7 ms·

> You still go to work, don't cause any issues, and spend 2 weeks building something you were never assigned to do. It turns out to be really good work and usef

by wdewind 13y ago

> You still go to work, don't cause any issues, and spend 2 weeks building something you were never assigned to do. It turns out to be really good work and useful to the company (as much, or moreso, than putting that time in on your assigned work) but your boss is pissed off that you were working on this side project, instead of your assigned work, and tags you as "unreliable". A morally decent person would recognize that as wrong (it's health discrimination, and counterproductive, to punish people with "creative flare-ups")... Isn't this behavior psychopathic by your definition? the person goes to work, disregards agreements he's made with his coworkers and does whatever he wants.

benched 13y ago
Not in the slightest. You're being highly selective in what you focus on, and deliberately phrasing your description of the situation to spin it that way. You're just short of begging the question.
- wdewind 13y ago
  What's the part where it's anti-psychopathic then?
  - michaelochurch 13y ago
    Anti-psychopath doesn't mean "good person". Many anti-psychopaths are good people but it's not a law of nature. Anti-psychopathy seems to be about sensitivity. A common anti-psychopathic/hypomanic pattern is the creative "flare-up" in which a person is highly focused but intolerant of inefficiency. Such people, when faced with the slow pace and meaninglessness of most corporate work, often just elect to do something more useful, or try to solve the deeper and more important problem. It's hard to blame them.
    - wdewind 13y ago
      > Such people, when faced with the slow pace and meaninglessness of most corporate work, often just elect to do something more useful, or try to solve the deeper and more important problem. It's hard to blame them. Again, massive implication here. Why are you so sure that the anti-psychopaths are making the right call, that the work they are working on is more useful to the organization?
      - michaelochurch 13y ago
        Why are you so sure that the anti-psychopaths are making the right call Case by case, one can't be 100% sure on every call, obviously. But I will choose the beneficial and sometimes altruistic creativity of the anti-psychopath over the self-advancing vice, social competitiveness, and superficial reliability of the psychopath every time, and be right most of the time. No one can make the right call all the time.
        wdewind 13y ago
        > But I will choose the beneficial and sometimes altruistic creativity of the anti-psychopath over the self-advancing vice, social competitiveness, and superficial reliability of the psychopath every time, and be right most of the time I do not accept the premise that the behavior your are describing is by definition "beneficial and sometimes altruistic." And I do not accept the premise that the reliability of the psychopath is superficial.
michaelochurch 13y ago
I'm talking about people reordering priorities. You seem to be jumping to ethical issues (breaking a commitment) right away. For most people, the work isn't based on free agreements. They have no power, must do what they're told, and rarely get the chance to freely commit to anything. I don't think there's much wrong with de-prioritizing an unfree commitment (especially if the delivery is only 2 weeks later rather than "not made"). The failure is on the people who created that context. Software companies especially need to understand that subordinate work will generally be of 1/10 the quality of work that people freely elect because it suits their vision, career goals, or intellectual interests. (A large part of the "10x" effect is motivation.) Knowing myself, I don't freely commit to things unless I'm 100% (or, to be honest about it, more like 99.5%) sure I can deliver. (If keeping my job requires it, I'll unfreely commit to things because I need to eat, but not prioritize them over my own career needs.) And no matter how sick I may be, I will fight it and keep it from affecting my work as much as I can. Having fought this thing for over 20 years, I'm actually far stronger than 99% of people almost all of the time. I'm also more conscientious. The illness is only a weakness during (very rare, less than once per year) flare-ups.
- wdewind 13y ago
  If you work with a group of people you can't separate "reordering priorities" from the ethical issue of breaking a commitment. You keep on implying that as a software developer you know better than the people asking you to do work. That even though you are not doing what was asked, you are doing something more important. That may be true, but I'm having a really hard time seeing the difference between the two types of people you are portraying (both seem very self-serving, regardless of motive), and neither of them seem like people I want to work with or have running large organizations.
  - sheepmullet 13y ago
    If you have a condition that causes you to spend a few weeks each year working on non-management-approved activities then it is a minor problem and we should be compassionate about it. If somebody had to spend a few extra weeks off work each year to get chemotherapy you'd be a complete bastard to say they were unethical and broke a commitment. That doesn't change just because it is a mental health issue instead of a physical one. If you can accommodate it then you have the ethical obligation to do so.
pje 13y ago
"Psychopathy is traditionally defined...by enduring antisocial behavior, diminished empathy and remorse, and disinhibited or bold behavior." [0] [0]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychopathy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychopathy
Jtsummers 13y ago
It depends on the why. Using michaelochurch's classifications. Psycopathic: I break the agreement because I want to do what I want to do. Anti-psycopathic (particularly for the manic/hypomanic phase): I break the agreement because my brain is creating thousands of ideas a minute, I'm churning out code, I've solved 20 problems that we'd been having just this morning, but none of them are my assigned task(s). It's almost a compulsion, and not one driven from personal want. I don't want to delay the actual work, or procrastinate, but my brain keeps focusing on all the wrong (for work) things. EDIT: Another fun bit is the after effect. After that spirited creative period, you realize what you've neglected and it feeds the part of the mind pushing you into depression as guilt.
- molsongolden 13y ago
  You seem to be familiar with these feelings, any ideas for fixing this?!
  - Jtsummers 13y ago
