I think that is a somewhat cynical view of the matter; I appreciate that "American Work Ethics" are highly flawed and mostly theatrics (I say this as an American expat who has experienced work from all over the globe), but as much as there is management theatrics in the US, there's also a lot of "woe is me" from employees when they're disciplined.
I'd really hate to see how the author of the piece would have reacted to the Russian Managers at the company I'm with at the moment, as the managers certainly don't sugar coat when they're unhappy; it's not abusive, it's just very to the point. Having been a manager when I still worked in the US, it was incredibly difficult to correct inappropriate behavior because virtually every time you did, you did it wrong to whoever you were correcting. Try to be gentle? You were unclear. Try to be polite but to the point? You were curt. This sort of dance suggests to me that we just don't handle criticism well professionally in the US. I'm sure this is just observer bias, but I see a tendency to avoid confrontation at any cost, with too many places hoping it just "works out".
I do think it's from both sides of the employer/employee line. I have been at places that were more interested in just removing people who had some bad habits or needed to have a line drawn for some behavior while otherwise being model employees. I have also seen employees who were absolutely resistant to any criticism for a multitude of reasons, and ultimately the just continued with bad behavior until they were fired or left the company out of frustration with the constant meetings.
The author touches on some very true feelings in the article - no one likes being reprimanded. It's harsh, it's embarrassing, and it saps your ego for many reasons. But like others have commented, I do think that they acted unprofessionally - I imagine the story would have been much different had the author simply PM's a manager or boss "hey, family issue, going to be incognito today, I'll try to get an update by X" or just anything to keep them in the loop. The author also seemed unaware of the expectations of their bosses before hand, so maybe that's the fault of the company or the fault of the author. The age disparity I appreciate the uncomfortableness of, but it's going to be something that is more and more of a reality. (Ageism in tech is very real, so not discounting that, but the reality of the world is that there are going to be many young tech managers; staying out of management is great, but it needs to come with the understanding that eventually you'll be older than your bosses on average).
Unfortunately it seems that the same smiley, inoffensive, A-for-effort mentality that exists in our school system has fully invaded the corporate world.
I experienced this personally after talking to a report about their absenteeism. Within a day I received a lengthy email from them complaining about my directness. That 30 second exchange was escalated to management; they agreed that my feedback was justified (the employee in question had missed our team's only recurring meeting for the past month) but suggested I adjust my "tone" to avoid embarrassing them.
I can't help but see similarities when I read this article. Speak directly to someone and they'll get their feelings hurt. Sugarcoat it and they'll claim that you weren't clear enough. Casually hint at the issue and they'll claim you were passive aggressive.
Something is fundamentally wrong with an environment where adults can't have honest and direct interaction for fear of hurting someone's feelings.
While I appreciate your agreement, I disagree with the reasoning - I don't think it has anything to do with that (and you can check my comments to see that I don't even think that "issue" is all that much of an issue in and of itself [1])
Instead, I think it's just a bad mixture of arrogance and antiquated power relationships in the modern workplace. Especially with technology, the age difference between any given two employees can be pretty drastic in either direction; with two peers, this typically isn't much of a problem, but when you have a manager/employee relationship, this can strain the relationship if both sides aren't willing to get outside of their comfort zones a little. Some of my most difficult colleagues and employees were people who were older than me, or thought they were (I look much younger than I actually am), who felt they could just ignore me because of my age. (or theirs, same result if for different reasons) And for sure, they took being wrong very hard, especially if I were the one to disagree and explain why.
Similarly, the love of having a social status quo makes it very difficult to enact change in people via any confrontation. People aren't just resistant to change they themselves aren't trying to enact, they're hostile towards it. The countless games I've seen played where poor programmers had to convince their bosses that a project was actually the boss' idea are simply ludicrous, but it's the only way in these environments that such projects were able to happen.
When a team works well together, it's because of mutual respect - the best teams I've been in, despite drastic differences in age, politics, and philosophies, everyone got along well professionally and respected each other's domains, challenging appropriately, but also conceding when appropriately. It's when people start digging their heels in and insisting that they've conceded enough or let pride get in the way that we get stories like you mentioned or like the author is describing. It takes a lot of maturity to quiet the part of you that wants to fight every criticism simply due to the fact that it's a criticism; it's that impulsive response, plus the above reasons, that people have such issues.
