Never fails, I've always been a "nice guy"...
You know the kind I mean.
Dating: You're a "nice guy" (fortunately for me, that was a criteria for my Mrs.)
School: C'mon ux, help me study, you're a "nice guy"
Work: Ya know ux, we were going to give you that job, but you're too much of a "nice guy". It needs someone who can put people off if needed (i.e. an @$$hole). Even when I have been a boss at some past jobs, management actually was pissed that I worked positively to bring my employees work level up instead of just writing them up (or firing them).
Others: Can you help me fix my house/garage/computer/broken widget/etc... (This one doesn't bother me so much as I feel this is considered in God's eyes as my "good works", and the favor usually comes back positively in some fashion.
The "nice guy" syndrome has a dark side...some people really hate you. I don't mean hate in the casual "dislike" manner, I mean "out to stab you in the back at every turn" hate. These people equate "nice" with "oblivious" and think you don't have a clue (well...sometimes I don't...or didn't). I've had one of these lurkers every few years since I was 17, and they always "come out" in the most spectacular fashion. Being now middle aged, I've found to reduce the incidence of this, I have to be a jerk sometimes...but only sometimes, and usually only at work.
Lurkers at work usually get weeded out, because they are (most often) the folks doing the same "job" as you, just with considerably less enthusiasm. Being a Technician, these folks usually get weeded out of private industry, so about the time they "come out", they are thisclose to being fired. I'll cover two of them.
One of them worked for me, and disliked when I stayed over to help him get up to speed on some equipment he habitually could not fix...He felt I was saying he was stupid. From the start, I informed him that I had worked on this equipment before, and I wanted to get everyone to the same level of familiarity on it. He took the training willingly...and did improve his quality of service on it. I always start training with the same line: "I'm going to cover everything from the most basic to the most advanced I can about this, because I'd rather give too much information than not enough" (this is 99.9% of the time received positively). I was as nice and positive as possible to this guy...which (I think) no boss had ever been before...and he just didn't know how to take it....So he threatened to beat me up in the parking lot...in front of other workers. I said: "Let's go", and I made sure to invite as many other employees to watch him kick my butt along the way, halfway there I turned around and said: "You know I have no intention of fighting back?". By the time we got to the lot doors (with a trail of 20+ employees behind us), he wisely saved his job and changed his mind. He also gave up his open animosity of me, and things when quite smoothly until I found a better job. Ironically he was fired a year after I left...for fighting with his new supervisor.
Well, I've been out of the private sector for some time now, and municipal employment spans the most diverse types of people you will ever work with. Unlike private industry, it's much harder to weed out the folks who might not fully adjusted to peaceful work co-operation. It's over the last decade that I've had to start being a bit of a jerk and push back at these folks who think it's O.K. to stab you in the back every chance they get. I've got one now...been nothing but honest with this person from day one (though not necessarily "nice"). Yet he persists that he's been ostracized and condescended to by me for almost the last decade. Actually, I'm just the latest enemy in his decades spanning career of having enemies (what a surprise, all his "enemies" have been "nice guys"). The amazing thing is that with the most diverse work climate I've ever had, I get along with everyone...and everyone gets along fairly well...just not with this person. For my first 5 years in this job, every time I'd take up working on new equipment...this guy actually went to my bosses and COMPLAINED about it, even though it made his job easier. I never made any more work for anybody (just took on more work myself). In the last decade, he's had a few spectacular blow ups...that thus far have blown up in his face. Egads...can't people just go to work and do their job right and leave it at that?
Well, this "nice guy" has had it. I think it's time to put in a formal complaint. I've held off for the last 8 years because I thought this person was going to retire...but it looks like it'll be another decade before that happens.
I've said it before, and now I'll have upper management say it:
PLAY NICE!
2 comments:
I certainly understand what you mean by the "nice guy" syndrome. I've always gotten the "nice girl" label myself, and strangely enough perhaps, at school (particularly university) this status wasn't fully accepted by some. I was hated, not because I was nice, but because those people didn't believe it was possible that I could be nice, and thus they decided it was a façade to hide my evil intentions. They didn't see it, but it _had_ to be there...
Maybe they saw it in your eyes on migraine days? (kidding) ;)
I had similarities at tech school. It was beyond comprehension of some students that you could be smart and nice. I went through about three study groups until we organized one were everyone was fully committed to working equally (and at the same level). I was still nice to the guys in the other groups, but I wasn't going to bog down my study time reviewing stuff from previous terms just to get them up to speed so they could understand the new stuff. I think those types have a entitlement complex which adds to their "perceived" evil in friendly folk.
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