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Comment by CiPHPerCoder | Hacker News Reader

> The "CB's" he's describing are so incredibly transparent, they might as well be strawmen.

Strawmen or not, I've worked for two. Those aren't fond memories.

Yup. It takes a while to see the abstract pattern underlying their behaviour. Once you see it, its very clear. But for a long time you're distracted by the details of day-to-day events and you think they're just another co-worker with some annoying habits.

I'm confused why so many commenters are quick to shout "B.S" on this article (are they BSers in hiding?) but maybe he is oversimplifying too much. True S-W types are pretty rare and are probably evidence of some extreme psychological disorder. (E.g., malignant narcissism or sociopathy. Robert Hare is a researcher in criminal psychology and wrote a book on such people: https://www.amazon.com/Snakes-Suits-When-Psychopaths-Work/dp...).

  maybe he is oversimplifying too much

I think that's it. Even distilled down to two variables ("smart" and "work"), you're talking about three "extremes": [1.0S,1.0W], [1.0S,0.0W], and [0.0S,1.0W]. Most people are probably in the 0.25-0.75 range on both variables.

There are almost certainly more variables, and "smart" and "work" are terribly named.

I agree, and add that sometimes people who have a tendency to BS can surround themselves with more grounded people, so that the whole package works. Their confidence and superficial knowledge can even make them seem more relatable to customers than a deeply knowledgable specialist would.

In other words, an individual's value is context-dependent. It's really hard to make such crisp distinctions as in the article.

I feel the article is written in a way that's crystal clear for those who know what it's talking about, but looks like a strawman for those who don't. I understand instinctively the kind of people he means, but the wide brush he paints with makes it seem like he's going off stereotypes.

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