Slashdot Mirror
Are You Annoying?
cweditor writes "This Computerworld article looks at some habits of people in general and IT pros in particular that can drive co-workers crazy."
← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)
← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)
Are You Annoying?
Irritating behaviors not only annoy your co-workers, but they can also compromise your effectiveness and even derail your career.
News Story by Alan S. Horowitz
JULY 23, 2004 (COMPUTERWORLD) - Do you tell IT insider jokes that users don't understand? Do you sprinkle technical jargon through discussions with business people? Do you find that you've usually got the right answer to any problem and you let everyone know it? If so, you may be something you didn't think you were: annoying.
Everyone's annoying some of the time, says Kimberly Alyn, a corporate trainer and co-author of Annoying People and Why You're One of Them (Llumina Press, 2003). But annoying behavior can have serious consequences in IT, where it can compromise your effectiveness, wreak havoc with projects and even derail your career.
Annoying behaviors are tricky because what annoys one person may sail by another. "You can say the same thing the same way to two people, and one person will say, 'Damn, that's annoying,' and the other person will not think anything of it," says Dan Bent, CIO at Benefit Systems Inc. in Indianapolis, an administrative services provider to health care plans.
But annoying behavior in IT sends ripples through the whole business. Gary Langer, associate vice president for academic technology at Chicago's Roosevelt University, explains that when IT support people are annoying, "people lose confidence, and they just give up. They stop asking questions."
Bent concurs. "You're always communicating with other people, and if you're annoying them, it reduces the likelihood your message will get across," he says.
Projects may also suffer. Jackie Palmer, a senior product manager at CRM software maker E.piphany Inc. in San Mateo, Calif., tells of participating at a meeting for a large insurance company that involved implementing process change. "The only way to do it is get [users] to buy in themselves," says Palmer. But a consultant at the meeting began to dictate what would happen. "The users became very combative," she recalls. It took several weeks of meetings to resolve the issues, and the project fell behind schedule.
If you think that you can't be annoying because you often work alone, think again. You still deal with people for support, advice and information, as well as to get a promotion, notes Gini Graham Scott, author of A Survival Guide for Working With Humans (Amacom, 2004).
For the worst offenders, the consequences of being annoying are potentially dire.
"Say someone comes to you and asks you a question today, and they find you annoying," says Bent. "Maybe the next time, they'll ask someone else. Soon people stop coming to you and asking you things, and you end up without a job."
The IT Niche
IT has its own annoying quirks. Langer says some IT people label users as neophytes and then blame them for any difficulties. "The user insists their e-mail doesn't work, and the IT person says, 'My e-mail works perfectly,' and assumes the user is the problem. Users really find this annoying," he says.
Some IT people are so sure they know what the problem is that they don't even listen to the user, says Katherine Spencer Lee, executive director at IT staffing firm Robert Half Technology in Menlo Park, Calif.
IT people expect users to always know what they want, and they can get exasperated when they don't. "Business people have a right to change their minds, because the business changes," says Ellen Gottesdiener, principal consultant at EBG Consulting in Carmel, Ind.
And IT folks often require the "right" decision, says Gerry McCartney, CIO at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School in Philadelphia. "[They] have diffic
Here is a nice story from the Guardian that might clue you in a little bit.
Oh, co-workers who correct colleagues on points of grammar and/or spelling are, in fact, annoying.
I hate liberals. If you are a liberal, do not reply.
Your frustration is understandable, of course. After you figure out what the problem is, you can remind the user to check the error message, not do what he/she was doing wrong, etc. But being mean about it isn't going to fix the problem, it's just going to make them not want to ask you when they have a problem. When that starts happening, people start to hate IT and start thinking about replacing them.
Even if the user is wrong every time, it's your responsibility to help them. Some people just never learn, but if you keep helping them in a friendly way, they will worship you and think you are indispensible. When you start to write them off and act like it's always their fault, they will be just as frustrated with you and want to get rid of you.
-Dan
Although I really, honestly, believe that you could be trusted with root on your linux box at work. (and if you just send your IT guys my way. I'll be willing to vouch for you.) there are some scenarios where giving even experienced users root is a bad idea for the company as a whole.
Unfortunately, where I am is the worst of all worlds. The machines are maintained with automation tools, but they are set up poorly, so the default install is already screwed up. PC Tech support ignores Unix machines, so they are on their own and maintained by the individual users.
Irony is one of those words that's very quickly being redefined by modern usage.
((please note, the usage of "you" in the following argument is defined as "you understood", the common plural usage. Not the singular usage. Or did that change?))
Ah, yes, the old "I'm too lazy to pick up a dictionary and find out what a word REALLY means so I'll just modify it" clause. While I am not picking on you in general, it does seem a custom to just change the meaning of a word. "moot", "hacker", and now an important literary term called "irony".
What about twenty, twenty-five years from now? Conversation will become more ambiguous (wait, that word still means 'open to more than one interpretation' right?). We, as a society, over time, have formulated words to more clearly define things. Take a look at any older language and you'll be hard pressed to find such modifiers as "terrible", "horrible", "fabulous", and "fantastic".
And now, just because someone doesn't feel like paying attention in English class, meanings of words get changed by the vulgar (definition 3). Years from now English classes will teach courses in "Irony: Not the modern kind, but the kind that employs such contrasts for humorous or rhetorical effect."
Why not just use a different word for what you mean? We have 26 letters, create a new word.
---
Personally, my favorite response for the mis-use of irony is: "I believe thw word you were straining for was "coincidence". Irony deals with opposites, coincidence deals with things that are related. If a rescue helicopter happened to have killed the person they were trying to rescue, that would be irony. The fact that you are a moron and mixed up the definitions of 'irony' and 'coincidence' is just a coincidence".
When modding "Informative", please make sure it both has a source and IS actually informative.
Not, that would not be irony. Unless you define "irony" to mean what Alanis Morissette evidently thinks it does. She's wrong and you're wrong.
Let me give you an example of irony. Take this sentence:
"ticklemeozmo certainly has grasped the concept of irony"
That was dripping with irony, get it? Your rescue helicopter example isn't irony, it's a twist of fate. In fact, your misunderstanding of the term irony probably stems from the usage:
"Fate must have a keen sense of irony to allow that helicopter to crash on the person it was rescuing"
The above is not the same as your use of the term. Allowing the helicopter to crash on the rescuee might be seen as an ironic statement by Fate, if you believe Fate was in control of the helicopter in the first place. As a disinterested observer the crash holds no irony for us, and certainly not for the person being crashed upon, in and of itself.
OTOH, your use of the helicopter example in a post lambasting another poster for his misunderstanding of irony, is, in a word, ironic.
Google for more references, here's a couple to start you off:
http://www.politicaljuice.com/2004/05/defining_iro ny.html
http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=ironic (check the usage note)
And remember kids: Never trust a computer you can actually lift.