Ask HN: Do you criticize? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Do you criticize?

38 pointscritic83 comments

If you follow HN, Reddit and various programming-related sites, you may have noticed that much of their content is criticism of some software, people who developed it, the design decisions they made and so on.

Programmers are prone to criticizing and tactlessness. Torvalds and de Raadt are perhaps among the better known examples. I too often find flaws everywhere (not just software) and criticize.

Lately, I've been reading Dale Carnegie's classic, whose fundamental principle is "Thou shalt not criticize", and came to the realization that the criticism I dished out over the years, however deserved it may have been, has hurt my professional relations, and my career would have been much better off if I had reserved ALL the criticism of others' work.

I made it my New Year's resolution to stop criticizing, but the habit of doing this is so deep, it's like a drug.

Do you criticize, and if not, how do you manage not to? How do you deal with coworkers doing/saying stupid things, especially in programming and science?

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Criticism can be motivated by a desire to communicate useful information and/or motivated by status-seeking/dominance. Criticism that repels even secure people is the kind that appears to have that self-promoting agenda.

I like the way Ben Franklin put it in his autobiography:

"I wish well-meaning, sensible men would not lessen their power of doing good by a positive, assuming manner, that seldom fails to disgust, tends to create opposition, and to defeat everyone of those purposes for which speech was given to us, to wit, giving or receiving information or pleasure. For, if you would inform, a positive and dogmatical manner in advancing your sentiments may provoke contradiction and prevent a candid attention."

He describes how he cultivated "the habit of expressing myself in terms of modest diffidence; never using, when I advanced any thing that may possibly be disputed, the words certainly, undoubtedly, or any others that give the air of positiveness to an opinion; but rather say, I conceive or apprehend a thing to be so and so; it appears to me, or I should think it so or so, for such and such reasons; or I imagine it to be so; or it is so, if I am not mistaken. ... When another asserted something that I thought an error, I deny'd myself the pleasure of contradicting him abruptly, and of showing immediately some absurdity in his proposition; and in answering I began by observing that in certain cases or circumstances his opinion would be right, but in the present case there appear'd or seem'd to me some difference, etc. I soon found the advantage of this change in my manner; the conversations I engag'd in went on more pleasantly. The modest way in which I propos'd my opinions procur'd them a readier reception and less contradiction; I had less mortification when I was found to be in the wrong, and I more easily prevail'd with others to give up their mistakes and join with me when I happened to be in the right."

Too bad Ben Franklin didn't know about Twitter...

Then again, some people will compain if you speak in uncertain terms.

It seems to me that there could perchance be another problem in our communication, namely that of people of a certain persuasion expressing themselves in quite a convoluted manner perhaps better fitting a person in the process of producing a work of literature, in an attempt at asserting their intellectual prowess.

We have something to say, but we encode it in a carrier signal of verbal acrobatics.

It's logical because intelligent people want to appear intelligent too, but communication shouldn't be a competition of who can bend the English language in the most ways while still saying something.. and that was close too!

Then there's Programming Reddit, where (often very intelligent) people gather to argue about things and out-smug each other while still being more right than their opponents. I read it because there's still a lot of useful information floating around, but it's getting tiresome to read conversations that have a "winner".

"C-C-C-COMBO-BREAKER!!"

And what's with the Franklin quote? Was it normal to write "I walk'd to the store and purchas'd a banana" in those days?

Quick - someone hit me with a "Never start a sentence with 'and'"!

> Then again, some people will compain if you speak in uncertain terms.

This is my experience too, especially on the internet.

I agree that Franklin's advice might lead to explicit dominance behavior being replaced by the subtler status-seeking antics of convoluted text. That would still be an improvement in my opinion.

Fortunately, the internet has an existing idiom for "simplify and shorten your message", which is of course: "tl;dr".

Franklin's prose could get very convoluted! I don't know whether he was showing off, or whether it was just the style of the time that he didn't think to change. He was fond of listing things in dense paragraphs so it's unfortunate that bulletpoints weren't invented until 1958 (seriously). Modern pundits are aware that simplicity can lead to more effective messages; we have widely-publicized advice like "Keep It Simple, Stupid". Maybe that's a modern insight or fashion.

True, convoluted text is much better than the outright hostility present on Reddit.

I thought people used "tl;dr" mostly because dismissing things is so much fun, not because they'd be willing to read a shortened version.

