How to work with me
davidbauer.ch
davidbauer.ch
…case in point is a current coworker of mine, who gave me something like a verbal version of this manual when we started working together. He almost immediately began acting completely opposite to what he said. Turns out his spiel was more aspirational than honest. Seems like he was trying to convince me to like him before his behavior steered me in the other direction. Not that I can’t work with the guy, but I had to learn my own ways to get around his quirks—ways which were certainly not outlined in his introduction.
I saw this primarily with managers and higher-ups who clearly used this as some form of pre-emptive signaling device, kinda like a Twitter Bio. It's creating a paper trail that serves your narrative in performance reviews, often indirectly through priming or "anchoring" people with an early impression. It ticks all the boxes – yet it doesn't come in a format that's usually under scrutiny – "why would anyone deceive in a user manual?". It's catnip for middle management.
From How to Rands:
> The following is a user guide for me and how I work. It captures what you can expect out of the average week working with me, how I like to work, my north star principles, and some of my, uh, nuance. My intent is to accelerate our working relationship with this document.
"How to Rands" is not saying "you need to do this to work with me." Rather, it's describing some of his preferences, behavior, etc.
I think a rename of OP's title from "How to work with me" to "How I like to work" or even just "About how I work" might more clearly communicate the author's original intent. (if I understand David's intent correctly, that is!)
This is a joke, right?
In reference to your coworker, at least you can suggest to him where his behaviour deviates from his ideal? Seems much better than starting from scratch.
That said, many of the points seem (from eyeballing) seem quite reasonable, and to touch on certain (sadly) highly prevalent anti-patterns in the modern w$rk culture (especially these days, when anyone remotely competent can catapult to a senior-sounding position within a couple of years, without much in the way of actual people and business process experience to match).
For example, the items on:
- expecting others to read your mind and/or take hints (sometimes sanctioning them for not doing so)
- dragging people into meetings that aren't effective or especially relevant to them (as if their time is infinite and worthless)
- assuming everyone is on the same "channel" as you (in regard to social media, answering texts at crazy hours, etc)
Seem to be basically on point, and sadly, do not go "without saying" in the modern work universe (given how frequently these basic points of decency are overrun or ignored, in some environments).
On some level it is helpful to know your teammates, but on the other hand it can come across as self centered, like you think you're special and require special instructions for interacting with.
I'm sure you have good intentions in creating this, but if someone gave this to me I would instantly thing "oh man this person is going to be high maintenance"
It seems like a contract required before interaction rather than a helpful guide to understanding him.
That's one of the reasons I liked "Working with Claire" [1]: It is full of open subjectivity ("I hope", "I believe"), is very clear yet polite ("please ...").
[1]: http://growth.eladgil.com/book/the-role-of-the-ceo/insights-...
"I can come across as a dick sometimes but that is because I like to test certain stances on issues by vigorously defending them, I assure you I'm open to changing my mind if you just keep pushing, actually I feel like you are taking my intelligence more serious if you do. Not many people appreciate this, but somehow discussion makes me feel good" or
"I actually can get pretty pissed if I feel that you are insulting my intelligence (which I'm sometimes overly sensitive to), it is where I seem to get my sense of self worth from. I may over-argue my point of view then later realize you were right and apologize." or
"I act all cool and hipster but I'm actually constantly stressed when I travel and it makes me make poor choices and not pay attention to important things like 'Did I take my pass from the ATM 15 min ago?'." or
"I'm very shitty at keeping context in mind and often jump on the wrong details in a conversation, please have some patience." or
"I really really cannot agree to disagree, it keeps nagging at me, I want to talk it out until someone "wins". Yeah I've been called a dick for that." or
"I get stuck where there is no obvious best choice in just about any situation because I cannot make a choice based on gut feeling (it feels like weakness), I need logic and it makes me swing back and forth on questions like 'subway or Uber?', really annoying when you travel with me." or
"I do appreciate jokes that are slightly inappropriate, and I feel like often at work I have to self-censor."
"I'm 40 but I like 9gag and memes."
Ultimately, “Working with Claire” seems more aimed at me, the reader / notional employee. E.g. it starts concrete, talking about meetings we’d have together. And it has helpful info about how she tends to work and the kinds of things she might do. In theory, it means I wouldn’t have to work out things like “How much info does my new manager expect?”
