Is it necessary to be mean to succeed at work?

[Mina]

You are an adult. You screw up I'm not gonna be fluffy about your lack of ability or aptitude.

Asked you to do a job knob. Qualified and competent? Then tell me why you didn't do it.

Don't mind me if I think you are an idiot for not doing your job. You work for me and suck it up princes

I'm not mean I tell you that you sucked at that task. You took the job so do it!

You may get away with this in the corporate world where there are dozens of people employed and everyone has a boss above them.

If you run a business and you treat your employees as such, you will have a very high turnover in staff.

You can get your point across without being condescending or belittling anyone. You can ask the same set of questions in a different tone and it will yield better results and keep the culture positive.

If this is how you really feel, you are not a leader. If you're in charge, you're allowed to think that someone is incompetent/"idiot" but you're never supposed to say it. Ever. Your job is to help make their job easier, ask them questions, find out what went wrong and provide a real solution to the problem. Pointing the finger and being passive-aggressive will never work long term.

 

[Mina]

I think you maybe too Bruteforce

Thinking the same thing.
It takes zero skill to get angry and "rip" someone.
It takes all the talent to muster those emotions and prevail.

My experience with guys that talk a lot is that they're usually full of **** and wouldn't hurt a fly if they had to. haha
In this case, I think the OP is acting this way as a defence mechanism, it's his way of standing up for himself so it's all good.

 

[Jampy00]

You are an adult. You screw up I'm not gonna be fluffy about your lack of ability or aptitude.

Asked you to do a job knob. Qualified and competent? Then tell me why you didn't do it.

Don't mind me if I think you are an idiot for not doing your job. You work for me and suck it up princes

I'm not mean I tell you that you sucked at that task. You took the job so do it!

While I can understand the context the delivery needs work.

Constructive critism is a helpful thing, thinking your employees are idiots is not. You hired them, so what does that say about you?
As someone that has 20 people reporting to them, I try to treat people the way I would want (or hope) to be treated by my employer.
With honesty, dignity, and respect. That also comes with some hard truths if they are lacking in performance, attendance or attitude.

Two little sayings I always keep in mind.

1. Attitude reflects leadership.
2. You can do what is easy or, you can do what is right.

Holding someone accountable for their actions is very important also equally important is holding youself accountable for yours.

 

[ToSlow]

You get more with sugar than you get with s$it

 

[crankcall]

I had a guy tell me early in life at a job, have everyone stand around a pail of water and put their hand in, have one pull thier hand out and show the others the hole in the water.....
point being, sure you'll be missed , but EVERYBODY can be replaced.

I worked with guys that only had a hammer for a tool , thus every problem looked like a nail.

And you sometimes get that employee that you have spoken with, given a hug, brought her/him a coffee, given them a written notice, and now you need to slap them in the nuts.

 

[ToSlow]

In today’s world it’s a very thin line

 

[油井緋色]

@Jampy00 @Mina @Mad Mike @mimico_polak

Thank you for the constructive alternative solutions.

My takeaway from this thread is:

• Focus on the work
• Start hanging up the calls if a fellow dev is being a dick when trying to explain something
  • Find another person for help in the above case
  • Give constructive criticism if the ass asks
• Worst case, keep job hopping

And I am really happy to hear about your leadership principles @Mina. There aren't enough leads like that.

@crankcall knowledge workers work very differently. A small/mid sized software shop will have 5-25 devs. There is always a few devs that are irreplaceable because they engineered and built everything. When these guys leave, they will take other devs with them; these are the competent ones that see the impeding **** show coming. I have seen companies bankrupt this way. I took every competent dev with me from my old job when I quit. This also plays into Price's Law. This is also why we don't have unions: our knowledge is our job security.

I think another takeaway for me is being on the receiving end of a smarter developer lacking patience. I can't exactly crucify them because I've done the same thing when I'm having a ****** day and somebody asks me a "stupid question."

 

[Ash]

FYI, refusing to work with someone is also a form of bullying (I now know this thanks to the latest version of my mandatory corporate education). So as ridiculous as it might sound, if you're dealing with a real dick, the bullying accusation could end up being applied to you first if your only response is to shut them out. So being able to explain "this behaviour is going to cause me to adapt in this way" to both the offender and your manager is necessary before you start doing it seriously.

 

[Mad Mike]

Mean people don’t last long. There’s always someone meaner that will come along and **** up their day at some point.

Firm, fair and respected work better than authoritarianism.

Also someone mentioned MBAs. I ******* detest the MBA types I’ve met. The meetings have gone like this:

”Hey, do you have a great idea that I can take and use as my own and in return I’ll give you a 6 font acknowledgement on page 1003 of the business proposal I need to write because I’m actually void of ideas and all I’m capable of is using other people as a way of making myself look like a bigshot entrepreneur type?”