> I thought people used "tl;dr" mostly because dismissing things is so much fun, not because they'd be willing to read a shortened version.

You might well be right! But I like to give the benefit of the doubt.

Also pertinent here is the Alexander Pope quotation included in Franklin's autobiography:

"Men must be taught as if you taught them not, And things unknown proposed as things forgot."

You may know the answer to the problem someone else is going through. You may know that their approach is utter garbage and that they are clueless as to what they are doing. But rather than saying so outright, which will likely come across as offensive, it seems better to phrase things in such a way as that they will come to see the better solution for themselves. They might not even realize the role you played in that, nor credit you for the insight. But they will have learned something, improved their work, and didn't feel insulted.

In my experience, it's a route worth trying, anyway.

When the student is ready, the teacher will appear.

Criticism is not the problem. How you say it, is.

Firstly, recognise that what you're about to hammer on is someone's child. Respect that, and respect the effort that's gone into it. Recognise that it's not perfect, and they will know it's not perfect, but also that it (probably) has merit.

Recognise that the person who made this thing is (probably) not an idiot. They are, however, almost certainly not an expert in everything. But neither are you. Your criticism is intended to help.

Make an effort to find that which is worth praising. Observe that other aspects need work/attention/deletion, but there will be things that are good. Be genuine in your praise of that which deserves it - there will be something.

Express optinions as opinions. "That sucks" is an opinion that is most likely not shared by everyone. "Linked lists can be slow" is a fact, but it's easier to hear that when it's accompanied by "... but fast enough sometimes, and can be replaced by better data structures when necessary."

Above all, remember that you are expressing opinions to a person who has feelings, who has invested effort, and who has been brave enough to invite criticism. When it's well intentioned and well expressed, opinions from others are incredibly valuable. When badly expressed, opinions can be of large negative value.

Strive to be of positive value.

For some reason, we socialize people today that criticizing people means that you are smarter than them. I've had people pick apart parts of my comments that weren't even germane to the discussion at hand simply because I said something "wrong"

This is why most journalists have a one-email rule: you can write and say hello or thanks for the article and get a reply, but very rarely can you continue a conversation past a couple of exchanges. There are simply too many people on the net who like to argue and criticize.

How do you deal with coworkers doing/saying stupid things

Learn the four magic words, "Help me to understand..."

There are 3 possible conditions. 1) They are mixed up and you are correct, 2) You are mixed up and they are correct, and 3) You are both mixed up. Given equal weighting, 2/3rds of the time you're the person who is mixed up. So when somebody says something that doesn't sound right, ask them to explain it to you. Heck, you might learn something.

In that same spirit (humility and learning), you may want to offer some education to somebody who is struggling. But that's only after you listen. Listening gives you the right to talk.

To save time on the net, I usually try to restate what I think the other person is saying and then provide the way I understand the situation. "If I understand you correctly, you're saying that large weasels were the first inhabitants of the New World. That's very interesting, because as I understand it, there have been no large weasel fossils found here. Help me to understand. Is there something I might be missing?"

Part of the problem with the net is that deep in our minds we view other posters as somehow just part of the machine and not real live humans, whether we acknowledge that or not. So we say things in comments we would never say face-to-face. Programmers are very analytical. When something appears in a program on in a thread that is "incorrect" we must jump in and stomp it out immediately! That little Mr. Spock in all of us turns on and immediately whips up a retort and criticism to show to others just how much more we know.

I think that most people who are confrontational and critical online are just like that in person. People can be quite blunt face-to-face, and are perfectly OK with it when people are blunt to them. Blunt interaction has the big advantage that you never have to second guess what a remark means. Consider how many relations (between friends/colleagues/etc) break up because somebody reads too much in a simple remark. The most tactful people also tend to be those who (needlessly) worry the most about what other people say. I say this just from personal experience, so YMMV - but it's worth considering.

As for the Mr. Spock argument, I think that has a much more mundane explanation. I, like most people, read far more on the internet than I write. But when I read I read to learn. Therefore, I want to be reasonably sure what I read is correct. Because of the Mr. Spocks amongst us I can read the comments and use that to figure out if the blogger made any sense. More often than not the comments reveal serious flaws in the blogger's post. It is this interaction between blogger and Spocks that leads to better understanding. Both for visitors like me and the blogger.

So the Spocks fight against the pollution of the internet by incorrect statements%. It's a futile fight, but I believe it's a noble one. Frankly, I think posting uninformed and wrong comments is far more inconsiderate than pointing out to all future readers that such a comment is uninformed or wrong.

