• Tee hee (unregistered) in reply to Zylon
    Zylon:
    I've been down this treadmill for years--

    Communicate so that reasonably intelligent people can understand you; get dinged by the dimbulbs for being "cryptic".

    Communicate so that everyone can understand you; get dinged for being condescending.

    Sigh.

    I wish my life was full of such simple rules.

    Sure beats thinking...

  • s73v3r (unregistered) in reply to WC
    WC:
    Steve The Cynic:
    So, our hero (?) has the misfortune to work for a boss who cannot communicate, but who also expects that everyone will understand anyway.

    But our hero occupies the role of enabler, in that he does stuff that has the practical effect of concealing the negative effects of his boss's inability to communicate.

    Nobody gets off lightly here. And I'd be putting a lot more effort into job hunting than our hero is, that's for sure.

    It always amazes me how much time and money managers like this waste.

    I've worked for them before and my solution was the same as our 'hero': Spend the time and do what they want. They clearly just want him to do things and not bother them, even if it costs more. No amount of explaining will change anything.

    As a bonus, you're the company hero that gets everything done without complaint.

    When your "reward" for being that hero is more requests like this, I'd rather pass.

  • big picture thinker (unregistered) in reply to the beholder
    the beholder:
    If I was Tycho I would approach the boss asking demanding him to change his behavior, for the sake of everyone else. I am fully aware that he wouldn't agree and would throw a tantrum again - it worked every time before, why not now? Which means he would want to fire me, but good luck to him finding another person who can translate bossspeak to english.

    That's ridiculous. Saying you don't mind getting fired to prove you're right and the boss is wrong is kinda like saying you're OK with getting hit by a car because at least the driver will be in the wrong and have to pay your medical bills.

    the beholder:
    Either way is a victory.
    Not quite.

    Unless of course you don't like working there anyway, in which case you should probably just find a new job and not even attempt to "fix" the boss.

  • Tractor (unregistered) in reply to Fred
    Fred:
    We've all known users -- and bosses -- who loathe giving understandable requirements.

    Invariably when they ask "Is it done yet?" the answer they want to hear is "Yes." So, the customer/boss is always right; give them what they want; say "Yes, the thank-you change is done."

    7 times out of ten they will think oh good and move on to another victim.

    2 times out of ten they will go to try it out but get distracted.

    1 time out of ten they will go to try it out and fire back an email saying "Hey I looked but it doesn't do XXXXXXX!"

    And now, grasshopper, you have tricked them into giving you a requirement. Carry on.

    Or they say "still broken, fix asap". Might not even get the comma.

  • Fred (unregistered) in reply to Tractor
    Tractor:
    Fred:
    We've all known users -- and bosses -- who loathe giving understandable requirements.

    Invariably when they ask "Is it done yet?" the answer they want to hear is "Yes." So, the customer/boss is always right; give them what they want; say "Yes, the thank-you change is done."

    7 times out of ten they will think oh good and move on to another victim.

    2 times out of ten they will go to try it out but get distracted.

    1 time out of ten they will go to try it out and fire back an email saying "Hey I looked but it doesn't do XXXXXXX!"

    And now, grasshopper, you have tricked them into giving you a requirement. Carry on.

    Or they say "still broken, fix asap". Might not even get the comma.

    "Fixed it, try again."

    Rinse and repeat.

  • (cs) in reply to Tee hee
    Tee hee:
    I wish my life was full of such simple rules.

    Sure beats thinking...

    Whatever you're trying to do, you're not doing it very well.

  • Dirk (unregistered) in reply to airdrik
    airdrik:
    Or TRWTF is a CMS which lets (as far as we can tell any) subscribed users edit administrative pages like the Subscription Confirmation Page, (presumable also the unsubscribe confirmation page). So what happens when a client discovers that they can edit any page and changes the Subscription Confirmation Page to say something like "We don't serve your kind here! Go away and grow up!"? (yeah, audit trails, it was client XYZ. Ban that client and revert the page - but how do we do that without being a subscribed user... Development: fix our blunder!)

    If there is some authorization mechanism which prevents clients from editing such pages, then that same mechanism should allow the marketing people to log in and make necessary changes without having to "subscribe" to the service like other clients (or they would already have a special marketing subscription which has the proper permissions in place to allow them to do so which other clients shouldn't have).

