Hacker News Reader

Comment by nicoburns | Hacker News Reader

> The other engineers would go by his office to make small talk, chat about great projects they're working on, and sports they both like. I never did any such thing and stayed in my office working. > Over time I would see him going to all the other engineers' offices to chat and catch up on projects, but never mine, and that further cemented the feeling that this guy doesn't like me.

So... you took it as a sign that he doesn't like you when he didn't come and talk to you, but you don't consider it reasonable that he took it as a sign that you didn't like him when you didn't talk to him?

View on HN

I'm not required to be friends with my boss, only to do my job and be respectful and friendly to all co-workers. He was not managing me, he was just wielding the power that came with the title.

Whenever we talked, it was because I came to him. He never came to me, I was ignored. The more I felt that he disliked me, the less frequently I went to talk to him and resorted to emails. I felt that he had already written me off.

In the performance review, one of the things mentioned was that I wasn't communicating with him enough. I pointed out how one-sided our relationship was, I would come to him and rarely the reverse. He said that he was very busy and doesn't always have time to come by my office but couldn't explain how he did that for all the other engineers.

I knew that I should suck up to him if I wanted to succeed there but the circumstances caused me to detest working there so I cared less and less about the threat of being fired.

> In the performance review, one of the things mentioned was that I wasn't communicating with him enough. I pointed out how one-sided our relationship was, I would come to him and rarely the reverse. He said that he was very busy and doesn't always have time to come by my office but couldn't explain how he did that for all the other engineers.

In case it's comforting to you, I'll let you in on a secret: For guys like Scott, there's always going to be a made-up excuse. You were his chosen scapegoat, and there was literally nothing you could do that would be right. I've had a manager like this, and it's hopeless. They'll choose 1+ people on the team as their "Can Do Nothing Wrong" golden boys, and they'll choose 1+ people as their "Can Do Nothing Right" scapegoats, and that's just the way it is. You unlucked into a bad manager.

Thanks, I think this is the most accurate take and it does feel better.

That's not a contradiction, is it? Selective engagement and non-engagement are different things. It's reasonable for some individuals to be generally less sociable than others. That doesn't mean it's OK to explicitly exclude them.

Nobody expects the teacher to bring in candy, but it's kind of awful if they only bring it in for the students they like.

"Rule of law" is ideal, even for laws you don't agree with.

etc.

> Nobody expects the teacher to bring in candy, but it's kind of awful if they only bring it in for the students they like.

I hated teachers who insisted on treating everyone exactly the same. Ideal would be treating everyone according to their need. Which might mean candy for some, the freedom to set their own workload for others, understanding of chattiness for yet other, etc. Admittedly candy is fairly universal in terms of how it affects people.

> "Rule of law" is ideal, even for laws you don't agree with.

I'd rather have exceptions be able to made where appropriate. I'd see "rule of law" as a least-worst fallback where that can't be achieved.

Managers should put in effort to reach out to their reports, even ones who don't initiate chatting/small talk. People get nervous about the new boss - would the chatting be viewed negatively (wasting time or whatever)?

Further:

> Then when we all went out for drinks at the end of the week, I chatted as I normally would but I felt like the new boss kept shutting down my stories to get a laugh from the others.

I would take that as a sign he didn't like me.

Its the manager's responsibility to communicate with and support his staff, not the other way around.

Work isn’t high school. A manager or lead, if they’re doing their job right, are a force multiplier for productivity. If they’re not, it’s time to jump ship

Reply on news.ycombinator.com