JimmieMcnulty (u/JimmieMcnulty)

JimmieMcnulty commented on How to disagree with someone more powerful than you (2016) hbr.org/2016/03/how-to-di... · Posted by u/tomrod

JimmieMcnulty · 3 years ago

Uh, what? White males have been speaking freely (and continue to do so) for as long as the concept of racial hierarchy has existed.

The American tech industry is run by (straight) white men, we're doing most of the speaking, highly disproportionate to our representation globally (where the impact of our decision are felt).

JimmieMcnulty commented on How to disagree with someone more powerful than you (2016) hbr.org/2016/03/how-to-di... · Posted by u/tomrod

boredemployee · 3 years ago

Staying calm and speaking slowly while arguing is the key for me.

But there's one space where no trained skill seems to work: politics.

I just avoid at all costs discussing politics with friends and family, because it simple leads to nowhere. Older people usually likes to stay in a position of power in those dicussions like "they know much more than us", so in the end I just stay quiet and "agree" because in the current state of things, people feel so much harmed by words that its better this way.

JimmieMcnulty · 3 years ago

Well, it may be possible for you to simply not talk about politics, but for folks who have their rights stripped away, their water made undrinkable, their loved ones ripped from them or shunned for simply existing, should they also not talk about that with others?

I doubt most folks who talk about politics really "want" to, as much as they feel a responsibility or need to do so out of compassion or even desperation. Nearly everyone would prefer if we all could just get along, but we don't get along, and pretending we do seems like a great way to just allow the majority to steamroll the minority.

JimmieMcnulty commented on U.S. appeals court rejects big tech’s right to regulate online speech reuters.com/legal/us-appe... · Posted by u/testrun

JimmieMcnulty · 3 years ago

What's funny is that none of the big tech firms would need to change their policies or behaviors, should this actually become the law of the land, as there are currently no policies that prohibit political speech from any of their platforms.

JimmieMcnulty commented on How to disagree with someone more powerful than you (2016) hbr.org/2016/03/how-to-di... · Posted by u/tomrod

JimmieMcnulty · 3 years ago

Everything here seems pretty fine (if basic), So often I see engineers screw this up, usually by forgetting a few things:

* They only have some of the information, and don’t account for that fact.

* Their goals aren’t the same as a leader’s goals.

* The leader has ownership of the larger outcome, and may want to make tradeoffs that are suboptimal for an individual person or team, but may ultimately be good for the overall outcome.

* Being technically correct isn’t a “trump” card, it doesn’t mean everything.

If I were a better writer I’d explain this better, but often you can tell who is used to thinking at a high level and who is used to hammering out details, based on these kind of conversations. Either you recognize your visibility and responsibility or you don’t.

JimmieMcnulty commented on Shopify lets staff decide cash-stock pay mix as shares dive bloomberg.com/news/articl... · Posted by u/jbredeche

tensor · 3 years ago

One crucial thing not often talked about with this plan is that the stock is granted and vests quarterly. In fact, the amount of stock you get each quarter is also variable. E.g. if you choose to have 100k of equity each year, each quarter you get whatever amount of units equates to 25k of stock.

So what they've done is nearly completely untie compensation from the stock price. You neither benefit significantly nor lose significantly as the stock moves around. I've never in my life seen an equity plan like it, and that's not a comment on whether it's good or bad, just that it's unusual.

JimmieMcnulty · 3 years ago

(One of) the largest retailers in the world also does this, I believe.

JimmieMcnulty commented on Software component names should be whimsical and cryptic medium.com/@histocrat/sof... · Posted by u/honoredb

dang · 3 years ago

I'm talking about the kind of pushback that happens when we get something seriously wrong and a significant subset of the community gets riled up about it. In the links you've listed, the one example that comes close to that is the pushback against how I moderated the QE thread. In that case I realized I'd made a mistake, and made a bunch of changes. Backing down, acknowledging the mistake, and changing direction is the only thing that works in response to a genuine wave of community dissatisfaction.

I'm not talking about resentful responses from individual users—those are inevitable, if only because misunderstandings are inevitable on the internet, and they don't (necessarily) indicate community discontent. On the contrary, by and large the community downvotes and flags those comments. It's the admins who usually come along and unkill them later.

I'm sure it must be very annoying to be around here for 15 years only to see some random asshole get anointed the big boss of the place and start banning people left and right. But I'm a bit more interested in what people (including you) think I'm doing wrong than you seem to assume.

JimmieMcnulty · 3 years ago

What annoys me is your continued refusal to acknowledge the unfair lack of recourse available for someone who disagrees with a decision you’ve made, and your flippant attitude around making those decisions when it comes to people you don’t seem to respect.

You’re hiding your behavior behind the mob mentality that punishes dissent, claiming that a shallow dismissal response is valid because the HN mob has attacked with downvotes, so violating your own policies is acceptable.

The fact that I was able to find so many examples in just the past week should concern you. It won’t, because it’s clear you don’t “count” those issues as legitimate, but it should and you should.

“I’m interested in what people think I’m doing wrong.” doesn’t mean you’re interested in improving, however. There are easy, concrete steps you could take; simple rewordings, a policy change or two, that would vastly improve how you interact with the “fringe” of HN.