    I lament the dearth of comprehension skills in this crazy world. Please die soon airdrik.

  • Mischief (unregistered) in reply to WC
    WC:
    Steve The Cynic:
    So, our hero (?) has the misfortune to work for a boss who cannot communicate, but who also expects that everyone will understand anyway.

    But our hero occupies the role of enabler, in that he does stuff that has the practical effect of concealing the negative effects of his boss's inability to communicate.

    Nobody gets off lightly here. And I'd be putting a lot more effort into job hunting than our hero is, that's for sure.

    It always amazes me how much time and money managers like this waste.

    I've worked for them before and my solution was the same as our 'hero': Spend the time and do what they want. They clearly just want him to do things and not bother them, even if it costs more. No amount of explaining will change anything.

    As a bonus, you're the company hero that gets everything done without complaint.

    No your the company SUCKER! that does all the work but then gets the same 2.5% raise that all the out-by-five turds get.

  • (cs) in reply to barrabus
    barrabus:
    Since they didn't want to artificially inflate the subscription numbers, the solution was to go directly to the thank-you page (www.example.com/thankyou.html?new_subscription_id=123456), but the boss left off the query string, blah blah blah, etc etc etc.
    I'm wondering why they were so exercised about the subscription numbers. If they have to subscribe to make the change, is increasing the count by a mere 1 going to mess up their system badly? And can't they unsubscribe that one addition after they make the change, thereby preserving their unblemished, pure subscription count?
  • Friedrice The great (unregistered) in reply to PiisAWheeL
    PiisAWheeL:
    ¯\(°_o)/¯ I DUNNO LOL:
    Where’s the thank-you comment?
    An unexpected error occurred.

    FILE_NOT_FOUND

  • (cs) in reply to Zylon
    Zylon:
    The new telephone books are here!

    +1

  • Ho ho (unregistered) in reply to Zylon
    Zylon:
    I've been down this treadmill for years--

    Communicate so that reasonably intelligent people can understand you; get dinged by the dimbulbs for being "cryptic".

    Communicate so that everyone can understand you; get dinged for being condescending.

    Sigh.

    Whatever you're trying to do, you're not doing it very well.
  • (cs) in reply to Silverhill
    Silverhill:
    And can't they unsubscribe that one addition after they make the change, thereby preserving their unblemished, pure subscription count?
    One new subscription and one unsubscription are not the same as zero subscriptions. For instance, if you're collecting metrics on the average length of time a subscription is held.
  • Jakob H. Poulsen (unregistered)

    Plight of the software engineer... typing out long emails detailing what exactly went into achieving what a client asked for, and then finally replacing everything with "Done! :)" to avoid follow-up questions.

  • Bit555 (unregistered)

    My frist thought is Dilbert ---> pointy haired boss.

    Captcha: "Eros" == mistakes I make when horney.

  • Tractor (unregistered) in reply to Silverhill
    Silverhill:
    barrabus:
    Since they didn't want to artificially inflate the subscription numbers, the solution was to go directly to the thank-you page (www.example.com/thankyou.html?new_subscription_id=123456), but the boss left off the query string, blah blah blah, etc etc etc.
    I'm wondering why they were so exercised about the subscription numbers. If they have to subscribe to make the change, is increasing the count by a mere 1 going to mess up their system badly? And can't they unsubscribe that one addition after they make the change, thereby preserving their unblemished, pure subscription count?

    And why didn't they just try it in one of their testing environments? Oh wait, nevermind...

  • drivelmonger (unregistered) in reply to Scarlet Manuka

    If a single extra subscription messes up the subscription count (or other subscription metrics) in any significant fashion then it's likely they have so few subscribers the whole issue's fairly pointless anyway.

  • Anon (unregistered) in reply to big picture thinker
    big picture thinker:
    That's ridiculous. Saying you don't mind getting fired to prove you're right and the boss is wrong is kinda like saying you're OK with getting hit by a car because at least the driver will be in the wrong and have to pay your medical bills.

    Unless of course you don't like working there anyway, in which case you should probably just find a new job and not even attempt to "fix" the boss.