%) You called it an internet maxim in another post.

I had a customer once that wanted me to hire a team of the best consultants we could find.

So I spent about a month reviewing resumes and doing interviews. At the end, we had about 8-10 folks who had top-drawer experiences, top-drawer credentials, and top-drawer recommendations. (Their rates were top-drawer too, but that's a different post)

Once they started, I found that I was wrong all of the time. If I said it was raining, one person would say nope, it's misting, another would say that a better term would be scattered showers, while a third person would point out that the technical meteorological term was BR.

It went on like this for weeks. Whatever my opinion, technical or not, was wrong. Drove me nuts.

Then I realized that these really sharp folks were simply acting the way they had their entire careers. People who criticize and correct get noticed as being smart. You can either be a wallflower or you can stand up and show how much you know.

These were great guys, but they weren't working as a team. Instead, each was jockeying to look good.

Not sure if my example directly applies, but it at least seems to me that a lot of folks are simply playing for points, ie, looking to nitpick instead of trying to learn.

People are tough, you know? Computers are a lot easier.

I've been in the situation you've described (and I've been part of the problem). And yes, it can be really frustrating. Some teams don't work. And sometimes a single person makes or breaks a team. This is fascinating by itself, but a bit off topic.

The big difference is that online the reader to writer ratio is way different. Online, when somebody points out that a hash-map insert is amortized O(1) instead of O(1) hundreds or thousands of people benefit.

When the contractor tries to convince you that a scattered shower is different from a heavy mist (even though you're not in the least interested) nobody benefits. It's just noise.

'I criticise by creation, not by finding fault.' - Michelangelo

There is a difference between criticising something so that it (and other things like it) can be improved, and criticising something as a means of tearing something (or someone) down.

Good criticism means saying what is good about something as well as what is bad.

I find that a lot of people can't tell the difference between what's meant to be constructive criticism and an insult.

I agree. Indeed, if you criticize the choices a professional made in his area of expertise, you are often criticizing their competence and/or intelligence by implication.

Often, the right target for criticism is supposed to be the person himself. For example, if someone without the right domain knowledge or understanding of math deluded himself into thinking he knows enough and starts messing things up, you really don't want to help him along.

Imagine some VB noob "fixing" your mission-critical Lisp code, saying it would have been easier if it was all ported to .NET or something.

Dealing with all these situations in the best way possible requires a lot of finesse, I'm sure.

I just noticed, in retrospect, that such a blunt approach as not giving any criticism ever is STILL better (for me, not my employer necessarily) than what I was doing.

I run into this problem all the time. As hard as I try to be diplomatic whoever I am trying to give constructive criticism is insulted. It doesn't help that I'm usually trying to give criticism to my boss, but still (at the jobs I've held I have had very few colleagues other than my direct boss).

COMPLETELY wrong. Telling someone the good as well as the bad is an obvious sandwich - everyone knows this, and the good is completely ignored.

Saying something is good is praise. Saying the bad is critism. Combining them makes some type of praise-criticism hybrid, it does not make good criticism. Let me give you an example of what you are saying:

Hey Dude, I really love the colors on your website. It sucks that your website is really useless to the entire world, but that butterfly you put up there is lovely.

How is that good criticism?

Some things and people should be torn down.

Yes, although they are a minority.

My home country was under single party rule in the 90's and has now emerged as a vibrant democracy with economic power on par with Australia thanks to such tearing down.

Polite requests were not sufficient to bring about change. It took confrontational, attacking arguments as well.

Public criticism is very bad. I once criticized a fellow team member in a fairly loud, emotionally heated public tiff saying stuff like 'If I have to implement that feature that way, I'll quit' (I really did feel like I would have). I was called into the carpet on my manager's office and made very well aware that I had disrupted the team dynamic (because I had surfaced conflict and more importantly other teams had overheard what I had said (which hurts our team's image). Among other things, one of the quieter members of our team expressed concern to our manager (which she had never done ever before). I had to apologize and repair the rift (which took months).

What I've found after many years is this: If you have something negative to say, and don't have any idea what would be better, then just shut up. If you see an ugly flower, do you rip it up and leave nothing in it's place? If something sucks and you don't have any idea how it could be better, keep your mouth shut.