(Of course, all my opinion and experience, your mileage may vary)
That is exactly the subject of the book, Crucial Conversations. They talk about the Fool's Choice, the false dichotomy of speaking truth (and holding someone accountable) while having a good relationship.
It is possible to do both and the book has specific tools to get to that. The little bit I am applying is working well -- better than what has been happening before.
You can find a wiki summary of the book and see if it helps.
> but suggested I adjust my "tone" to avoid embarrassing them.
Oh, I know this so well, but also from incompetent superiors. Not giving you an example of what would be a better tone, but just vague things like that. Of course, if I'm not a bit late too often, or something obvious like that, I don't need a tutorial on how to get out of bed in time. "Ahem, cut it out" is enough there.
But in other cases, it really felt like they were bluffing, and I realized I really need to leave ASAP when I could actually call the bluff and leave them standing. E.g. boss comes up because they think I've been taking too long on task X, which they know fuck all about, proudly so ("I don't need to know that"). They stand next to me, ask if I need help which translated to "why are you still doing this", I roll my eyes (NOT because my feelings were hurt, really just because I was doing my very best, and because I knew I was doing better works than their "metrics glasses" allowed them to see) and say "should I explain what I'm doing? that'll just take more time but okay" and they'd be like "oh okay, I was just saying".
In a way, that was funny, in another totally unacceptable. Even more than clowning around in school, I wanted teachers I can respect. Even more than slacking off at work, I want to get shit done and get supported in doing it. If I'm doing something wrong, I want to be told what it is, in concrete terms. Because otherwise, I'm suspecting you don't even know, and that I should have your job. Roughly speaking. I certainly met a fair share of people who hardly worked because they were higher in the hierarchy. They were sweating because they constantly had to pretend to know what they're doing, not because they worked so hard. Not that I wanted their job, but when they were sick nothing changed on the ground floor other than who stamped or authorized certain things, production did not slow down. That's for sure, and that's a problem, too.
I don't want to "turn this around" and pretend employees can't be pains in the ass, too. But with colleagues, I had no huge expectations, but once you feel like the only adult in a conversation with your boss or even the boss of their boss, and they cede the ground though while saving face to themselves, it just gets impossible to take the place seriously on anything but a "personal" professional level. That is, I learned for myself, and I tried to do good work in a shit situation even though it couldn't possibly keep the company from tanking, but I could not get into any mindset of honestly coming up with ideas on how to fix the company. I expect those who have been there before me, get paid more, supposedly know more and have more authority, to at least give it an earnest shot, too, and I wasn't seeing that. They all just had excuses and slogans and "that's how we do things around here". Only half of the promised things ever happened, but there was always plenty of marketing material for it in advance.
But I know I and they had harsh teachers. Several of them grew up in the GDR, one of those had an officer for a father. So not an "A for effort" mentality, but still not honest. So I both disagree and agree on that point. I think it just starts with adults trying to answer the questions of kids that are uncomfortable to them honestly, instead of blaming the kids for coming up with questions they should be asking, too. It would do both them and their kids good, and 20 years later who knows what becomes possible.
I've worked blue collar jobs where bosses are way more direct, like your Russian managers - and it's better. I remember one who would tell me most mornings, "Try not to fuck up today!" When a boss is angry and direct in giving feedback, we don't become resentful; we get scared for a while, then settle down. It's the natural way of hierarchy. We all need course correction from time to time, and the modern white-collar way sucks.
This guy's bad feelings were increased by his isolation. Compare this to an old school environment where you got yelled at by the boss, then emerged from the office to the jokes of your co-workers who heard the yelling through the door. That's a more natural environment.
(The old school boss sometimes fucked up by abusing an employee in front of co-workers. It should always be done behind closed doors.)
However in many years of corporate work I can rarely figure out what my bosses actually want or what they're thinking. They talk about corporate initiatives and get that uncomfortable "lying" body language, probably because they don't really believe this stuff but have to parrot it.
Getting back to your Russian managers - I think we are wired for hierarchy but we need certain signals to be comfortable with it. We like to work for bosses who are comfortable wielding power. When the boss projects too much weakness, the power relationship becomes very uncomfortable. I'm guessing that the remote bosses in the story didn't give strong course correction early on because they felt uncomfortable. They let the situation escalate, then took this drastic action.
I had three different style managers within a three year period.