    There is no reward without risk, why are you so afraid to face your boss? Your analogy fails because getting fired is not like getting hit by a car. If you know you have other job options and savings it's merely a nice vacation.

    So worst case you get fired and get a new job. Same as if you'd just quit.

    Best case either the boss changes or you impress someone (the uberboss, coworkers, etc.). Then if they ever need someone who isn't a mindless lackey they'll remember you.

    Basically, grow a spine.

  • the beholder (unregistered) in reply to big picture thinker
    big picture thinker:
    the beholder:
    If I was Tycho I would approach the boss asking demanding him to change his behavior, for the sake of everyone else. I am fully aware that he wouldn't agree and would throw a tantrum again - it worked every time before, why not now? Which means he would want to fire me, but good luck to him finding another person who can translate bossspeak to english.

    That's ridiculous. Saying you don't mind getting fired to prove you're right and the boss is wrong is kinda like saying you're OK with getting hit by a car because at least the driver will be in the wrong and have to pay your medical bills.

    Nope, I didn't say that, and if you had actually read my comment in full you would see that. I said - and I repeat myself in bold so that you can notice the important thing you missed: "I am not cattle and prefer not to be treated as such" - means that if I'm mistreated I might be willing to get another, better job.

    big picture thinker:
    the beholder:
    Either way is a victory.
    Not quite.
    Maybe it's a lateral move for my career, but I mean it's a victory for society as a whole.
    big picture thinker:
    Unless of course you don't like working there anyway, in which case you should probably just find a new job and not even attempt to "fix" the boss.
    So in the end you DO agree with me, except for the part of "not even attempt to 'fix' the boss." If your foot is out the door, why not? It's not like you'll lose anything for trying, and there's a slim chance - maybe only a dream - that he'll somehow listen to you someday.

    So, disagreeing just for the sake of disagreeing?

  • Remy Martin (unregistered)

    Sorry guys, but I've got some really bad news. Alex unexpected passed this morning and we're trying to make sense of everything. Stay tuned, and we'll post the address where you can send flowers.

  • Attention troll (unregistered) in reply to Zylon

    You, Zylon, and the 'You are stupid' fellow are attention whores too

  • Fred (unregistered) in reply to Remy Martin
    Remy Martin:
    Alex unexpected passed this morning
    Passed what? Gas? And how was that unexpected?
    Stay tuned, and we'll post the address where you can send flowers.
    Could I just send money some random place instead?
  • Zunesize Me! (unregistered) in reply to Remy Martin
    Remy Martin:
    Sorry guys, but I've got some really bad news. Alex unexpected passed this morning and we're trying to make sense of everything. Stay tuned, and we'll post the address where you can send flowers.
    What are you going to do with the body?

    'Cause if you're just going to bury it or burn it or something... what a waste.

  • sino (unregistered)
    Had Tycho not had a solid two years of experiencing working for this organization...

    Had Tycho had a fucking DICK, he would have also had guts to reply to his brainless boss the nicer version of "what the fuck are you talking about?" before spending 4 hours guessing which application is relevant, then analyzing history of changes. The boss would reply with "you know, the email-confirmation page text changes that the marketing manager was supposed to make" - and Tycho would tell him, "well, ask him then". And, that would be the end of this story for Tycho. However, since Tycho is gutless, he's one and only WTF in this story.

  • AN AWESOME CODER (unregistered) in reply to Anon

    Swear to god some of your are tweens when it comes to dealing with people.

    Anon:
    big picture thinker:
    That's ridiculous. Saying you don't mind getting fired to prove you're right and the boss is wrong is kinda like saying you're OK with getting hit by a car because at least the driver will be in the wrong and have to pay your medical bills.

    Unless of course you don't like working there anyway, in which case you should probably just find a new job and not even attempt to "fix" the boss.

    There is no reward without risk, why are you so afraid to face your boss? Your analogy fails because getting fired is not like getting hit by a car. If you know you have other job options and savings it's merely a nice vacation.

    People don't usually apply the "risk/reward" cliched to proving oneself right. If being proven right is a reward to you, then you will in fact be this boss that you've just got to tell off one day.

