Re:Ask HN: How to deal with a senior colleague who acts like...
by 300bps on Monday April 29, 2019 @09:53AM
(#19778339)
You might be a bozo. He might be a bozo. You both might be bozos. Or maybe you are both pretty good and both just bad communicators.
This should be a checklist of possibilities to consider anytime there is office conflict.
Re:Ask HN: How to deal with a senior colleague who acts like...
by chancla35 on Monday April 29, 2019 @10:03AM
(#19778415)
+1, though I would add “As frustrating as it may be, it doesn’t really matter who’s at fault because you’ll both end up looking bad if the situation undermines your productivity.”
Re:Ask HN: How to deal with a senior colleague who acts like...
by vokep on Tuesday April 30, 2019 @01:42PM
(#19790151)
I'm bookmarking this and trying to commit it to memory. So good.
Re:Ask HN: How to deal with a senior colleague who acts like...
by humanrebar on Monday April 29, 2019 @10:10AM
(#19778461)
> If in the "blah blah blah" he's telling you that your solution is not re-entrant and it's going to crash then you are going to find out he's right.
To be fair to the soothsayers, you could find out you're wrong about reentrancy after the code is in production for two years and some records in the database start having garbage sporadically.
There are some categories of problems where results are king, and some where humility is wiser.
Re:Ask HN: How to deal with a senior colleague who acts like...
by cmsonger on Monday April 29, 2019 @10:53AM
(#19778873)
Completely agree. I read your comment as: "There exist OPs so far into the stupid space and senior colleagues far enough into the competent space that good advice may not be immediately apparent to OP, even through the lens of a first implementation." That's spot on and the example you cite is a good one.
It's just so hard to advise here without knowing more about OP and the senior colleague. (That should be the title of the novel "OP and the Senior Colleague.")
So without really having any insight about what's up here, I have two pieces of advice.
Ask a lot of questions to understand why he thinks what he thinks. The job is not to explain to him why he's wrong; the job is to ask enough questions that you understand why he's reached some specific conclusion.
And focus on getting things done. Forward progress tends to get everyone aligned and give you something specific to talk about that's productive. If in the "blah blah blah" he's telling you 'this will never work' then you have proof positive that he's wrong. Great. If in the "blah blah blah" he's telling you that your solution is not re-entrant and it's going to crash then you are going to find out he's right.