3 ms·

Always a good idea to keep a work journal, but there's something on the tone of this article that bothers me. I would like working with someone that is not a bo

by kh_hk 2y ago

Always a good idea to keep a work journal, but there's something on the tone of this article that bothers me. I would like working with someone that is not a borg and is not following a script that seems taken from How to win friends and influence people. In general I will mistrust anyone that tries to manipulate me, that is, if I catch them doing it.

spencerchubb 2y ago
What about the tone bothers you? I've never read How to win friends and influence people. I thought the article is pretty well-written
- lopatin 2y ago
  Not the parent, but what bothers me is how the author tries to spin the idea of taking notes when you're new as something profound. He even gives it a catchy name "WTF Notebook". And the connection between creating a reputation of a fixer at the company, and taking notes with a WTF journal, is weak. I usually don't like to hate on articles like this and instead ignore them, but since you asked, it mostly sounds like bullshit to me.
  - colonwqbang 2y ago
    Writing things down and thinking them over before acting on them, isn't bullshit. There's other decent advice in the article. I think your review of the article is overly negative. Perhaps these techniques come naturally to some people, and others need to learn it by instruction? I'm in the latter camp. I often need to think about how I sound and make sure I don't come across as too negative.
  - strken 2y ago
    I think there's a strong connection between identifying and fixing problems, and between fixing problems and getting a reputation as a fixer.
- kh_hk 2y ago
  I will quote specifically some examples of what jumps out to me as manipulative behavior: > I'll ask why things on the list are that way, and how they got to be that way. I'm trying to establish credibility as someone who's genuinely curious and empathetic, who's patient, and who respects the expertise of my coworkers. That's the reputation that's going to let me make changes later. I would not try to establish credibility, but earn it. I will not try to be genuinely curious or empathetic. I either am, or am not. > At this point I'm looking for one or two problems that have been bugging one of my new teammates for a while, and that have relatively simple solutions. I'm looking for something I can put on the retro board and know I won't be the only person who's bothered by that problem. This screams to me as playing the work game. If someone can spend time looking for problems over their coworker shoulders or "something to put on the retro board" it just means they are out of meaningful tasks to do. > Then, during the team conversation about the problem, I'll identify something that teammate suggests as an action item that we could try immediately. That way the team starts to see me as someone who helps them solve their problems. Change the context and this sounds like a pickup artist explaining dating tricks, or a con man telling you how to infiltrate or someone on the secret service trying to enter a gang. > The feeling that I want to create, the association I want people to have with me, is, "Oh, Nat joine [...] Feelings are not something one goes around creating unless they are actively manipulating people around. > There's a very specific reputation I want to have on a team: "Nat helps me solve my problems. Nat get things I care about done." That's the reputation that's going to get me the results I want in next year's performance review. I could keep going on, but I think these are enough examples
  - Vegenoid 2y ago
    I don't agree. You should only do things that benefit the team if they are done out of a true sense of cameraderie, and pure desire to empathize and solve problems? Not everyone has natural empathy, and people who don't have it learning how to do it in a way that benefits them and the people around them is positive. Re:'It sounds like a con artist', the techniques for getting people to trust and like you are often the same whether your intent is good or bad. I don't think these techniques should be reserved for people who have an innate wellspring of curiosity and cooperation. This person is trying to earn credibility, and is specifically focused on the 'new' phase of being on a team, when you do not have a big pile of meaningful tasks yet and your primary goal is getting the lay of the land and establishing good relationships with your teammates. Finally, > Feelings are not something one goes around creating unless they are actively manipulating people around. I don't really understand what this means. I create feelings all the time, intentionally and unintentionally. I often do things where the primary purpose is to make somebody feel good, usually things like 'make some effort to solve a problem that I don't think matters' or 'let somebody explain something to me that I already know about'. It's not about gaining power and status, it's about greasing social wheels and making friendly cooperation easier. Am I 'manipulating' people? Well, I am often trying to influence them so that they act in a way that I believe will benefit both of us. I do want to rise in my career, but I want to do it by making positive impacts and relationships, not by stepping on others. I don't think that's a bad thing.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
dogman144 2y ago
You hit on the most interesting aspect from this. I will explain what I noticed and I’m interested in how this viewpoint lands. First, the author is doing 101 new leadership stuff. I’ve done it, I’ve seen it done, there’s a science to it. I can distill the whole blog post into when taking over leading something (as an experienced IC, as a new manager, as an army officer, it’s all the same), take the first 30-90 days to not change anything, and just seek to understand how and more relevantly why things work. There are a mess of organization benefits to this, it would take more than a comment to explain why. But in short, ya this is how it’s done. Second, engs have worked for awful managers, can’t often understand or exactly place why but they know their manager sucks. I can argue capably in thread about how often this difficult to explain “sh*ty manager” sense boils down to the manager not doing like tactically good leadership. In the same way as engineering is a taught skill, so is leading teams. Issue is only a few places teach it intentionally. Top of mind for me is the military, and senior exec training. There’s an actual science to it, full stop. You either get taught it by orgs that treat it this way, or you pick it up from a mentor who learned it somehow. Note - the author learned it this second way. This is really common. Third, to work for good managers, you actually want to work for good leaders. Leadership is a tactical skill, the same way efficient lines of C++ are. Leadership tactical means tactically shaping and steering people to achieve a goal greater than the sum of the team’s individual parts. This full stop requires what in a certain light is what you point out - it’s a bit manipulative feeling. It’s using leadership methods to make people work together in a way that is effective. A lot of this is good EQ and stuff like the author maps out. So, who do engs like working for? Often it’s working for technically inclined good people who go to bat for their team with external parties, shield their team from stupid stuff, resource the team to complete its goals, praise in public criticize in private, give good but not overly micromanaging guidance on where to steer things, recognizes and rewards performance, holds unperforners to a standard, and so on and so on? Some examples of who knows how to do this but for the wrong reasons are people engs don’t like working for - to stereotype: charismatic jocks out of MBA programs who can know nothing about tech but know corp politics and deploy this stuff tactically. Who do engs hate working for often - technical hires promoted into management and they hate/are bad at their jobs bc management != tech chops, as my above covered. So, what that leaves is a scenario where teams are led by the occasional person that inherently knows good leadership chops, or more often it’s pissed off engineers who hate working for someone manipulative or incompetent. To raise the collective industry odds that tech teams work for skilled and competent leaders, that leaves as the solution spelling out tactical leadership - how to do it, what it looks like, how people fit into it, like this blog does. Pick your poison - more of the same, or good people who just need clear guidance learning from resources like this on how to run teams people want to work on? HN certainly complains to no end about the dynamic caused by not approaching leadership as a skill vs some nebulous thing people somehow know how to do.
d0gsg0w00f 2y ago
Yeah, my first thought was "how often does this guy change jobs?"
jfil 2y ago
That intentional attitude around how the author wants to be perceived is definitely going to sound offputting to mamy people. Just wanted to comment to say: don't get carried away by that knee-jerk reaction. Sit with it for a while. Personally, I also have a goal for how I want my stakeholders to feel. And it'd been a useful rule of thumb in how to behave. I've also run into provlems with my technical work whenever I ignored the human dimension (like what kind of gossip is going around, how I'm perceived by others and how others are casting my work). "Just do a good job" doesn't get rid of the fact that there is a "feelings dimension" to your work - and that it matters how you & your work make others feel.