    Anon:
    So worst case you get fired and get a new job. Same as if you'd just quit.

    Not true, whatsoever. No matter the situation, It's better to go out on a good note with no burnt bridges than to have an ego and get yourself fired. ESPECIALLY if you knew damned well from the beginning that what you say isn't going to change anything anyway.

    Telling off your boss just to tell him off isn't having balls. Having balls is not crying like a baby, and just removing yourself from the situation (if you can't correct it.)

  • sino (unregistered) in reply to WC
    WC:
    Steve The Cynic:
    So, our hero (?) has the misfortune to work for a boss who cannot communicate, but who also expects that everyone will understand anyway.

    But our hero occupies the role of enabler, in that he does stuff that has the practical effect of concealing the negative effects of his boss's inability to communicate.

    Nobody gets off lightly here. And I'd be putting a lot more effort into job hunting than our hero is, that's for sure.

    It always amazes me how much time and money managers like this waste.

    I've worked for them before and my solution was the same as our 'hero': Spend the time and do what they want. They clearly just want him to do things and not bother them, even if it costs more. No amount of explaining will change anything.

    As a bonus, you're the company hero that gets everything done without complaint.

    How do you get anything done if you're afraid of your boss... All it takes is a pair of balls. Have those?

  • sino (unregistered) in reply to Rootbeer
    Rootbeer:
    Maybe instead of wasting hours on forensic research trying to divine what's rattling around inside the boss's empty head, Tycho could have spent five minutes getting the answer straight from the horse's ass?

    If he doesn't respond to email, call him. If he doesn't answer his phone, visit him in his office. You're much harder to ignore when you're front and center.

    Finally a guy with guts on site...

    Yes! Thank you!

  • sino (unregistered) in reply to airdrik
    airdrik:
    jonny_q:
    So, apparently the only way to access the desired page, and then apparently edit it using the CMS, was for the marketing manager to know to manipulate a query string in a URL? No wonder they edited the wrong page and didn't know any better. Does the CMS have an admin page of sorts with a list that contains "Subscription Confirmation Page" with an "Edit" button next to it?

    Fairly often, I have to deal with people requesting changes that they could easily make themselves using the tools they've been trained to use. However, this is one of those I would have done myself and then entered a task to fix the CMS to make this more obvious.

    Or TRWTF is a CMS which lets (as far as we can tell any) subscribed users edit administrative pages like the Subscription Confirmation Page, (presumable also the unsubscribe confirmation page). So what happens when a client discovers that they can edit any page and changes the Subscription Confirmation Page to say something like "We don't serve your kind here! Go away and grow up!"? (yeah, audit trails, it was client XYZ. Ban that client and revert the page - but how do we do that without being a subscribed user... Development: fix our blunder!)

    If there is some authorization mechanism which prevents clients from editing such pages, then that same mechanism should allow the marketing people to log in and make necessary changes without having to "subscribe" to the service like other clients (or they would already have a special marketing subscription which has the proper permissions in place to allow them to do so which other clients shouldn't have).

    Of course. That mechanism is called "roles", dude...

  • sino (unregistered) in reply to the beholder
    the beholder:
    WC:
    As a bonus, you're the company hero that gets everything done without complaint.
    Really? And what is this "bonus" good for, other than a massage to your ego?

    If I was Tycho I would approach the boss asking demanding him to change his behavior, for the sake of everyone else. I am fully aware that he wouldn't agree and would throw a tantrum again - it worked every time before, why not now? Which means he would want to fire me, but good luck to him finding another person who can translate bossspeak to english.

    From here two things can happen: with time, lost revenues may make him consider that I was right and he'll at least try and change, or else he won't change and the company will deservedly bleed money (maybe up to the point of going belly up). Either way is a victory.

    Naturally I would precede this plan with a thorough job hunting. But I am not cattle and prefer not be treated as such, even if the pay is good.

    So far, 2 pairs of balls on the site (not including my own; thank you)...

  • sino (unregistered) in reply to Zylon
    Zylon:
    You are stupid:
    What if I told you people like you are the reason why people post "first" in the first place?
    Only some of them. Most of them really are attention whores. They may be a complete failure in life in all other respects, but by god, they got a first post! They're SOMEBODY! The new telephone books are here!

