[HN Gopher] How to professionally say
___________________________________________________________________
How to professionally say
Author : ghostfoxgod
Score : 709 points
Date : 2022-05-01 13:50 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (howtoprofessionallysay.akashrajpurohit.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (howtoprofessionallysay.akashrajpurohit.com)
| illuminati1911 wrote:
| This is very helpful. Thank you so much.
|
| Some of them might require slight changes depending on the
| context to not sound too passive aggressive.
| ghostfoxgod wrote:
| Agree with that, it depends on person to person, but hey, since
| the repo is open sourced, please feel free to make any changes
| and send a PR, I'll be happy to take a look at it :)
| mattcwilson wrote:
| Agree - the intent of this resource is fantastic. Thank you
| for taking the time!
|
| I do feel like I have some even better suggestions. When I
| get back to my computer, I'm so taking you up on this.
| ghostfoxgod wrote:
| Happy to hear your thoughts and suggestions.
| daenz wrote:
| These are great, but a few still have some "sting" on them that
| would set off people who are very attuned to language.
| chrsig wrote:
| s/are very attuned to language/can read past passive aggressive
| corpspeak
| hashtag-til wrote:
| Are we confident that this is the best solution or are we still
| exploring alternatives?
| ghostfoxgod wrote:
| I see what you did there, cracked me up
| vessenes wrote:
| Hey Akash,
|
| I like the idea of giving people some help expressing themselves
| at work. You might be interested to learn about the Power
| Distance Index, and the body of work on PDI and work culture.
|
| You'll see if you read the comments here that some people are
| like "the alternatives are bullshit corporate speak and infuriate
| me", and some are like "yes, at last, a way to help people be
| more polite / better communicators". There's a smattering of
| "this is passive aggressive" thrown in.
|
| One of the broad pitches PDI at work types make is that the lower
| the PDI, the more direct communications are preferred; the
| higher, the more 'diplomatic' the communications are preferred.
| My vibe on your list is that it's just a tad more diplomatic than
| Silicon Valley wants to be, hence the slight negative 'passive
| aggressive' reactions.
|
| Some of the lowest PDI countries in the world are Israel, and
| many Northern European countries, and it fits my experience that
| in those places additional respect is given for bluntness - as
| Jan Maas in Ted Lasso says "I'm not rude, I'm Dutch." As a broad
| stereotype using the alternate wordings you give would be a sign
| you are not someone to be respected in that environment.
|
| On the other hand, Saudi Arabia's PDI is high, and I would bet
| that some of your alternate list there would still be much too
| rude; just a guess, I haven't worked in Saudi.
|
| Anyway, thanks again for this; if you stay interested, you might
| consider reworking this into different 'cultural norms' lists to
| help people acclimate / go both ways; at that point, I think it
| would be a very broadly useful resource.
| michaelbrave wrote:
| People that aren't in power not being able to communicate
| equally with those in power is why we have 1.Gossip[1]
| 2.Sarcasm[2][3] and 3.Passive Agressiveness[4]. Sometimes it
| even manifests as quiet protest and doing small destructive
| things like not meeting deadlines or other small acts of
| sabotage[4].
|
| This is rarely understood by those in power though, they would
| see it only as disrespect rather than the only way to regain
| some small amount of power.
|
| It's also worth thinking about not just broad strokes societal
| culture at a national level, but also family culture, like the
| metafilter post[5] about guess vs ask cultures explains, some
| feel comfortable asking for anything leaving the responder to
| say no (putting the load from the requester to the requested)
| while others guess and try to predict and will only ask when
| they know it will likely be a positive response (putting the
| load on the requester instead of the requested). Ask culture is
| probably more healthy, but despite that the real problems are
| when the two clash.
|
| [1] Gossip as Revenge of the Powerless -
| https://aeon.co/ideas/gossip-was-a-powerful-tool-for-the-pow...
| [2] Humor as a Serious Strategy of Nonviolent Resistance to
| Oppression -
| https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1468-0130...
| [3] Follower sarcasm reduces leader overpay by increasing
| accountability -
| https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S002210312...
| [4] Powerlessness Corrupts - leads to sabotage -
| https://hbr.org/2010/07/column-powerlessness-corrupts [5] Ask &
| Guess Culture - https://ask.metafilter.com/55153/Whats-the-
| middle-ground-bet...
| jimkleiber wrote:
| I appreciate so much in this post. I also had never heard of
| the Ask/Guess culture description. I wonder if there could be
| another component, a Tell culture. I don't ask you, I don't
| guess, I just tell you how it is or what you'll do.
|
| I think that's another way we communicate and often is even
| more so a way to avoid the possibility of being rejected. If
| I ask, you can say no. If I guess, then I can maybe figure
| out if you say no before you actually do so you don't have
| to. If I tell you, then there's not much way for you to say
| no, or if you do, then it is a clear violation of the
| agreement.
|
| I think this happens with some people who are in military
| culture or other top-down hierarchies where there seems to be
| a "Tell culture" (I don't like labeling cultures too much
| with such identity descriptors because I think it can lock
| them into existence). And I think that can be one of the
| hardest things for people trying to reintegrate as veterans,
| to go from telling people what to do and being told what to
| do to telling your 5-year-old what to do and they say
| no...and then having to learn to guess or even ask...or more
| deep down, opening up first and then asking, maybe the most
| emotionally raw version.
| avip wrote:
| As an Israeli, I'm fully accustomed and conditioned to tell
| others their solution is idiotic and their ideas are dumb. But
| having worked abroad, I've come to depreciate this "quality"
| more as just bad taste and lack of manners, and less as
| "straight talking".
|
| It really adds little to the conversation. It's just an IDF
| inheritance that should be eradicated.
| riazrizvi wrote:
| I think PDI negatively correlates strongly with social
| safety. In the IDF you are unlikely to be punished for
| speaking up, and in general that's true in Dutch and Israeli
| culture for locals talking to one another. Frankness is not
| punished. In more hierarchical societies where you can be put
| in jail for pissing off the wrong cousin, frankness can be
| severely punished, and stories are abound of such.
|
| So when the social consequences shift for an individual who
| is moved to a new setting, then the PDI for that individual
| will shift hard. Hence you find this working abroad and
| you've adapted your communication style. But we can do
| thought experiments on the PDI for the following situations:
|
| - Arab talking to Israeli, inside Israel vs inside home
| country - Israeli outside Israel talking to Jewish vs non-
| Jewish person - Consumer Salesperson (small commission
| product, very frequent close opportunities) vs Enterprise
| Salesperson (large commission product, lots of confirmation
| pre-close meetings across org, leading to the final sale)
|
| I think in each case the PDI will correlate with the negative
| consequences for the speaker speaking out of turn, once they
| become habituated to the situation of course.
| jimkleiber wrote:
| I remember asking an American vet what the communication
| style was within the US military and he said, "Someone who
| outranks you tells you what to do and there's always someone
| who outranks you."
|
| How you would describe the communication style within the
| IDF?
| kingcharles wrote:
| Living in the UK I used to find all the French acted very rude.
| Then I spent enough time in France to realize the French don't
| find each other rude, it's just the way they communicate. Once
| you understand the culture it all makes sense, they're not
| trying to be dicks.
| NikolaNovak wrote:
| I currently work for a federal public sector client. The
| substitutes are all I hear day in and day out.
|
| We can talk about what _oughta_ be all day long; and that 's a
| fun and important conversation of its own; but should not be
| confused with what _is_ -- at my current client /project, you
| definitely need to learn the language if you want to be
| successful. And not in a "BS-y management successful", I mean
| get _anything_ done including architecture and development. C
| 'est la vie!
|
| (FWIW, after decades of complaining and moaning, I decided to
| approach people / projects / relationships with at least a
| fraction of analytical mindset and effort that I take to
| technical problems. It's been both rewarding and effective and
| fascinating, and dear gawd I wish I paid attention to it
| earlier rather than spending all that time moaning and
| complaining. Again, we can have a discussion about how ideal
| world should be, and we can work toward changing it, but it
| absolutely has to start with actually understanding it. I'll
| take a look at the PDI, anything that helps understand the
| mechanics of work relationships is beneficial - thx! :)
| ghostfoxgod wrote:
| Thank you for sharing your insights and information about PDI
| (will be looking more in depth about this), and I agree with
| what you mentioned how based on demographics and the
| relationship between the two person can totally change how you
| communicate with them.
|
| The basic intent of the project was to curate a list of things
| what you might feel like saying vs how you can say it (more
| professionally I guess)
|
| Would be happy to see how the data can be improved which can be
| better suited for majority of people.
| exikyut wrote:
| Idea: alter the repo to add a diplomacy dimension with a few
| notches in it, and invite contributions of alternate wordings
| appropriate for different scenarios. (The focus being on
| creating an obvious void in the hope people fill it with
| insight)
|
| From there, I was originally imagining the site could use a
| slider to cycle back and forth through wordings, but the
| associative and comparative value of just displaying them all
| simultaneously in columns under each heading is probably
| worth the tight information density.
|
| Maybe also alter the site (now, while trending!) to indicate
| you're looking for additional data (for both the situation
| and diplomacy-level dimensions) - the GitHub link at the
| bottom is a tiny bit... I have to go looking for it myself,
| which is very good, but you might be able to passively
| collect that bit more low hanging fruit by making it more of
| a (polite :D) call to action.
| ghostfoxgod wrote:
| Thank you for the suggestion, definitely makes sense to me.
| exikyut wrote:
| Oooh, I don't think the page looked quite like _that_
| before. Looks great!
| ghostfoxgod wrote:
| Made the CTA changes based on your suggestions, would be
| looking into the other ones as well in the morning :)
| nautilius wrote:
| Yes, but as vassanas points out, you are not achieving this -
| because it is different from culture to culture!
|
| If you add the specific culture / region you are targeting
| this at, it could already mitigate that issue.
|
| As vassanas points out, the phrases you suggest would work to
| your disadvantage in more confrontational cultures, because
| you will be perceived as bullshitting and beating around the
| bush, but not as a serious contributer one should listen to.
| rendall wrote:
| Here in Finland, if you honestly think something sounds like
| a horrible idea, you're essentially duty bound to say "that
| sounds like a horrible idea". Be prepared to say why, but
| don't mince words.
|
| Even I as a New Yorker had to acclimate to that level of
| bluntness.
| PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
| (I hate nationalistic stereotyping, but all the same I did
| always love this joke/guide to workplace culture):
|
| You've just finished your report, which happens to
| absolutely awful in every way. You send copies to each of
| your colleagues and later today, talk to each of them about
| their thoughts.
|
| American colleague: Good job! Excellent! Great piece of
| work!
|
| English colleague: Some great material in here. A few parts
| might benefit from a rewrite, but its a great start.
|
| French colleague: I think we can probably use a lot of
| this, but there are substantial parts that really need
| rewriting.
|
| German colleague: This is pretty terrible. A few parts are
| ok, perhaps, but it needs a complete rewrite.
|
| Israeli colleague: This is shit. We'll get someone else to
| do it.
| bernulli wrote:
| Haha, I wonder how this maps to the responses to the
| linked article in this very discussion forum ;-)
| rendall wrote:
| Finn: No.
| comprev wrote:
| (only said after a very long pause)
| HerrMonnezza wrote:
| (There should be a 2nd part to your post, where you send
| a very good report to the colleagues, and note their
| reaction.)
| evo_9 wrote:
| I think you should put this on GitHub and also make it
| available as a PDF.
| avivo wrote:
| I would love to see a language model (e.g. GPT-3) prompt for
| translating emails/slack/responses across this language
| barrier.
| flint wrote:
| YES! A revers lookup into the Dutch would be great!
| civilized wrote:
| I definitely have my bread buttered on the low PDI side, but
| this is a fascinating concept and I'm sure will help me manage
| cultural differences productively.
|
| I'm now furiously Googling this and apparently it's part of a
| broader framework called cultural dimensions theory.
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hofstede%27s_cultural_dimens...
| vmception wrote:
| > Some of the lowest PDI countries in the world are Israel, and
| many Northern European countries
|
| because its the same people right? like its just a branch from
| the same culture due to very recent immigration trends
| mastax wrote:
| No[1]. Unless a surprising proportion of the Jews from the
| "Former USSR" are from the Baltics, there are far more
| Israeli Jews from e.g. Morocco than from Northern Europe.
|
| [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Israel#Eth
| nic_... Chart only includes Jews, unfortunately, but that is
| 75% of the population.
| vmception wrote:
| thanks! very useful chart
| temp8964 wrote:
| The context is important. There is cultural difference among
| countries and fields.
|
| There is also the difference from types of communication, i.e.
| face-to-face or email or slack.
|
| There is also the difference from the audience, i.e. who are
| you talking to, coworkers or clients.
|
| There is even individual differences, i.e. different people
| will perceive differently, simply because their personalities.
| silvestrov wrote:
| > I'm not rude
|
| One word Danes (and other N.Es) often get in trouble for is
| 'fuck'. In Denmark it is no problem to use this in many
| business meetings but will often spell trouble when we
| participate in a meeting with people from USA. We simply do not
| see using it as something to avoid.
|
| (and pupils in Denmark will absolutely not be sent to
| headmaster or parents contacted if they use it. At most it will
| be a glance from the teacher if they use it too much).
| cbozeman wrote:
| The more I learn about Denmark, the more I love it.
| Trasmatta wrote:
| I would say this is generally true, except in SV start up
| culture. "Fuck" is used so ubiquitously there that it's
| almost seen as weird if you don't use it frequently.
| nautilius wrote:
| Obviously not generally true, as silvestrov discusses in
| the very post you reply to.
| rzz3 wrote:
| Fuck is generally very acceptable in meetings at my (large
| tech) company (in US at least), depending of course on
| context. I hear it a lot less from our APAC and EU offices
| though.
| jimkleiber wrote:
| Ahh this brought me back! I wrote a paper in college about
| swearwords, taboo words, and euphemisms in first and second
| languages and interviewed one of my Danish friends, who
| shared similar sentiments about the word fuck. As an
| American, I feel trepidation to even type that word out here
| in a public forum lol. At least what I remember him saying is
| that he learned it from the film Raw by Eddie Murphy.
| jonnydubowsky wrote:
| And you've brought me back to a childhood memory of my
| older brother, age 13 with a big smile on his face, brought
| me into the closet where he had a portable cassette player
| and a newly acquired copy of Raw, and we listened to it and
| had our vocabulary suddenly expanded to a new level.