If you have a better idea, then tell the person straightforward - I think this could be better like this, that could be better like that, then let the person take what he wants of your suggestions. Don't defend your points, don't argue it. Just give your opinion and leave.

If your opinion is strong, and this particular part of the item affects you DIRECTLY, then first of all make it clear that you would like to argue a point, then make sure that the other person understands that this is not personal. Then lay out the points you dislike with suggestions on how they would be better, and then try to come to a middle ground on which items should go your way and which items should go the other way.

Keep the primary rule in mind - finding an error and pointing it out does not show you are clever. If the thing you see is not relevant to you and you cannot play any difference in getting it fixed, then don't say anything. Just let it be.

It's not the critic that needs fixing, it's the person who takes criticism to heart, and doesn't learn from it.

Criticism is vital feedback IMHO.

technically yes, but I find that more often than not, people think it is the critic who is wrong. Should the critic really continue to fight the society he is part of? it only serves to hurt him/her in the long run.

Criticism is great, but it should be done appropriately. Instead of telling someone how much X sucks, tell them that, in your opinion, X they might be able to make X much better by doing A, B, and C. This is difficult to do appropriately, but very helpful to everyone.

It is also difficult and important to learn to listen to criticism. However, you can probably screw up your life much quicker by giving criticism in an undiplomatic way than by failing to take criticism.

unfortunately it's not as easy as saying it might be able to be done by by doing it way X. my sister was constantly offended by my intended to be constructive criticism of her cooking, and usually it was a simple as this would be better if you used more salt. I never said it was bad, I merely suggested how things could be improved, and she took this as an insult, and a complaint.

I find that people don't like criticism period, doesn't matter what, you are criticizing or why. They see it as A, complaining, B insulting, C plain negativity.

It depends on the person. I'd much rather people were straight and honest with me, rather than wooly and said the dreaded "That's nice".

Also it depends on experience I guess, if you're just starting to learn something out of your comfort zone, you don't really want harshly honest critique of your (probably lame) efforts. You want mainly encouragement. Once you become more confident though, and believe in your own abilities, you just want the truth.

in my experience people don't want the truth, most people aren't like hackers. Hackers love honesty, no matter how brutal, most people simply aren't like that. I don't mind a brutal critique so long as it includes advice on how to be better if I'm just starting something. But don't tell me I did it wrong and leave it at that, I have to know why.

While most people's behavior would be net improved by following Carnegie's recipe, I don't think it's optimal. There are cases when you want to criticize something, even if it doesn't make you liked.

Do you think either approach - blunt criticism, or avoidance of such - is more optimal than the other? Many CEOs are famous for being colorful and blunt - Steve Jobs, Herb Kelleher - and I find that very often, I gravitate towards services produced by such people. I don't know about many CEOs that practice the opposite approach, but that's because the opposite is less newsworthy.

I guess what I'm asking is: would you say the net improvement is worth the loss of those exceptions in business relationships?

Dale Carnegie never used Vista.

I think Dale Carnegie's feedback to Microsoft would have sounded thusly:

===

Dear Sir:

I wish to express my most sincere admiration of your company's business leadership over the years and its continued relevance in all matters of public life.

I am especially fond of your Windows XP product, as its ease of use and popularity are unparalleled. It was very generous of you to trust your users to do the right thing when it comes to multimedia copyright.

Your Windows Vista product also shows a lot of promise and I'm sure your company's renewed emphasis on security and stability is appreciated by many.

I can't wait to see what you will come up with next!

===

I think this is the funniest comment I've ever read on Hacker News. Please subscribe me to your newsletter.

Yeah, that's brilliant, but really - you can only decode what it means if you know the other person is too polite to say things outright.

criticism is not constructive if it cannot be.

Criticizing vista is generally little other than an exercise of complaining, whining, etc. Microsoft most likely does not hear the majority of it, and therefore cannot do anything about it. You cannot do anything about vista's poor qualities other than not use it.

Criticism is only truly useful when it can have a positive impact.

Imagine saying, I don't think it should have rained today. Although phrased as a criticism, there is no possible good change that can come from that statement. Therefore, it is simply a complaint.

Truly, however, criticizing vista in the proper venues and at times where some good can come of it could be constructive, generally, however, it is as useful as criticizing god for the weather. If you want it different, go elsewhere.

Criticizing vista is generally little other than an exercise of complaining, whining, etc.

Have you ever tried it? I have. I had to go back to XP because I had so much commercial software that would not run on Vista. Good luck finding a new laptop with XP in your local Office Depot.