    1. I'm not a therapist and I didn't stay at a Holliday Inn Express last night. 2. If you really think that you have a problem, talk to your doctor and find a therapist. This is the #1 thing that helped me. I'm trying to write a response and have deleted several in composing this one. Depression with anxiety (for me, they feed on each other and dealing with one helps with the other) and hypomania are my issues. "Fixing" them, I haven't yet. I've learned to deal with and mitigate them. I'm going to focus on dealing with depression, because that's what I really have the most experience with and has impacted me the most. My manic episodes have been brief, and usually occur immediately before or after depression and they've not directly impacted my work since I've been able to focus that energy in a way that was productive. I didn't do it on my own. Seek therapy to develop the skills to help you. On sleep: Sleep, but not too much. This is hard, especially with depression. For me, I found that I wouldn't sleep in either extreme state. The worst was a period of depression where I'd sleep an average of 1 hour a night for 3-5 days, and then crash for a day. I didn't want to be by myself in a dark room and an empty bed, and my dreams were far from pleasant. But I needed that sleep, I went insane without it. I was hallucinating. I saw things constantly moving out of the corner of my eye. I was convinced I was hearing things, but couldn't see what made the noise (didn't help when, once, it turned out that a spider had taken up residence in an errant grocery bag, that scratching noise was real). I felt that things were crawling on me (at one point I convinced myself that I had fleas I couldn't see, that scene from A Scanner Darkly where the guy goes nuts seeing the bugs everywhere, I could sympathize). So for the love of god, get some sleep. If you find yourself oversleeping (note: easier said than done), find a reason to get up every day. I had school at the time. I didn't miss a class. It forced me out of the apartment. Later, I quit grad school and got a full-time job. The responsibility of having to go somewhere really did help kick me out of that cycle. I was socializing with people, made new friends, and got out of the apartment for 9+ hours a day. Like I said, easier said than done, but find something to motivate you out of the house at least every weekday. I spent a lot of money eating out, but that walk to the restaurant got me out of my home and out of my head for a while. Just don't let food become a crutch, I nearly topped 240 lbs at one point (not good on my frame). A note on exercise: Walk around the block. Walk around the office block. If you're in a city where this is feasible, walk to lunch. You don't need to become a gym rat, but getting a little bit more exercise and fresh air can help to brighten your mood and help you get through the day. I took up soccer a couple years back, it provides me with both exercise and socialization. A note on socialization: Socialize, but don't hide yourself in it. In my worst depression I was trying to get other people to go out with me all the time or to do things at someone's place (never my own, it was a constant mess). I was overdoing it, and when I left I felt emptier than when I got there. I was all smiles, and sometimes they were genuine. But when I left I went back to a neutral face, and all the thoughts that I was hiding from came flooding back. Try and make some real connections, maybe meet with a support group. Finding someone, in addition to your therapist, that you can talk to about your issues is incredibly helpful. I've talked to several friends over the years about my issues and told them what some of my warning signs are. I've never stopped an episode with this, but they've helped me recognize it earlier so that I could deal with it before I lost myself in it (in my deepest depression, as noted above, I was not at all of sound mind). A note on medication: I've never taken medication for my issues. There were a couple episodes of depression where I probably made the wrong choice with that, however. This is a personal decision that you should make with the guidance of your doctor. If you find something that helps you, good. I've just found that (most of the time, again some episodes got...dark) talk therapy and CBT have been mostly sufficient for me. A note on work: Work is good, it keeps me from sitting around all day and thinking about whatever's driving me mad, and it puts me in a situation where I socialize. Socializing isn't always easy when you're depressed, sometimes it's just fucking painful. But if you can get past the pain, the benefits (for me) payoff. Hopefully you have a good boss you can go to for help. But you probably don't (at least by my measure, most bosses aren't good bosses). Find a way to state your need for a reduced workload when you're depressed without saying that you're depressed. Tell them that the 3 projects are just too much, you can finish 2 of them if they can hand the third off to someone else. This may not be as much as you want removed from your plate, but it's a start and you're not pressing your luck. If you've got a good boss (like I presently do) you can be honest, tell them you need a light load for a few weeks, and they'll accommodate you. But get diagnosed. If you can't get out of bed in the morning, get diagnosed and go through HR to get a flex schedule. Getting diagnosed is incredibly important to keeping your job when you have issues with depression. Work with a manic episode. Try to focus, I'm lucky that I can with mine (or I focus well enough on the tasks at hand). If you can't, sell them on whatever you want to work on. Don't try to ask forgiveness later for "slacking" on your assignments for a month, it may not go well. Convince them that the tool you're making will really payoff in the end. Convince them that the resources you're learning and studying can be used in the project, but you need this time to develop the skills. And don't lie to them about this. That'll come back on you, too. A note on sympathy: Sympathy is not enabling. If you're looking for advice on how to help a friend, be sympathetic but try not to do anything to encourage their negative feelings. And don't dismiss them when they have problems. One of the cruelest things that I ever saw was when a friend attempted suicide and nearly all her friends abandoned her. You may feel angry and confused over their actions, why did they keep this from you for so long, because they didn't think they could talk to anyone. Your anger and confusion is normal and natural, but do not let it out on them. We need support in these situations, feeling abandoned will only drive us back down that hole. The friendship may not survive in the end, but as a decent human being at least give it a chance. A final note: This may not be well-written, I'm under a time crunch here. I'll try and read it again when I get home later tonight and reply with corrections or a better post.
bm1362 13y ago
It's neither. It's subjectively irresponsible (or from the other perspective, heroic martyrdom- "It needed to be done").
ScottBurson 13y ago
As someone who used to do this kind of thing occasionally, I think calling it psychopathic is too strong, but I agree it can be a problem. Now I try to get agreement on the project before I start. I've found this is often possible.

