I was really impressed with how successful RC is at maintaining an environment where people can learn and grow. Part of that is certainly selection effects- the point of center is self directed growth around programming, and there's an interview process that I assume filters especially hostile people.
But I think the social rules do a lot too, and have been trying to pay attention to the effects on others when someone breaks them at work. No Feigned Surprise is a particularly important one around people who are trying to learn and already a little insecure. It's great when they've learned a new thing, and you want to celebrate that, not meet it with denigration!
I always found this particular Recurse Center rule strange. I understand how not feigning surprise can be a good rule, as in you should not pretend to be surprised when you genuinely aren't. (e.g. a web front-end dev saying "I don't know how to recompile the kernel" - "What, you don't know ?!?" - when it's clear that there's no actual expectation of knowing, it's just an attempt to self-aggrandize or put the other person down). But if it's a true, genuine surprise, then there is no feigning! If a web front-end dev says "I've never heard of CSS", it's genuinely surprising, and I think it's ok to express that. It's also useful to the recipient to hear this genuine surprise, because it's a strong signal that they're missing something important, a much stronger signal than if someone just said in a calm voice "you know, CSS is one of the most important things to learn for web front-end development". But that's not how Recurse Center means it - when they say "no feigning surprise" they actually mean "not showing surprise, no matter how genuine". I think it's generally best to be open in communicating with others, and neither feign something that isn't there nor hide something that actually is there.
It is not always best to communicate openly. Honesty without kindness is cruelty.
It does a learner no good to hear that you are shocked by a skill deficit. If you're planning to be around people who are in a learning space, you should not be surprised if they don't know something. And even if you are surprised, it is kinder to not show it.
I don't think this rule is universal. If you're in a professional environment where, say, you're coding C++, and a new collegue with five years of purported experience claims to have never used a pointer, it would be okay to show surprise. And then maybe speak to your shared leadership chain. Learning environments are special that way.
I don't think most recipients would be able to tell the difference between a put down or self aggrandizing feigned surprise and genuine surprise reliably, so the effect in terms of discouraging them is probably at least similar. It's at least a very subtle difference in social cues even if it's genuine.
Either way, that’s not feigning surprise. Odd to call it that. What they are saying is when you are surprised somebody didn’t know something, don’t let it show.
The reason we call it "feigning surprise", is that the surprise is pretty rarely genuine. It's an interaction people have more-or-less-unthinkingly practiced throughout their lives to keep the out-group separated from the in-group
I think so. Maybe dang or tomhow could switch the link :)
The social rules work so well that I wish tech cos would just adopt these as baseline. They make interacting with other technical folks much more enjoyable.
That seems like a more general idea, and I like it more.
For the last 5 or so decades we've been transitioning from a world where everyone watches the same 4 TV channels to a world where everyone is in their own niche, and the tendency to be surprised that someone doesn't know about some cultural phenomenon is directly proportional to age. The way boomers gape and stutter when I said I don't know much about The Beatles...
In software too, it feels like there's been a shift to a more individualistic "learn-on-the-job" attitude in companies. If you're not the kind of person who knows how to structure learning a new field, it's easy to end up with big gaps when you don't know what you're looking for.
I was really impressed with how successful RC is at maintaining an environment where people can learn and grow. Part of that is certainly selection effects- the point of center is self directed growth around programming, and there's an interview process that I assume filters especially hostile people.
But I think the social rules do a lot too, and have been trying to pay attention to the effects on others when someone breaks them at work. No Feigned Surprise is a particularly important one around people who are trying to learn and already a little insecure. It's great when they've learned a new thing, and you want to celebrate that, not meet it with denigration!
It does a learner no good to hear that you are shocked by a skill deficit. If you're planning to be around people who are in a learning space, you should not be surprised if they don't know something. And even if you are surprised, it is kinder to not show it.
I don't think this rule is universal. If you're in a professional environment where, say, you're coding C++, and a new collegue with five years of purported experience claims to have never used a pointer, it would be okay to show surprise. And then maybe speak to your shared leadership chain. Learning environments are special that way.
So “feign unsurprise.”
Thats about 50% of what they’re saying. The name comes from the other half.
The social rules work so well that I wish tech cos would just adopt these as baseline. They make interacting with other technical folks much more enjoyable.
edit:rhplus beat me to it
I really enjoy sharing a planet with Ms. Evans. She seems to be a genuinely decent person, and we could always use more of those.
https://xkcd.com/1053/
I feel like the "falsehoods programmers believe about [thing]" is a little similar, but about correctness and never about performance.
For the last 5 or so decades we've been transitioning from a world where everyone watches the same 4 TV channels to a world where everyone is in their own niche, and the tendency to be surprised that someone doesn't know about some cultural phenomenon is directly proportional to age. The way boomers gape and stutter when I said I don't know much about The Beatles...