Self-reflection is a big part of these personal READMEs. But it’s also important to work out which bits of self-reflection are useful to the reader. For me, that’s where the main article didn’t quite hit the mark.
"Working with Claire" signals: This is an article about what it's like to work with me.
"How to work with me" signals: This is a set of rules I expect to be followed if we are to get along.
I am just immediately rubbed the wrong way by the latter, while I'd be willing to approach the former with an open mind.
Also if you are my peer, you setting expectations like that is inappropriate.
I'd rather work with someone who's honest about how they operate than with someone who uses action as a verb.
Other than that: the whole thing comes across as hopelessly naive with respect to how humans interact, it misses the fact that people that dislike each other on a personal level may be forced to work with one another and it misses the 'office politics' angle.
If I was assigned to a team to work with you and you handed me this document I would in turn hand in my resignation with reference to your document and that would be that, any organization that tolerates this kind of bs is not one that I would want to work for.
What you have written is actually a list of demands.
Not likes. Not tendencies. Not polite requests. Not values you hope to share with others by meeting them half way, possibly clumsily but with good faith.
Demands.
There is no social context in which a document like this is appropriate.
Did you write this for your managing role at NZZ? Or as a freelancer? Or ...?
Sounds like a lot like on-line dating profiles.
Now speaking for myself, I'm conflicted. On the one hand, I would certainly like an efficient and upfront method to assess a person's capabilities and mental state without having to waste time with pleasantries or wade through a social mine field. The more information the better.
On the other hand, it's likely that this personal resumé of sorts will be another layer of buzzwords and prattle to muck through as composing one evolves from a discovery process to a status competition.
Let's stick to business cards, shall we?
In particular, I did not get the impression that the text makes any demands from co-workers that the author would not mutually grant them himself.
Can you point out specific examples of language you found self centered or high maintenance?
To my eyes the comments read like pattern matches on low-level grammar and lexical choice. RFCs are even more egregious users of imperative language, but I don't see many people getting their jimmies ruffled about that, so I wonder what kind of social background and circumstances could make simple grammar features feel like a strong signal of character to people.
As a point of contrast, if discussion brought up things like the following, I would instead feel eminent warmness and inclusiveness:
- There is not a social norm encouraging people to write "Me Manuals", so what factors might bring such an idea to salience?
- Cultivating such a document and sharing with people exposes a lot of vulnerability. What does this act itself communicate? (Cooperative intent? Perfectionist tendencies? Bravery? Narcissism?)
- How would a document like this parse out under various different cultural and corporate norms?
- What are the failure modes of trying to communicate nuances of human cooperation through low-bandwidth channels of explicit delineation?
- Engaging witch such a document also engages our Kahneman System 1 cognition strongly. What can we glean about our individual biases by the snap-judgements and intuitions we feel reading the article?
- Are there historical or anthropological analogies we can draw to a "Me Manual" practice that could shed light on how such it may operate?
Et cetera. Personally, the author's article pushes my priors about him/her in the direction of earnest, open, optimistic, defaulting to cooperation vs competition, and perhaps having perfectionist tendencies. My base-rate estimate for this personality is semi-low, but the article feels like a pretty strong signal, so overall, I would feel cautiously hopeful about working with the author.
IMO, these seem to me to be a friendly way of dictating process to others.
And I don't think you intend that :)
If you would be my manager or a person highly skilled in one area, I will probably try to not talk with you at all as much as possible.
Just as an example:
> Ask for help: I love giving input, but only if I know it can still make a difference.
So let's say I have an idea and I need some help. Do you I know that if I ask for your help you will make a difference. Maybe you will agree with me so there is no difference there to be made. Also further down you want me to find the proper time to ask for feedback: not too early and too late. Suddenly I need to be aware of you and the time when I should talk or not with you.
What do you think about this?
Would you say this is an accurate reflection of what you wanted to express sharing it here? Would love to hear it.
If you want to work with me, never, ever, use the imperative, just ask gently and unless what you're asking is dangerous for me, I'll most of the time help you.
I had a boss who told me he was looking for the manual to work with me. He was actually looking for user manual, to use me (in his word it was not "use", it was "I'll help you to get the best of yourself")
Since then, I'll never RTFM again :-)
- It's a great ice breaker into the things they're actually interested in.