by wdewind 13y ago

benched 13y ago

Not in the slightest. You're being highly selective in what you focus on, and deliberately phrasing your description of the situation to spin it that way. You're just short of begging the question.

wdewind 13y ago
What's the part where it's anti-psychopathic then?
- michaelochurch 13y ago
  Anti-psychopath doesn't mean "good person". Many anti-psychopaths are good people but it's not a law of nature. Anti-psychopathy seems to be about sensitivity. A common anti-psychopathic/hypomanic pattern is the creative "flare-up" in which a person is highly focused but intolerant of inefficiency. Such people, when faced with the slow pace and meaninglessness of most corporate work, often just elect to do something more useful, or try to solve the deeper and more important problem. It's hard to blame them.
  - wdewind 13y ago
    > Such people, when faced with the slow pace and meaninglessness of most corporate work, often just elect to do something more useful, or try to solve the deeper and more important problem. It's hard to blame them. Again, massive implication here. Why are you so sure that the anti-psychopaths are making the right call, that the work they are working on is more useful to the organization?
    - michaelochurch 13y ago
      Why are you so sure that the anti-psychopaths are making the right call Case by case, one can't be 100% sure on every call, obviously. But I will choose the beneficial and sometimes altruistic creativity of the anti-psychopath over the self-advancing vice, social competitiveness, and superficial reliability of the psychopath every time, and be right most of the time. No one can make the right call all the time.
      - wdewind 13y ago
        > But I will choose the beneficial and sometimes altruistic creativity of the anti-psychopath over the self-advancing vice, social competitiveness, and superficial reliability of the psychopath every time, and be right most of the time I do not accept the premise that the behavior your are describing is by definition "beneficial and sometimes altruistic." And I do not accept the premise that the reliability of the psychopath is superficial.

