Training courses seem to be a place that they've increasingly made terrible in this way.<p>I'm fine with useful training where they teach you some stuff, and let you have a go at it, and are available for questions.<p>But no... these days they have to make it all "interactive". Instead of teaching stuff they have to stand there picking on people asking "what do you know about X", and then after a few hours of "teaching" you are "rewarded" by being forced to join a group of people for a group activity. No, it's not a reward, it's a few hours of hell.<p>ugh, this is why I tend to avoid so called training these days. Why can't we just be given actual teaching and notes and not be forced to do awful group activities.
I just got off a call discussing the problems of technical teams where introverts get thrown into the deep end by being promoted to team leads etc. often without <i>any</i> kind of support.<p>I suffered through being in that position myself early in my career, and people under me suffered as a result, and I had no follow up or help whatsoever in terms of obtaining the skills to deal with it. It took a lot of time to recognise the problem and "fix it".<p>It still saps me of energy to spend time actively reaching out to people, but I've learned strategies to work around it (e.g. setting appointments to talk to people so I can't get out of it without being rude prevents me from just indefinitely postponing it), and "compensate" by ensuring I allocate "quiet time" to recharge.<p>There were also a lot of little things I had to learn. E.g. I eventually learned that simply walking around the office now and again and asking people how they were doing got people to report far higher satisfaction with my level of engagement, even if I spent <i>less</i> time actually responding to issues.<p>My managers never engaged with me that way when I started leading teams (I once had a manager that didn't actually talk to me for about two years - I passed on status reports once a week and that was pretty much it), so I didn't either for a long time. It turned out to be a very "low touch" method of showing interest that didn't wear me down but gave very positive results.<p>A lot of teams struggle with bad to non-existent training of people who get promoted into management positions, and that problem gets far worse with people whose "default" is to not spend a lot of time talking to people, and it puts a strain both on the team and the person put into that position that could be reduced very quickly with some basic training and some coaching.<p>I actually occasionally take on contracts to do coaching for technology managers because I love helping people shortcut all the time I wasted on it when I first started managing teams.
Meanwhile in tech being an introvert is lumped together with "poor social skills" and frowned upon in the name of diversity.<p>I've actually heard conference speakers call out behaviours as toxic that are basically the defining character traits of introverts (not to mention people in the autism spectrum).<p>Note that I'm not even talking about the shouty-sweary-abrasive behaviour people like Torvalds are being derided for but simply preferring to work alone rather than in a team.
> ...the best way to encourage creativity is to knock down office walls and to hold incessant meetings.<p>Being part of office layout team in a Fortune 10 company I'm now aware that most of the time the motivation is cost. It is way cheaper by many order of magnitude to have an open plan office. Other cost related reasons are easy to manage space -can be expanded and scaled down in jiffy- cheaper HVAC installation and maintenance etc.
> Claude Mongeau, the former CEO of Canadian National Railway, for example, set himself the goal of acting like an extrovert five times a day. In any case, the majority of people are on a spectrum of introversion to extroversion.<p>Probably my comparison is too extreme, but as an introvert myself I can see this as telling gay person to be straight five times a day.
Very true. I'm an introvert but I have to force myself to act like an extrovert in order to move forward in my career... But I feel somewhat insincere doing that and it takes a lot of effort emotionally.<p>I think this behaviour is necessary because the corporate environment cultivates a culture of insincerity and sometimes downright hypocrisy.<p>We all want to feel good about ourselves - So we either:<p>- Lie to ourselves or;<p>- Accept the reality and only pretend to believe the lies (that's where the public façade comes in handy).
I remember seeing many posts of /r/introvert who were just people complaining about introverts and introversion in general.<p>I also remember some school director warning me about my behavior and telling me that humans are a social species.<p>The Susan McCain book really opened my eyes, in the end, to me it really seems to be a matter of values.<p>It's crazy because this issue makes me pretty angry. I failed 2 degrees because the score coefficients in teamwork projects were pretty high, not to mention being targeted and harassed in school because you're calm and silent most of the time.<p>Also I listened to some NPR podcast who talked about personality being a myth.<p>Basically we moved from recognizing that race and gender are bad biases, but we have new ones now.
I think there are a greater percentage of introverts in the software development world than in the general population, and attempting to put developers into the same environments as many other corporate jobs just doesn't work very well. I work with some talented guys remotely, all who work from home and I'd casually judge them to all be more introverts than extroverts. The key I believe is to respect someone's ability to get work done without a lot of social interaction and judge them on how they meet deadlines on their own, the quality of the work, and let it go at that. If they can do this, leave them alone and let them thrive. If they can't, then it is possibly not a good fit for your company to have them onboard.