I'm speaking specifically about engineers who have gone on to get the business and leadership training necessary to become effective in management. I too know a lot of snot nosed MBAs too -- many of whom grew up with educational and financial advantages that come along with daddy's money. Consulting, education, and financial services has armies of these folks -- many would drown in the sink of swim situations that small companies face on a daily basis.

Lets give them a little credit: most can golf, handle a ski boat, know which fork to use at dinner, and drive nice cars.

 

[mimico_polak]

The single most important aspect of ANY job in any industry or sector is communication. As cliche as it sounds, 90% or more of issues can be resolved by proper mutual and respectful communication.

For all we know the offending party is this way, because you make them put up their defence mechanism.

Sometimes a simple call to ask ‘is there something I’m doing wrong to make you act this way?’ Can really clarify things.

1. offending party realizes they’re an ass
2. Offending party tells you that you’ve made the uncomfortable in the past in your interactions
3. Offending party tells you to shut up and do your job

I had a guy that loosely worked under me. I couldn’t get him to do anything, management didn’t do anything, and it was like beating my head against a wall. He wait for management to leave and then start yelling at me, so I asked him to politely eff off and leave my office.

Turns out other colleagues of him heard this and reported him to my managers.

He was the first one out the door when the layoffs started.

He also called me 3 months ago, and another manager, and apologies for his behaviour in 2013! Said he was immature and didn’t realize our constructive discussions tried to lead him toward a better route.

You will ALWAYS be more successful if you’re easy to work with. You don’t have to be the best of the best, but you need to have people like working WITH you because in the end, in small industries, everyone will know if you’re a difficult person to work with.

As all the old guys tell me....’do your job and keep your name clean, you’ll never be out of a job in this industry’.

 

[Superveloce]

I just had a person apply for a job at my company who had zero experience. I took the time and courtesy to reply back to them and say thank you for your résumé but we only hire people with experience.
The idiot wrote me back berating me saying, “ I suggest next time that when you write back to a person applying for a job you say you need people who have X amount of experience don’t just tell them you only hire people with experience”
I had another guy apply for a job and I asked him how he was going to generate sales. When he replied to me the first word in his email to me was, LISTEN .....Who are these arrogant idiots who think they can talk to the owner of a company like this when they are applying for a job. These are the type of people that end up making managers and owners treat them like crap because they start off being arrogant idiots from the beginning. Everybody today thinks they should be a manager from day one and promoted every month with a raise to match. It’s nuts

 

[油井緋色]

The single most important aspect of ANY job in any industry or sector is communication. As cliche as it sounds, 90% or more of issues can be resolved by proper mutual and respectful communication.

For all we know the offending party is this way, because you make them put up their defence mechanism.

Sometimes a simple call to ask ‘is there something I’m doing wrong to make you act this way?’ Can really clarify things.

I am an INFJ. I bring this up because one of the key traits of an INFJ is having a "chameleon" personality where we shed whatever personality we have and adapt based on what people want. I cannot, however, maintain this as it's ******* exhausting lol

I am "friends" with every dev at my new workplace and got into the 'circle' on the 2nd week (aka. a chat channel outside of work, where uncensored **** occurs.) The goal was to build trust, because devs need to trust each other not to **** up each other's work.

It was from doing the above I learned the two "superstar" devs at my new workplace are complete ******** to everyone but no one has said anything. I've had this happen with a manager who didn't code at a previous job. It was not hard to steamroll him out of a job and increase team synergy. In this case, no one can afford to steamroll the two superstars because they know more than everyone. Knowledge is power lol

 

[Deleted member 50930]

^
That Myer Brigg think ain't accurate

I hope between INTP and INTJ

 

[油井緋色]

^
That Myer Brigg think ain't accurate

I hope between INTP and INTJ

It's been stupidly accurate for me from IQ predictions to leadership tendencies to my communication methods. Even the sexual intimacy predictions between my fiancee and I were spot on.

And the really odd part about being an INFJ is you can "sense" when others are INFJs. I've only met 2 in my life lol. I can also switch to an ENFJ, so similar to you swapping from the P and J likely because you're in the middle for those two.

But hey, I'm no psych expert.

 

[Superveloce]

It's been stupidly accurate for me from IQ predictions to leadership tendencies to my communication methods. Even the sexual intimacy predictions between my fiancee and I were spot on.

And the really odd part about being an INFJ is you can "sense" when others are INFJs. I've only met 2 in my life lol. I can also switch to an ENFJ, so similar to you swapping from the P and J likely because you're in the middle for those two.

But hey, I'm no psych expert.

why the hell does everybody want a label and a syndrome ? More than likely it’s a self fulfilling prophecy that you are fitting into a diagnosis because you want to fit into it and then you start acting like the diagnosis because you want to believe it.

