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Comment by asdkhadsj | Hacker News Reader

This is more of a question than a critique on your comment, but:

Couldn't he still not be a people person _(perhaps a poor communicator)_, and still manage a successful community? I say that because historically it's been a bit of a meme around how forceful and abrasive Linus is. Yet, he's often right, or at the very least very informed.

He's a very smart man who has done very smart things. I'm not sure if the Linux community inherently means he's a gifted communicator. Eg, I don't think I could behave like Linus and make a Linux-like community - I think his talent and intelligence carry his lack of communication skills. Which is not a discredit to him, we're all different.

Thoughts?

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Torvalds' written communications are incredibly well-composed, full of information and get his point across well. On the basis of his emails alone, he's a "gifted communicator" in my view. Not everyone who is as logically brilliant as him can write like that.

Despite that, I'm sure that when he says he's "not a people person" there's something to it. Maybe a certain difficulty reading people or anticipating their responses?

That those two things live together side-by-side, that's what I personally meant by "interesting".

IMO, the thing that he doesn't seem to understand is the difference between criticizing the implementation and criticizing the person. Pointing out flaws in the code is not the same as calling a person stupid. If he could just learn to explain why the code is bad most of his people problems would disappear.

Not all, since some people take criticism of their code poorly, but if you aren't committed to the highest quality code possible then you probably shouldn't be working on something like kernel development. There are some ways to reduce problems with those kinds of people though. Asking probing questions to get the person to think through the problems on their own to fix them for example. Or having a standards document that all kernel code is expected to conform to so you can just point out parts that don't conform to the standard.

"Asking probing questions to get the person to think through the problems on their own to fix them for example."

My impression that most of his blow ups happen after he has tried this approach unsuccessfully.

I am just a little tech lead but over the years I have found that with some people you have to yell at them from time to time because they don't understand feedback that was given nicely.

"not a people person"

Some people are are task oriented and some people are relationship oriented. I think he cares more about the project than making people happy.

I highly recommend watching the TED Talk that Torvalds presented. You get a much clearer idea what he means by "not a people person".

https://www.ted.com/talks/linus_torvalds_the_mind_behind_lin...

This talk is also back in 2016, and even then, he talks about not being proud of the way that he reacts to people sometimes. So, while his recent announcement may come as a surprise to some, it's something he appears to have been giving a good deal of thought for a while now.

That's a fair point. My comment is mainly in reference to my viewpoint that to be a good communicator, you need to both convey information, and convey a socially acceptable tone to allow people to ingest your view with ease. It's what make heated conversations (ie, politics, sensitive subjects, etc) hard to communicate about - the tone becomes aggressive and communication is less effective.

You are very correct, he is very good at conveying information. I think he's poor at placating people and handling people in ways that ease tension, lesson aggressive tones, etc. Great communicators need to do both if they want the information to be conveyed as effectively as possible - even though it stinks to have to placate/etc people, sometimes.

There's different types of communication.

From my casual view, he's not a great communicator in the sense of communicating with the public. That requires measured response and dealing with issues in a particular way.

He is a master of his craft, and very effective technical communicator. As a non-kernel programmer, I can read something that he writes about and understand it enough to answer questions I have about how things work.

It's one of the challenges of working in big groups of people. He is dealing with a huge community, all with their own interests and agendas in pursuit of his vision of excellence. In a private company he would be able to exert (directly or indirectly) control over the conduct of community members. In this public forum, he has the ability to influence rhetorically or control what gets past him. That's a different and more difficult form of control, especially when you have to do it in public.

The fact that he has been leading this for so long shows that he is a great communicator. You can't do this without.

Communication skills doesn't necessarily mean to be smooth and agreeable. It's one facet of it but not everything. On the other hand some people may think his style works because he is abrasive and emulate that (like some people didnand still do with Jobs).

In the end as a leader you need to have a vision where things should go and be able to communicate that. You need to give people freedom to do what they need to do but also sometimes clearly say "no" and risk to alientate some people.

If the email to BBC was written by Torvalds, then he is a great communicator. Very few people can write with such clarity.

I also think Linux is successful because the tool and ideology appeals to people rather than Linus.

In a huge part of development of distros you don't come into contact with Linus anyway, and they are part of the reason why Linux is popular.

So I would not attribute the whole Linux effort and community to him. (He had a huge part in getting it off the ground though and I do not wish to minimize his influenve and input)

Yes. That seems entirely plausible and even likely.

Have you ever worked with someone who is both skilled and a good communicator? It’s an excellent experience, because good people skills are like a force multiplier on those technical skills.

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