1. An old army guy who was about 48 who left the military in his early 30s and became a developer. He was smart, direct, but polite. He called a spade a spade, put family first and I enjoyed working for him. He would always tell you when your stuff stinks. He had a falling out with the main office located in another state about two hours away because he intentionally hired senior developers who were all in our 40s who weren't afraid to shake things up and do things the right way. I specifically took the job at the company because of him.
2. After he left, the company promoted a developer to management who would not rock the boat. He was a nice guy, but would never stand up for doing things the right way and you didn't know where you stood until you got a review. I left the company as soon as was feasible -- I put in my letter as soon as I closed on my house.
3. Then I went to work for a company as the software architect for the entire company. My manager there was person who was technically strong and knew how to play politics - not in a bad way - he knew how to navigate corporate structure and would sometimes clean up behind me with my more direct approach at getting things done.
Managers like #3 have the ability to advocate for their directs when it comes to career development and advances and when it comes to salary.
The one weakness with good managers who are both technically strong and know how to navigate corporate America and "manage up" seems to be that they don't have the time to be technical leads and get into the nitty gritty of what their department is doing. They have to hire or promote someone as the "benevolent dictator" who enforces best practices and who has interpersonal skills to keep the manager informed and to talk to the customer - either the internal or external customer.
The architect role is really important for a type 3 manager.
If you need a mentor though, manager #1 is better but go in with the understanding that the only way you're going to get ahead in your career with that type of manager is to learn what you can from them and be prepared to advocate for yourself within the organization or more realistically, find another job and use what you've learned.
Time is a multiplier on a lot of issues. There are a lot of things that are essentially non-issues if addressed immediately, which can be problems if they linger. I think the white collar world could do with more directness!
I once had a boss that would get really worked up and angry if you made him mad. He's spew why he was upset at you. But then that was it. You knew when it was over. I miss that refreshing interaction in a weird way.
>I'd really hate to see how the author of the piece would have reacted to the Russian Managers at the company I'm with at the moment, as the managers certainly don't sugar coat when they're unhappy; it's not abusive, it's just very to the point.
I don't know - he may actually prefer it?
I had a manager who would be polite, indirect, etc when he wanted to criticize me. As a result, he did a really poor job at it and because he felt defensive he felt he had to strategize the whole thing, and it was a waste of company time. I cannot correct his misconceptions because he was so indirect that it wasn't clear what his concerns were, etc.
My other boss: He occasionally has a tantrum and throws F-bombs - borderline shouting. Very scary in the beginning, but overall better. The direct feedback loop works well. And when he's wrong, even if he won't admit it, it is less stressful for me. It's easier when you know someone is wrong than when you don't even know what the person is thinking.
Anyway, to the larger point - a company should invest in coming up with an appropriate methodology for having these conversations. Managers should follow it ("stick to the script"), and employees should be aware of it as well. That way, at least there's no side conversation on how appropriate the feedback was.
I'd really hate to see how the author of the piece would have reacted to the Russian Managers at the company I'm with at the moment, as the managers certainly don't sugar coat when they're unhappy; it's not abusive, it's just very to the point. Having been a manager when I still worked in the US, it was incredibly difficult to correct inappropriate behavior because virtually every time you did, you did it wrong to whoever you were correcting. Try to be gentle? You were unclear. Try to be polite but to the point? You were curt. This sort of dance suggests to me that we just don't handle criticism well professionally in the US. I'm sure this is just observer bias, but I see a tendency to avoid confrontation at any cost, with too many places hoping it just "works out".
I do think it's from both sides of the employer/employee line. I have been at places that were more interested in just removing people who had some bad habits or needed to have a line drawn for some behavior while otherwise being model employees. I have also seen employees who were absolutely resistant to any criticism for a multitude of reasons, and ultimately the just continued with bad behavior until they were fired or left the company out of frustration with the constant meetings.
The author touches on some very true feelings in the article - no one likes being reprimanded. It's harsh, it's embarrassing, and it saps your ego for many reasons. But like others have commented, I do think that they acted unprofessionally - I imagine the story would have been much different had the author simply PM's a manager or boss "hey, family issue, going to be incognito today, I'll try to get an update by X" or just anything to keep them in the loop. The author also seemed unaware of the expectations of their bosses before hand, so maybe that's the fault of the company or the fault of the author. The age disparity I appreciate the uncomfortableness of, but it's going to be something that is more and more of a reality. (Ageism in tech is very real, so not discounting that, but the reality of the world is that there are going to be many young tech managers; staying out of management is great, but it needs to come with the understanding that eventually you'll be older than your bosses on average).