- Some people have a particular way they want to be addressed. Pamela, never Pam. Put it in one place and you're golden. (Ideally, someone would be able to put it as their Slack or Email handle and also be golden, but those are not always in the user's control at a company)
- How's the best way to get your attention if it's urgent? If it's not urgent but still time sensitive? If I want to make sure not to disturb you?
- What's your biggest office pet peeve (it's chewing ice for me; some people never realize that it could bug someone else)
- It's an easy and intentional way to disseminate your work history to your colleagues, who most likely won't have way to view it otherwise. (For example, knowing someone was a DBA gives you a potential point of contact for related questions)
I could see a lot of people who are complaining here about TFA whinging 70 years ago when their secretary might push back on being sexually harassed.
Yeah, the document could have been written a bit better, but having open and honest communication about how to put people at ease and ensure they will be at optimal performance levels just seems like a good idea.
I sometimes write messages when we should be talking instead. I know that’s not ideal, I’m working on it. In the meantime, please point it out to me.
I have two small kids at home.
Those are literally the only three useful sentences in that entire document. Everything else are the basic virtues of professional cooperation.
> Default to action. Often it’s best to just do it. Most decisions are reversible, so it’s better to see how things work out instead of overthinking them.
> Act like an owner: Make your own decisions when you’re confident enough. Solve issues yourself when you can. If you need support or want your ideas challenged, I am always there to help.
These are good, but doesn't address the reason people don't do this: they anticipate getting in trouble for making a decision their boss or peers disagree with. I'd recommend re-framing this as a semi-formal commitment about how you'll respond.
"You should make decisions on your own" is often secretly "...but if they're not the decision I would have made, I'll be mad". To count this, you need to explicitly promise not to respond that way. "If I disagree with your decision, I'll address it, but I won't hold it against you for taking the initiative even when I would have chosen differently."
Basically, make it more two-sided: "I prefer you to follow these guidelines when in interacting with me and I commit to [trying to] response in these specific ways."
In some cases it's not necessary. I like nohello.net and don't think it needs to spell out "I won't get mad if you don't open with a hello". But when telling people to do things that may get them scolded, you need to promise not to scold them.
At least Patrick Bateman stuck with a single business card, you had to go and write a whole life story and print it on your digital business card that you presumably shove down everyone's throats.
Consider deleting immediately, i would never work with someone who wrote something like this. Cheers.
When somebody has a challenge and is reaching out, it adds an unnecessary level of complexity for them to communicate their problem while translating it into the form that the receiver prefers. Often, the reason they're reaching out in the first place is a lack of understanding about a problem. Adding the translation step often makes it harder for them to communicate, rather than more effective.
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I've also found that these documents both conflict with reality and are made redundant by people's actions.
* When people are writing these, they often write them from an aspirational aspect. They view their preferences through the way they'd ideally like to work, rather than the way they actually work.
* The major relationship pieces in these working with me docs become extremely obvious quickly.
As a manager, I enjoy these for new hires. They help me calibrate, but over time it simply becomes about the relationship and history that you've built up.
If you prefer people to interact with you a certain way, you’re going to have to remind them of it regularly regardless. And if you want people to understand why you interact a certain way with them, you’re going to have to explain it in context when it happens. Ultimately our relationships are formed by our shared experiences and our lived reality, and no amount of referring to a document will change that.
I could definitely see how this would be useful for a manager, but in the context of writing one to be public for my fellow employees to read I did not enjoy the experience.
I just don't think that's a very good idea. Not because I think you wrote anything wrong (you didn't), but that's just not how interpersonal relationships work.
Sorry, dude.
Most of the document you linked is about management practices, presumably written by someone in a management position. This sets the tone. The last topic is more similar to what you wrote, but it is much shorter and to the point. How to Rands is framed as a declaration of management philosophy, and, as such, sounds entirely appropriate. Yours is more personal in nature. If you are in a management position, it may be a good idea to let this transpire in your writing as well.
- On Work
- Some Thoughts on Work
- Thoughts on Collaboration (then take yourself out of it)
Another idea, just expand one of the points into its own document. I found the part on async communication especially interesting because in some ways it goes against a lot of conventional wisdom. Some anecdotes, details, or sociological research on the topic would make a pretty helpful document.
