6 ms·

What about the people who like their job less because you don't trust them?

• hga 13y ago
  They might decide it's not quite so simple the moment they see him resolve a "he said/she said" dispute in favor of the employee after reviewing the footage.
• saraid216 13y ago
  Trust, but verify. Same reason contracts are written down.
  • gngeal 13y ago
    I have yet to sign a contract that would mandate that I be watched by cameras at all times.
    • icegreentea 13y ago
      I don't believe that that was his point. I think that his point was that a healthy attitude to take on in life is to generally take other people's words as true (thus trust), but to have mechanisms to ensure that (thus verify). The key point is that unless you have specific reasons not to trust them, then you do not set up an antagonistic relationship. For this to work, both parties must believe that 'trust, but verify' is a valid norm. His example about contracts is exactly that. Typically, for most 'small things', you could probably just take someone's word for it. But just in case, we're going to sign on it. As I said before, this really only works when both parties accept this as a norm. Examine trying to sign a contract with someone from a culture which places far higher value on personal honor (or however you want to put it). They might get completely insulted that you would not just 'take their word for it'. That's something of a similar situation with employers vs employees and video surveillance at work. Clearly, most employees -don't- warrant video surveillance, and simply imposing it on them could lead to serious issues (like the culture clash above).
      • petsos 13y ago
        How is that different from "don't trust, verify"?
        • saraid216 13y ago
          It's not. It mostly depends on how pedantic you are.
      • gngeal 13y ago
        but to have mechanisms to ensure that (thus verify) Actually, that's not a mechanism to ensure anything, that's a mechanism to remediate the consequences of failure. Actually ensuring the compliance would, again, require for you to be under close observation.
    • deleted 13y ago
      [deleted]
  • Strilanc 13y ago
    Ah yes, the old "I want it both ways" statement. Trust is the belief that you don't need to verify.
    • thaumasiotes 13y ago
      Actually, there's a fairly sensible way to view the statement "trust, but verify" -- think of it as a policy of entering agreements without doing the necessary vetting / clearing / what have you in advance. You still do that, but afterwards. As long as the people you're working with are trustworthy, things will run much more smoothly, but if they're not, you'll still find out. That "verify" step is important to maintaining trustworthiness all around.
      • Strilanc 13y ago
        That's a reasonable interpretation. "Trust now, verify later" would be a bit clearer.
    • saraid216 13y ago
      If you don't trust someone, there's no point in verifying. Verification is for when you're wrong about being trusting.
      • Strilanc 13y ago
        Interesting, I think we mean something different when we say trust. In cryptography, you're trusting an entity when you don't verify that it's doing the right thing. Typically, the goal is to minimize or eliminate trust (otherwise attackers can exploit the system).
        • saraid216 13y ago
          The phrase is a Russian saying popularized by Reagan for diplomatic purposes. He wasn't talking about cryptography.
    • PeterisP 13y ago