Comment by luxuryballs

I’m happy somebody pays this much attention to what emotions they cause in others. Communication with humans is hard, and people get it wrong every day. The people who don’t realise this are either natural born communicators, or rough to be around, in my experience. People accommodate rude colleagues but it’s rarely pleasant. For the rest of us, this much introspection is what it takes to decrypt the codex.

If you find yourself thinking this article is over the top, either you’re lucky, or your colleagues are not :)

I think words matter, because they convey an underlying attitude toward a person's work, and that attitude matters.

Consider an extreme: "You're an idiot, any competent person would have done X".

Obviously that would be rude, disrespectful, and arrogant. Nobody would say that, but it suggests there is a continuum of responses from "I do not respect your work at all" to "I respect your work but think you might have overlooked something". There's a line somewhere on that continuum (which is going to vary by person) that separates useful input from arrogant drive-by criticism.

If I want my suggestions to be taken seriously, I should take care that I'm on the right side of the line. Using the word "just" implies that your proposed solution is obvious and trivial, and will probably be on the far side of the line for lots of people.

I think the problem isn't the phrasing, it's asking the question at all.

It's all too easy to confuse PRs as a quick peer review with an opportunity to vicariously work on something by asking questions that you should have asked when pairing.

If you don't trust the engineer, then why let them waste their time getting to the point they're asking for feedback to telegraph your contempt for them and try to "help" them?

I completely agree with you. I've come to the realization recently that most people are incredibly insecure. It's funny that I find this article posted today given that this is something that I'm struggling with and was mentioned to me today.

Some of my colleagues have told me that they consider me to be "brilliant" and that they enjoy working with me, yet there are many others who tell me I can't hold a conversation with them without making them feel like an idiot or that I'm belittling them. From my perspective, I would never intentionally say anything that would cause someone to feel bad about themselves. I also make it a point to tell those I meet that I'm very blunt and if I seem confrontational it's just because I'm curious about their thought process. I see mistakes or inefficiencies as a way to learn, not belittle.

However, this never works. Some people are simply unwilling to learn or consider your solution. The unfortunate part about software development is that the actual software development is a fraction of the job and the politics make up the rest. There is no clear answer to the question of "how can I say this particular thing without someone getting offended?" because the unfortunate truth that I've found is that at the end of the day if the person is insecure or is going through some kind of emotional turmoil anything you say or do will offend or bother them. Especially if you're confident and incredibly good at what you do.

The solution that has seemed to work for me is to simply not help them unless you are their boss. If you're their boss people are more likely to be receptive of your advice. However if you're not their boss and you know they're insecure (you can learn who is and who isn't if you pay attention and practice this skill) just avoid any chance you can where you might point out their mistakes or make them feel bad unintentionally. It's unfortunate, but it's human nature.

I've learned a lot about human nature and politics in the positions that I've been in recently... I might write a blog post about it. It's incredibly frustrating how much of software development is mired with emotions.