Criticism is only truly useful when it can have a positive impact.

Agreed. To anyone reading this: Don't get Vista. It's garbage. There. I just gave positive impact. I potentially saved many strangers a lot of unnecessary pain.

If you want it different, go elsewhere.

Where have you been the last 20 years? If you have commercial or enterprise customers, there is no elsewhere.

xp, mac, linux. most enterprise customers are on xp, not vista.

Yes I've used vista, only moderately, someone wanted a new computer and even though I advised against vista, they bought it anyways.

most likely everyone here knows vista's garbage. providing the same criticism repeatedly is generally futile. If you didn't get through the last few times, what makes you think it'll change now.

If you don't want Vista why would you buy a laptop from Office Depot? If you have enterprise customers then you can downgrade to XP when buying from Dell, or presumably HP. I think it's more of a positive note that Microsoft is softly breaking from some of the Legacy requirements that people complain of so much.

Criticism from people I respect tends to have a large impact on me. Criticism that is clearly technically right can make me say "Oops" and correct it. Criticism that is vague and ad hominem gets flushed out the window.

Just think of what kind of criticism you want to get and actually impacts you; make that the kind of criticism you deliver. That's if you want to help other people.

To the extent you want to help yourself, flattery has always been a favored method.

> it's like a drug

I think criticizing is enticing because it gives a feeling of superiority, without the hard work and risk of mistakes... and risk of criticism. Even more insidiously drug-like is that habitual criticizing makes one more reluctant to take those risks oneself, because one is more self-critical, and one expects criticism.

"It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat." - Theodore Roosevelt

I know exactly what you mean about the habit of criticizing being like a drug. I don't know if I can completely give up criticizing; it may not even be a good idea to do so for reasons that others have mentioned here.

But after reading the Carnegie book recently, I am trying to be more tactful. Whether I change my behaviour in the long run or not, I find it is a good social experiment to carry out. Now when I disagree with someone or am tempted to criticize them for some reason, I have to think about it carefully. I don't just blurt out my first thoughts. I have definitely seen that it helps to start with a compliment or merely stating the things that we do agree upon. And then I politely pose the differences as questions, similar to what Ben Franklin suggests. It's too early for me to make any big inferences, but one thing I can say is that it certainly feels better to have pleasant conversations than heated abrupt arguments.

Is criticism a bad thing? If people are posting here just to get their ego stroked then there's no real point to it..

If I post something here it would be for it to get torn apart by people experienced in stuff like that. Design decisions are the main area that needs outside help and this is the best place to ask for it IMO.

Anonymously criticizing things on the internet - perhaps not.

In real life, especially in the work environment or personal life, I'm convinced now that criticism is very bad for the one giving it.

Withholding criticism though is not something I've completely mastered yet.

If you don't present your criticism tactfully, then it'll be bad for you.

Withholding your criticism, however, will just turn you into a mostly worthless zero-contributor.

Don't dump criticism - dump tactlessness.

Here's a simple trick: Instead of saying "You're wrong, because X Y Z" (which is also my natural tendency, as you can see from these posts!) try using the formula: "I see what you're saying. A B C (rephrase what they just said). Hmm. What about X? Does that have any impact?" and let them get to Y and Z themselves.

Just using that phrasing will help you tremendously. Of course there are other even more subtle ways to do it, but this works for most situations, and once you get started down this path, you'll figure them out.

I think the "What about X" approach often comes across as condescending. It translates to "I figured out what's wrong with it in 2 seconds, but maybe, if I give you a few hints you'll see it too.". I've noticed though that people who don't like criticism (become defensive, etc) respond better to the "what about X" approach.

You suggest tactlessness should be dropped. But plain language is almost by definition tactless. Tact is something you add on top of your opinion/statement because you don't want to hurt somebody's feelings. Adding boilerplate tact is bound to give you poor results when it's not sincere. You're emphasizing the good parts merely because you don't want the other person to become defensive. Not because you think the good parts really need emphasis. When I use the "what about X" approach I often feel insincere because I can't directly get to the point. I end up respecting the person I'm talking to less for having to take the insincere route.

To give another example of boilerplate tact: often people advice to combine a compliment and a criticism with "and" instead of "but". Instead of saying "I like the layout, but I think that column should be wider"." you're supposed to say "I like the layout -and- I think that column should be wider". It's so obviously insincere.

