5 ms·
Let's presume, for the sake of the argument, that not every conversation That Guy has is slow and painful. It's far more likely that That Guy only has a problem
by gizmo 13y ago
Let's presume, for the sake of the argument, that not every conversation That Guy has is slow and painful. It's far more likely that That Guy only has a problem communicating with some people than that every conversation TG has ever had looks like the one in the article.
This is a fair assumption because otherwise That Guy wouldn't bother trying to talk to anybody anymore. So TG is TG from the perspective of the Normal Person. That Guy may be a normal person from the perspective of many other people.
So my problem with this article is that That Guy's guilt is presumed. In all likelihood this fictitious That Guy expected the conversation to go like this:
NC: “I think the new guy is really getting up to speed quickly.”
TG: “OK, but what do you mean by quickly?”
NC: “After the first week he hasn't interrupted me with questions every
hour, unlike some of the previous interns.”
TG: “Gotcha.”
Here TG discovers that what NC originally described as "getting up to speed" really meant "hasn't interrupted me in a while". And perhaps TG knows that follow up questions are needed to figure out what NC is really saying.
If NC presumes that TG is out to antagonize him then every question will be answered with a short (and unhelpful) reply until both parties are exasperated.
- optimiz3 13y agoTG's behavior strikes me more as trolling...the example you gave could play out like: NC: “After the first week he hasn't interrupted me with questions every hour, unlike some of the previous interns.” TG: “Which of the previous interns?” NC: “Bob and Alice.” TG: “Why were their questions inappropriate?” etc. Folks like TG can be sociopaths, where a game is being played with the aim of making the target spend more effort on the response than it takes to ask the question. There are also chat-bot AIs that use interaction patterns like this to keep the subject engaged as long as possible.
- gizmo 13y agoI suppose it's possible TG is a sociopath, although I don't know anybody who deliberately trolls like that. I still think it's far more likely that both people are poor communicators in that TG wants to get a precise and accurate answer from somebody who doesn't think about language that way and that NG is oblivious of the fact that TG is looking for a precise answer and will get frustrated with replies that don't answer his questions.
- ChuckMcM 13y agoIf you start giving them action items based on their objections it changes the value equation for a socio-path. TG: Which of the previous interns? NC: Unclear, go find a list of all questions asked by all interns and rank them by frequency. Normalize the list where the most questions is rank 10 and the least rank 1. Then place the new guy on that scale. Let's have that done by Friday, kay?
- Timmmmbob 13y agoI think you grant too many favours... Or perhaps you are that guy!
- tyree732 13y agoThis. Part of being a good communicator is understanding how other people communicate and being able to adapt your communication to their style.
- Sheepshow 13y agoI think the difference is between: "OK, but what do you mean by quickly?" and "Oh that's great to hear. What is impressing you most?"