I wrote about the "Care and feeding of your introvert engineering leader" not too long ago [0]<p>tl;dr Extroverted leadership teams always seem to try and set goal's for introverts that aims to help get them "out of their shell" or fake being an extrovert. But you need to stop trying to get me to fake being an extrovert and leverage my actual skill's instead. "Traditional" Org's like that still have a really hard time leveraging introverted leaders effectively. Its super frustrating.<p>[0] <a href="https://medium.com/@pandemicsyn/on-care-feeding-of-your-introvert-leader-1f406c3c5064#.kfxd95w7x" rel="nofollow">https://medium.com/@pandemicsyn/on-care-feeding-of-your-intr...</a>
In multiple companies, I was repeatedly cited and complimented for solving problems and carrying workloads that others couldn't.<p>I also was no wallflower, networking -- on my own initiative and maintenance -- with people throughout these large organizations spanning multiple countries.<p>In those same workplaces, I was met with a bureacratic, political, and not infrequently <i>personal</i> wall of rejection when I requested a quieter workplace.<p>I was raised to "pay my dues." My advice to the current generation: There's no such thing, particularly with respect to introversion and/or environmental differences. If they are not already respecting you, get out.<p>Take it from Mr. Burnout, here.<p>P.S. The current "introvert" business press is just the latest round of "mind the gap" cargo cult management. If organizations were really on board with understanding and practicing some of what's being written -- well, too late for me, but at least "hurrah" for future generations.<p>But... I severely doubt it. Same old bullies, new clothes. (And who is going to be the first to get those performance enhancing offices, do you thing?)<p>So, I repeat myself: If they are not already doing it, and you identify with the described population, GET OUT!
I feel like this issue is not introversion. I am an extreme introvert. Socializing is extremely tiring for me. I used to be extremely anti-social and had social phobias. I was bad at socializing and frankly still not great at it.<p>The issue could be boiled down to a lack of self confidence. There are lots of other things that were part of it, but mostly explained by self confidence.<p>I worked (and am still working) through this and I am tremendously better than I was. My coworkers argued that I wasn't introverted when I described myself as such once.<p>I say all this to make the point: the real issue is that some people are poor leaders and have poor social awareness. Leadership is less natural for introverts but the nature of leadership isn't any different for them because of that introversion.<p>Introverts need to be able to take charge of their own lives and their own success as a leader. Employers shouldn't need to provide quiet spaces for them. They should make their own quiet space. If you're unable to do that at your job for whatever reason (it's as simple as sitting in your car for a 15 minute break) then you need to move to a different environment if you have the expectation of being a successful leader.
I feel like the focus on any particular personality trait is a little facile.<p>Really, companies should be gaining understanding and helping all of their employees to do their best work regardless of which specific traits you're talking about.
This whole "spectrum" thing is nonsense. Classifying people in such a grossly simplified way is like dividing the brain into "left" and "right" which was only some eye-grabbing stunt which totally misses the essence of the issue. What matters in constructive work is the ability to present one's ideas clearly, coherently and convincingly, not the habit of hanging out with people and keeping your mouth open all day. I think somehow a lot of concepts get these two things mixed together. A lot of people are absolutely fantastic in communicating their ideas, engaging in conversations and contributing their unique insight in a manner that makes everybody else get what she's trying to convey in no time. However such people might not be the type who parties all day long outside of work, and might instead enjoy reading or creating something on her own while idle. I don't see the least bit of problem in that and I think those people will well succeed in business settings, in fact they can well achieve greater success than those who only talk and don't reflect. I'd even argue that every person who has achieved something must have spent a lot of time on her own, learning and reflecting upon various things, instead of wasting her time in trivial social activities all day long.<p>Now, what we usually call "introverts" are people who can't express their thoughts well, who sometimes can't even pronounce words cleanly, loudly and with confidence when ideas are needed. They tend to be quiet at formal group settings and say nothing at all even though they might have already thought of something. That's really just a <i>lack of ability (totally acquirable)</i> instead of "personality trait" or whatsoever. The type of person I mentioned in the previous paragraph also don't necessarily enjoy talking all day long, but they make a hell of a talker when the time is right. So, differentiating people based on whether they "enjoy being together with others all the time" is just such a totally laughable and nonsensical concept. And to say people should "act like" an "extrovert" is just some other oversimplification BS. Act like a pro who can present ideas expertly, not a brat who only knows to party all day and crack irrelevant "jokes".<p>What those real "introverts" need is indeed some help in getting themselves at least able to express their thoughts with clarity and communicate with others in a group setting. However, to say that successful CEOs etc. are such "introverts" is really a gross mischaracterization and something totally missing the core of the issue.
so yeah because of my supposedly flawed personality i will have 0 chances at promotion beyond just being a developer. and developers are not rewarded very well where i live. the logical conclusion is that i will have to become their competitor as soon as i can. which sadly benefits nobody as i could potentially do better with big-company resources behind me and the companies would do better without upstarts trying to take their profits.
Working in investment banking here. I sincerely hope that tech companies will continue to thrive -- the reasoning being that at some point IB will be so much short of talents that it will have to adjust to working practices/policies more suitable for introverts.
But if your work helps you get past being so introvert, which ultimately can make you difficult for others to work with in a team. Isn't that a good thing?
I would re-title the article, _Generalization, generalization and more generalizations_. Why, this is a typical space-filler article typical of consumer publications, most visible in the Daily Mail, to provoke criticism, rage, agreement but not much else. People don't always fit in the neat boxes so don't waste time reading such common and regurgitated content.