| jimkleiber wrote:
| Lol, the level of secrecy we had back in those days, no
| two-way headphones, no phones, just had to scurry into
| corners to do the things our parents would say are bad,
| even though they did them just in their own scurried away
| corners. Thank you for sharing this story :-D
| bradknowles wrote:
| I was about that age when I discovered one of my Dad's
| records from Bill Cosby.
|
| I had never considered that "Damnit" and "Jesus Christ"
| could be misconstrued as the names of two children.
|
| I almost passed out laughing so hard at that album.
|
| Sometime later, I discovered his Iron Butterfly album,
| which also changed my world.
| SayThis_BOB wrote:
| ..trepidation
|
| then you should go and visit a therapist.
|
| :)
| jimkleiber wrote:
| Such a comment annoys me, even if in jest. I feel glad
| that I pause to think about how my words may impact
| people based on their expectations. I'm not sure what you
| were trying to imply by "go and visit a therapist"--that
| I should not care at all about how others feel? Maybe you
| think I care too much about how they feel and too little
| about how I feel but I still said the word, more to share
| how I believe HN has an expectation of not using that
| word too often.
|
| EDIT: I also have my name attached to my words here and
| in most places on the internet, so I'm more mindful of
| how things said here can be read in other contexts where
| certain words are more taboo.
| yourad_io wrote:
| > Such a comment annoys me, even if in jest.
|
| Rightfully so. Feel free to disregard.
|
| Some people are very desensitized to sweating online,
| usually anonymously. Not wanting to doesn't merit
| psychiatric help.
| djur wrote:
| One thing that is more inappropriate and offensive than
| using the word "fuck" is suggesting that someone is
| mentally ill because they're not comfortable doing so.
| bloak wrote:
| It's unclear whether you're talking about the English word
| "fuck" or some Danish "equivalent". Either way, the word
| doesn't necessarily mean the same thing to people who speak
| different languages, or even just different dialects, do it's
| unclear to what extent the difference you're referring to is
| cultural or linguistic.
|
| (Is there even a clear distinction between "cultural" and
| "linguistic"?)
| tinco wrote:
| The English word, used in the way we picked up from
| American cultural expression like TV, movies and music. The
| meaning is the same but the sensitivity to it is different.
| To us Samuel L Jackson characters are colourful and funny,
| not rude or abrasive, perhaps that was lost in translation.
| js2 wrote:
| Fuck is one of the seven dirty words:
|
| https://interviews.televisionacademy.com/news/the-seven-
| dirt...
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_dirty_words
|
| (Aside, but I don't think Carlin ever credited Lenny
| Bruce:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lenny_Bruce#Obscenity_arres
| ts
|
| Lenny Bruce's 1962 "Dirty Words" album is on Spotify and
| Apple Music; worth a listen if you've never heard it.)
|
| Jackson's use of fuck is typically to add emphasis to a
| statement, and actually, I think he uses "motherfucker" a
| lot more than bare fuck[1], but in any case, fuck has
| different meanings depending upon context. Consider: Oh
| fuck. Fuck off. Fuck you. I'm fucked. Hey lady, you wanna
| fuck?[2] This fucking bug. Let's get the fuck outta here.
|
| It's an adaptable word but still bleeped on the air in
| 2022. At the same time, it's okay to allude to it on
| primetime TV as in: "Holy mother forking shirt balls!"
|
| [1]: https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2019/06/samuel-
| l-jackso...
|
| [2]: https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Body_Heat
| Terry_Roll wrote:
| God should be added to that list of dirty words because
| not every one is religious and being constantly reminded
| of the presence of what is old school law and order but
| in the extreme psychological warfare is just as nasty if
| not worse.
|
| The other problem is who are these people imposing those
| rules on us? Is this the thought police who hide behind
| the anonymity of public outrage and public morals but
| typically work for media outlets as editors, or
| legislators or law enforcement and judiciary? Are they an
| anagram of Non Technical Computer Users?
| ARandomerDude wrote:
| Kale should be added to that list of dirty words because
| not every one is a health nut, and being constantly
| reminded of the presence of what is new school law and
| order but in the extreme psychological warfare is just as
| nasty if not worse.
| opan wrote:
| Wendy's puts kale on one of their chicken sandwiches. Is
| it really a health nut thing? Seems similar to lettuce.
| danachow wrote:
| Yes it was traditionally a pro health fad food - and this
| is precisely one the reasons Wendy's is marketing it.
| That and it still has a little panache as being more
| "upscale" than iceberg.
|
| In the 00sKFC tried to market their chicken as a pro
| health Atkins type food with none other than Jason
| Alexander. That one was so bad that even the fucking ad
| industry criticized it. Marketing the unhealthiest of
| fast food as somewhat healthy is not a new thing.
| kube-system wrote:
| ... "traditional" as in 20 years ago.
|
| Before that, it was mostly used as decoration, in the US.
| bradknowles wrote:
| Kale is also high in Oxalate. If you have had kidney
| stones, you care about this.
|
| It's not as high as Spinach or Almonds, but it's still in
| the top ten.
|
| So, maybe they need to be sued by someone who has had
| kidney stones, before they reconsider that idea, or at
| least required to put a huge warning on that item?
| Terry_Roll wrote:
| The phosphorus in iceberg lettuce will help dissolve
| kidney stones.
| AdrianB1 wrote:
| About 20 years ago I was also bothered by people bringing
| in their religion in my face too much. Then I realized
| that they have the right to speak their mind, same as I
| have the right to speak my mind, and their view of the
| world is as good to them as it is mine to me. I had no
| problem with any religion per se (I grew in places with
| antagonistic religions and I learned to be neutral), just
| with their "in your face" attitude, but I realized there
| is a huge differences between being polite and banning.
| js2 wrote:
| > God should be added to that list
|
| Not using it in vain is one of the ten commandments:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thou_shalt_not_take_the_nam
| e_o...
|
| The "these people" are us, and I don't believe there's
| actually a formal list of banned words. Rather, Federal
| law prohibits obscene, indecent and profane content from
| being broadcast[1].
|
| It's then up to us, the public, to work out whether
| content falls into one of these categories. NBC could,
| for example, choose not to bleep fuck during a daytime
| podcast. That would probably lead to a bunch of
| complaints to the FCC. The FCC would then fine NBC, and I
| gather, ultimately could revoke NBC's broadcasting
| license.
|
| What's offensive changes over time[1]. Maybe fuck won't
| be seen as offensive some day, and then networks will be
| free to broadcast it over the air because no one
| complains to the FCC about it.
|
| [1]: https://www.fcc.gov/consumers/guides/obscene-
| indecent-and-pr...
|
| [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motion_Picture_Product
| ion_Code
| Terry_Roll wrote:
| > Not using it in vain is one of the ten commandments:
|
| Religion has only been around for about 2000-3000 years,
| and if it was banned so we couldnt utter the word god
| anymore, I wonder how long it would take for the
| epigenetics to work out of the gene pool.
|
| In todays world, I have a hunch most kids have learnt to
| swear by the time they start primary school, so why the
| mental bondage to use a euphemism and to have an excuse
| to beat a kind mentally and/or physically for saying it?
|
| Would it really bring that much chaos to the world,
| considering the psychological idea that something banned
| or illicit is more highly treasured?
| implements wrote:
| Malcolm Tucker in "The Thick of It" made extensive use of
| the word "fuck", my favourite being responding to a door
| knock with "Come the fuck in or fuck the fuck off." - an
| impressive 33% fuck content.
| rzz3 wrote:
| I feel "on the air" is a bit misleading and antiquated,
| and I think that's quite relevant, because you seem to be
| using "the air" as some barometer of social acceptance.
|
| Even the "cool" elderly people I know stopped listening
| to the radio and broadcast TV years ago. Nowadays,
| everything is Podcasts, Netflix, Hulu, Spotify, YouTube,
| TikTok, etc. and none of them censor "fuck". Our culture
| is generally becoming a lot more open and accepting when
| it comes to the use of words like "fuck" and "shit",
| however words like "cunt" are still fairly taboo.
|
| From my perspective, broadcast TV and radio are simply a
| measure of how many Americans are hanging onto an
| antiquated culture, and I'm sure there's significant
| overlap between "people who listen to broadcast" and
| "people who still find 'fuck' offensive", and it's likely
| no longer just a function of age.
|
| Thanks for sharing the Lenny Bruce but, I had no idea
| that inspired Carlin!
| genewitch wrote:
| Literally the only reason i _do not_ use Television or
| terrestrial radio broadcast is the advertisements. I got
| sick of the advertisements back in 2001, and i have never
| had a CATV subscription. I have an aerial now because PBS
| has a channel aimed specifically at children and as it 's
| publicly funded the advertisements (including product
| placement) are benign or at least unobtrusive, not loud,
| and not about medicines. Doctors aren't watching
| children's programming (generally) so that's the last
| refuge from the billions pharma spends on marketing every
| year.
|
| 90% of the freemium streaming services are the same, and
| i'll include SiriusXM as well.
|
| That all being said, I personally consider sectioning off
| parts of the language (colorful or whatever) a net
| positive. In my opinion, disallowing words that have
| "universal meaning" forces children (and people who want
| to run for office, be an instructor, whatever) to find
| better and more descriptive ways to express themselves.
| The alternative, as an extreme, would be two utterances:
| "Fuck yes!" for good things, and "aw, fuck!" for bad
| things.
|
| All in favor say fuck yes
| couchand wrote:
| I may just be a simple big city technologist, but there's
| something really vim-like about broadcast that I
| thoroughly appreciate. I sure hope I'm not the only one
| who sees value in such things!
| rockostrich wrote:
| This really depends on the company, at least in tech. In the
| US, I've never felt awkward using the work "fuck" in meetings
| but I've also only worked in less uptight cultures. We also
| would prefer the direct phrases instead of the passive
| "polite" ones in the posted site.
| _whiteCaps_ wrote:
| How do you folks feel about 'collaboration'?
| seadan83 wrote:
| There is a rule, never swear in a foreign language, or meow
| at a cat, you just don't know exactly what you are saying.
| Saying fuck is very context dependent. It can make you seem
| familiar, in a formal context that would be unwelcome (ie, we
| are not friends so don't talk to me as if we were pals (eg:
| tu, vs vous in french)) It could be a sign of directness and
| frankness. It can be somewhat comedy, or it can be crass, or
| it can be ignorant and uneducated (ie, no other way to
| Express yourself without cursing, a limited vocabulary) It
| also depends on how often one curses and hears them. High
| schoolers curse every other sentence, but when their
| (teacher, parent etc) curses once and for the first time in
| years, it means seriousness and is powerful. So something
| like "you little fuck" can be all the way from endearing, to
| the most serious of threats
| psyfi wrote:
| This reminded me of the video of a french guy telling an
| american guy about his baby: She looks like a "grosse
| phoque" (Chubby seal, in french)
| danrochman wrote:
| I understand the sentiment, but can't follow the rule. I
| meow at cats whenever I meet them. It just always seemed
| the right thing to do. Granted, I don't know exactly what
| I'm saying when I meow (or otherwise, really) - but then I
| don't know what they're saying, either, so I figure we're
| even.
|
| In any case, none of the cats I've meowed at over the years
| have ever seemed too offended - perhaps I've just been
| lucky. Barking at dogs has been a totally different story,
| though...
| yourad_io wrote:
| When you work as a foreigner in Japan, you can be
| afforded a lot of leeway in business custom and etiquette
| - as you as you are polite. You are assumed to be a well-
| meaning Gaijin who doesn't know better/proper form.
|
| I've always assumed it is the same with meowing at cats:
| "we appreciate your effort. At least you didn't shit in
| our litter box like Jerry"
| bazeblackwood wrote:
| Cats only meow to communicate with humans, they don't make
| the sound around other adult cats. It's a holdover from
| kittenhood that turned out to be advantageous at getting
| human attention, so when they self-domesticated, so they
| kept it. So basically if you meow at a cat you're just
| saying "I'm baby".
| SayThis_BOB wrote:
| LOL
|
| Even my C-Level guys are saying this (banking)
|
| Do not understan til today, why for an american this word is
| that problematic....
| throwaway7865 wrote:
| I'm currently interviewing for jobs in Israel and their
| "straight talk" habit is honestly number one problem for me.
|
| People never schedule meetings, they just ask for your phone
| number and call whether it's appropriate for them. They
| interrupt you in the meetings, tell your solution is bad.
|
| It may sound refreshing on paper, but honestly you feel treated
| like a low-skilled worker in a laundry or a kitchen. I'm not a
| Westerner, but I do come from a background of working with an
| English company and the difference in respect to boundaries and
| time is night and day.
| josh_fyi wrote:
| I've worked in hi tech in Israel for 20 years and now have a
| completely international clientele that I work with, and I
| don't think Israelis in general are like that.
| throwaway7865 wrote:
| My general impression is that "corporate" structures may
| have some veneer of a professional workplace culture in
| Israel, but with startups all bets are off.
|
| I felt like being at a bazaar where a stranger talks to you
| like a person they know all their life. Which probably
| sounds appealing for people tired of Western sugarcoating
| and is probably great at a party when drinks flow freely.
| But at workspace it just feels unprofessional and
| disrespectful.
|
| Local friends explained to me that this is cultural.
| Workplace in Israel is catered to locals and they rarely
| hire outsiders or expats. People have very short distance,
| they serve in army together, go to parties together, hide
| from bombings together. So hierarchy and workspace
| mannerisms make little sense in that context.
| bradknowles wrote:
| Radical honesty is something that I would appreciate and find
| quite refreshing.
|
| Offensiveness just for the sake of being offensive and trying
| to make other people feel powerless around you, that kind of
| thing I would not appreciate.
|
| Sometimes it's hard to tell the difference between these two.
|
| Now, scheduling, I'm not quite as bad as the Germans, but I
| do require that stuff get put on the calendar, and you make a
| really strong effort to hold to that schedule.
|
| If you think you can just call me whenever you want, then you
| can just fuck off. Not even my wife can just call me whenever
| she wants. Fortunately, she knows this.
| js2 wrote:
| Your comment on different communication styles between cultures
| reminds me of a (famous?) metafilter comment, the difference
| between Ask Culture and Guess Culture:
|
| http://ask.metafilter.com/55153/Whats-the-middle-ground-betw...
