"Those that I respected the most." I always say this, but if you appreciate someone at work, dont say it to them. Say it to management. Managements face an impossible task of appreciating every single employees' worth. You can help.
Respect. Everyone says "Oh, we respect our team members!", but few do when the rubber meets the road.
I've always insisted on going out to lunch with my potential boss, and watch how they treat the servers. I've never regretted working with the ones who treated everyone with courtesy and politeness. I've regretted working with those who weren't.
Do you think management at this company respects their employees? Or maybe they refer to them as "resources", treat them as disposable, fungible, commodities, and deserve no more respect in turn?
Not saying that is the case, but the question deserves asking. Respect is a two way street.
> treating your coworkers and customers with respect and empathy
This can be as subjective as the word professionalism. People always use their own value judgement in these things - whether it's deciding if something is professional, or not, or if something is respectful, or not.
Sometimes, you do have to just follow rules, for the sake of it, because there is no standard in personal value.
I respect almost every working person. That does not mean I should remember names of all of them. Even if I wanted -- I cannot -- there are more than a billion such people.
I worked at a place like that once, they churned through so many system administrators especially and in the end found themselves in a situation where they were finding it hard to get system administrators and after all of that eventually fired the manager who had single-handedly damaged the company by that stage it was too late. So respect is something I definitely agree a company and its higher-ups should possess.
Respect is a personal trait not a business trait either you have it or you don't. If you want to make money fine but chances are if that is your focus you are not going to have quality people you need anyway you will have the ones' you want to afford.
>and the most respectable person is the one who silently gets stuff done.
Except even in this case, others must be aware of the person getting things done. If you managed to do a lot of work and people literally didn't notice or attributed the work to someone else, you won't be respected by them. So what ends up earning the most respect is the ability to spread knowing of your accomplishments without appearing like you are boasting about your accomplishments. That said, in such a system the people likely think they are valuing the person quietly getting things done, ignorant of what they actually value.
The "respect" aspect isn't touched on much in these comments. It's shitty when your boss belittles your team in front of guests and makes you feel like you're all his "peons." No perks can fix that kind of disrespect.
> Some people are a whole lot more fragile than others.
A slightly more charitable way to phrase this might be “Some people prefer to be treated as professionals, with dignity and respect.”
I think what the poster above you was trying to get across is, part of a leaders role is to distinguish what works best for their different team members. While some people may enjoy being treated less than respectful, others may not.
I agree with the end you're talking about — respecting people who have difficult jobs — but I find the means bizarre. Can you not respect someone without having put yourself in the exact same position? Your default position should be empathy!
But you also glossed over an important point I'm trying to make: we should see suffering as a sometimes necessary evil and try to alleviate it whenever possible, rather than see it as some sort of virtue.
By using "cool", I get the impression that you're thinking more about respect from people outside work, rather than those you are working with. I think the article was talking about respect from the people you work with and work under, in the sense that if you are not respected, then you likely won't get paid what you are worth. From the point of view, point (a) is a contradiction - if you are not respected by the company you work for, the pay won't be good.
Just as you have to earn the respect from everyone, each single individual in that org must earn your respect. Choose your confidants carefully. HR is for door in, and out.
Like everything else that we feel, I sense that we don't have a lot of control over who we feel great respect for... we only have the opportunity to justify it in hindsight.
I think that the people that I respect the most are people that I feel are honest and trustworthy. I have no patience for those who play politics or talk out of both sides of their mouths.
You could be the most talented coder or illustrator or kung-fu master or whatever fits the bill for the project that I'm working on... and if you're not honest and trustworthy, I really can't build any kind of working relationship with you.
I can certainly see how you could interpret my remarks on disrespect as "perceiving it (...) as a threat to one's dominance", but this was certainly not my intention.
My context is of never having had a 'bad' manager, they have always been agreeable and pleasant with a good technical understanding and (I can only assume) high self-esteem.
I think I have used the word respect in two slightly different ways: one when describing employer/employee relationship and one where describing manager/managed.
When I talk about disrespect in the context of a manager I mean it on more of an interpersonal relationship level, not as a struggle for dominance in some sort of power structure.
> "...As an employee I would see that as weakness, especially if combined with technical incompetence."
Adding the bit about "technical incompetence" sound to me like you are projecting certain other attributes on the hypothetical manager that we are discussing. What has been your experience with managers?
> "It's funny, an employer actually asked me that in my first job and I shrugged my shoulders and I said I probably wouldn't notice, which was an answer that clearly infuriated him."
When you have few bills to pay and/or other obligations then this attitude is fine, but I think for a large group of people (e.g. with families to support) this would be a real problem.
The point I was trying to make in the paragraph about "programmers acting any way they like" was that this may be an accept/successful strategy in the short term, but it may not be optimal long term. However indispensable you are now there is someone somewhere out there looking to optimize your job or make your skill set irrelevant. It's certainly possible that you are the exception and that no one will be able to do this to you, but I don't think that it applies to the majority of people reading this thread (I know it doesn't apply to me).
It seems like you view the employer/employee relationship in a very adversarial way, rather than an optimal way for both parties to get something they want. I have had jobs in the past (mainly part time service worker type jobs) where I feel that this attitude is valid. However, most companies I have worked for as a programmer have been small/medium level and started/funded by the same people (no VC money, no faceless career CEO or public shareholders). In these situations I have found that there is no calculated malice or attempt to 'enslave' you, just a few motivated people putting their own money and future on the line to try and make something of value and better themselves.
> "By his definition, you think programmers are "too free", no?"
No, I think a lot of programmers think that they are "too free", but are in-fact only "short term too free"
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