The content is different in spirit from the implication of the title, IMO. A document with this title is an unusual way to begin a collaboration or working relationship. On the other hand, I can see how it would be useful to know what's inside the document.
And it takes guts to write something like this, knowing that everyone who reads it and knows you will be comparing their own mental notes on how you actually work with how you say you work and view yourself.
...and no mentally stable person ever needs to write a page like this
this just screams "i'm a narcissist, these are my rules. wanna talk to me? obey the rules!"
Re: "no person will ever want to read this page": I have read the manual, I found it quite refreshing actually. Different strokes for different folks, I guess.
I was thinking of creating a manual of my own, and a curious thought occurred to me while reading your response (and other negative responses in this thread): the kind of people who are repelled by this sort of thing are probably not the kind of folks I'd enjoy working with, so that's actually a feature as far as I'm concerned. (Not making a negative evaluation about a group of people, just stating a personal preference and how such a "filter" as a personal manual might actually work to one's favor.)
Steve Pavlina has written on this subject[0], how broadcasting your true personality/values/desires will get you a lot more rejections, but will also allow you to connect with others who are a better match for you, who might have missed your authentic self if you had masked it instead.
He asserts that most people are so afraid of rejection (getting a "1" ie. a mismatch) that they settle for "partial matches" in the 6-7 range, but they'd actually be far happier if they had the courage to broadcast their true values because it's the only way to find the "10s".
I think that sort of judgement breaks HN guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
I don't think the average person knows themselves well enough to write a user manual, myself included. This is an idealized version of how he thinks about himself. Reality could be very different.
I'd be much more interested in a guide written by his wife or parents.
Put this on GitHub and let your co workers submit issues for the problems they have with you and pull requests for changes they want you to make.
I'm starting to like this instruction manual idea more and more now ;)
That is actually not true. When building a team it is important to learn what each individual seeks out of the "project". For example your goal might be to use the project as a way to get promoted. I might not care at all about getting promoted and instead my goal is to learn new stuff. Our colleague might be using the project as a way to push some new technology into broader acceptance in the company. Our other colleagues goal might be to bail half way through because they never wanted to be on the project in the first place. All four of us have different motivations and personal goals for this project--and that is totally okay!
It isn't a good idea to assume everybody has the same goal. It is a good idea to at least address this in the beginnings of team building. Knowing that you are trying to get a promo out of this would help me help you get that promo.
Oftentimes different incentives imply different outcomes, though. I've been in environments where product's incentives were not "enable dev to get to work" but instead "create documentation/slide decks for upper management". So they were busy as hell, creating artifacts that did not help dev identify what problem they were solving (let alone what solutions might look like), and were extremely successful based on what they cared about, but meant that the dev teams had very little time or direction to be successful with, leading to low morale and high rates of burnout.
In the example you provide, if that leads to one person going off to play with new stuff while the rest of the team is focused on the project, that's a problem. Likewise if the person wanting to get promoted insists on taking on all the high visibility work (or worse, just taking credit for it), that creates a problem. As long as the desired outcome is the same and you can create a path towards it that aligns with everyone's incentives (project succeeds, people get recognized for their contributions, we use some new stuff along the way) you can be successful.
Joking aside, that thing stood out to me. Would you ever say no, isn't it then a social obligation to say yes? Or if you do say no, that person is just supposed to leave whatever unsaid until a potential future opportunity and in the meantime they'll have to still work with you? It seems odd from both sides.
The challenge I've seen regarding user manuals however is that people immediately discount them. They aren't willing to sit down and think about how they want to operate as an individual. So they poorly write one instead of giving it effort. Managers think it's burdensome and don't take the time to even read them. Lastly, those who write down how they want to operate sometimes do not operate in their integrity. They ultimately have to live with it, but it does create confusion when you give someone feedback based on their user manual and it's not well received.
As a career-long remote employee. I think it's a beautiful initiative if given the time and thought.
This specific user manual screams product manager having issues with engineering manager counterpart.
it just screams desperation
I don't want to learn 35 rules and their context. Give me the five most important points that make you tick.