I totally agree, and, in fact, one of the things I enjoy most about working with the people I work with now is that I can bypass all the bullshit and just get straight to the point. It's a pleasure for me not to have to add all these extra layers of foam around my points.

However, when faced with someone whose ability to take direct answers I don't know, I'd fall back to the "What about X" method. If they were to answer that by jumping straight to Z and looking a little bit annoyed at me, I'd probably try getting straight to the point next time, and see if that works better with them.

Different people, different conversation styles...

When I worked in japan, I often got tired of people witholding their criticism out of politeness... For example, just to get my coworkers to actually correct my japanese took a few month of me insisting that no I won't be angry at them for correcting me and that I want them to do it.

Some people can't handle criticism but it doesn't mean that you shouldn't try at first to give others constructive criticism, see their reaction and drop it off if they are too defensive. How people react to criticism is also a good test to see if someone is interesting and likely to evolve his opinion or not...

Nah I totaly disagree with that. Well no I dont: I just personally dont mind criticism in RL. If it comes from someone I respect I take note. Otherwise I alrgely ignore it (obviously!).

If I ask for criticism (i.e. post my app here) I expect it.. and if I see anyone post an app here then I critique it. Criticism is not a negative thing (unless you phrase it as so). I look on it more as a process to feedback the experiences of others into your own personal "view".

I commend you on your welcoming criticism. I too like to think that, while I'm blunt, I can take criticism myself and welcome it as well.

I'm wondering though where you are disagreeing with me exactly? I said criticism is bad for the one giving it, not the one receiving it.

I'll share one personal anecdote: a new coworker of mine came to the U.S. for the first time and his English was terrible. He specifically asked me to correct his bad English whenever possible. I was wary of such a request at first, but started doing it nevertheless.

You know how he paid me back for my efforts? He tried to score some sympathy by complaining to others about my nagging him about his English. F that.

First thing in your NY resolution would be then not to have a loginid 'critic' :-)

The guidelines of this site contain a useful rule: act as if you were saying something to someone's face. If you're more or less normal, that means that sure, you can criticize things, but you won't be a jerk about it.

The guidelines also include a useful example of how to keep criticism from being personal:

When disagreeing, please reply to the argument instead of calling names. E.g. "That is an idiotic thing to say; 1 + 1 is 2, not 3" can be shortened to "1 + 1 is 2, not 3."

I love that "can be shortened to."

http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Strange when you get that realization isn't it? How could we (and so many others) go so long not realizing that criticism usually has opposite effects? Why do we continue to do so? I still don't know.

Don't be hard on yourself that you haven't changed after just 6 days. Making a major change to your personality takes some time. I suggest re-reading the book every once in a while to keep the goal fresh in your thoughts.

Also I recommend Erich Fromm's "The Art of Loving" which briefly discusses Carnegie's book and gives more of a "why" than a "how" on dealing with people.

Criticism is extremely valuable. You can't improve without criticism.

People who feel like criticism is a personal affront are somewhat foolish. If someone is taking the time to explain you why they think you're wrong about something, you should take the time to consider their opinion. They themselves may be wrong in their criticism, but the intent/result of criticism is to help you improve.

I warmly encourage everyone to criticise me at all times.

This is a good post, but your response to critic in the thread started by ErrantX should be read by everybody.

Yep, that's a fair comment. I wrote this one before I read that thread, hence why they are two separate replies. I could probably have merged them as a single response with a bit more forethought.

Situationally dependent.

If you ask for my opinion, you're going to generally get pretty direct feedback. Over the years I've managed to find the right balance (mostly) between tactfulness and directness. I don't generally sugar-coat things, nor do I like when people try to "phrase" their criticism TO me.

For the last ~11 years I've been working with various startup or turnaround companies. You don't often have time to make sure that everyone leaves every meeting with their feelings and emotions fully intact. But that also doesn't mean that you can or should be a flaming asshole either.

I do not believe that my critical assessment of things has ever hurt a relationship that I would have wanted to maintain. I have had situations where the person receiving the criticism was incapable of handling any negative feedback. But in those cases, that individual usually ends up with a stack of imagined enemies and has zero future value to me anyway.

Just practice a softer delivery. Instead of saying "I don't like how this is..." or "This sucks because..." say: "This is good and it would be even better if ...". This way you're not saying anything negative at all, but at the same time voicing the things you believe should be improved.

