Never Argue With Your Boss: A Lesson in Professional Survival
Never argue with your boss (2009)
Early in my career, I ignored Bill Howell's advice to never argue with my boss. I publicly defeated him in a technical debate, only to realize that winning the argument meant losing my job and my team's trust. This painful experience taught me that managing up requires making your manager look good, even when you disagree, and that public confrontation is rarely the right path.
Never argue with your boss, because even if you 'win', you lose.
- specproc
The article seems to be about arguing with your boss in _public_. Having a fight with anyone in public in a professional environment is pretty intense behaviour. Not saying I've never done it, but it's not usually productive. It takes a lot of skill to get things done your way without alienating people. We should always be careful of how we "debate" in a professional context. Discussion habits picked up on HN translate poorly to Slack.
Arguing with your boss in private, now that's a completely different deck of Magic cards. Totally helpful, productive behaviour if done respectfully and constructively. You're there to solve problems together, having differences of opinion is natural. Thrash it out between you in a 1:1, book time to engage and brainstorm.
Be nice, be prepared, find solutions that move things forward without bruising egos, try and get them to think it was their idea.
Importantly, you're coming to a decision in which they get the final say, because it's their team. Once a decision is made, after consultation, you just gotta roll with it. Don't bitch, or moan, or rub it in if things go wrong. Chain of command. One of these days you'll be there too.
If you keep on "losing" or finding yourself in constant conflict with your boss, that suggests a deeper problem. Jobs are like relationships, they've gotta work both ways. Maybe this isn't the right one for you (or them, but just as likely you).
Anyway. Never argue with your boss _in public_. Debate in private, come to […]
- DannyBee
Everyone in this story sucks.
As a manager, the people I hired were almost always smarter than me or better than me at various things. That's why i hired them.
I did my best to make sure they were empowered to solve the problems the org needed solving.
Why would I not want their opinions or viewpoints, especially if they differed from my own?
Heck, why would i try to enforce my opinion or viewpoint in the first place?
Not realizing this makes the boss here a crappy manager. Yes, lots of crappy managers exist (for many reasons - one commonly overlooked one being that technicaly knowledge/etc is often shared and discussed much more than manager or organizational knowledge. So it doesn't proliferate as easily and quickly. There are many other reasons, some simpler, some more complex)
Truthfully, I resolved many many more arguments between people (within my own org or between orgs) than between me and someone else.
At the same time, the person arguing with their boss doesn't realize (until much later) their job is not to be technically right. Technically right/good is one of many aspects that are often getting traded off against each other. One thing they seem to not have discussed at all is "is this worth arguing about?". Does this choice really matter? What was the worst thing that happens if they don't do it the way they were arguing about. How likely is that really to happen, and if it does, can you tell early enough to do something about it? etc.
Reading this story f […]
- datakan
If your boss is so fragile they can't take a healthy debate or discussion or stand to be challenged on anything then find a new boss.
- oytis
I feel like the real takeaway should be "don't make a competition out of a technical discussion". A culture that doesn't allow openly debating technical decisions sounds like one I wouldn't want to be part of.
- FinnLobsien
Disclaimer: Work culture has changed since 2009 and obviously none of this applies if you work with/for someone who can't take any criticism or disagreement and expects subordination.
I think the issue is not disagreeing with one's boss, but what relationship you have with your boss.
There's a big difference between hostility and wanting to win against the other person vs. trying to find the best possible solution for the team, and clashing on what that should look like.
Some of this is about communication (continually centering on what goal one is trying to reach and validating the other party's perspective) other stuff is basic manners (don't make a public spectacle of your disagreements, especially in front of your boss's boss), but much of it boils down to relationship skills.
I think more people in tech should understand basic relationship skills and how they apply at work. Work is more transactional than a friendship or a marriage, but the core parts still matter: everyone wants to feel seen and heard, not invalidated and attacked.