 

[油井緋色]

why the hell does everybody want a label and a syndrome ? More than likely it’s a self fulfilling prophecy that you are fitting into a diagnosis because you want to fit into it and then you start acting like the diagnosis because you want to believe it.

Because of our natural tendency to want to make sense and order of ****, especially in a society where disorder/chaos is pretty normal due to multiculturalism. Japan and a lot of the Nordic countries are counter examples of less chaos with homogenization of culture.

Most of my job is literally about identifying patterns, understanding why they exist, then changing or adapting them. Or if there is no pattern, destroy the chaos and create order.

When this is applied to people, it's very useful (leader or not) to understand what "bucket" the people you are working with belong to. Then you adapt and update your approach. You can't, for example, tell a highly extroverted person to be introverted.

The above isn't anything new btw. I've been doing it for a while then read Ray Dalio's book "Principles" where he describes the exact same leadership principles. That's a pretty good "go ahead" imo if one of the most successful guys have been doing it. I'm also obviously not perfect at this or this thread wouldn't exist lol

 

[Superveloce]

Because of our natural tendency to want to make sense and order of ****, especially in a society where disorder/chaos is pretty normal due to multiculturalism. Japan and a lot of the Nordic countries are counter examples of less chaos with homogenization of culture.

Most of my job is literally about identifying patterns, understanding why they exist, then changing or adapting them. Or if there is no pattern, destroy the chaos and create order.

When this is applied to people, it's very useful (leader or not) to understand what "bucket" the people you are working with belong to. Then you adapt and update your approach. You can't, for example, tell a highly extroverted person to be introverted.

The above isn't anything new btw. I've been doing it for a while then read Ray Dalio's book "Principles" where he describes the exact same leadership principles. That's a pretty good "go ahead" imo if one of the most successful guys have been doing it. I'm also obviously not perfect at this or this thread wouldn't exist lol

If you want to make sense and order of stuff that’s fine but I find most people use this stuff as a crutch, oh I have ADD, oh I’m lactose intolerant, I have a gluten allergy, and on and on. The victim culture is out of control. It seems now everyone doesn’t want to be happy and healthy they all want to have some disease or condition. Mostly made up crap like fibromyalgia Or my favourite one is out of shape overweight person says they have a bad back and bad knees. No you don’t you just destroyed them with your lifestyle, they weren’t bad.
Your example of Japan is hilarious too because they pretty much allow no immigration and that’s why they’re homogenous

 

[油井緋色]

If you want to make sense and order of stuff that’s fine but I find most people use this stuff as a crutch, oh I have ADD, ih I’m lactose intolerant, I have a gluten allergy, and on and on. The victim culture is out of control. It seems now everyone doesn’t want to be happy and healthy they all want to have some disease or condition. Mostly made up crap like fibromyalgia Or my favourite one out is of shape overweight person says they have a bad back and bad knees. No you don’t you just destroyed them with your lifestyle, they weren’t bad.
Your example of Japan is hilarious too because they pretty much allow no immigration and that’s why they’re homogenous

Yeah....I don't work well with those types tbh. I had to tutor/TA a few in college. They were used to other tutors accepting their excuses and the tutors doing their homework for them instead (also a shortcut to high reviews this way for the tutor/TA.) I booted students that showed up without doing what I told them to last time if it was a pattern; there were always excuses (aka. victim culture.)

So yeah, I can see exactly where you are coming from: low conscientiousness triggers me badly.

 

[backmarkerducati]

It is a corporate culture thing and for large and small companies, a lot of it is top down.

In a bad corporate culture the top is the limit for these people. Many times even encouraged.

In a decent one, they may succeed early on as "things are getting done" but they will hit a ceiling. Sooner or later they end up working for someone that worked for them that has a long memory and the door is next (sadly that can take 10 to 20 years for some). Or the people above them see it and just get sick of it.

The tone has also changed in MBA programs. The old focus on the wizkid approach has been replaced with things like organization behaviour and team building. That does not result in mean people immediately failing but it does slowly change corporate culture over time.

It does not mean management needs to be all touchy feely soft of course and a firm hand is always required. For slackers that may be seen as being "mean".

Oddly enough, I think it may actually be worse in the gig-economy these days, or maybe there are just more slackers thinking people are mean???

 

[meme]

Sorry but blah blah blah do YOUR job and do it well. You shouldn't need someone to point out your mistakes and if we do I may not be in enough of a happy corporate rah rah mood to mollycoddle you and use acceptable language

Ffs we are adults, accept criticism where it is due.

I'm not here to mom you to death so do your damn work and I'm not gonna ask please. You are paid for this