> "doing/saying stupid things"

if you think something is stupid slow down. stop. try and understand the other person's perspective and the root of their concerns.

be respectful. i find this easier when i'm in a good mood and my mind is actually being respectful, rather than simply watching what i say. the latter is important, too, because emotions, stress and frustrations cannot always be avoided or ignored.

1. their perspective and concerns are likely valid, even if they don't have the background to properly express their concerns or come up with a smart solution.

2. no one is stupid, we just have different backgrounds and are in different places of development. sometimes it is appropriate (and useful) to teach or mentor others; other times the group needs to stick to a process that permits communication and specialized expertise.

I find that it's not the criticism that's the problem: it's the presentation.

If instead of saying "this dialog box sucks," you say "the user might find it easier to use if you move this button over here" you accomplish the same thing, but with a much less negative impact.

That's a stupid resolution! 5 cents please.

Seriously though, I prefer to go Socratic when I disagree on a technical question. I don't want to prove to myself or anyone else that I'm right. I do want to draw someone else into my way of thinking.

If my partner in argument manages to answer the questions I thought were subtle and revealing, maybe my understanding was incomplete. In that case, I should have been asking questions all along anyway. Depending on how sarcastic your questions sound at the beginning, you can probably change stance from know-it-all to ignoramus without anyone noticing.

If a problem has a settled answer in the public record, send a link. Not everyone considers the same sources authoritative, though.

Personal criticism is harsh and a bit rude.

However criticism of code or architecture should be encouraged and seen as a constructive thing as it lets you discuss different approaches and why the current approach was taken and how it can be changed or improved.

Criticism and debate in Math, Engineering and Science should be encouraged.

I think it's ok to criticize as long as it's constructive.

I can't speak for others, but I really appreciate good criticism. I'm talking about the kind that is brutally honest.

It still pays to be polite, I don't take shit from people who are rude.

I think it's great that Hacker News has the 'Rate my Startup' style threads. One of the things that stands out is the quality and honesty of the criticism, there's always some interesting points brought up.. and everyone here so damn nice too!

It's unfortunate that TdR and others like him are remembered more for their internet comments and less for their contributions. Some of the lamest people I've ever worked with were the ones who were unable to criticize anything and some of the best and most effective people I've ever worked with were also the most critical (and sometimes the most obnoxious) and I've always preferred to work with the latter.

Criticism, if kept in check, can be a valuable tool IMHO. Remember, to many eyes, all bugs are shallow. In a way, then, I think that criticism can provide a way of bug checking designs and modes of thought. Of course, criticism can turn nasty and destructive, but I don't think it has to. That's my 2¢, anyway.

It's worth remembering that Dale Carnegie was a salesperson. Salespeople can afford not to criticize. That's because, when the sales negotiation ends, they will present you with a contract to sign -- a contract that has been written by some of the bluntest, most critical, most paranoid people on Earth: Lawyers. Salespeople get away without criticizing because they outsource the task to lawyers.

As an engineer, it pays to have great sales skills, but you have a much harder task than the average salesperson, because ultimately your job is more like the lawyer's. Your raison d'etre is to build things that actually work. In the famous words of Richard Feynman:

For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled.

And that forces engineers to be critical. The decisions they make in the early parts of a project could make an order-of-magnitude difference in the eventual cost. If they don't find the holes in the plan ("gosh, won't your proposed friends-of-friends search scale as O(N^3) and ultimately bring your social network to its knees?") or properly evaluate the likelihood of rare-but-deadly scenarios ("is it worth a million dollars to guard against the odds that our offsite backup's drive controller will fail just as an earthquake takes out our primary data center, or shall we just buy insurance?") the whole enterprise could fail catastrophically.

Perhaps many engineers err on the side of too little Dale Carnegie. But it's telling that many of the great ones don't so much avoid criticism as get really, really good at selling criticism to you. Think of Steve Jobs, one of the most critical people in human history, who gets away with it by playing the role of a fanatically driven artist. Or Torvalds, who is really blunt but turns it into a joke: He makes fun of his own bluntness (he named his DVCS "git" -- look it up in the dictionary!), he's deliberately over the top, and he plays strictly to an audience of engineers, who are more likely to see the humor in lines like "CVS users are ugly and stupid" than the average person is.

Try to moderate your criticism, but don't forget that ultimately it is your job. Don't lose focus on it.

My girlfriend at that same resolution last year, I think it lasted a good 48 hours before she started talking in other people's back.

You just did the same thing.