by kh_hk 2y ago

spencerchubb 2y ago

What about the tone bothers you? I've never read How to win friends and influence people. I thought the article is pretty well-written

lopatin 2y ago
Not the parent, but what bothers me is how the author tries to spin the idea of taking notes when you're new as something profound. He even gives it a catchy name "WTF Notebook". And the connection between creating a reputation of a fixer at the company, and taking notes with a WTF journal, is weak. I usually don't like to hate on articles like this and instead ignore them, but since you asked, it mostly sounds like bullshit to me.
- colonwqbang 2y ago
  Writing things down and thinking them over before acting on them, isn't bullshit. There's other decent advice in the article. I think your review of the article is overly negative. Perhaps these techniques come naturally to some people, and others need to learn it by instruction? I'm in the latter camp. I often need to think about how I sound and make sure I don't come across as too negative.
- strken 2y ago
  I think there's a strong connection between identifying and fixing problems, and between fixing problems and getting a reputation as a fixer.
kh_hk 2y ago
I will quote specifically some examples of what jumps out to me as manipulative behavior: > I'll ask why things on the list are that way, and how they got to be that way. I'm trying to establish credibility as someone who's genuinely curious and empathetic, who's patient, and who respects the expertise of my coworkers. That's the reputation that's going to let me make changes later. I would not try to establish credibility, but earn it. I will not try to be genuinely curious or empathetic. I either am, or am not. > At this point I'm looking for one or two problems that have been bugging one of my new teammates for a while, and that have relatively simple solutions. I'm looking for something I can put on the retro board and know I won't be the only person who's bothered by that problem. This screams to me as playing the work game. If someone can spend time looking for problems over their coworker shoulders or "something to put on the retro board" it just means they are out of meaningful tasks to do. > Then, during the team conversation about the problem, I'll identify something that teammate suggests as an action item that we could try immediately. That way the team starts to see me as someone who helps them solve their problems. Change the context and this sounds like a pickup artist explaining dating tricks, or a con man telling you how to infiltrate or someone on the secret service trying to enter a gang. > The feeling that I want to create, the association I want people to have with me, is, "Oh, Nat joine [...] Feelings are not something one goes around creating unless they are actively manipulating people around. > There's a very specific reputation I want to have on a team: "Nat helps me solve my problems. Nat get things I care about done." That's the reputation that's going to get me the results I want in next year's performance review. I could keep going on, but I think these are enough examples
- Vegenoid 2y ago
  I don't agree. You should only do things that benefit the team if they are done out of a true sense of cameraderie, and pure desire to empathize and solve problems? Not everyone has natural empathy, and people who don't have it learning how to do it in a way that benefits them and the people around them is positive. Re:'It sounds like a con artist', the techniques for getting people to trust and like you are often the same whether your intent is good or bad. I don't think these techniques should be reserved for people who have an innate wellspring of curiosity and cooperation. This person is trying to earn credibility, and is specifically focused on the 'new' phase of being on a team, when you do not have a big pile of meaningful tasks yet and your primary goal is getting the lay of the land and establishing good relationships with your teammates. Finally, > Feelings are not something one goes around creating unless they are actively manipulating people around. I don't really understand what this means. I create feelings all the time, intentionally and unintentionally. I often do things where the primary purpose is to make somebody feel good, usually things like 'make some effort to solve a problem that I don't think matters' or 'let somebody explain something to me that I already know about'. It's not about gaining power and status, it's about greasing social wheels and making friendly cooperation easier. Am I 'manipulating' people? Well, I am often trying to influence them so that they act in a way that I believe will benefit both of us. I do want to rise in my career, but I want to do it by making positive impacts and relationships, not by stepping on others. I don't think that's a bad thing.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