| darkerside wrote:
| That is a hilarious thread. My take is that the initial
| request is quite rude, not for asking, but for including a
| veiled threat that they won't be able to see each other if it
| doesn't work out. This is classic manipulation, and I hope
| the couple said no!
| aynsof wrote:
| I reread the letter, but I'm still not seeing the veiled
| threat here. Would you be able to spell out where/what it
| is?
| js2 wrote:
| "I hope this works out /so/ we can see each other!"
|
| Implies that they won't be able to see each other unless
| the host allows the guest to stay with them. Of course,
| this only works as a threat if the guest assumes the host
| wants their company in the first place. I don't find it
| to be a threat because the guest would only be
| withholding something the host doesn't want in the first
| place. That said, changing one word makes a big
| difference:
|
| "I hope this works out /and/ we can see each other!"
|
| This way seeing each other is disconnected from the
| hosting.
|
| The truth is, I don't find the request rude at all. The
| asker doesn't know she's making the request of someone
| who doesn't like her. Jeff seems offended that the woman
| mentioned his name ("I don't even know this woman.") But
| to me, that's just being polite as opposed to leaving him
| out entirely or referring to him generally (i.e. "you and
| your husband").
| aynsof wrote:
| Thanks for explaining. I'm a native English speaker who
| grew up in a (fairly?) strongly guess culture, and I'm
| still really surprised that anyone would find this rude
| or threatening. It's interesting to see the very
| different interpretations.
| crispyambulance wrote:
| I've not heard of the "PDI" concept before this, but I believe
| the same thing can be achieved by simply adapting to your
| audience.
|
| The problem is actually knowing your audience (as individuals)
| well enough to assess how they will interpret your words.
|
| Can you assume that all Saudi's, for instance, will react well
| to the somewhat cloying language suggested by the OP's post? I
| think not. But if you don't personally know the audience it's
| also tricky to know what each culture's acceptably polite
| "default" is.
|
| I've gotten myself into some etiquette faux-pas in the past by
| using sarcasm and irreverent humor around Chinese colleagues.
| My previous experience with Chinese folks had been limited to
| grad school and I had just (wrongly) assumed that such
| communication was OK as the default.
| [deleted]
| seventhtiger wrote:
| As a Saudi I supposed I can comment on this.
|
| The minimum of polite language is higher. Profanity can get
| you in trouble like getting a written warning, and graphic
| profanity can land you in handcuffs, like insulting someone's
| mother. Saying son of a bitch is a misdemeanor.
|
| My experience in big corps is that the PDI is high but the
| power isn't so concerned with neutral formal phrasing.
| Phrasing in Saudi culture can be shockingly informal even at
| the highest level, since open tribal gatherings were the
| highest authority in the land until recently. The King and
| Princes still run open tribal gatherings where citizens can
| speak informally. Corporate speak is new and still seen as
| intrusive to how we do business.
|
| How PDI would express itself would be preserving face, I
| guess. You can't contradict superiors or even coworkers too
| openly and directly, you can't openly disrespect or be
| irreverent. All possibly disruptive feedback must be private
| or you're bringing shame to yourself and others.
|
| Startups are not like that at all. They're young, irreverent,
| and passionate. The young people really express themselves in
| those spaces with barely any hint of the old school social
| expectations. Guys and gals taking smoke breaks together and
| focusing on getting the job done.
| jimkleiber wrote:
| I'm really curious how this interacts with display rules,
| or the emotions we're allowed to show/communicate in
| different contexts.
|
| When you talk of preserving face:
|
| > You can't contradict superiors or even coworkers too
| openly and directly, you can't openly disrespect or be
| irreverent. All possibly disruptive feedback must be
| private or you're bringing shame to yourself and others.
|
| Are you saying that you're not allowed to express anger to
| superiors or coworkers in public? Is it the way it's said,
| the emotion behind it, or something else that seems to
| matter the most?
| seventhtiger wrote:
| I'll give more details, but keep in mind Saudi society's
| norms are in massive flux. Even specifically the things
| I'm saying are changing. The new nationalism is bringing
| down a lot of old hierarchies. This might be more useful
| to understand the past than the future at this point.
|
| It's not specifically the way it's said because like I
| said informal speech is accepted at all level. I meant
| that the act of embarrassing others is very scandalous.
|
| It's a concept called lstr (the veil or the cover) which
| has a high place in both the faith and the culture. Hide
| your own flaws, helps others hide their flaws, and if you
| see another's flaw don't look too closely. You could
| translate it to shame but it doesn't have the inner shame
| or guilt connotation. It's more about conducting yourself
| in public.
|
| Another common concept is qT` l'`nq w l qT` l'rzq (rather
| cut necks than cut livelihoods) which puts affecting
| people's livelihoods on the same level as murder.
|
| So if you criticize openly, and jeopridize someone's
| career, it probably won't matter whether you're right or
| wrong. You're violating many social contracts and there
| will be social consequences. The preferred way would be
| to approach someone privately, tell them what you think,
| and even better, provide a solution that includes a cover
| story for why things weren't done correctly in the first
| place.
| jimkleiber wrote:
| Wow I feel really grateful you wrote all this and also
| tremendously fascinated. I'll reply more later in an edit
| to this post. Thank you for now!
| ncmncm wrote:
| Expressing anger anywhere is a business setting is a
| problem. Anybody can be angry anytime, but your feelings
| are your business.
|
| Stick to the facts.
| jimkleiber wrote:
| "I feel really angry that you said my colleague was lazy.
| As her manager, I know that she has been working late
| every day, including the weekends, to hit these
| deadlines."
|
| EDIT: Another example: "I feel quite angry right now and
| it probably has less to do with what you did and more to
| do with the fact that I haven't eaten yet. So before we
| do my performance review, could we get lunch so I might
| be in a better mood to hear it?"
|
| I think that would be a way to express anger connected to
| facts. Do you think that is still something people should
| keep to themselves?
| yellowstuff wrote:
| Good idea, but a lot of these feel like saying the professional
| way of telling someone to eat shit and die is "consume fecal
| matter and perish in an inferno".
| yowzadave wrote:
| Exactly--many of these are hostile sentiments; it would be a
| mistake to assume that re-wording them will lead to a better
| outcome, as most people will (correctly) perceive the hostile
| intent in spite of the re-wording. A more useful list would
| perhaps be, "How to _not_ say", which could guide you through a
| way of successfully resolving the conflict when you find
| yourself wanting to express one of the listed sentiments.
| lolinder wrote:
| Yes. The difference between acting professionally and not is
| usually in what you choose to say, not how you choose to say
| it. Dressing up an unprofessional comment in bigger words
| doesn't make the comment more professional, just more
| pretentious.
|
| There are some here that are okay, but a lot just shouldn't be
| said (like "I told you so").
| Deltion wrote:
| I'm not sure why I should not.
|
| If I told someone something and they ignore it, potentially
| even multiple times why should I not say it?
| morelisp wrote:
| There's nothing to gain from saying it to a coworker. You
| should:
|
| - Remind them _next time_ it 's relevant - "Remember last
| time we touched this service and the Widget crashed and
| took the rest of switch down with it? I think this could be
| similar and we should reconsider my plan to isolate the
| network before hand."
|
| - Mention it to _your_ manager. Failing to heed a warning
| can be blameless and rational, but if you 're consistently
| right when others aren't that's a sign you should have more
| formal influence (and responsibility). You won't get that
| by complaining to peers.
|
| - If it was extremely serious (it rarely is - the really
| bad stuff is usually stuff no one foresaw) and your
| concerns dismissed out-of-hand (also rarely the case -
| people legitimately have different priorities), discuss it
| with your/their manager.
|
| You can also of course do it if there is no other
| escalation path - CEOs and EMs ideally didn't get where
| they are by being unable to take criticism - but you should
| also be very sure your advice really was _right_ , and not
| a stopped clock.
| grzm wrote:
| What's the likely outcome of doing so?* Why are you saying
| it? To show you were right? To make them feel stupid for
| not listening to you? How will you feel afterwards? How
| will they feel? How will that likely affect your
| interactions with them in the future?
|
| Maybe you're fine with the likely outcome. But maybe not.
|
| * And there's a distinction between what's _likely_ to
| happen and what you think _should_ happen. They're not
| always the same thing.
| bee_rider wrote:
| It adds little value and is annoying to hear.
|
| If you make a prediction correctly, and it is ignored, then
| that's an indication that you should either make it more
| assertively next time, or you just can't work with this
| person.
|
| And anyway, some humbleness is due -- sometimes we think
| we've given good advice, but it ends up being somehow
| inapplicable to the problem for reasons that are outside
| our scope.
| jimkleiber wrote:
| Maybe therein lies the rub (a fun idiom): if one wants to
| say "I told you so", or whichever variant to say "I was
| right", then one should also say "I did not tell you so",
| or the "I was wrong" when that person made an incorrect
| prediction :-D
| ramesh31 wrote:
| This. The worst sin is the "I'm not saying _X_ , but... (then
| proceeds describe a euphemized form of X)". Mentioning that
| you are not mentioning something is the most blatant form of
| passive aggression, and it's entirely counterproductive.
| [deleted]
| mattbee wrote:
| Ha, they remind me of the phrases in the "hidden insults"
| section of
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latin_for_All_Occasions
|
| LATIN: Stercorem pro cerebro habes.
|
| WHAT YOU SAY IT MEANS: That's certainly food for thought.
|
| WHAT IT REALLY MEANS: You have shit for brains.
| NovemberWhiskey wrote:
| Yes; that's correct. There's a change of language register to
| "corporate workplace" but no change of meaning or intent.
|
| I can still tell you're being an asshole even if you write in
| business English, so can others who read it, and no-one is
| giving bonus marks for "professionalism".
| MrJohz wrote:
| It's like the old gag where someone uses a thesaurus on every
| word in their letter to make it sound cleverer, but just ends
| up demonstrating their own lack of knowledge.
|
| I've worked in the UK and in Germany. In the UK there's much
| more of a tendency to use roundabout phrases to get across
| what you mean, much like many of this site's suggestions. In
| Germany, people tend to be more abrupt. Both registers can be
| just as kind and supportive, and just as cutting and
| destructive. But either way, there's no magic politeness
| spell you can cast that stops you from appearing to be, like
| the parent commenter says, an asshole.
| rgoulter wrote:
| The concept I'm reminded of is the related "meta-message".
|
| OP's site adjusts the register to something more polite.
|
| The confrontational statements are still confrontational when
| phrased more politely.
| titzer wrote:
| Having been on the receiving end of "I'm not sure we really
| understand what is going on here" more than a few times, from
| specific people, I was able to decode this eventually. I'm still
| not sure how I feel about it, but it definitely was less jarring
| to hear those words instead of "you don't know what you are
| talking about."
| librish wrote:
| I don't think I agree with most of these. The professional way to
| say "I told you so" is to not say it. If there are specific
| action items you can bring them up in a post mortem without
| pointing fingers.
|
| If you feel like you genuinely need to let people know that
| something wasn't your fault (which would be a bit of an
| organizational red flag) that's an action item for _you_ to make
| sure your interjections are more visible next time.
| sokoloff wrote:
| The most infuriating item I've ever received on a performance
| review was that I'd warned the engineering organization of our
| poor source code control practices, but then took no action to
| prevent the inevitable failure of Microsoft Visual Sourcesafe.
| (I still have that review in printed paper form from 2003.)
|
| At the time, I felt like "no one asked me to fix this, and I
| was doing all these other things you did ask me to do, so why
| are you bitching that I didn't fix it?"
|
| Subsequently, I wasn't so sure and now lean towards thinking
| that I was in the wrong for not taking initiative on an item
| that was that critical and where I was the company expert.
| Trasmatta wrote:
| I'm pretty sure the post is satire, not intended to be an
| actual recommendation
| dqpb wrote:
| "I told you so"'s are better as saved rounds for future
| disagreements.
| notreallyserio wrote:
| But even then only in your head or while talking to yourself
| in the shower, of course.
| dqpb wrote:
| You can politely explain to someone that you think they are
| wrong now evidenced by the fact they they were proven wrong
| in a similar situation before.
|
| In fact, I would argue its literally your job to do so.
| You're paid to make the right decisions AND to persuade
| others (and to be persuadable if you're wrong).
|
| If it turns out you were right but failed to convince
| others because you failed to present all valid arguments,
| then you are negligent.
| mattcwilson wrote:
| Agree. Haven't gone through the whole list, but the first few
| strike me as avoidance wrapped in fancy jargon.
|
| I think a direct, kind, but clear and unambiguous response
| would go a lot farther. Followed by a suggestion, to
| demonstrate you're not just complaining, you're trying to be
| helpful.
|
| To your point about culture: feeing like you couldn't say any
| of the following probably says a lot about either the
| environment, or about your own comfort with candor.
|
| You are overcomplicating this -> This sounds overcomplicated to
| me. Have you considered X instead?
|
| That meeting sounds like a waste of my time -> Can you clarify
| what you're hoping for from me being in this meeting? Can I
| read the notes, or send feedback async instead?
|
| I told you so -> (Ask yourself _why_ you want to even say this.
| Then, don't say it, and say the why instead.) 1. "Well, that's
| a shame. Are you looking for suggestions on next steps?" 2.
| "Should we go back and consider plan X?" 3. "What did we learn
| from this outcome?"
| ModernMech wrote:
| > The professional way to say "I told you so" is to not say it.
|
| The professional way to say "I told you so" is to write a post
| mortem.
|
| - What was the problem?
|
| - What solutions were considered?
|
| - Why was the chosen solution implemented?
|
| - How did the chosen solution fail?
|
| - How would have considered but discarded alternatives fared?
|
| - What will be the choice in the future?
|
| That's basically "I told you so" in report form. Just stick to
| the facts and it's not petty but helpful. Hidden under the ego
| stroke of "I told you so" is a lost opportunity to have taken
| the correct or better path when it was available. Understanding
| why that opportunity was lost is important for an organization.
| ErrantX wrote:
| Depends on the context I think.
|
| Step one is for everyone to agree the outcome was poor (or
| for the client to say so, or the market, or senior
| leadership, etc.).
|
| Otherwise writing that report is very literally "I told you
| so", written to make a point.