"Exposition, criticism, appreciation, is work for second-rate minds.” -G H Hardy, the opening lines of A Mathematician’s apology

Go to reddit and just fight the trolls. Nobody feels bad about criticizing Mr. "It was an inside job" conspiracy nutbag.

I'm an analyst and strategist, so the answer is yes. Otherwise, I'm not doing my job.

What a dumb question

> How do you deal with coworkers doing/saying stupid things, especially in programming and science?

I think the real question you have to answer for yourself is, who died and appointed you the arbiter of stupid? Why do you think you should go around and share your opinion on what other people want to do and say?

The fundamental problem is not how you present criticism, as other commentors have suggested. That is a techie "hacks" approach to the issue.

It's your attitude towards other people on the whole. You want to critize because of the way it makes you feel, not because you want to help them grow as human beings.

I don't know you personally, but a lot of people with the kinds of criticizing problems you describe look at being correct as being righteous, and being incorrect as sinful, unvirtuous and contemptible.

Just biting your tongue's not going to solve this underlying view.

What you need to cultivate is respect and empathy for everyone's humanity and their complete otherness from you.(And some gentleness for yourself, too.) I'd recommend some vipashyana mediation.

Note: I'm aware of the irony. But you asked.

> "who died and appointed you the arbiter of stupid"

I think that's the key. We all are entitled to an opinion, but none of us is entitled to spit that opinion in the face of anyone else.

> "It's your attitude towards other people on the whole. You want to criticize because of the way it makes you feel"

> "Just biting your tongue's not going to solve this [negative] underlying view [of other people]."

Strongly agree. Most peoples' criticism (mine especially included) isn't harsh because they use a bad method, it's harsh because they're mean, selfish people.

I think hating bad/incorrect is key to being good/correct: hating bad spelling is key to being motivated enough to learn to spell correctly.

Learning to be indifferent to failure and mediocrity is not the right goal IMO.

I firmly disagree.

If you hate bad/incorrect, then you will have to hate yourself most of the time, because you are a fallible human just like everyone else. And hate is not a very good motivator. If you hate yourself when you are wrong, it is much easier to just not seek the truth in the first place.

Accepting that mistakes are a huge part of life, and striving to get better every time, is a much better approach.

> If you hate bad/incorrect, then you will have to hate yourself most of the time

Look at it this way (Depending on your background, you may need to read http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utility to understand the nature of my argument):

There is a utilty to you of person P doing behavior B. Let's call this utility function U(P, B)

You strive to maximize U, i.e. low U - hate; high U - love. And when U is flat you are indifferent.

If you are making hiring/firing decisions, you get to maximize U in the first argument, so your hate/love of good/bad behaviors can translates into preferences of persons (i.e. hires)

However, when looking at your own actions, you don't get to maximize U in the first argument, and so your hate/love of bad/good does not translate into self-loathing. "Self" is just not part of the equation there.

See how it's much clearer when you think of it mathematically?

> Accepting that mistakes are a huge part of life, > and striving to get better every time, > is a much better approach.

If you are indifferent about failures (your utility function is flat), where would the striving come from?

"Acting in anger is like throwing hot coals. First, you get burned."

But beyond that, you're sadly mistaken if you believe that humans actually maximize utility and follow any kind of logical equation in their lives.

I suggest you read Stumbling onto Happiness, Mistakes Were Made (But Not By Me), The Presentation of the Self in Everyday Life, and of course Predictably Irrational. All chock-full of good, meaty studies that show what irrational creatures we are.

> But beyond that, you're sadly mistaken if you believe that humans actually maximize utility and follow any kind of logical equation in their lives.

This objection is of the kind "you can't use scientific models to describe our world":

Planets are not points (don't use Newton's equations).

Temperature begins to exist only after you wait an infinite amount of time for the system to reach an equilibrium.

etc.

The maximization of utility may be an approximation, but it's definitely a more helpful mental model of human preferences than none at all, and claiming that somehow hating failures and loving success should translate into self-loathing because all humans are fallible.

Anyhow, I'm working on not arguing this year, so I'll leave you here. Sorry I started this branch of the discussion.

I'm guessing that you know exactly how full of crap you are and are just waiting to see how many people eat it up like a delicious ham sandwich.

You know very well that by referring to actual studies of human nature I am not, in any way, implying or suggesting that "you can't use scientific models to describe our world."

It's not funny, and it's not clever.

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