I think the author forgot to include the "me" part of these sections as generalized tips are not personal. EX: how to give me feedback -> 3 ways I enjoy getting feedback.
For example, “I love direct feedback. Please don’t sugar coat things with me.” or “I am sometimes very direct and it comes across as rude. That is never my intention, so please feel free to call me out on it when it happens.”
Even that though is less useful than the constant work of difficult, honest communication that is actually required to shape your interaction patterns with others. I worry that user manuals might be used to absolve oneself of that work.
This document is a nice piece describing the environment the author wants to work in, in my opinion, rather than being a user manual for the author. Maybe reframing it that way would engender a better response in readers.
All that said though, the response here is often verging into the downright cruel, and I am disgusted by a lot of it. Many folks are making sweeping proclamations about this person’s personality or character and/or directly attacking the author. I think there are things to critique here, but it’s hasty as hell to assume that this document gives you enough to judge an entire person, and a whole other thing to rip that person down with insults.
I didn't get it then, and I don't get it now. I guess I just don't see who has time for this kind of thing -- literally. I doubt very seriously anyone ever actually read these things.
I couldnt imagine sharing this with a coworker. Even if I did, I cant imagine they would read all of it and internalize it. Most people act how they act. They may adjust their behavior slightly when interacting with you but they are not going to adopt a whole new communication style or something complex just to work better with you.
The only person I feel like I could share this with without feeling like an ass would be my direct manager. And typically I have a similar conversation with them during one on ones in the first 6 months of working there.
But at the end of the day its a compromise. Managers are often good at managing and motivating in MAYBE one way. If your way of ideally being managed or motivated doesnt align with theirs then you will both have to find some middle ground. Or change teams/managers/companies.
I might appreciate being able to read this as a manager, and I would take what insight I could glean from it as a coworker. However, even as someone who tries hard to adapt my natural method of interaction to other people, I can’t imagine their poorly self-descriptive document is going to be more useful than a month of direct contact and honest communication.
I think it's very telling that this person says they're an introvert because people who have a need to write a manual for themselves are likely lacking in people skills (and probably shouldn't be managers).
This document is written for the author and don't provide much value to the reader.
Things like "Default to action" are pretty dependent on team/company culture and what you're working on. Your coworkers won't start defaulting to action just because you prefer it if their boss, their boss' boss, etc prefer cautious consideration. There's nothing wrong with preferring to work somewhere with a "default to action" culture, but presumably by the time someone is reading this you've already made the decision that the culture is a good fit for you. (Ditto for "There’s life beyond work". If that isn't the existing culture, then as a reader all it tells me is that you choose to work somewhere that doesn't share your values and we may be in for a bumpy ride.)
Similarly, the way it's written now "Mind the channel" reads like a mandate about team/company norms and culture. Despite being under the heading of "How to efficiently work and communicate with me", rather than explaining which channels of communication you prefer in which contexts, it makes a broad statement about what the reader should consider when communicating with anyone. IMO guidance on how to communicate with others in general, rather than you specifically, belongs in a team handbook and not your personal user manual.
"Don’t give clues" on the other hand is a good example of something that does seem to belong in a user manual. It explains something about you and tells the reader how to more effectively communicate with you. It doesn't make broad generalizations about how they should communicate with others in general.
In the end, I wonder whether this should be split into multiple documents - maybe a user manual (for people working with you) and a separate list of what's important to you in a working environment and company culture (for yourself when job hunting)?
In any case, for the user manual I think it would help to replace broad platitudes and decrees with statements focused on you. If a statement would make sense in a team handbook or similar, I think that's a sign that it may come across as inappropriate/presumptuous in your personal user manual.
https://skamille.medium.com/i-hate-manager-readmes-20a0dd9a7...
https://vinay.notion.site/If-you-want-to-work-with-me-at-Loo...
I don't see how 'humble, hungry and smart' will go together in most applicants, you'll be lucky to have one out of three, extremely happy to get two and all three is usually a question of broken self assessment.
Adding 'hungry' also seems to select for people in need, giving you an advantage over them in negotiations. As for humility: you will not find it in most sub 40 year olds, they don't know what they don't know yet. So this might cause good candidates to back out.
Finally, the extra heading 'We cannot hire within these countries' is superfluous, it is already covered by the previous heading.
hth.