|
| (I do think it is a related scenario where the outcome was
| fine but you still believe an alternative approach has value;
| so you then have to make a choice between accepting "my way
| is not the only way" and moving on or repeating your point)
| dsugarman wrote:
| "I told you so" has no value to a conversation, relationship or
| business results. 100%
|
| I think it can be very productive to say something like "hey,
| I'm a little upset because I tried to get ahead of this problem
| and to me, it didn't feel like my concerns and ideas were taken
| into account and now we're considerably behind. I'd like to be
| helpful on these types of problems in the future, can we make a
| change to support that?"
|
| If the statement is just about ego, it shouldn't be said. If
| there's something deeper that is causing relationship or
| business issues, find a way to dig it up and say it clearly
| with the goal clearly outlined.
| fffobar wrote:
| "I told you so", perhaps wrapped in a corpspeak package if
| the recipient is resonant to those frequencies, adds a lot of
| value in terms of me not having to handle the fallout. Yes, I
| know some people want to do an awesome job, be noticed or
| whatever, but the easier solution (and fairer) is to let the
| fire burn under whoever caused it. OTOH if you find yourself
| in a situation when you have to clean up mess that was caused
| by indifference to your own concerns then it simply means
| you've lost politically, sadly.
| saila wrote:
| I've seen it happen often enough that someone's concerns are
| summarily ignored that I don't think you can _always_ blame the
| person raising issues for not being loud or visible enough.
|
| The way this often goes down is that someone who is perceived
| as more senior will push something through, steamrolling right
| over well-formed interjections. If someone lower on the org
| chart tries to make more noise than the steam roller, the
| consequences can be quite bad for them.
|
| If something then fails as predicted, why shouldn't that be
| noted? If someone has expertise that was ignored, that _should_
| be taken into account in the future, and part of the post
| mortem should be figuring out why their expertise was ignored.
|
| The thing is, it should probably be noted by management or
| whoever is in the chain of responsibility and probably not by
| the person who was ignored, but management often doesn't want
| to admit mistakes of this type.
|
| So what do you do then? How is it constructive to ignore a
| glaring issue in your planning and decision making process?
| dvtrn wrote:
| _that 's an action item for you to make sure your interjections
| are more visible next time._
|
| Takes a certain skill to be tactful and deliberate enough to do
| this.
|
| Yet it takes mastery and _wisdom_ to know when to say your
| peace and rest on that.
|
| It's been my experience that even with a sufficient and proper
| amount of CYA, visibility and otherwise intentional effort put
| forth so that your actions and words toe the line and dutifully
| provide context, one can still find themselves on the pointy
| end of the blame stick being wielded by the more powerful,
| persuasive or otherwise popular trying to cover _their_ own
| asses.
| xwdv wrote:
| Not only are these very passive aggressive, some of them leave
| you with action items that I have no desire to carry out.
|
| If I say something isn't my job, that's the end of it, you hear
| me? I will certainly NOT be happy to waste my time helping you
| find someone else who can do it. Do _your_ job.
| orev wrote:
| Depending on your career goals, being the person that everyone
| approaches for help on finding the right path is a very
| valuable thing. It means they see you as a leader who can work
| with other people to help them get things done.
|
| Having an attitude of "I don't know and won't make any effort
| to help you. Leave me alone" is going to negatively impact how
| people see you, and limit your growth potential in any company.
|
| Maybe that's fine for you if you just want to write code, but
| it will stop you from obtaining even team lead type roles where
| you need to collaborate with others.
| chrsig wrote:
| The tradeoff here being how much of your time are you willing
| to dedicate towards helping others, and for what level of
| task.
|
| As a general rule of thumb, I try to ask "Have you X, Y, or
| Z'd?" as a quick filter for if the person has engaged with
| the problem at all. A common example being "Do you know why
| I'm getting error message X?" "Have you checked the Y logs?"
|
| Ideally, people do some amount of leg work first and
| proactively state what they've done. Sometimes people will do
| the leg work, but need to be asked to share the context
| they've gathered. Sometimes people ask immediately, without
| any investigation of their own, because you might know and be
| able to save them time.
|
| Of course, having the full blown belligerent attitude of "I
| wont make any effort to help you" isn't very welcome, but
| "You should take a few hours to dive in, if you're still
| stuck, I'll set aside some time to take a look with you" is
| pretty reasonable.
| xwdv wrote:
| I don't want a team lead role. You know what my team lead
| does most of the time? Meetings, meetings, meetings.
| Occasionally writes code.
|
| The message I want to send is clear. When you want _code_ ,
| come to me. Everything else, I can't be bothered.
| thfuran wrote:
| But I don't think most of the rewordings suggested here are
| going to make people want to interact with you. They make you
| sound like you run your every utterance by HR, legal, and
| three teams of consultants but they won't keep you from
| seeming like an asshole.
| traceroute66 wrote:
| I'm sorry but all these are pointless waffle that don't serve any
| purpose or achieve the goal.
|
| For example...
|
| A whole bunch of them are just a longer version of making
| yourself sound like an utter twat, e.g. _" I told you so"_ vs _"
| As per my prediction, this outcome does not come as a surprise."_
| .... to the listener both equal _" you're a twat"_.
|
| Then a whole bunch of others just open scope for further
| problems, e.g. _" that meeting sounds like a waste of time"_ ->
| _" waffle...I would be happy to read the minutes"_ ..... cue
| colleague coming back to you asking why you have not read the
| minutes / for your opinion on the minutes.
|
| Finally, as others have commented, it's all very Americanised and
| would likely not work in "no BS" cultures elsewhere in the world.
| punkspider wrote:
| This will be very useful when using with GPT-3. Thanks so much!
|
| Some examples generated using the site title and tagline in the
| beginning of the prompt, confidence 0, and the first 3 samples.
| Some are misses, but it can be tweaked to come in very useful
| when I don't know how to provide constructive criticism or
| feedback. There is a fly in my soup: I'm afraid
| there is something in this food that shouldn't be here.
| Fuck you: I strongly disagree with your approach/decision.
| You make me cringe: Your delivery makes me feel uncomfortable.
| I never loved you: Our relationship was purely professional.
| I am so tired of all your fucking meetings: I'm not able to
| attend all the meetings you're scheduling. Can we review which
| ones I can be of most help with? I'm fed up with all
| these dumb "coaching" courses: I've taken a number of courses on
| this topic and I'm not convinced that this is the most effective
| use of my time. I'd like to end our contract as you have
| been late for the deadline twice and haven't even given me a
| heads up: I regret to inform you that I will be terminating our
| contract as of today.
| ghostfoxgod wrote:
| Wow, this is great, surely GPT-3 can provide more sophisticated
| results and can also help in improving the data set here. Would
| really appreciate if you would, could run the current data set
| through GPT-3 and share your results?
|
| You can share it via opening an issue here (https://github.com/
| AkashRajpurohit/howtoprofessionallysay/is...), so it becomes a
| bit easier to track
| gotamas wrote:
| I think the two versions here should say rude vs. passive
| aggressive. I don't see any professional or collegial in most of
| the answers. The only difference is that passive aggressive
| versions are harder to understand and see through
| aghilmort wrote:
| turn these into a browser extension
| debarshri wrote:
| When I start reading the phrases and their corresponding
| responses. It gives me jitters because I have been in an org that
| used very similar language and I often connect that language to a
| toxic work environment and office politics.
|
| I have worked in netherlands for dutch orgs, I love the fact that
| communication is direct, people communicate directly. You don't
| have read between the lines, if something has to be done, it said
| as it. There is BS in an org. There is toxic politics per say.
|
| It could be just be me but I think an org could work efficiently
| if there was no reading between the lines and communication was
| to the point.
| geocrasher wrote:
| 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.
| morpheuskafka wrote:
| 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.
| soared wrote:
| 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".
| civilized wrote:
| > 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.
| geocrasher wrote:
| - 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 :)
| verve_rat wrote:
| 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.
| baxtr wrote:
| 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.
| wintermutestwin wrote:
| >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?"
| baxtr wrote:
| 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.
| civilized wrote:
| I think he's got the gist basically right and people can
| remove some of the extra to suit their taste and style.
| geocrasher wrote:
| 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.
| civilized wrote:
| People are different. More words can be confusing to some
| people.
| emerged wrote:
| 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.
| geocrasher wrote:
| 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 ;-)
| mkl95 wrote:
| > Can you answer all of the questions I asked and not just pick
| and choose one
|
| That hit close to home.
| Cpoll wrote:
| I used to get annoyed at that, then I caught myself doing it to
| someone else (accidentally). It's surprisingly easy to do,
| especially if you get distracted midway through reading an
| email.
|
| I've had much better success numbering all my asks, that
| reminds people that there's more than one question to answer.
| It also helps to cluster all the questions at the end of the
| email, when possible.
| proc0 wrote:
| Are we confident that this is the best solution or are we still
| exploring alternatives?
| karaterobot wrote:
| One that I don't see on the list, which I am constantly looking
| for a way to politely say, is: "I don't think you were paying
| attention to what I said just now. It's possible that I wasn't
| clear enough, but if that's so, you should ask me questions
| rather than ignoring me. What I'm hearing from you now is exactly
| what someone would say if they had spent all of my previous
| statement waiting to talk instead of listening."
|
| How do I say this?
| soared wrote:
| Some strategies for rephrasing I like are (1) converting "you"
| to "us/we", (2) removing emotion/blame, (3) occams razor -
| assume incompetence over malice, (4) false timidness/fake
| blaming yourself. The person likely was listening but is not
| able to connect their statement with yours. Telling someone you
| think they aren't listening won't make them listen unless you
| hold power over them or are publicly embarrassing them. Assume
| your solution is x, but immediately after the person asks about
| y, which is solved by x. Some starters:
|
| "One concern we have is y, I think it makes sense that x will
| resolve it. What are your thoughts?"
|
| "I was thinking about y when coming up with x and thought the
| issue would be resolved, but maybe I misunderstood a piece of
| y?"
|
| "Sorry I may not have communicated that clearly - I think x
| will resolve y but perhaps I misunderstood your question. Can
| you expand on why x might not solve y?"
|
| Very dependent on culture/etc though. These work great for
| Americans, but for other cultures they are way too indirect.
| Unless you and everyone on the call is highly technical, fake
| taking blame doesn't have the negative impact people think it
| does. If you have a feeling someone wasn't listening, everyone
| else on the call has the same feeling. Calling them out likely
| won't help, but you earn respect if you progress the meeting
| forward without being a dick.
| chasing wrote:
| Speak like an empathic human being, not like an asshole, not like
| a robot.
| shimonabi wrote:
| If you were taught English as a second language in school like
| me, this is both helpful and hilarious:
|
| https://www.worldaccent.com/blog/2011/05/british-translation...
| Animats wrote:
| Probably coming soon to Grammarly and Google Docs.
|
| There should be a reverse version in reader programs: the
| bullshit remover.
| musesum wrote:
| Much of conflict is avoided when switching from 2nd person to 1st
| person point of view:
|
| 1) you're not delivering on time
|
| 2) I see a delay in progress
|
| for 1), the speaker interjects an implicit judgment which the
| receiver has to defend against or quietly accept under duress.
|
| for 2), the topic shifts from the receiver to the work; both
| parties are on the same team working towards the same goal.
| jimkleiber wrote:
| Yes! Exactly what I was thinking. Also to take it even further,
| shifting into the 1st-person emotional.
|
| 1) you're not delivering on time 2) I see a delay in
| progress...3) I feel frustrated that the project is not yet
| done.
|
| or go even further and include the 2nd-person (imagined and
| uncertain) emotional...
|
| 4) I feel frustrated that the project is not yet done and I
| imagine maybe you're feeling frustrated as well or maybe
| overwhelmed, I don't know.
|
| I find 4 works SO well. especially if I add a 5th version in
| there, including a phrase to express love/care/unity...
|
| 5) I feel frustrated that the project is not yet done and I
| imagine maybe you're feeling frustrated as well or maybe
| overwhelmed, I don't know. I just want to let you know that I'm
| here for you.
| rapjr9 wrote:
| >"Stop assigning me so many tasks if you want any of them to get
| done"
|
| >"As my workload is quite heavy, can you help me understand what
| I should reprioritize to accommodate this new task?"
|
| I've used this one a lot and it helped quite a bit. Eventually
| the boss saw it as obstructive to his demands and started saying
| "it's all top priority". So I just arranged my priorities as I
| saw fit based on what I observed his own priorities to be, and it
| mostly worked out fine. When he'd ask me about all the other
| tasks he'd assigned, after I reported on what I'd accomplished at
| the weekly meeting, I'd say "I haven't had time to work on that".
| It's what he always said to everyone, that he was "so strapped
| for time, had so many meetings on his schedule" so how could he
| not accept it? Or he'd say "this other stuff is important, you
| need to work on it", I'd say "ok, I'll put off THE IMPORTANT
| THING for a day to do that", and he'd back off. In essence there
| is only so much time, and when you get to the details of
| scheduling what you are going to work on, it becomes extremely
| obvious how long things take to do. Maybe someone more brilliant
| could do it faster than you, but it will take a year to bring
| them in and get them up to speed, and they will cost more. If
| your boss refuses to recognize that and demands more, just do
| what you can, and reserve some inviolable time for yourself. It's
| basically a management failure and has nothing to do with you,
| let them fail. You know your value, you are accomplishing the
| most important of the work.
|
| Oh, and when the boss stops wanting to prioritize, start looking
| for a better place to work.
| jasode wrote:
| A meta observation about the replies:
|
| - Group 1 : These alternatives suggestions are great!
|
| - Group 2 : These alternatives sound like corporate-drone-speak
| that are passive-aggressive and condescending.
|
| The differences in perception seems like a unintended Rorschach
| Test. The differing interpretations looks like a worthy candidate
| for somebody's PhD psych research paper.
|
| Conclusion: Projecting an _intended tone_ to a universal audience
| is hard. Possibly unresolvable.
| ryandrake wrote:
| I mean, it's both: They are all great (I've used many of them
| in the past) AND it's stupid that we have to use polite
| euphemistic speech at work!
|
| I _wish_ I could tell people at work "Check your goddamn
| E-mail, this is the third time I've asked you to do your job!"
| or "Can you stop talking? You're derailing this fucking
| meeting!" but we can't if we expect our careers to go anywhere
| besides the basement.
