to work for them. Or become one.
- patch_cable 3y ago
  How would you describe the difference between thoughtful and caring?
  - roenxi 3y ago
    Maybe I'd pick on an auditor as an example. They need to think about whether people are doing what they say they do. They don't need to care about what they are doing. To me, caring means expecting work to be done to your standards instead of an independent standard.
sndean 3y ago
Especially if you're working as team. Caring obsessively can be a negative in some competitive environments, e.g., a very insular/non-collaborative university department. But I suppose I might not call those other professors coworkers.
irjustin 3y ago
> One of the top things that I want in a job is coworkers who care obsessively. While I agree with the premise, the "downstream" really matters though. There's a lot of different ways to care obsessively and many are quite toxic if you've ever worked with them. One example comes to mind is I've been there were PR comments are way overbearing. There's definitely good points/notes, but nitpicking, snide comments, holier-than-art attitude easily comes along with the boat. "With love" is such a blase statement, but it really has to be the starting point. That caring combined with respect has to be present to be a healthy, long term working environment. Like with many things, there's a balance.
- jaggederest 3y ago
  I'm going to plug my PR log level policy here: I add a tag to my PRs asking for "error level" or "debug level" or whatever in between. Then the reviewer can tune their feedback. I started doing this when I was working with a diverse group of folks with different backgrounds. I'd like it to be a standard thing. I find that I want different kinds of feedback through the process of developing a PR, and whether it's over a day or a month matters a lot too. That way, I can safely be obsessive about things when giving PR feedback, in the knowledge they're asking for "debug level" feedback, or give it just-the-facts review if they're just trying to get something merged that has been reviewed to hell and back.
serf 3y ago
it's a double-edged sword. I want balance rather than obsession.
- ersamsa 3y ago
  Ppl tend to care for things that enable bonuses
- gorjusborg 3y ago
  Yes. Balance. It is okay to care, but nobody is always right, and noone has a monopoly on good ideas. It follows then that the person who just 'cares too much' will be on the wrong side of a decision. At that point the best outcome is for them to either change their mind, or let go.
Retr0id 3y ago
s/obsessively/pragmatically/
erikpukinskis 3y ago
This works if people also have very clear boundaries for where their responsibilities end and where their teammates responsibilities begin. Someone who cares obsessively about things that are closer to their coworkers area of responsibility are a liability to a team IMO. Caring obsessively about your own responsibilities is great. It is a pain in the ass from time to time, but that pain is worth it.

That’s such a great observation

Well, y'know. You're likely to be better off if you put that desire to one side and focus within. Consider a soup kitchen vs a supermarket checkout. The people working at the soup kitchen arguably care a lot more. The person at the supermarket checkout can be as glassy eyed as they feel and still be part of feeding more people in absolute terms. Humans seem to have some sort of emotional heuristic to focus on care (really, focus on motivation of others I think). That works in small groups but it is highly misleading in large ones. In large groups, the only factors that matter are incentives and competence. If the incentives are good and the people are competent, good results will happen. If the reverse, corruption. The motivation heuristic actually does a lot of harm because it causes a huge amount of noise in the discourse where people whinge about this person or that having bad character to no avail. It is often true that people have impure motivations, but at scale that is true of effectively everyone. There are the devils you know and the devils waiting to become known. We can get great outcomes regardless; our politicians are cut from the same cloth as the Nazi and Communist parties but look at the difference in outcomes. One of the most peaceful insights I ever stumbled across was that of the people in the workplace who cared less than me, there were a significant and productive subset who were just doing more good than me through competence and being thoughtful about what work to pick up.

ozr 3y ago
I've been on large and small teams of people that cared and didn't care. It feels noble and reasonable and right to tie it to a greater purpose; like your soup kitchen vs supermarket example. It's not that type of care the OP is getting at. It's closer to a craftmanship kind of care. Being proud of what you're putting into the world. Caring that it works well, not because the purpose is important, but because it's something you're doing and you want to do it well.
- roenxi 3y ago
  If someone wants high personal standards then ok, that'll be good for them in the long term. But if we're talking about colleagues that care then that is just a cover for bad management. And fair enough bad management is endemic in the software industry so teams pick up the slack. But it is management's job to decide on software quality standards and provide feedback to devs. Expecting the developers to be responsible for quality as a baseline is just a path to burnout for those devs; because then they are going to go mad because everyone on the team has different personal standards. The person with the highest standards on the team will never be satisfied. You can't reasonably expect teammates to cover for bad managers, it is much cleverer to learn to identify good managers and try to work for them. Or become one.
patch_cable 3y ago
How would you describe the difference between thoughtful and caring?
- roenxi 3y ago
  Maybe I'd pick on an auditor as an example. They need to think about whether people are doing what they say they do. They don't need to care about what they are doing. To me, caring means expecting work to be done to your standards instead of an independent standard.

sndean 3y ago

Especially if you're working as team. Caring obsessively can be a negative in some competitive environments, e.g., a very insular/non-collaborative university department. But I suppose I might not call those other professors coworkers.

irjustin 3y ago

> One of the top things that I want in a job is coworkers who care obsessively. While I agree with the premise, the "downstream" really matters though. There's a lot of different ways to care obsessively and many are quite toxic if you've ever worked with them. One example comes to mind is I've been there were PR comments are way overbearing. There's definitely good points/notes, but nitpicking, snide comments, holier-than-art attitude easily comes along with the boat. "With love" is such a blase statement, but it really has to be the starting point. That caring combined with respect has to be present to be a healthy, long term working environment. Like with many things, there's a balance.

jaggederest 3y ago
I'm going to plug my PR log level policy here: I add a tag to my PRs asking for "error level" or "debug level" or whatever in between. Then the reviewer can tune their feedback. I started doing this when I was working with a diverse group of folks with different backgrounds. I'd like it to be a standard thing. I find that I want different kinds of feedback through the process of developing a PR, and whether it's over a day or a month matters a lot too. That way, I can safely be obsessive about things when giving PR feedback, in the knowledge they're asking for "debug level" feedback, or give it just-the-facts review if they're just trying to get something merged that has been reviewed to hell and back.

serf 3y ago

it's a double-edged sword. I want balance rather than obsession.

ersamsa 3y ago
Ppl tend to care for things that enable bonuses
gorjusborg 3y ago
Yes. Balance. It is okay to care, but nobody is always right, and noone has a monopoly on good ideas. It follows then that the person who just 'cares too much' will be on the wrong side of a decision. At that point the best outcome is for them to either change their mind, or let go.

Retr0id 3y ago

s/obsessively/pragmatically/

erikpukinskis 3y ago

This works if people also have very clear boundaries for where their responsibilities end and where their teammates responsibilities begin. Someone who cares obsessively about things that are closer to their coworkers area of responsibility are a liability to a team IMO. Caring obsessively about your own responsibilities is great. It is a pain in the ass from time to time, but that pain is worth it.