    The other ones are just trolls, which of course is just a slightly more sociopathic form of attention whore.

    And, since you're trolling off-topic, that definitely makes you one. So, shut the fuck up.

  • Coder (unregistered) in reply to Remy Martin

    Really hoping this is an early April Fools joke.

  • IceUck (unregistered)

    Just remember: all of the other idiot-actors in this particular story are paid more than you are.

  • sino (unregistered) in reply to QJo
    QJo:
    radarbob:
    Steve The Cynic:
    jonny_q:
    So, apparently the only way to access the desired page, and then apparently edit it using the CMS, was for the marketing manager to know to manipulate a query string in a URL? No wonder they edited the wrong page and didn't know any better. Does the CMS have an admin page of sorts with a list that contains "Subscription Confirmation Page" with an "Edit" button next to it?

    Fairly often, I have to deal with people requesting changes that they could easily make themselves using the tools they've been trained to use. However, this is one of those I would have done myself and then entered a task to fix the CMS to make this more obvious.

    No, I think the marketing dude wanted to check that the edits had been done right, but without adding a subscription. And the discommunicative boss screwed up, and Tycho helped to hide the fallout from that screw-up. Tycho is not a hero.

    Of course Tycho is a hero. (1) He did not reflect his boss(es)' stupidity back to his bosses. (2) He did not engage in an inevitably losing email flame war (3)He did not leave an email trail demonstrating his "lack of team player-ship / disrespect for authority / blah, blah" ; as his obtuse boss WILL interpret his email in proportion to #1 above (4) He did not commit political hari-kari for his sanity's sake (4) he fixed the problem.

    No, he's not particularly a hero. He was just doing a perfectly ordinary run-of-the-mill job (pretty well, I'll give him that) - but come on, this sort of thing is all in a day's work for a competent engineer. Throwing bloody stupid tantrums like a load of silly girls is the real WTF.

    Go it Tycho, come and work for me any time.

    Why? Because you're like his current boss and what shit done for you all the time?

  • sino (unregistered) in reply to Vlad Patryshev
    Vlad Patryshev:
    It's a bug. The page should clearly tell the user what he or she is editing and where it goes. (my personal opinion)

    It probably did, but that won't prevent a retard mktg mgr to go ahead and change it anyway.

  • neminem (unregistered) in reply to AN AWESOME CODER
    AN AWESOME CODER:
    People don't usually apply the "risk/reward" cliched to proving oneself right. If being proven right is a reward to you, then you will in fact be this boss that you've just got to tell off one day.
    The reward isn't "being proven right". The reward is "getting useful information", or in a larger sense, "not having to find a new job because your current one is driving you clinically insane". Those are perfectly legitimate rewards to strive for, I'd say. (Though there's nothing wrong with being proven right, either.)
    AN AWESOME CODER:
    No matter the situation, It's better to go out on a good note with no burnt bridges than to have an ego and get yourself fired.
    There's a difference between having an ego and requesting, even repeatedly, that useful information be exchanged, and there's a difference between telling your boss off "just to tell him off", and telling him off because he's acting like an unreasonable dick and expecting that you cover for him. And anyway, how do you know what you say won't change anything, if you never try? I'd rather quit than go slowly insane working under someone with the social skills of a housecat, but I'd also rather try to improve my (and my coworkers'!) lives and not have to quit, than just give up immediately.

    ... I just responded to a troll post, didn't I? Crud.

  • bad_management (unregistered)

    The real kick in the butt is when you have a manager (like my last manager) who is equally terse in his requests, trivializes every problem -- like it's one line of code change (when in actuality it means rewriting an entire module and then rewriting the calls to that module and who cares about doing it in a TEST env, sure, just make the change directly in PROD) -- and then micromanages you until you get it done -- but won't take the blame if it breaks PROD. Then the icing on the cake is that he dings you on your "performance review" that you need to improve your communication skills. He is the one who can't communicate and forces us to send twice as many emails to twice as many people just to find somebody who knows WTF the boss really wants. You can't win with a boss like this. And that's why I left that moron and have a new boss now who is actually reasonable to work with (so far).