|
| I think another awesome translator would be the reverse: When
| someone tells you something in corporate-drone-speak that
| sounds CorporateUpbeat, help me to figure out what it's really
| saying. Is this person really happy, or are they seething with
| rage at something I did, and can't articulate their anger in a
| work setting without coating it with passive aggressive
| euphemisms?
| blablabla123 wrote:
| But generally I think that's where a lot of conflict in
| workplaces (and not only there) comes from. People have
| different preferences for talking, also because of having
| different goals, speaking habits and interests. Telling
| someone who speaks very diplomatically to read their goddamn
| email might come off intimidating while another person might
| just think this is really important. Or vice-versa passive
| aggressive/condescending. Both sides knowing this would
| already help a lot. IMHO this would even make frameworks like
| non-violent communication obsolete. People trying to bend
| their way of talking too much is definitely not fun
| jimkleiber wrote:
| So almost like a training on different metalanguages we
| use? Not sure if that's the right word for it, maybe
| linguistic styles? I hesitate to use "communication styles"
| as I don't think it gets to the core language part of it,
| but maybe communication styles. EDIT: maybe "emotional
| communication"?
|
| I ask because I work in this space and have avoided going
| into corporate spaces after quitting consulting about 10
| years ago and am curious to dive back in.
|
| Is there a term for it that resonates more with you?
| blablabla123 wrote:
| Yeah metalanguages sounds good. I was also thinking of
| tongue or jargon, but metalanguages seems less
| ambiguous/more polished (not a native speaker anyway) Ah
| cool, that's definitely a useful job. In my last
| adventure in the corporate space as engineer that was
| definitely a topic.
|
| (To answer the edit: I think this emotional communication
| reminds me so much of EQ and all this. Dealing directly
| on the language layer with this seems more next level I
| would say)
| jimkleiber wrote:
| Ahh thank you! Emotional metalanguage? Haha probably too
| much. EDIT: "emotional" is probably too taboo for most
| workplaces currently. However I hope in the future we
| realize just how integral emotion is to communication--
| it's there whether we want to admit it or not.
| blablabla123 wrote:
| No worries! True, true... Might be worth a try and see
| how people react. At least it sounds less technical
| jimkleiber wrote:
| > Might be worth a try and see how people react.
|
| Yes, that's how I'm hoping to act more these days. I've
| been locked into trying to project a certainty in
| business and I want to project more uncertainty, more
| experimental energy instead of "I know the answer"
| energy.
|
| > At least it sounds less technical
|
| Haha, true. But maybe the more technical works for the
| engineering places? Maybe I'll use both. "Emotional
| communication from a metalinguistic perspective." :-D
|
| Or, "I teach people how to say how they feel." Which is
| pretty close to how one might say it using Natural
| Semantic Metalanguage[0].
|
| [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_semantic_metal
| anguage
| mattcwilson wrote:
| If someone needed to tell you to check your email, or stop
| interrupting the meeting, how would you want them to do it?
| How would you want to _have others see you being told that?_
| ryandrake wrote:
| "Hey, [name], could you check your E-mail? Your TPS report
| was due yesterday!" I mean, it's not offensive, and if I
| did screw up, I would want to know clearly and directly
| that I screwed up.
|
| I've worked in a blue collar setting where people were
| direct and unambiguous. "You need to put the wrench back
| after you're done using it." is much better than "I would
| like to encourage you to address the speed at which you
| submit your TPS reports, given our well understood weekly
| cadence."
| AlbertCory wrote:
| "Professionally" might be rephrased as "approved use of corporate
| speak." Anytime anyone uses the words "unable", "reach out",
| "elaborate", "expertise" or "input" you know they're bucking for
| promotion, as they say in the military.
|
| You need to translate another phrase: "You are sucking up."
| todd3834 wrote:
| These all seem highly passive aggressive in this context. So much
| so that it is actually entertaining to read.
| ransom1538 wrote:
| Ok. Can someone please make a firefox plugin so these auto
| replace for me? [1 github start will be paid]
| 867-5309 wrote:
| how to split professionally an infinitive
| sn41 wrote:
| What a bunch of threatening gobbledygook. I'd be truly frightened
| if this was the tone of all the emails I get from my boss.
| twayt wrote:
| Add comments so people can discuss each one
| GnomeSaiyan wrote:
| Y'all are getting worked up over nothing. All these sayings were
| taken directly off of a TikToker's/Instagrammer's posts. They're
| all basically just light humor.
| SpikeMeister wrote:
| Yup. Originals: https://vm.tiktok.com/ZMLGoHyTy/
| ghostfoxgod wrote:
| It's just how humans interact, I am happy to see both positive
| and negative feedbacks here, maybe it shows that there is scope
| of having such a project, and it could be taken seriously.
|
| I started this as just a fun weekend activity, but I might
| proofread the data and take some help to make it better and
| convenient for others.
| eligro91 wrote:
| I prefer to use Reverso Context.
|
| The way I'm using it is that I'm putting some words from a
| sentence I want to say, and it will show me how others have used
| those words. then I'm looking for the common use of those words
| and building my own sentence.
| civilized wrote:
| This version of "professionalism" has the stereotypical West
| Coast problem: the message it claims to be sending gets not only
| lost in translation, but distorted into something more
| superficially inoffensive, but underneath that, more opaque and
| manipulative. It encourages indirection and avoidance rather than
| respectful candor.
|
| Let's start with the first example. The polite way to say "you
| are overcomplicating this" is "I think this could be simpler".
| Not "let's concentrate on initial scope", which isn't remotely
| the same thing in general. The latter is less generally
| applicable (how do we know there was an initial scope?), less
| specific ( _why_ stick to initial scope?), and more prescriptive
| ( "let's do this" instead of "I listened to your idea and this is
| what I think of it").
|
| Now, being less specific and more prescriptive may be some
| people's idea of effective self-interested corporate behavior,
| since it works to minimize your vulnerabilities and maximize the
| obligations of others. But I think communication is more
| meaningful, effective, and respectful if you explain how you
| evaluate others' ideas (which implies you at least gave them the
| respect of _listening_ ) before just telling them what to do.
|
| They're not all bad though! I definitely think "that's a horrible
| idea" is productively replaced with some version of "I have these
| concerns" or "I think there may be better alternatives". It's
| generally good to avoid terms that communicate nothing but
| negative affect and instead communicate whatever ideas that
| prompted the negative affect.
|
| EDIT: another comment mentions Power-Distance Index, which is
| part of a broader cultural dimensions theory.
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hofstede%27s_cultural_dimens...
|
| Apparently I have a very strong preference for low PDI culture,
| as do most of you. But it's good to be aware that that's not
| universal and our style may require adaptation for success with
| diverse audiences.
| systemvoltage wrote:
| I find it better to say: "Do you think there is a way to make
| this simpler?". This has far better convincing power as it
| gives the individual space to provide input and it doesn't
| distance them. Slight variation of this usually makes it far
| worse - "Don't you think there is a way to make this simpler?".
|
| Alternatively, "I think this can be simpler. Your thoughts?"
| civilized wrote:
| It is clear so it works for me.
| dagmx wrote:
| While I agree with the rest of your point, I don't think it's a
| West coast thing.
|
| Personally I find it across the range of the US (and of course
| other countries), but people in different areas will phrase it
| differently where the meaning can be clearer/lost depending on
| the familiarity with both the phrasing of the sentence and the
| culture of the person (I.e I find people in southern US will
| sugarcoat things differently but it's harder/easier to pickup
| depending on your familiarity with it).
| tristor wrote:
| > (I.e I find people in southern US will sugarcoat things
| differently but it's harder/easier to pickup depending on
| your familiarity with it).
|
| As a Southerner that's worked in tech for a long time, I
| would say the broad-stroke difference between the way
| Southern US and West Coast approach sugarcoating is that
| Southerners will try to avoid saying anything directly
| negative /about the person/ but will have no problem being
| directly negative about the problem. Outside of religious
| contexts or in less conservative / more blue-collar
| surroundings, even profanity is acceptable in professional
| settings in the South. E.g. rather than "Bill didn't maintain
| the hydraulics properly on this piece of equipment." it'd be
| "The fucking bucket is stuck again on the backhoe." Where
| everyone involves knows it was Bill's job, but nobody is
| going to call him out directly.
|
| Where, in West Coast settings, there's a sort of indirection
| that tries to (in my opinion) remove agency from the people
| involved entirely and sets the problem up as being inherently
| systemic. WRT to example above, e.g. "The maintenance process
| for heavy equipment should be revised to prevent future
| issues." when everybody involved presumably knows it's /a
| particular piece of equipment/ that's actually the problem,
| and one person failed to do their job, but nobody will say
| either of those things directly.
|
| The result, as I see it, is the Southern approach prevents
| /direct/ blame, but creates indirect blame/accountability for
| individuals, and focuses on specific/smaller problem areas.
| The West Coast approach avoids accountability (and agency) of
| the people involved entirely, but has the benefit of looking
| at problems more systemically (although sometimes that's a
| waste of time/effort).
| civilized wrote:
| It's a pretty entrenched stereotype, but I don't have enough
| personal experience with it to vouch for or against even a
| general statistical validity relative to other regions and
| cultures.
| Aromasin wrote:
| Agreed. Certainly within the UK, we're infamous for our sugar
| coating and nonchalant understatements. Politeness is the
| word in terms of business transactions or discussion, and
| I've found it often hampers everyone in reaching the end
| result of the problem at hand by muddying waters.
| lloydatkinson wrote:
| West coast of where? The exact same speak is used here in the
| UK, regardless of which coast.
| gotaquestion wrote:
| Bookmarked!
|
| Also, there is a long form of this called "Difficult
| Conversations", which is a really good book for handling all
| sorts of complicated issues, both at work and at home. Strongly
| recommended.
| ghostfoxgod wrote:
| Thanks for sharing this, looking forward to reading it.
| lvass wrote:
| This is disgusting. I wouldn't want to work with people offended
| by simple and direct speech, and even less if they'd be fine with
| a sugarcoated version like this instead. I feel sorry for anyone
| who has to talk like this, if I were to create a company, it'd
| never reach this point.
| criddell wrote:
| I don't think it's all sugarcoating, some of the suggestions
| are just better ways to say something.
|
| For example, the first item is _you are overcomplicating this_.
| Saying it that way sounds like you are expressing an objective
| fact rather than an opinion. Instead, saying _let's concentrate
| on initial scope_ is not only more diplomatic, it suggests a
| path to fix the problem.
| baby wrote:
| Really? I hate working with people who are just being agressive
| when they talk to me.
| ghusto wrote:
| I'm so glad someone said it.
|
| This version of _""professionalism""_ needs double double-
| quotes, before being killed and dumped in the sea.
|
| Being the most bland, safe, manipulative version of yourself
| isn't being professional, it's cowardice and soul destroying.
|
| Why do people think "professional" means pretending to be
| someone else?
| ComradePhil wrote:
| Seems like they are stolen from TikTok channel @loewhaley... or
| the other way around.
| paulcole wrote:
| Yes, these are hers, minus the "moist" jokes. They do credit
| her at the bottom of the page at least.
|
| https://www.tiktok.com/@loewhaley
| ghostfoxgod wrote:
| Yes, I have mentioned the credits on both the website and on
| the project's README (https://github.com/AkashRajpurohit/howt
| oprofessionallysay/#c...)
| MasterScrat wrote:
| I somehow feel these credits are not prominent enough.
|
| For people not familiar with her content, take a look e.g.
| here: https://www.instagram.com/p/CcDPE1MOIBT/
|
| This project is not just inspired by her work, but takes
| her jokes verbatim in written format. I you quote people,
| you're supposed to use quotation marks.
|
| Of course if this is a collaboration, things are different,
| but it's not clear that it is.
| ghostfoxgod wrote:
| I understand where you're coming from, this is not a
| collaboration but as you mentioned, the content is
| presented in written format which is a bit more easily
| searchable.
|
| These are just some phrases and not "quoting people's
| thoughts", I did not consider adding quotation marks to
| each phrase.
|
| I have added relevant credits every place possible (on
| web as well as code repo). I'll be happy to make the
| intent more clear if you have any ideas on how you would
| feel it can be best represented.
| crubb wrote:
| I would strongly suggest crediting her at the top of the
| page, before the quotes.
|
| Edit: And state your intentions, i.e. making the content
| searchable.
| ghostfoxgod wrote:
| Agree with you, I have added the credits on the top
| section as well. As far as it goes about stating my
| intentions about making the content searchable, I feel
| that the input box for search pretty much conveys that,
| so I won't be explicitly mentioning this in writing (not
| at least on the website). Thank you for your suggestions.
| paulcole wrote:
| Yes, that's what I said lol.
| neonsunset wrote:
| Hahah I like how many of these phrases unlike their direct
| counterparts appear even more passive aggressive and insulting if
| you are used to corpspeak.
| harrisonjackson wrote:
| I hope that junior engineers/employees take all of these with a
| grain of salt. You can't skip meetings because you won't add to
| them. Part of your job is to observe and learn.
| jaequery wrote:
| This is great
| ghostfoxgod wrote:
| Thanks
| mrfusion wrote:
| Now we need one for spouses ... (not joking)
| dj_mc_merlin wrote:
| Huh? I thought this was a satire/joke website. The amount of
| people who thank the author for help is.. worrying. This is how
| we jokingly communicate at work, or in commit messages.
| moralestapia wrote:
| >I told you so
|
| >As per my prediction, this outcome does not come as a surprise.
|
| Whew ... that sounds quite arrogant and egoistical.
|
| I'd probably just say "you see, I told you so" with a very
| friendly attitude, almost as a joke, followed by "but it's fine,
| let's focus on how are we going to proceed now that ...".
| XorNot wrote:
| I think I've used "this wasn't a surprise" a fair amount.
| notahacker wrote:
| I agree that anyone uttering the entire phrase in isolation
| comes across as a pretentious douchebag.
|
| But "as per my prediction, revenues were below target again" or
| "x is not functioning correctly. This does not come as a
| surprise" is normal enough corporatespeak, and more polite than
| "I told you so" because it _could_ mean other things.
| n4bz0r wrote:
| > I totally forgot about your email
|
| > Thank you for your patience
|
| Gave me a little chuckle :)
|
| I figure this "corp-speak" is supposed to help to deliver the
| message clearly while milding the confrontation down insensibly.
| Some of the proposed lines, merely repharsed into a colder,
| official tone, aren't too great at that. But this one is quite
| clever!