michaelochurch 13y ago

I'm talking about people reordering priorities. You seem to be jumping to ethical issues (breaking a commitment) right away. For most people, the work isn't based on free agreements. They have no power, must do what they're told, and rarely get the chance to freely commit to anything. I don't think there's much wrong with de-prioritizing an unfree commitment (especially if the delivery is only 2 weeks later rather than "not made"). The failure is on the people who created that context. Software companies especially need to understand that subordinate work will generally be of 1/10 the quality of work that people freely elect because it suits their vision, career goals, or intellectual interests. (A large part of the "10x" effect is motivation.) Knowing myself, I don't freely commit to things unless I'm 100% (or, to be honest about it, more like 99.5%) sure I can deliver. (If keeping my job requires it, I'll unfreely commit to things because I need to eat, but not prioritize them over my own career needs.) And no matter how sick I may be, I will fight it and keep it from affecting my work as much as I can. Having fought this thing for over 20 years, I'm actually far stronger than 99% of people almost all of the time. I'm also more conscientious. The illness is only a weakness during (very rare, less than once per year) flare-ups.

wdewind 13y ago
If you work with a group of people you can't separate "reordering priorities" from the ethical issue of breaking a commitment. You keep on implying that as a software developer you know better than the people asking you to do work. That even though you are not doing what was asked, you are doing something more important. That may be true, but I'm having a really hard time seeing the difference between the two types of people you are portraying (both seem very self-serving, regardless of motive), and neither of them seem like people I want to work with or have running large organizations.
- sheepmullet 13y ago
  If you have a condition that causes you to spend a few weeks each year working on non-management-approved activities then it is a minor problem and we should be compassionate about it. If somebody had to spend a few extra weeks off work each year to get chemotherapy you'd be a complete bastard to say they were unethical and broke a commitment. That doesn't change just because it is a mental health issue instead of a physical one. If you can accommodate it then you have the ethical obligation to do so.

pje 13y ago

"Psychopathy is traditionally defined...by enduring antisocial behavior, diminished empathy and remorse, and disinhibited or bold behavior." [0] [0]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychopathy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychopathy

Jtsummers 13y ago

It depends on the why. Using michaelochurch's classifications. Psycopathic: I break the agreement because I want to do what I want to do. Anti-psycopathic (particularly for the manic/hypomanic phase): I break the agreement because my brain is creating thousands of ideas a minute, I'm churning out code, I've solved 20 problems that we'd been having just this morning, but none of them are my assigned task(s). It's almost a compulsion, and not one driven from personal want. I don't want to delay the actual work, or procrastinate, but my brain keeps focusing on all the wrong (for work) things. EDIT: Another fun bit is the after effect. After that spirited creative period, you realize what you've neglected and it feeds the part of the mind pushing you into depression as guilt.

