Comment by geocrasher | Hacker News Reader

Comment by geocrasher | Hacker News Reader

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I find that the majority of these suggestions take a needlessly adversarial approach. I lack the energy to write more right now, but overall a collaborative approach should be taken. Here's my version of the first dozen or so:

- You are overcomplicating this

    Wow, You've put a lot of thought into this- that's great! I think we can probably simplify it a bit though. What do you think?

- That meeting sounds like a waste of my time

    Is attendance mandatory? I'm not sure what I'll be able to bring to the table on this one.

- I told you so

    (Silence is golden)

- That sounds like a horrible idea

   That would probably work if $thing were true, but in this case I don't think it'll apply. What do you think?

Also this is closely related to "That won't work!" which I wrote about on my blog some time back: https://meetryanflowers.com/that-wont-work/

- I already told you this

   Oh, I think this is something we already covered. Did you you remember when we talked about $this?

- Can you answer all of the question I asked and not just pick and choose one?

   OK, so for $question, you're saying $this. What do you think about $otherquestion(s)?

- Did you even read my email?

   Oh, I think I actually covered this in the email I sent this morning - is $emailsubject not what you're referring to?

- Stop bothering me

   I really wish I had a better answer right now, but I simply don't. Feel free to check with me later today, but as soon as I hear back on this I'll definitely keep you in the loop.

- Do your job!

   Oh, I thought you were the right person to go to for this. Who should I be talking to instead?

- That's not my job

   Oh, I don't know the answer to that, I usually don't deal with $thing. Have you talked to so-and-so? Here lets hop on a call with them and we'll get it figured out together.

- Stop assigning me so many tasks if you want any of them to get done

   I'll be glad to do it, thanks. I do need to know if you want this done before or after $things though, since those are still in progress.

I completely agree. It took me many years to learn the lesson, but communication like you have above produces better short term and long term results in 100% of cases. The website's answer come off as passive aggressive.

I've gotten way better and your post is an excellent way to do so, but I still struggle to find a good way to phrase "Stop asking me to work on the weekends for things that are very low impact".

> I still struggle to find a good way to phrase "Stop asking me to work on the weekends for things that are very low impact".

The first step would be to confirm that you are in fact being asked to do this, and what you think the consequences of ignoring the request would be.

It can be okay to just not do something you're asked to do, or at least not do it right away. People don't have a right to your time and effort just because they wrote you an email or a Slack message.

I agree it'd be nice not to be asked in the first place, but the first step in a situation like this is to minimize the impact of the requests on you.

- Stop asking me to work on the weekends for things that are very low impact

    I need to adjust my work/life balance a bit. If anything super urgent comes up on the weekend, definitely let me know. Otherwise It'll need to wait until Monday. Thanks for understanding :)

Nah, fuck that. How about, "I do not work weekends. If something is on fire I will help out, but I'll be taking Monday off."

You have a contract, stick to it.

To phrase what you are saying another way for OP, the issue is the website's substitutions are more professional, but not always more polite.

In other words, no would would ever say "stop bothering me" in a professional environment. However, saying "you have not heard from me because there is no information" is still extremely strong and direct.

While it's possible to imagine someone saying this in an office, if I heard it, I would assume that the speaker is very frustrated, perhaps a bit angry, and probably wanted to say a bit more if they could get away with it. That might be appropriate if someone really is literally calling you every two minutes, but otherwise, it is not really appropriate in a context where you are trying to maintain good relations with a customer/coworker.

Oh dear. That might be politer. But just look how you have inflated the number of words.

Why can't we be just efficient and say what we're thinking? So much time is wasted at work simply because we have so differently compared to when we are with friends/family.

What's wrong with more words? Are they at a premium? Would you rather be succinct, or polite? You can be both, but given a binary option, I'd rather be polite.

People are different. More words can be confusing to some people.

>Why can't we be just efficient and say what we're thinking?

Triggering emotions is far more inefficient than using a couple of extra words to attempt to make people feel valued and respected.

>So much time is wasted at work simply because we have so differently compared to when we are with friends/family.

I take it your partner has never said to you "why can't you be as nice and respectful to me as you are at work?"

So I guess you didn't want to trigger any emotions when you referenced how I communicate with my partner.

Btw: That's a great example where someone thinks they are polite but, in reality, aren't at all. More words won't help with that.

I think he's got the gist basically right and people can remove some of the extra to suit their taste and style.

For what it’s worth, I would roll my eyes and be annoyed by half of these improvements too. But I really dislike speech which is purposefully obfuscated to try and hide the “negative” aspects.

I think it’s far better to find a genuinely more empathetic thought process and then express those thoughts without having to specially obfuscate it to sound nice.

To each their own. But if you look carefully, nothing is obfuscated. Each of them says exactly what the issue is without being rude about it. Yes, some might be a bit too soft for some cases, but that's the beauty of words. We can use our own as needed ;-)

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