> As for humility: you will not find it in most sub 40 year olds, they don't know what they don't know yet
This is interesting and very different from my experience. I feel like humility is actually the hardest thing to find in anyone (controlled for age and all). I haven't actually seen a clear trend line between humility and age.
> Adding 'hungry' also seems to select for people in need, giving you an advantage over them in negotiations.
Interesting I never really thought about it like this. Do you associate "hungry" with "desperate"? I've always seen them as completely distinct, but, if enough people see them as closely related, I probably should figure out how to qualify this.
Also, keep in mind that my viewpoint is Euro-centric and that just that alone could easily qualify to make up the difference.
As for terminology, eager might be a better term than hungry.
> As for terminology, eager might be a better term than hungry. So funny, I associate eager more with "desperate". Maybe this is a US vs. EU sorta thing. I'm going to noodle on this - thank you!
Without those sections I think the rest is fine. If you want to introduce the whole thing to explain why it's necessary I would entirely leave yourself out of it because it comes off as self aggrandizing. I would just write something like, "I appreciate your interest in working at Loom. I can't simply pass your resume on if you contact me, because it isn't fair to my hiring manager. It makes it easier for everyone when I provide the below information up front because its saves us both time".
If you actually cared about the recipients of this document it would be half a page or shorter and have bullet points of your biggest weaknesses or eccentricities and other actionable info. You aren't Napoleon, nobody needs to read more than a half page about you, especially when most of what you have to say is meaningless corporate jargon.
* meaningless corporate jargon * silly and insecure * corporate kool-aid
I will gladly revise so I don't come off that way.
For the "work-a-loholics" comment, I certainly am a workaholic and you can easily find that online. I don't apologize for it, and I don't mind if others aren't but it will be a problem if that fact makes you salty. I'm doing a lot of shit, and I'm not sorry if that makes you insecure in yourself, although I do hope you work through that for your own benefit.
> have bullet points of your biggest weaknesses or eccentricities and other actionable info
The point of this document is to respond to someone who already wants to work with me and get signal through our hiring process to know if I should refer them in (ideally quickly). Highlighting my biggest weaknesses (something you can Google for - I'm very open about myself) feels off topic and doesn't seem to actually solve anyone's pain points (mine or the candidate's).
That said, I have been told that I can be long-winded in my writing, so it's valuable to get that feedback. I will take a stab at cutting as much fluff as possible - thank you!
it reads more like a guide on working for you, less a guide for working with you.
these should give people the context and "why" of working with you, not the prescriptive steps required.
the use of "we" everywhere is the tell here. the readme is about you, not me.
> People prefer different channels of communication, often depending on context. Don’t communicate in the way that’s most convenient to you. Always consider whom you’re communicating with and what their needs and context might be.
Sure, but my needs should be somewhere in the equation too. If we are peers, it is reasonable to expect them to be as important as yours.
> I try to truly understand a position before arguing against it. Ask questions. Repeat back what I understood to be their point.
Does not leave space for you accepting someone elses position. Also, if primary reason you ask me questions is so that you can argue against, then it does not sound like symmetric cooperative debate seeking solution. Instead, it sounds like debate club where one needs to win by creating gotchas.
Again, I am back to one sided. There are a lot of expectations for other person to understand and tolerate your peculiarities. But little about you trying to actually understand them.
The end.
> tl;dr Trust + Ownership + Mindful communication = Win
the tl;dr doesn't tell you anything.
The rest tries to reform the other person rather than indicate preferences. I would be more ok with one that says: - I prefer emails to meetings. Don't invite me to meetings that could be emails - I decline meetings without an agenda. - respect my time and don't double book me. If you double book me, I may not come, dont act surprised. - I voice my opinions and sometimes it might sound harsh. You can voice yours and I won't take it personally
Overall, I think I would like to work with someone who is conscientious enough and introspective enough to take the effort to make a doc like this. On the other hand, I did have to suppress a bit of an eye-roll and I would wonder whether contextually they'd be annoying to work with or oblivious to subtler contexts and human interactions. But I've written plenty of communications that could cause the same questions in someone else, so...