dogman144 2y ago

You hit on the most interesting aspect from this. I will explain what I noticed and I’m interested in how this viewpoint lands. First, the author is doing 101 new leadership stuff. I’ve done it, I’ve seen it done, there’s a science to it. I can distill the whole blog post into when taking over leading something (as an experienced IC, as a new manager, as an army officer, it’s all the same), take the first 30-90 days to not change anything, and just seek to understand how and more relevantly why things work. There are a mess of organization benefits to this, it would take more than a comment to explain why. But in short, ya this is how it’s done. Second, engs have worked for awful managers, can’t often understand or exactly place why but they know their manager sucks. I can argue capably in thread about how often this difficult to explain “sh*ty manager” sense boils down to the manager not doing like tactically good leadership. In the same way as engineering is a taught skill, so is leading teams. Issue is only a few places teach it intentionally. Top of mind for me is the military, and senior exec training. There’s an actual science to it, full stop. You either get taught it by orgs that treat it this way, or you pick it up from a mentor who learned it somehow. Note - the author learned it this second way. This is really common. Third, to work for good managers, you actually want to work for good leaders. Leadership is a tactical skill, the same way efficient lines of C++ are. Leadership tactical means tactically shaping and steering people to achieve a goal greater than the sum of the team’s individual parts. This full stop requires what in a certain light is what you point out - it’s a bit manipulative feeling. It’s using leadership methods to make people work together in a way that is effective. A lot of this is good EQ and stuff like the author maps out. So, who do engs like working for? Often it’s working for technically inclined good people who go to bat for their team with external parties, shield their team from stupid stuff, resource the team to complete its goals, praise in public criticize in private, give good but not overly micromanaging guidance on where to steer things, recognizes and rewards performance, holds unperforners to a standard, and so on and so on? Some examples of who knows how to do this but for the wrong reasons are people engs don’t like working for - to stereotype: charismatic jocks out of MBA programs who can know nothing about tech but know corp politics and deploy this stuff tactically. Who do engs hate working for often - technical hires promoted into management and they hate/are bad at their jobs bc management != tech chops, as my above covered. So, what that leaves is a scenario where teams are led by the occasional person that inherently knows good leadership chops, or more often it’s pissed off engineers who hate working for someone manipulative or incompetent. To raise the collective industry odds that tech teams work for skilled and competent leaders, that leaves as the solution spelling out tactical leadership - how to do it, what it looks like, how people fit into it, like this blog does. Pick your poison - more of the same, or good people who just need clear guidance learning from resources like this on how to run teams people want to work on? HN certainly complains to no end about the dynamic caused by not approaching leadership as a skill vs some nebulous thing people somehow know how to do.

d0gsg0w00f 2y ago

Yeah, my first thought was "how often does this guy change jobs?"

jfil 2y ago

That intentional attitude around how the author wants to be perceived is definitely going to sound offputting to mamy people. Just wanted to comment to say: don't get carried away by that knee-jerk reaction. Sit with it for a while. Personally, I also have a goal for how I want my stakeholders to feel. And it'd been a useful rule of thumb in how to behave. I've also run into provlems with my technical work whenever I ignored the human dimension (like what kind of gossip is going around, how I'm perceived by others and how others are casting my work). "Just do a good job" doesn't get rid of the fact that there is a "feelings dimension" to your work - and that it matters how you & your work make others feel.