> I just fired back something along the lines of "you're quite a sperglord.
> Would you be comfortable with that response? Would it feel pleasant, or even neutral? Or would it feel like a personal attack -- something that would make you feel an impulse to lash out back at me?
Just as I don't care about your feelings, I also don't care that you thing I am a sperglord. It's your opinion and you're entitled to it.
I agree that we must be nice (smiling, saying "thank you", being polite, etc). I see it as a social convention, a sort of rule like driving in the right side of the road and following the traffic signs. It makes society work smoothly and we, as social beings, are hardwired to react positively to it. Now being kind... That just assumes an emotial investement in the other person, which I simply don't have with 90% of the people I interact daily.
To conclude, I'll respond to the OP's article. It's not the author's fault. His co-workers don't want to work with him because he wasn't nice, besides him being more than capable for the job. IMO it shows how unprofessional they are.
This a million times. For lack of a better term, I find a lot of managers refuse to work with anyone but a "Uncle Tom" geek who will just say yes to everything and smile politely and never, ever correct bad ideas or wrongful assumptions. This leads to bad implementations, impossible requirements, unrealistic deadlines, bullshitting, and other issues people have to deal with.
If you can't work with the guy who occasionally says, "Whoa this is a bad practice for reasons x, y, and z," then that says a lot about how broken that culture is and not a lot about that person.
Just as I don't care about your feelings, I also don't care that you thing I am a sperglord. It's your opinion and you're entitled to it.
I agree that we must be nice (smiling, saying "thank you", being polite, etc). I see it as a social convention, a sort of rule like driving in the right side of the road and following the traffic signs. It makes society work smoothly and we, as social beings, are hardwired to react positively to it. Now being kind... That just assumes an emotial investement in the other person, which I simply don't have with 90% of the people I interact daily.
To conclude, I'll respond to the OP's article. It's not the author's fault. His co-workers don't want to work with him because he wasn't nice, besides him being more than capable for the job. IMO it shows how unprofessional they are.