Introverts are ‘routinely passed up’ for promotions | Hacker News Reader

Introverts are ‘routinely passed up’ for promotions

cnbc.com

19 pointscheeaun7 comments

This hits close to home. I am extremely introverted but I have not had problems in this area because I was specifically told by someone in sr. Management how important "visibility" is.

But what I have witnessed is that this mindset rewards incompetence even insists on it at times. It doesn't matter how good you are at what you do, it only matters if you can go out of your way and explain it in a way multiple levels of middle management can take notice. So naturally people engage in things that can easily be displayed in powepoints and don't take up a lot of time. Fresh talented guys work hard and get noticed by their manager and immediate peers but no reports,papers,powerpoints so I hear some manager bad mouthing them and acting like the person that rushed through their work and put together a nice presentation (who is gonna take a closer look that knows what they are doing?) is a rockstar. And everything takes months because of this. Simple things with minimal effort don't get done because you can't get a person who is also interested in presenting it to managers to work on it (because they don't want to do too much so that it won't be expected of them).

People in tech that like their work tend to be introverts. You shouldn't judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree. Maybe some places do need a tree climbing fish hence "skilled talent shortage"?

When I worked at a tech company (don't anymore) I worked with a lot more talented folks but on top of that I was never asked to be more visible, my work was enough and my talented coworkers progressed to other things. Is it because some businesses naturally prioritize different abilities?

I call it the anti-hacker culture lol. Just an observation, I get it either way.

Yes, part of leadership is the ability to get messages across and extroverts are better at it.

Yeah, this is kinda like saying that people with less talent don't get promoted that often.

We have to acknowledge that introverts and extroverts excel at different things. It's not always the case. But it's generalizing, yes.

It's a bit like saying men are physically stronger than women on average. It shouldn't be controversial.

Are they? Or are they just louder and more assertive in general?

It's not like gregarious people have a skill, it's just a preference. There's nothing stopping introverts from communicating effectively when placed in positions of authority, they are just passed up for those positions on the assumption that they are worse at it (or because the extrovert interacts with management more).

Not every promotion is to leadership. Sometimes you just get more toys and funding.

I found it interesting that 85% of pro sports athletes are introverts.

That said, I believe extroverts are the ones who make decisions about open-plan seating, with no regard to introversion.

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