| CSDude wrote:
| This is how many people survive and get promoted in a large
| enterprise. One of the reasons I quit my job.
| mdb31 wrote:
| Ah, yes, the same kind of guide that brought us "how to
| professionally respond to outages"... With classics like "We
| recognize the incident", "a small subset of customers", "degraded
| performance" and "the next update (which will be the exact same
| meaningless drivel as the current 'update') will be in 60
| minutes". Don't we just love those? So let's add more of that to
| the shared vocabulary of IT professionals!
|
| Or... let's just not? In writing, always avoid cliches. Whether
| it's "do the needful", "by utilizing" or "we did not live up to
| our customer's expectations", there is one simple rule: if you've
| seen the exact same sentence or expression before in the exact
| same context in the last week or so, you should _probably_ avoid
| it.
|
| And if that makes you unsure what exactly to say, just type what
| you mean, then get an editor before posting it to your blog or
| incident report. And if it's time-sensitive, then just ask for
| forgiveness later, not permission upfront (which is also a cliche
| but reworded, see what I did there?)
| omginternets wrote:
| I'm so glad I work in a place that emphasizes benevolent
| directness.
|
| In fact, I'm so far removed from this kind of lingo that I have
| to ask: is this website an accurate depiction of how people
| communicate in other organizations? Or is this a caricature?
| mdb31 wrote:
| Nope, not a caricature. Read, for example
| https://www.atlassian.com/engineering/post-incident-
| review-a...
|
| This is held up as a great example of transparent
| communication. For me, this is true, but only for the meaning
| of 'transparent' which equates to 'you can see right through
| it, to the extent there is effectively nothing there'.
|
| But as per the article this comment thread is about, this
| kind of response apparently the 'professional' state-of-the-
| art.
|
| Yes, I despair too...
| omginternets wrote:
| I think I was unclear. I always assumed (perhaps foolishly)
| that this kind of communication was the result of some sort
| of PR committee, and was mostly found in outward-facing
| communications. Are you saying that colleagues interact
| this was amongst themselves too? Because _that_ would
| indeed be despairing.
| mdb31 wrote:
| Nope, people communicate like that internally as well,
| because "that's what's _professional_ "
|
| In some cases, you can fix this by asking the sender to
| be, like, normal. This works half the time, the other
| half involves referrals to HR...
| omginternets wrote:
| > In some cases, you can fix this by asking the sender to
| be, like, normal.
|
| I was about to be tongue-in-cheek and ask why the
| "professional" way of asking that question might be.
|
| ... then I saw the very next sentence and chuckled aloud.
|
| What a nightmare :/
| mirkodrummer wrote:
| Oh cmon seriously? Did we really need a guide? I'm not arguing
| you shouldnt be professional, rather scared of a future where we
| all talk like bots with no emotions. Are we so fu**d up?
| jafo wrote:
| > Are we so fu*d up?
|
| "Is the alternative way to express these sentiments?"
| CyanDeparture wrote:
| I'm not sure I agree with most of these, it's not the way I'd go
| about them, but also I don't see what I do in the comments so
| I'll add my own hopefully unique perspective here. For example
| with:
|
| "you are overcomplicating this"
|
| I would put it in the 3rd person or include myself in the
| problem, and I would apologise at the start for saying something
| negative, so I would say for example:
|
| "Sorry, but I think we're overcomplicating this, what do we think
| about the following idea..."
|
| I've found that works fantastically because I'm sort of saying
| I'm wrong or have caused an issue (I haven't) and they're
| included in my suggested solution (they're not really) so it
| makes a great way to change peoples minds (if you don't mind
| pretending you're having a bad idea too and giving them credit
| for yours).
|
| I apply this to everything and it works great. You get a lot of
| people taking credit for your good ideas, but I don't mind if it
| means the solution is better.
| sunny3 wrote:
| My $0.02: "You are complicating this" is an accusation of the
| recipient. In my opinion, offering the alternative you see as
| simpler can make the dialogue more productive, e.g., have you
| considered y? It's simpler because abc... and also achieves the
| same objective. How did you arrive at this solution? This also
| saves your own face if/when it turns out things are indeed more
| complicated than you originally thought.
| twayt wrote:
| It's all in your mindset. Stop viewing your coworker as your
| adversary or someone you have to walk on thin ice with.
|
| Just say: "I think we might be able to simplify this a
| bit...<say idea>. What do you think? Do you think that would
| work?"
| ncmncm wrote:
| At issue is when your colleague is an idiot who will be
| unable to comprehend what is wrong with their idea, no matter
| how carefully explained.
| twayt wrote:
| Been fortunate enough to not work with anyone like that
| coffeefirst wrote:
| Yes. You can be kind and speak plainly at the same time. It's
| really not that hard.
| jka wrote:
| I mostly agree, but for the sake of argument, I do wonder how
| much time and emotional energy is spent developing and
| articulating those kind & plain responses in situations where
| the {requests/demands} that prompted them were unreasonable
| in the first place.
|
| (if the onus moves to the demand-makers instead, then perhaps
| we can improve workplace cultures and find something more
| like the root cause(s))
| ErrantX wrote:
| This is how I would approach it too. Specifically creating an
| "us" or "we".
|
| The reason for me is that I am in a reasonably senior
| leadership role. So even these diplomatically framed options
| would come across the same way "don't bother me" etc.
|
| Investing myself as part of the team is a key way to make sure
| I can give feedback in a safe and engaged way.
|
| You do have to actually be engaged though. And it can be a fine
| balance between engaged and interfering.
|
| Upwards & with direct reports I am more blunt, depending on the
| dynamic of the relationship. For people I have minimal
| relationship with (say peers in a different part of the
| business) I'll tend to flip it as a question; so not "this
| meeting is not a good use of my time" but instead "what,
| specifically, might you need from me in the session" (asking
| for clarification also has the advantage of challenging your
| assumptions)
| icambron wrote:
| This is my approach almost to a T. Managing upward, be direct
| and take personal responsibility for saying something with
| friction. Only use we when taking credit. This what your
| bosses want; their egos are secure but they don't have time
| to parse indirect communication and guess what you want
| (source: I was until recently in sr management)
|
| Managing down, I use "we" and (narratively, if not always in
| practice) to include everyone in a decision. (Some caveats:
| e.g. just be direct about stuff they have no say in; no one
| wants you to pretend they're included in like reorgs or
| something). This isn't about tricking them into
| misunderstanding how much power they have--it's about
| creating the safety for them to push back directly on
| something they disagree on, despite being objectively less
| powerful. They'll feel more comfortable doing the managing
| upward part directly and effectively.
|
| I'd never say most of the things on that list for fear of
| feeling squirmy, evasive, or, yes, passive aggressive.
|
| In general, people want firm but open bosses, and bold but
| accepting staff, where this way of approaching communication
| works. If you don't have that, you should find them.
| dosethree wrote:
| Just phrase it as a question
|
| "Do you think this is too complicated?"
|
| "Is there any way we can simplify this?"
| social_quotient wrote:
| I would think this creates an issue.
|
| Yes it's complicated because it's complicated. If it could
| have been simplied I would have done it already.
|
| I would approach this like
|
| I think this is overly complicated. Let's see if we can
| simplify.
|
| It's direct. It says what I truly believe and it puts me on
| the side of having to do work to simply fit as a collective
| "we".
|
| Thoughts?
| jimkleiber wrote:
| I like it. I think when most people use the word "direct"
| they mean using the 2nd-person and stating an "objective"
| truth about their actions or person. Whereas in you using
| direct, you meant more directly sharing how one is
| feeling/thinking on the inside, 1st-person disclosure.
|
| For me, I often try to add a 2nd-person component in there,
| so it goes 1st-person (singular), 2nd-person (singular),
| 1st-person (collective).
|
| "I think this is overly complicated, and I imagine you
| might as well. Shall we find a way to simplify it?"
| dsugarman wrote:
| It's not really disingenuous if you look at it from another
| perspective that you really are a team. It's generally
| productive to try to position things from the same side of the
| table rather than opposing sides of the table. It's cooperation
| instead of competition. In your example you're not attacking
| someone else's suggestion, you're evaluating your teams current
| path, you're removing ego which removes defensiveness.
| alliao wrote:
| reminded me of this twitter thread...
| https://twitter.com/MeanestTA/status/1509936432625897474
|
| took me way too long to find it, how do you guys search whatever
| it is you've seen on the internet
| ozzythecat wrote:
| Many of these statements come off as being passive aggressive,
| but to the authors credit, sometimes you don't have much else to
| respond back with, or just don't engage at all, which can cause
| its own issues.
|
| What made me chuckle a bit is how real these situations were on a
| daily basis at Amazon, and how I'd write an email or Chime
| message only to rewrite it and discard it... "hmm, how do I
| respond without being passive aggressive? How do I keep my mental
| sanity?"
| mattcwilson wrote:
| I disagree - I think it's possible to respond to each of these
| situations with a clear, kind, and direct response.
|
| I think the underlying issue is more that, yes, if you're
| _already feeling like_ saying any of the original messages,
| communication and understanding is probably already damaged.
| Which makes it a higher degree of difficulty challenge to put
| things back on better footing.
|
| Good communication definitely takes practice. Maintaining
| positive intent and respecting the other person's humanity and
| feelings is vital.
| quadcore wrote:
| How to professionally say "I cant do this (technically)"
| punkspider wrote:
| This is out of my area of expertise.
| tofflos wrote:
| I don't know how to solve this problem. Is there someone on the
| team that can help me?
| nathias wrote:
| I think I heard most of the lines listed used word for word, but
| is professionalism just translating active agression into passive
| agression?
| sdwvit wrote:
| elilev wrote:
| Passive aggressive language is not leadership.
| Copenjin wrote:
| Most of these are just passive aggressive versions of the
| original, maybe more blunt, comment. The effect on me would be
| the opposite of what the author expects.
|
| Totally unprofessional, remember that you are usually among
| adults, not kids. Don't be blunt but don't even use this
| alternative style. Both will get you fired eventually.
|
| My simple suggestion, when something is wrong, make it about _us_
| , don't target the individual and try to propose a plan to fix
| the issue/situation. That's the way to handle conflict, we work
| together, let's fix issues.
| okasaki wrote:
| IMO A lot of the fixed professional ones would still be way too
| spicy to use in the UK.
|
| Many seem to imply a bad relationship or dissatisfaction with a
| coworker. I would never [again] talk to a coworker about this. I
| would either ignore it or talk to my manager.
| karmakaze wrote:
| I told you so. -> As per my prediction, this outcome does
| not come as a surprise.
|
| Is "Being mindful of timelines. Let's concentrate on the initial
| scope." better than "You're overcomplicating this" to describe
| the above transformation?
|
| Seriously though, I think these soft phrasings might be useful
| for talking to non-technical types or more junior devs. For
| senior+ devs, I prefer plain-speak.
| tomasreimers wrote:
| In case anyone wants to throw it into GPT-3:
|
| Blunt: You are overcomplicating this
|
| Polite: Being mindful of timelines. Let's concentrate on the
| initial scope.
|
| Blunt: That meeting sounds like a waste of my time
|
| Polite: I'm unable to add value to this meeting but I would be
| happy to review the minutes.
|
| Blunt: I told you so
|
| Polite: As per my prediction, this outcome does not come as a
| surprise.
|
| Blunt: That sounds like a horrible idea
|
| Polite: Are we confident that this is the best solution or are we
| still exploring alternatives?
|
| Blunt: I already told you this
|
| Polite: As Indicated prior
|
| Blunt: Can you answer all of the questions I asked and not just
| pick and choose one
|
| Polite: Are you able to provide some clarity around the other
| questions previously asked?
|
| Blunt: Did you even read my email?
|
| Polite: Reattaching my email to provide further clarity
|
| I'll provide an update when I have one
|
| Blunt: Stop bothering me
|
| Polite: You have not heard from me because further information is
| not available at this time, Once I have an update I'll be sure to
| loop you in.
|
| Blunt: I don't want to talk to you right now!
|
| Polite: I am currently tied up with something but I will connect
| with you once I am free.
|
| Blunt: Do your job!
|
| Polite: It is my understanding that you are the appropriate
| person to contact in regards to this. But If there's is someone
| better equipped for this let me know.
|
| Blunt: That's not my job
|
| Polite: This falls outside of my responsibilities but I would be
| happy to connect you with someone who can help.
|
| Blunt: Stop assigning me so many tasks if you want any of them to
| get done
|
| Polite: As my workload is quite heavy, can you help me understand
| what I should reprioritize to accommodate this new task?
|
| Blunt: answer my emails
|
| Polite: If there's a better way to get in contact with you please
| let me know as I am hoping to have this resolved as soon as
| possible
|
| Blunt: This is not my problem
|
| Polite: I recommend directing this issue to [Name] as they have
| the proper expertise to best assist you
|
| Blunt: If you would have read the whole email you'd know the
| answer to this
|
| Polite: I have included my initial email below which contains all
| of the details you are looking for.
|
| Blunt: I have absolutely no idea what you are talking about
|
| Polite: Can you help me better understand what exactly is it that
| you require on my end?
|
| Blunt: Stop micromanaging
|
| Polite: I am confident in my ability to complete this project and
| will be sure to reach out, If or when I require your input.
|
| Blunt: Please hurry and get this done!
|
| Polite: It is important that we have this completed in order to
| meet our targeted deadlines which are quickly approaching.
|
| Blunt: Stay in your own lane
|
| Polite: Thank you for your input. I'll keep that in mind as I
| move forward with decisions that fall within my responsibilities
|
| Blunt: I've told you this multiple times
|
| Polite: There seems to be a disconnect here as this information
| has already been provided
|
| Blunt: I'm not doing your job for you
|
| Polite: I do not have the capacity to take this on in addition to
| my own workload but I'm happy to support where it makes sense.
|
| Blunt: We do not need to have a meeting about this.
|
| Polite: Being respectful of everyone's time let's discuss this
| through email until we have a more defined agenda
|
| Blunt: Did you just take credit for my work?
|
| Polite: It is great to see my ideas being exposed to a wider
| audience and I would have appreciated the opportunity to have
| been included in the delivery.
|
| Blunt: Google that your self
|
| Polite: The internet is a great resource for these types of
| questions and I am available to clarify elements that you are not
| able to find online.
