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Comment by tom_b | Hacker News Reader

The "hard to talk to" test is almost the perfect description of how I feel about working with certain clients (for lack of a better phrase) in my current job.

Prior to this gig, I would have said one my strengths was actually working and communicating with users of software I helped write or support.

Now, it seems like our team is mostly "walled off" from the external people we could do the most for.

Any tips out there for breaking through that wall? It is really discouraging . . .

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I don't know if you believe in the 'Myers Briggs' stuff (I do to an extent) - but one of the most valuable tools with it (which isn't often mentioned) is to look out for any of your types switching from one to the other.

If this is happening it means you are under stress, and once you can spot it and do something about it, it's really powerful.

Myers Briggs is a descriptive, not prescriptive, categorization of personality types; belief doesn't enter into it. Like all categorizations, it's merely a useful description of people with a fixed precision of 16. If 16 is an accurate enough categorization for a particular need, then Myers Briggs is sufficient. And like all categorizations, it's just a single way of looking at things, it's not in any way authoritative. You can't dis-believe in a categorization system.

I think the GP was talking about belief in the usefulness (or reliability or validity) of Myers Briggs. Note that the MBTI doesn't just classify people into 16 categories; it classifies people into discontinuous binary categories along 4 axes, obviously resulting in a total of 16 categories. It's certainly useful to think about peoples' positions along those 4 axes, although maybe there are other axes more useful for describing personalities in some situations. However, I find the idea of absolute binary classification (i.e. you're either an introvert or an extrovert, there are no shades of gray) hard to swallow.

For what it's worth, Wikipedia has some interesting summaries of criticisms of the MTBI's validity and reliability. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myers-Briggs_Type_Indicator#Val...

That's interesting. I've always tested as an ENTJ ("The Executive or Field Marshall). Lately I've been under a lot of stress as my startup has gotten zero traction and something needs to give soon, because I'm hungry (for food!). Anyways, I recently took the Myers-Briggs again and the result was INFP - which some websites refer to as "The Idealist" who are focused on searching for the value they can provide in life. Weird.

Organizations can be complicated things, so I'm guessing there is some history behind the wall. I think the first step is thinking about (and hopefully understanding) why the gap is there. What do you think the reasons for the wall are?

This reminded me of one of the "motivational" posters we have in my building:

*Never take down a fence before you know why it was put up in the first place."

I'm still not sure I agree with it, since it sounds like rationalization for "We've always done it this way."

EDIT: All of your responses are correct, and I appreciate knowing where the quote/paraphrase comes from. Unfortunately, the unique environment I'm in means that this paraphrase is aimed at the type of people (warehouse workers) who would most certainly read into it as a cop-out, and not the nuanced and thoughtful call to rational thinking that it is.

Oh well.

Not really.

It merely means that you should ask people 'why do we do this' until you get a better answer than 'We have always done it this way' (unless the actual answer is that).

It is a good warning to heed too -- otherwise you will end up redoing all the mistakes of the past.

It's taken out of context. You can read the passage by G.K. Chesterton here: https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/G._K._Chesterton#The_Thing_.28...

I'd say it's a good paraphrase. That larger passage is really great and has many implications for software and technology, for sure.

Turns out it is quoted as Robert Frost instead of Chesterton.

I can't find a date for the Frost quote, though. not sure who was first (they were actually born the same year, so either is possible).

The phrase make good sense. Knowing why the fence was put up in the first place is key. Then "We've always done it this way." is usually defeated with a more appropriate reason. Unless the same type of fences you see are reasonably indicative of poor or confused judgement. Then blast away at will!

rephrase it again. "Yea x is annoying, why did we introduce that step in the process?". That doesn't have the same 'we're not going to stop x!' implication, but explicitly asks for the information you'd need before you went through with stopping it.

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