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Comment by darthvoldemort | Hacker News Reader

You don't have to be a social butterfly to be liked. You just mainly shouldn't be an asshole.

And the key is to consistently not be an asshole, otherwise those things will accumulate and you will eventually get rejected. (I'm not accusing you of being an asshole.) If you're nice 90% of the time, but lash out or say shitty things 10% of the time, that's more than enough to get eventually rejected.

My son, unfortunately, is like this. 95% a sweet kid but 5% really, really shitty and saying mean things. We are working on it. He started out immensely popular but over the course of this school year, his classmates look at him lukewarm now, instead of being his close friends, and it's entirely his issue.

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>You just mainly shouldn't be an asshole.

This sounds so obvious on paper, but in my own experience, things have definitely shifted to include more traits and lower intensity of those traits as "asshole traits". I have no doubt many critical people who do not sugarcoat things and do not spend time trying to curry favor, despite staying stoic and civil, are often seen as negative and told to "be more outgoing / positive / extroverted / etc." Not only does that go against just not going out of one's way to upset people, it also shows the boundaries of what is / isn't an "asshole" can change over time.

I have been told multiple times by HR, that people have become upset at communications with me. However, no one has ever informed me of what exactly I said was wrong, or what do I need to fix, its been infuriating since I have no idea what I'm supposed to do. Even when I ask what they want me to do, there is no real feedback.

I try very hard to remove all emotion and personal judgement with my interactions and treat everyone exactly the same. What is wrong with that.

Have you asked your coworkers for advice?

One thing you have to accept is that there is a problem with the way you communicate. People would not be going to HR if you were as unemotional as you think. So seek out advice and honest feedback from your friends, your coworkers and your family. Maybe you can find an expert in communications that can point out what the flaws are and how to correct them.

But DO NOT sweep this under the rug. There is a problem here, and it sounds like no one wants to help you fix it. That's probably another indication that there's a pretty bad problem.

> I try very hard to remove all emotion and personal judgement with my interactions and treat everyone exactly the same. What is wrong with that.

This is perhaps not the best way for a lot of scenarios. Read a book like How to Win Friends and Influence People. Take every person you work with and list out their best qualities, list out what excites them (work wise and personally as far as you know). Keep these at the forefront of your mind when you talk to them. Have interactions with them within this context.

People like being appreciated, like knowing that others recognize their good qualities. Do it.

To be frank HR people are certifiably insane - they think people who show they can deceive them in body languahe better are more trustworthy. There is no sugarcoating just how utterly batshit that notion is - even before pointing out that is literally how sociopaths operate!

I had an HR guy once that said everyone thought I was an asshole. I asked around. Turns out he was the only one that thought that and many felt the same about him.

This can change dramatically based on the environment too. I have trouble with being dishonest, and prefer a straightforward style when giving and receiving both praise and critical feedback. I started my career at Google, where this worked fine. But when I worked at a startup full of people insecure about their ability to be an engineer, it was a terrible culture fit and I had to adapt heavily (at the cost of productivity: it took me five whole minutes of conversation once to figure out that the guy I was talking to wasn't failing to understand the problem with his code, he just disliked the fact that I referred to it as a bug)

I went back to working at a company full of in-demand folks who were secure in their ability, and my style immediately works smoothly again.

> I started my career at Google, where this worked fine. But > when I worked at a startup full of people insecure about > their ability to be an engineer, it was a terrible culture > fit and I had to adapt heavily

Also experienced this. Was very surprised.

In personal interactions, be on average at least 20% kinder/more considerate than you think is necessary to account for subjective bias.

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