|
| Blunt: What you are saying does not make sense
|
| Polite: We seem to have a different understanding on this. Can
| you elaborate further on your thought process here?
|
| Blunt: I am not paid enough to do this
|
| Polite: This falls out of my job description but if the
| opportunity for a role expansion becomes available I would be
| happy to discuss reworking my contract to better align with these
| new responsibilities
|
| Blunt: I totally forgot about your email
|
| Polite: Thank you for your patience
|
| Blunt: I'm going to need a whole lot of more information if you
| want me to do this
|
| Polite: Please let me know when further details become available
| as I require more information to successfully complete this task
|
| Blunt: Stop calling me before my workday even starts
|
| Polite: If you need to contact me, please note that my working
| hours being at 8 am and 6 pm. Communications received prior to
| this won't be seen.
|
| Blunt: Check your inbox, I already sent this to you!
|
| Polite: I previously sent you an email regarding that but please
| let me know if something went wrong in transit
|
| Blunt: I couldn't care less
|
| Polite: I will defer to your judgment on this as I am not
| passionate either way and I trust your expertise.
|
| Blunt: I told you so and now this is your problem
|
| Polite: I did previously note that this was a likely outcome. How
| do you plan to resolve this?
|
| Blunt: Stop trying to make me do your work!
|
| Polite: I am not able to offer you additional support in
| completing your workload
| [deleted]
| tomilola39 wrote:
| Seems to parse this as a back and forth without more fine-
| tuning. For me at least
| thenoblesunfish wrote:
| Very practically useful (if you insist on saying these things, at
| all) but should come with some indication of which culture or
| (global) industry this advice is tuned to. I think these seem
| like what I would expect as an American (slightly passive
| aggressive, offering to "help" just as way to put things in
| someone else's court), but for example (as per countless memes)
| if you were Dutch you might be expected to be more direct, if
| British even less direct.
| bushnugget wrote:
| I enjoyed this, mostly because I refuse to play the corporate-
| speak games. I have grown weary of the overuse of diluted
| buzzwords, undefined acronyms, and email posturing to signal
| importance. As a sysadmin, I don't care about how important you
| SAY your application is. If your team didn't pay for the
| corresponding SLA, too bad. If your team didn't follow the lead
| time policy for changes to production hosts, too bad. If your
| team doesn't know who else to reach out to, that doesn't make me
| your "yellow pages".
|
| This is just trying to shove planning/work that isn't mine down
| my throat with corporate action words. I've taken to using a
| "blunt-ish" approach. It may not be the best for my career, but
| at least I don't feel like a passive drone being railroaded.
|
| Example:
|
| THEM: We really need this config changed on our prod servers for
| our app deployment to be successful. We have raised CHG1234 for
| this to be done this afternoon. Please do the needful on
| priority.
|
| ME: Production changes require a 2 week lead time, you need to
| resubmit this change in accordance with this policy. <link-to-
| policy>
|
| THEM: How can we escalate? We cannot wait 2 weeks.
|
| ME: ...
|
| I just don't respond any further. I give them the exact reason
| for the "no" and don't engage with the rest of their badgering.
| EVERYTHING else they will respond with is an attempt to
| manipulate me into violating policy for their benefit, with no
| credit for me saving the day, yet all of the risk if I don't.
|
| Nope.
| chrsig wrote:
| > I just don't respond any further. I give them the exact
| reason for the "no" and don't engage with the rest of their
| badgering. EVERYTHING else they will respond with is an attempt
| to manipulate me into violating policy for their benefit, with
| no credit for me saving the day, yet all of the risk if I
| don't.
|
| I don't think this is really any better. Going unresponsive
| doesn't wind up improving anything. Not to say that you should
| cave, but a "if there are any questions or issues with the
| policy, please take it up with <manager>" let's the other
| person know that you're disengaging. Otherwise they're in a
| situation along the lines of "I asked how we could escalate,
| but I haven't heard back. I don't know if they haven't read my
| message yet or just aren't responding for some reason"
|
| If you're in this situation, there's a disconnect between
| policy and process that needs to be resolved. Let the
| management demonstrate their "leadership" skills.
| cde-v wrote:
| AKA How to tread lightly around the irrelevant dinosaurs in your
| office.
| ghusto wrote:
| I find the people my age (old) can take a lot of crap, whereas
| I'm treading on eggshells with the young engineers.
| amelius wrote:
| Sounds a lot like the suggestions that are already in GMail.
| uncomputation wrote:
| Almost none of these are "professional" or the sort of corporate
| double speak the author wants to convey. In fact, I find a lot of
| the "alternatives" more passive aggressive and rude than the
| original intentions! Instead of "stop bothering me" being:
| You have not heard from me because further information is not
| available at this time, Once I have an update I'll be sure to
| loop you in
|
| It should be something like "Let's sync up later" or "I will ping
| you once I have an update." Way less hostile.
| dadoge wrote:
| Exactly, especially
|
| "The internet is a great resource for these types of questions
| and I am available to clarify elements that you are not able to
| find online."
|
| Instead of "Google that yourself"
| soheil wrote:
| For this reason whenever someone speaks professionally instead of
| just saying the thing directly not only they're saying the
| original thing it's meant to be (ie. I don't have time for you, I
| told you so, that's a horrible idea...), but they're also adding
| an element of plausible deniability, which makes it pretty
| cowardly.
|
| When I see managers speak like this I know the rot of bureaucracy
| has plagued the company culture and is time to find a
| smaller/less bs-type company.
|
| It'd be a fun project to create a tool to "auto-correct" these
| phrases back to their original meaning so everyone knows what's
| being communicated. Maybe a Gmail Chrome extension?
| polskibus wrote:
| This site needs a British equivalent.
| [deleted]
| marcodiego wrote:
| I once had to bring the news that about half a team would lose
| their jobs. So, in Brazil we have what is called "aviso previo";
| by our rules, your employer must put you under "aviso previo"
| (advance notice) for a time before deciding to fire you. Because
| of some bureaucracy, the whole team was under advance notice but
| now I just got the news of who was to be fired and I had to give
| the team such news. It was a very cohesive, young, talented team
| and everybody behaved like a family. Definitely not an easy task.
|
| I wanted to say: - I'm not guilty of this, I
| didn't chose who. - Half of the team will be fired.
| - It is all right if you want to point a finger. -
| They're doing a bad thing because they don't know how talented
| you are.
|
| Since I had to do it in a meeting which also included the bosses,
| this is how I said it: - I don't know the
| criteria used, but it is not my job to contest or specify it.
| Whoever did it, I'm sure had a though task doing so. -
| About 50% of the team was chosen to continue under "advance
| notice". - Last meeting, everybody got together to
| comment on the situation and I'm sure it will happen again
| because it is just unavoidable. - Talking for myself,
| independent of who was chosen, I can say that there is absolutely
| no doubt about your skills.
| ErrantX wrote:
| It makes me so sad that people get fired in team meetings of
| any size...
|
| Not your fault, I am sure - and I much prefer your version of
| the meeting! But it should always be a personal conversation
| with HR support.
| sqs wrote:
| This is a great resource that'll be useful to many people. To the
| author, thank you for taking the time to write these down and put
| them online. It would be a fascinating sociological/psychological
| research project to go one level deeper and give a few variants
| of each response, noting the implications and nuanced differences
| in the connotation of each.
|
| For example, for "answer my emails", the author suggests: "If
| there's a better way to get in contact with you please let me
| know as I am hoping to have this resolved as soon as possible".
| This is a totally valid and common way to say that. However,
| taken literally, it's silly! The person would need to read this
| email in order to know to suggest a different way to get in
| contact with the sender. Who's going to reply and say (basically)
| "I got your email, but please contact me with the same inquiry on
| (different contact method)"?
|
| Another way to rephrase "answer my emails" would be to say "Just
| checking: did this email get flagged by your spam filter?" It's
| similarly facially silly: if it was flagged as spam, then this
| followup would likely also be flagged as spam, so the recipient
| wouldn't see it. But it signals to the recipient that you
| don't/won't consider their slow reply to be their fault, which
| could increase your likelihood of getting a reply. And other
| things (eg the recipient doesn't want to be seen as having a dumb
| spam filter, short 1-question emails get the highest response
| rate, the recipient now has an opportunity to immediately help
| clear up a simple question--was the email flagged as spam--which
| is an immediate reward for them, etc.).
|
| Ah, the infinite complexity of human communication.
| sandruso wrote:
| Internally I don't want message to be sugar coated. Criticize my
| performance with whatever language, be direct and make sure
| personal boundaries are not crossed. In other words, make it
| clear that everybody focus on performance not the person. A
| question is whether this is scalable anybody with some
| experience?
|
| Edit: typo
| ryandrake wrote:
| George Carlin had a great bit[1] about our continuous need to
| soften our language with euphemisms. That, combined with a kind
| of forced optimism: needing to hide all negativity inside robotic
| passive aggression, is what communication has become in a lot of
| corporations. I don't imagine anyone actually likes having to do
| it, but we all seem to adopt these speech patterns eventually.
|
| Every time your boss tells you, "Hey, can you tone it down next
| time? Fred told me he was very offended by your asking him to do
| his job!"-- you're being asked to participate in the game.
|
| 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuEQixrBKCc
| throwaway821909 wrote:
| The euphemism treadmill is real but I disagree with Carlin's
| point that calling it shell shock rather than PTSD would have
| helped Vietnam veterans - when we called it shell shock in WW1
| it was associated with cowardice and weakness, I think calling
| it PTSD was an attempt to break from that and frame it as a
| legitimate medical condition that merits being
| discharged/treated.
| cr1pablo wrote:
| So useful for me as non-native English speaker. Sometimes it's
| difficult to know how rude your affirmations sound
| ramesh31 wrote:
| I've gotten into a habit over the years of exclusively using "We"
| in reference to anything code related, even if it's something I
| wrote entirely myself. The diffusion of "we" versus "I" allows
| you talk about things much more objectively and openly. And it
| really helps to maintain a blameless culture. This also extends
| to "You", so I'd never tell a junior "You did this poorly, you
| should fix this". It's always "We should find a better solution,
| what are your suggestions?".
| unmole wrote:
| I tend to use _we_ when the context is positive or neutral but
| _I_ when something is clearly my fault.
| bittercynic wrote:
| This is the way. People notice (and it just feels better)
| when you absorb blame but share credit. Then again, maybe
| I've just been lucky to work in reasonably OK environments so
| far.
| amelius wrote:
| Of course, the recipient would need an inverse translation table
| to see the original intent.
| fargle wrote:
| Wrapping everything in a euphemism does _not_ make it more
| professional.
|
| Finding a way to speak clearly and truthfully without being
| outright rude, as appropriate for the culture and situation, is
| important. Speaking up when necessary is important. But it's a
| lot more nuanced than phrase substitution.
|
| Some of these are pretty good. Some would make you sound
| extremely passive-aggressive. Some of them imply your own
| attitude problem ("I told you so...").
|
| A lot are most professionally handled by saying nothing at all.
| While it is important to speak up truthfully when there would be
| some positive outcome for you or me or your team, some of these
| fall into a category where the best outcome is to leave it. It's
| either irrelevant, unhelpful, or a self-solving dilemma ;-)
|
| Pretend Nice ! => Professional - you're fooling no one
| thebeardisred wrote:
| Thank you for framing the point about sounding passive
| aggressive better than I was prepared to. :smile:
| BeetleB wrote:
| > Wrapping everything in a euphemism does not make it more
| professional.
|
| We may have very different definitions of "euphemism", but I do
| not see saying "I'm unable to add value to this meeting but I
| would be happy to review the minutes." instead of "That meeting
| sounds like a waste of my time" as a euphemism.
|
| The benefit of the former is that you are signaling an openness
| to being wrong. The latter doesn't imply you're right, but nor
| is it signaling an invitation to disagree. In my experience,
| when people (including me) say the latter, they are wrong about
| 50% of the times - there often _is_ something in the meeting
| that made it useful. Stating it is a waste of my time will come
| across as arrogant (justified or otherwise).
|
| Even saying "I'm not sure there's value in meeting. What are
| you hoping to gain from this meeting?" is better than "I think
| it's a waste of my time".
| fargle wrote:
| Agree. That was one of the better examples. Saying "That
| meeting sounds like a waste of my time" is pretty rude.
|
| To me the euphemism part is "I'm unable to add value to this
| meeting" which means "I don't see the need for me to attend
| this meeting".
|
| Your examples are better too. Adding a question to ensure
| you've not misread the situation is absolutely the right
| thing: "I don't see the need for me to attend this meeting,
| is there something you needed me for?"
| efitz wrote:
| A couple of the suggested answers are in passive voice. IMO in
| addition to being poor stylistically in business communications,
| passive voice conveys apathy and disclaims responsibility. In
| some of these cases that may be the intent but as other examples
| show there are ways to do that without passive voice.
| ghostfoxgod wrote:
| weekend project, open sourced at
| https://github.com/AkashRajpurohit/howtoprofessionallysay feel
| free to add/update the data.
| ianai wrote:
| Contrary to other comments I think you're actually trying to
| provide a meaningful "blunt" to "not likely to become a
| problem" lookup table of sorts. Hope it works.
| ghostfoxgod wrote:
| That's the intent here, but based on the comments, it feels
| like I need to add a disclaimer of "try at your own risk"
| lolinder wrote:
| I think that if you expanded the scope a bit to include
| advice on when to avoid saying something, it would be more
| helpful. For example, "I told you so" shouldn't really be
| said in most contexts. It comes off as unprofessional no
| matter how you say it, so there's no entry you could create
| that would not seem wrong. If in those cases you suggest
| alternatives to saying _anything_ , it would come off
| better.
| webkike wrote:
| If someone said to me "As per my prediction, this outcome does
| not come as a surprise" I would not like them very much
| NovemberWhiskey wrote:
| Alternative title: "how to come across as a passive-aggressive
| asshole"
| blablabla123 wrote:
| Yeah there's not much the other person can respond to that
| stuff. Better would be to start a discussion if any of these
| things are worth bothering
| voldacar wrote:
| These remind me of Orwell's "Objective consideration of
| contemporary phenomena compels the conclusion that success or
| failure in competitive activities exhibits no tendency to be
| commensurate with innate capacity, but that a considerable
| element of the unpredictable must invariably be taken into
| account."