  • sino (unregistered) in reply to AN AWESOME CODER
    AN AWESOME CODER:
    Swear to god some of your are tweens when it comes to dealing with _people_.
    Anon:
    big picture thinker:
    That's ridiculous. Saying you don't mind getting fired to prove you're right and the boss is wrong is kinda like saying you're OK with getting hit by a car because at least the driver will be in the wrong and have to pay your medical bills.

    Unless of course you don't like working there anyway, in which case you should probably just find a new job and not even attempt to "fix" the boss.

    There is no reward without risk, why are you so afraid to face your boss? Your analogy fails because getting fired is not like getting hit by a car. If you know you have other job options and savings it's merely a nice vacation.

    People don't usually apply the "risk/reward" cliched to proving oneself right. If being proven right is a reward to you, then you will in fact be this boss that you've just got to tell off one day.

    Anon:
    So worst case you get fired and get a new job. Same as if you'd just quit.

    Not true, whatsoever. No matter the situation, It's better to go out on a good note with no burnt bridges than to have an ego and get yourself fired. ESPECIALLY if you knew damned well from the beginning that what you say isn't going to change anything anyway.

    Telling off your boss just to tell him off isn't having balls. Having balls is not crying like a baby, and just removing yourself from the situation (if you can't correct it.)

    Only dickless people are afraid of burning the bridge with brainless bosses. Aside from that, generally, if you're leaving the company, you're leaving it without the intention to come back; so, who cares about the fucking bridge?

  • (cs)

    Yo, fake Remy Martin -- go die in a fire, OK? Your sick humor is a definite waste of time here (and you are a waste of oxygen).

  • (cs) in reply to sino
    sino:
    Only dickless people are afraid of burning the bridge with brainless bosses.
    sino, you seem unduly concerned with having/growing dicks and balls. Maybe you should try it yourself first, eh?

    Remember that, in the story, communicating with the PHB was known to be next to impossible, so "growing a pair and telling him off" wasn't going to help any.

    Bear in mind also that one's prospects of simply getting another job, much less a better one, might be difficult in the current economy, especially if one can't afford to move to where an acceptable job might be.

  • sino (unregistered) in reply to Silverhill
    Silverhill:
    sino:
    Only dickless people are afraid of burning the bridge with brainless bosses.
    sino, you seem unduly concerned with having/growing dicks and balls. Maybe you should try it yourself first, eh?

    Remember that, in the story, communicating with the PHB was known to be next to impossible, so "growing a pair and telling him off" wasn't going to help any.

    Bear in mind also that one's prospects of simply getting another job, much less a better one, might be difficult in the current economy, especially if one can't afford to move to where an acceptable job might be.

    My point wasn't "growing a pair and telling him off", but "growing a pair and asking for clarification instead of wasting hours trying to avoid the stupid making a fool out of you".

    Anyone going off to attempt to work on a task without knowing what exactly to do is a dickless dumbass to me. And, you're probably one of them - otherwise, you wouldn't defend.

  • sino (unregistered) in reply to Silverhill
    Silverhill:
    Bear in mind also that one's prospects of simply getting another job, much less a better one, might be difficult in the current economy, especially if one can't afford to move to where an acceptable job might be.

    I'm to proud do suck somebody's dick only because I have to eat. I'd rather starve than let my boss fuck me on a daily basis.

  • Decius (unregistered)

    If I couldn't find a job with a company that makes sure the managers have basic communication skills, I'd an hero too.

  • Friedrice The great (unregistered) in reply to Remy Martin
    Remy Martin:
    Sorry guys, but I've got some really bad news. Alex unexpected passed this morning and we're trying to make sense of everything. Stay tuned, and we'll post the address where you can send flowers.

    Make sense of Alex? How?

  • El Mauve (unregistered)

    That's how we lost octarine. He wanted to edit piss into yellow, but somehow navigated to special disambiguation page: you know, is it piss or is it amber? Special pages are octarine. Correction, were octarine. The piss itself started mauve, and we couldn't stand to lose THAT, so now everything that is special is also mauve. Hope this helps.