If a random person on my team or the manager of some other team handed this to me? No, no, and no. Huge red flag. But if I was joining a team for the first time and my manager handed me a manual of expectations and made it clear what they value, what they expect, and how they see the world, that would be a treasure trove for my career. After all, managing my career is essentially managing my manager.
That being said, this document... isn't that. I appreciate the intent, but like many have said, it can be a little self-indulgent :)
The document also makes you sound like a condescending person to me (though it's difficult to judge without knowing the greater context).
If my analysis is correct, a different way around the bad experiences is to detach from them and learn to recognize the unfortunate situations as they come up early on. But if they are too frequent the problem could be your attitude.
For myself, I feel that the posts I put up here (on HN) give a fairly decent idea of what I'm like, but it's been my experience that folks will interpret them to fit whatever narrative they choose (often, unflattering to me).
I think the only way that we'd figure out how we'd work together, would be to ... you know ... work together ... for a while.
To quote dang from 12 hours ago: > It's against the HN guidelines to editorialize titles like this. Please see https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html: "Please use the original title, unless it is misleading or linkbait; don't editorialize."
But the submitted title in this case ("Every person should come with a user manual. So I created one for me.") was baity and therefore against the site guidelines, so we reverted it the way we normally do.
After those initial ideas, I started to get bored. I wanted more humor or a story.
Reagle’s Collaborative Work Style
Ive read what author values and instantly knew we would cooperate well.
I would also add one more thing:
I value the quality of work we do. I try to always deliver the best work I can, but if deadlines are short and we know we are not able deliver quality solution on time -> at least document what can be improved later and why it was not done in the first place.
[0] https://growth.eladgil.com/book/the-role-of-the-ceo/insights...
Is it because of the word manual? It sounds like a very emotional interpretation of the piece without trying to understand its goal at all.
Interesting belief. I don't actually think it holds true in a lot of situations, certainly at least many 'work/employment' situations I've been.
Make it "you-focused" toward colleagues. A lot of the pushback this is receiving here is because it's "me-focused" about OP.
You might as well sum it up as "be nice and reasonable, and don't waste each other's time".
> Don’t give clues: I sometimes miss clues, many people do. Don’t give clues. Tell me what you need.
So important when we're context switching all the time.
This is literally the last thing I would look for or indeed think to look for.
Like, its a little awkward, but based on writing samples I'd rather work with this David guy than with you.
And yes, I admit the word "snowflakes" popped up in my head.
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
Edit: since you have a long history of doing this and are continuing to break the site guidelines, I've banned the account.
How is that "taking threads into flamewar hell"?
How many threads did you have to go back in my timeline to make the claim that I "always do that"? I clicked several pages and found nothing, even defending your own Sam Altman from insults in one of them.
None of that depends on what other people did, though you're certainly right that they shouldn't have attacked you (and we'll ban them, too, if they keep posting like that).
If you don't want to be banned, it's not that hard to read the guidelines and follow them. The vast majority of users here manage that just fine.
I don't want to get locked into hostility here! It's nothing personal, and if you genuinely want to use HN as intended, there are always ways to correct the situation. We just need reason to believe that you do in fact want to use HN as intended and that the pattern of breaking the guidelines won't keep happening in the future.
I did nothing in this thread that is against the guidelines whatsoever. And not in my previous comments, either.
The only thing I did I guess is to voice an opinion or inconvenient truth that you personally don't like. I can see no other explanation for it.
Perhaps it is the comment on the "personal pronouns", because you belong to the group of people pushing that new ideology. But I did not even say you should not indulge people's request for their pronouns, just that people should not be forced to use them against their own convictions. As I explained, there is a clear analogy to the pronouns issue from the "personal manual", that is why I chose to mention it, because it is a well known issue.
Honestly, I just don't know what personal issue you seem to have with me.
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
It's hard to think of a more obvious violation than that one. Moderating such comments has zero to do with your opinions. We don't know or care what your opinions are.
Yet somehow you protect those people and not me. Sorry I can not respect you for that.
If you feel like you're personally being singled out for more stringent moderation, that's an illusion. I don't recognize your username (nor most usernames on HN). It's true that I banned you where I only warned the other user (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30856521) but that's I looked up the history and saw that you'd been warned (and indeed, banned) more than once before, and because your account was considerably more abusive overall.
If the other user continues to break the site guidelines we will end up banning them also.