| delaaxe wrote:
| Relevant "corporate speak" https://youtu.be/4ab2ZeZ-krY
| amznbyebyebye wrote:
| Some of these are quite confrontational and still come across as
| unprofessional. This has a very boomer feel to it. I think Gen Z
| will just say the what they want instead of applying a
| professional filter.
| ccbccccbbcccbb wrote:
| I am afraid to hurt your feelings with incautious wording, so you
| might want to make your educated guess as to what I really meant
| to communicate to you.
| aspaviento wrote:
| I think there's no need to overcomplicate those answers. You can
| be direct with your message without coming as aggressive. This is
| basic conflict management: don't focus on the person, focus on
| the problem.
|
| Examples:
|
| You are overcomplicating this
|
| this is unnecessarily complex.
|
| That meeting sounds like a waste of my time
|
| if I'm not necessary for this meeting, I would rather do X
|
| I told you so
|
| this is what we talked that could happen, remember?
| jimkleiber wrote:
| I've been thinking to start a podcast about how to improve the
| quality of our communication, especially in different cultural
| contexts.
|
| I'm wondering, would any of you want to listen to a podcast where
| someone helps people change how they speak, almost like a Dr.
| Phil meets Marshall Rosenberg (nonviolent communication guy)?
| curious_cat_163 wrote:
| Some of the suggested phrasing changes the meaning of the
| original.
|
| Also, besides the alternatives requiring cultural sensitivity (as
| some commentators have argued), I think, there is just a little
| bit more sensitivity required to your receiver's personality and
| appetite for bluntness and their role relative to you.
| jmyeet wrote:
| These tend to be better than the alternative but let me warn you:
| people know what you actually mean and it'll be treated almost as
| negatively over time.
|
| I didn't look at all of these but this one stuck out:
|
| > I told you so
|
| > As per my prediction, this outcome does not come as a surprise.
|
| Don't say this. It's just as bad and really negative. It's not
| even passive aggressive. It's just aggressive.
| soared wrote:
| Agreed. On the other hand its very possible to rephrase these
| much better than the site lists, and doing so earns you
| respect. In a meeting full of people where 1 person
| overcomplicates an issue, everyone on the call will know 1
| person is overcomplicating it.
|
| If you say "Being mindful of timelines. Let's concentrate on
| the initial scope." you move the meeting forward but come off
| as a jerk.
|
| If you say "Those are good thoughts - lets make note of them
| and circle back at the end of the call" you've moved the
| meeting forward, the 1 person feels heard and doesn't hate you,
| and everyone else silently thanks you for skipping the
| overcomplicated person.
| krono wrote:
| These lines are Dutch directness' kryptonite!
|
| The website could come in handy if I ever need to translate some
| of these theatrics back to human speech. The ability to switch
| the variants around would be a nice to have ;)
|
| Edit: removed unintentional rudeness, throwing OP a bone
| ghostfoxgod wrote:
| Sounds like a good feature
| nine_zeros wrote:
| I love the Dutch style. This kind of double meaning statements
| every day takes a toll on me.
| BasDirks wrote:
| Well written but too hostile.
| [deleted]
| hemmert wrote:
| Very nice! It reminds me of Frank Rausch's and Timm Kekeritz'
| beautiful chart:
|
| https://twitter.com/frankrausch/status/966252757815570432
| darthrupert wrote:
| I realize there's a lot of cultural differences at play here.
| Still, some of these professionalisms are blatant lying in my
| opinion and should be discouraged. E.g. "I totally forgot your
| email" vs "thank you for your patience".
|
| Owning your mistakes is what pros do and deflecting blame is not.
| frobozz wrote:
| > stop calling me before my workday even starts
|
| In what circumstances would you use this phrase?
|
| If they are calling you out of hours, ignore it. They'll
| eventually get the message.
| ghostfoxgod wrote:
| Definitely you would ignore it at that time, but you can
| basically send a message (like that or something else) once you
| are back to notify about why you were not able to respond at
| that given time.
| frobozz wrote:
| The thing is, "stop calling me" implies a pattern of
| behaviour you want them to break, not a one-off.
|
| If it's the first call from someone who doesn't know your
| working pattern, then you're not really saying "stop calling
| me", but genuinely telling them when you are available.
| Putting the details in your email signature works well if you
| have unconventional hours for your workplace.
|
| If it's someone close to you - e.g. line manager or team mate
| - then they know your hours, so responding by telling them
| what your hours are strikes me as less polite than simply
| saying "I wasn't working when you called, but here I am now."
| ergocoder wrote:
| Most of these are more like "how to create arch enemy at work"
|
| Every time you say those versions of "I told you so", you create
| one extra arch enemy
| throwaway98797 wrote:
| the intent behind this project is great
|
| the hard part is how to not come off passive aggressive
|
| many (all?) of the places i worked at, the professional versions
| suggested would get a negative reaction
|
| ultimately, that's not this tools fault
|
| humans hate to be asked to do anything ever
| ghostfoxgod wrote:
| Totally agreed, it depends on person to person and with whom
| you are interacting, although the intent here is not to come
| off as passive-aggressive.
| dssagar93 wrote:
| This should be available as an autocorrect on Slack and Terms. :p
| ianai wrote:
| "This falls out of my job description but if the opportunity for
| a role expansion becomes available I would be happy to discuss
| reworking my contract to better align with these new
| responsibilities"
|
| I see you've chosen to play with fire.
| throwaway98797 wrote:
| "pay me more and i'll do it, otherwise stfu"
|
| is how I'd read this version, which is a threat
| ianai wrote:
| In a more even work environment it probably wouldn't be. But
| it underscores how uneven the power balance is today.
| chrisseaton wrote:
| All of these are super passive-aggressive.
| leecommamichael wrote:
| I think the suggestions are good, but the premises aren't. All
| of the statements that you click are an aggressive voice, but
| the revealed suggestion is passive.
|
| That being said, so long as you don't feel as aggressive as the
| premises, you'll be okay.
| elcapitan wrote:
| I would think of this as kind of a translation table between one
| communication culture and another, which might come in handy. I'm
| used to work with people from different cultures in a team and in
| my head just transpose whatever they say based on their culture.
|
| If an American tells me "Are we confident that this is the best
| solution or are we still exploring alternatives?" then I'm
| automatically translating it to "this is complete shit". When
| someone from Eastern Europe tells me "this is complete shit", I
| translate it into "hm this looks weird, care to explain?". Plus
| minus individual adjustments based on my experience with that
| person.
|
| But there's one thing I never do, and that is taking this kind of
| communication literally, and therefore I don't really care about
| flowery language, passive-aggressive clichees, or maybe a little
| negativity on the other side of the spectrum.
| williadc wrote:
| In my last performance review, the primary feedback is that I'm
| too blunt in emails, so I've bookmarked this site. Thanks for
| creating this.
| kevmo314 wrote:
| All the other comments here seem to be criticizing the OP whereas
| I thought this site was pretty funny.
|
| That's a professional way to say: I'm pretty sure this site is
| satire.
|
| Just look at the source Instagram, it's meant to be
| funny/relatable. Not actual advice.
| https://www.instagram.com/loewhaley/
| Noumenon72 wrote:
| Ah, OK. I read this as serious in the vein of the Military to
| Business Translation Guide (https://imgur.com/gallery/MO9Oo?,
| strong language)
| jcadam wrote:
| Oh that stuff is funny, but after getting my first "real" job
| after leaving the military, I actually found it difficult to
| determine if my boss was happy with the work I was doing. In
| the military, you usually have several people let you know
| immediately and in very direct language when you screw up :)
| ghostfoxgod wrote:
| I should probably add this to the site.
| readme wrote:
| I think this dictionary works backwards, but shouldn't be used
| forwards. If you had trouble understanding the passive aggressive
| BS of a coworker, this should come in handy.
| rufius wrote:
| Or just say what you mean within cultural norms. People know when
| they're being bullshitted with nice sounding boiler plate in my
| experience.
|
| A good rule to follow is to prefer being Kind rather than Nice.
| Kind is being blunt and honest. Nice is saying things nicely but
| not being clear on commitments (see: ruinous empathy).
| grensley wrote:
| If someone says the original, I'd assume they're impolite but
| good at their job,
|
| If someone says the "corrected" version, I'd assume they're
| impolite, but bad at their job.
| lazyant wrote:
| I don't know if this is satire or not but rather than
| "professional" this is passive-aggressive wording.
| jmbwell wrote:
| I hope this is a joke. This sort of corporate garbage language is
| a scourge.
|
| No need to be rude, no need to fill the space with pseudo-
| professional gibberish. Just speak plainly.
| Skunkleton wrote:
| Are we confident that this is the best solution or are we still
| exploring alternatives?
| oliv__ wrote:
| This is the kind of veiled talk that I can't stand. I'm left
| trying to decipher whether the person is serious or what they
| mean exactly.
|
| If my idea sucks, just tell me so and we can talk about why,
| don't beat around the bush with ambiguous politically correct
| words.
| gavinray wrote:
| This reads like robot-ey enterprise speak.
|
| No human being speaks to someone else like this in a normal
| situation. Just say what you mean and stop dancing around silly
| social games like this.
| rytis wrote:
| you'd be surprised... I've had "it has come to my attention
| that you ran 'rm /var/log/some_random_log' when you should have
| enquired regarding the importance of said 'some_random_log'"
| instead of "wtf did you just remove some_random_log, you nut"
| in the past.
| junon wrote:
| I only use this tone when I'm trying to convey that someone is
| pissing me off. Usually works.
| hocuspocus wrote:
| On the contrary I feel like that's pretty close to what my PO
| and PMs do all day.
|
| I used to work at a former Nokia company and my PO was Finnish.
| He would get people upset all the time by simply being too
| direct, especially with American colleagues.
| gavinray wrote:
| Maybe I'm the odd the one then.
|
| I get mildly upset when people send me messages like this,
| because I know that wasn't what was in their head and that's
| not what they wanted to tell me.
|
| It feels really... I don't know, like you can't even bother
| to speak to me like we're human beings.
|
| I'd rather someone just talk to me like a normal person than
| use this corporate buzzword speak. But I was also raised in a
| family where you'd be told to "stop being an idiot" and then
| an explanation of why what you're doing was stupid. My mum
| wasn't one to mince words.
| ModernMech wrote:
| The suggestions here seem like they're taking a sentiment
| with negative framing and just recasting it in a positive
| light. A lot of the corrected phrases assign blame, are
| hostile, overly confrontational, flippant, accusatory,
| curt, and impolite. Are you saying this kind of
| communication is how you think normal humans should speak
| with one another? What kind of environment do you think is
| created when everyone speaks that way to one another? Is
| that a place you'd like to work?
| legalcorrection wrote:
| In a high-trust environment, candor is not perceived as
| hostile.
|
| When you encourage people to interpret candor as
| hostility, you make everyone constantly afraid of
| offending others. It's hard to build trust and rapport
| with your coworkers in that environment.
| ModernMech wrote:
| I don't think calling someone an idiot, for example, is
| candor. I have plenty of trust and rapport with my
| coworkers, and I can't imagine them saying _anything_ of
| the sort on this list to me. That 's actually how we've
| built the trust we enjoy, by _not_ engaging in the kind
| of language exhibited in TFA.
| gavinray wrote:
| It might be a cultural thing.
|
| If you can casually tell someone they're acting like an
| idiot, it's (to me) a sign that you have a level of trust
| with that person and the ability to empathize/communicate
| with each other.
|
| If someone comes to you in private and says, "Look man,
| you're really fucking up.", it hits different than "You
| might reconsider some of your recent behaviors."
|
| It shows that you are emotionally invested enough to use
| empathic language, rather than make blase/meek innuendos
| to avoid any chance of offending them. The point is "You
| need to hear this" and not "I want to avoid offending
| you", which feels more productive to me.
| tbihl wrote:
| I found myself laughing for having used a majority of these
| phrases in meetings or emails. To each his own, I guess.
|
| The initial phrase is what you use in verbal communication, if
| you have a close working relationship. The 'professional'
| version goes in the email, which you assume is publicly
| distributed.
| DennisP wrote:
| People do in fact speak this way in corporate situations.
|
| I once sat in a meeting of reps from about a dozen big
| companies in the agchem industry. They were proposing some kind
| of cooperative data thing. One guy spent five minutes spouting
| exactly this sort of enterprise speak, and it all could have
| been boiled down "what's in it for us?"
| mattcwilson wrote:
| I wonder if the people speaking this way in corporate
| settings just don't know how to do better?
|
| A good deal of corporate culture is people just following the
| patterns they see around them to conform. A good deal of
| culture change is just proudly, kindly, and confidently
| demonstrating how to do better - and having epic patience to
| wait for people to take notice and start following you (which
| might never happen.)
| marginalia_nu wrote:
| Like it or not, this is what a lot of enterprise communication
| sounds like.
|
| Half the reason for mastering it is to avoid coming off as a
| huge back of dicks by inadvertently sending the wrong message
| through some polite-seeming offer to help or whatever.
| VirgilShelton wrote:
| This is awesome! Bookmarked!
| motohagiography wrote:
| The essence of these is how you set boundaries for yourself,
| while a) not threatening the percieved power of the person you
| are speaking to, and b) expressing needs in terms of appealing to
| some shared principle of professionalism.
|
| The challenge with flat organizations is they reward bullying
| because they lack recourse to principle and positional authority.
| This communication style is necessary for navigating them, and
| it's how most educated people in orgs communicate these days, as
| they higher you go up the org chart, the higher the percentage of
| your time is spent essentially just navigating power.
|
| While I see people reacting to the passive aggression in these
| phrases, that's literally how managers communicate. Bureaucracy
| is passive aggressive warfare and a power struggle where people
| try to subordinate and make others accountable to them.
|
| Sometimes someone is only asking you for something because they
| want to set you up as a blocker for their project to both get
| more time and blame it on you, or you are being added to
| something because the person who failed at it needs to add
| stakeholders to diffuse accountability for the failure -
| bureaucracies are systems of alien incentives, and the people in
| them must often operate according to objectively insane rules. If
| you want to stop this stuff, learn to lead and make sure your org
| doesn't default to this, or start your own company, and make a
| place that doesn't run like this.
|
| When I've seen leaders mystified at how their orgs got like this,
| it was because when they asked everyone to find ways to work
| together without the toxic culture, they didn't take ownership
| and set the example, and everyone just interpreted it as, "hide
| how you are doing this."
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