  • Friedrice The great (unregistered) in reply to neminem
    neminem:
    AN AWESOME CODER:
    People don't usually apply the "risk/reward" cliched to proving oneself right. If being proven right is a reward to you, then you will in fact be this boss that you've just got to tell off one day.
    The reward isn't "being proven right". The reward is "getting useful information", or in a larger sense, "not having to find a new job because your current one is driving you clinically insane". Those are perfectly legitimate rewards to strive for, I'd say. (Though there's nothing wrong with being proven right, either.)
    AN AWESOME CODER:
    No matter the situation, It's better to go out on a good note with no burnt bridges than to have an ego and get yourself fired.
    There's a difference between having an ego and requesting, even repeatedly, that useful information be exchanged, and there's a difference between telling your boss off "just to tell him off", and telling him off because he's acting like an unreasonable dick and expecting that you cover for him. And anyway, how do you know what you say won't change anything, if you never try? I'd rather quit than go slowly insane working under someone with the social skills of a housecat, but I'd also rather try to improve my (and my coworkers'!) lives and not have to quit, than just give up immediately.

    ... I just responded to a troll post, didn't I? Crud.

    Cats have great social skills - just watch any well-trained cat owner in action. ;-)

  • (cs) in reply to Friedrice The great
    Friedrice The great:
    PiisAWheeL:
    ¯\(°_o)/¯ I DUNNO LOL:
    Where’s the thank-you comment?
    An unexpected error occurred.

    FILE_NOT_FOUND

    (I love recursion.)

  • (cs) in reply to AN AWESOME CODER
    AN AWESOME CODER:
    It amazes me that all of you think Tycos should make his boss change his behavior, or defend that he did the right thing.

    In reality, it's just a communication issue, and laziness on both parties side. Do you think his boss would have been equally terse verbally? I doubt it. In fact, his original email is a perfectly valid intro to a dialogue about the problem.

    I've got news for you: there's this newfangled thing. It's called literacy. It enables you to write your thoughts and concerns down, and to communicate them effectively without vocalizing. Powerful stuff. If someone who is in any management capacity can't write a simple, clear email, then perhaps they should be flipping burgers instead of managing. Sure it's a communications issue. The boss should go back to grade school. It's unfortunate that I've got some customers who are the same way. Educated people, often with graduate degrees. I always wonder who wrote their theses and dissertations for them (assuming they were any good).

  • Guest (unregistered) in reply to Rootbeer
    Rootbeer:
    If he doesn't respond to email, call him. If he doesn't answer his phone, visit him in his office. You're much harder to ignore when you're front and center.

    Exactly. Emailing is basically asking for being ignored.

    Not to mention that writing a email that clearly defines what you want often takes 3 times longer than a short walk to the other guys office.

  • (cs) in reply to Guest
    Guest:
    Rootbeer:
    If he doesn't respond to email, call him. If he doesn't answer his phone, visit him in his office. You're much harder to ignore when you're front and center.

    Exactly. Emailing is basically asking for being ignored.

    Not to mention that writing a email that clearly defines what you want often takes 3 times longer than a short walk to the other guys office.

    On the other hand, an email is part of an auditable trail to prove that such an interaction did (or did not) take place.

    As was hinted at in the description of the problem, Tycho had learned through experience that the only way to proceed would be to work it out for himself. This presupposes that there is a systemic failure to elucidate useful information using a wide range of date-extraction techniques, from an email saying "Huh?" through the standing-in-front-of-his-desk-till-he's-finished-talking-to-his-two-year-old-on-the-telephone technique (doesn't work because he doesn't get off the phone till offending annoyance has left the office), right up to the calling-a-meeting-to-discuss-it-with-the-entire-team technique (doesn't work because he's too busy to go to any meetings that you schedule), etc.

    In such a situation you have two choices: exercise your initiative, get the job done and keep the company on track, or decide you no longer want to do this job and go to find another one. Oh yes, and the childish response of throwing angry communications around, which is usually a career-limiting move (such indiscretions are frequently communicated between personnel in different companies).

  • just me (unregistered) in reply to Silverhill
    Silverhill:
    sino:
    Only dickless people are afraid of burning the bridge with brainless bosses.
    sino, you seem unduly concerned with having/growing dicks and balls. Maybe you should try it yourself first, eh?

    You know, there's only three kinds of people: dicks, pussies and assholes...

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