molsongolden 13y ago
You seem to be familiar with these feelings, any ideas for fixing this?!
- Jtsummers 13y ago
  1. I'm not a therapist and I didn't stay at a Holliday Inn Express last night. 2. If you really think that you have a problem, talk to your doctor and find a therapist. This is the #1 thing that helped me. I'm trying to write a response and have deleted several in composing this one. Depression with anxiety (for me, they feed on each other and dealing with one helps with the other) and hypomania are my issues. "Fixing" them, I haven't yet. I've learned to deal with and mitigate them. I'm going to focus on dealing with depression, because that's what I really have the most experience with and has impacted me the most. My manic episodes have been brief, and usually occur immediately before or after depression and they've not directly impacted my work since I've been able to focus that energy in a way that was productive. I didn't do it on my own. Seek therapy to develop the skills to help you. On sleep: Sleep, but not too much. This is hard, especially with depression. For me, I found that I wouldn't sleep in either extreme state. The worst was a period of depression where I'd sleep an average of 1 hour a night for 3-5 days, and then crash for a day. I didn't want to be by myself in a dark room and an empty bed, and my dreams were far from pleasant. But I needed that sleep, I went insane without it. I was hallucinating. I saw things constantly moving out of the corner of my eye. I was convinced I was hearing things, but couldn't see what made the noise (didn't help when, once, it turned out that a spider had taken up residence in an errant grocery bag, that scratching noise was real). I felt that things were crawling on me (at one point I convinced myself that I had fleas I couldn't see, that scene from A Scanner Darkly where the guy goes nuts seeing the bugs everywhere, I could sympathize). So for the love of god, get some sleep. If you find yourself oversleeping (note: easier said than done), find a reason to get up every day. I had school at the time. I didn't miss a class. It forced me out of the apartment. Later, I quit grad school and got a full-time job. The responsibility of having to go somewhere really did help kick me out of that cycle. I was socializing with people, made new friends, and got out of the apartment for 9+ hours a day. Like I said, easier said than done, but find something to motivate you out of the house at least every weekday. I spent a lot of money eating out, but that walk to the restaurant got me out of my home and out of my head for a while. Just don't let food become a crutch, I nearly topped 240 lbs at one point (not good on my frame). A note on exercise: Walk around the block. Walk around the office block. If you're in a city where this is feasible, walk to lunch. You don't need to become a gym rat, but getting a little bit more exercise and fresh air can help to brighten your mood and help you get through the day. I took up soccer a couple years back, it provides me with both exercise and socialization. A note on socialization: Socialize, but don't hide yourself in it. In my worst depression I was trying to get other people to go out with me all the time or to do things at someone's place (never my own, it was a constant mess). I was overdoing it, and when I left I felt emptier than when I got there. I was all smiles, and sometimes they were genuine. But when I left I went back to a neutral face, and all the thoughts that I was hiding from came flooding back. Try and make some real connections, maybe meet with a support group. Finding someone, in addition to your therapist, that you can talk to about your issues is incredibly helpful. I've talked to several friends over the years about my issues and told them what some of my warning signs are. I've never stopped an episode with this, but they've helped me recognize it earlier so that I could deal with it before I lost myself in it (in my deepest depression, as noted above, I was not at all of sound mind). A note on medication: I've never taken medication for my issues. There were a couple episodes of depression where I probably made the wrong choice with that, however. This is a personal decision that you should make with the guidance of your doctor. If you find something that helps you, good. I've just found that (most of the time, again some episodes got...dark) talk therapy and CBT have been mostly sufficient for me. A note on work: Work is good, it keeps me from sitting around all day and thinking about whatever's driving me mad, and it puts me in a situation where I socialize. Socializing isn't always easy when you're depressed, sometimes it's just fucking painful. But if you can get past the pain, the benefits (for me) payoff. Hopefully you have a good boss you can go to for help. But you probably don't (at least by my measure, most bosses aren't good bosses). Find a way to state your need for a reduced workload when you're depressed without saying that you're depressed. Tell them that the 3 projects are just too much, you can finish 2 of them if they can hand the third off to someone else. This may not be as much as you want removed from your plate, but it's a start and you're not pressing your luck. If you've got a good boss (like I presently do) you can be honest, tell them you need a light load for a few weeks, and they'll accommodate you. But get diagnosed. If you can't get out of bed in the morning, get diagnosed and go through HR to get a flex schedule. Getting diagnosed is incredibly important to keeping your job when you have issues with depression. Work with a manic episode. Try to focus, I'm lucky that I can with mine (or I focus well enough on the tasks at hand). If you can't, sell them on whatever you want to work on. Don't try to ask forgiveness later for "slacking" on your assignments for a month, it may not go well. Convince them that the tool you're making will really payoff in the end. Convince them that the resources you're learning and studying can be used in the project, but you need this time to develop the skills. And don't lie to them about this. That'll come back on you, too. A note on sympathy: Sympathy is not enabling. If you're looking for advice on how to help a friend, be sympathetic but try not to do anything to encourage their negative feelings. And don't dismiss them when they have problems. One of the cruelest things that I ever saw was when a friend attempted suicide and nearly all her friends abandoned her. You may feel angry and confused over their actions, why did they keep this from you for so long, because they didn't think they could talk to anyone. Your anger and confusion is normal and natural, but do not let it out on them. We need support in these situations, feeling abandoned will only drive us back down that hole. The friendship may not survive in the end, but as a decent human being at least give it a chance. A final note: This may not be well-written, I'm under a time crunch here. I'll try and read it again when I get home later tonight and reply with corrections or a better post.

bm1362 13y ago

It's neither. It's subjectively irresponsible (or from the other perspective, heroic martyrdom- "It needed to be done").

ScottBurson 13y ago

As someone who used to do this kind of thing occasionally, I think calling it psychopathic is too strong, but I agree it can be a problem. Now I try to get agreement on the project before I start. I've found this is often possible.