It's not particularly fair, but social awkwardness does tend to send a signal about what people value. And what a socially awkward person clearly does not particularly value is time spent with other people. I'm not saying everyone needs to be a gregarious extrovert (I'm certainly not), but if I were looking to hire someone, I'd be a bit concerned if it was obvious that they had no real interest in anything that isn't directly within their bubble. It's not just "are they skilled" it's, are they actually going to fit in the company?

For example, manners say, "don't swear at people in conversation." We all know it can be okay to swear at people in conversation, but Xah Lee hasn't learned when to swear at people.

Xah Lee, stop swearing at people for now and stick to your technical guns. Once you get on some stronger footing, experiment with venting.

I'm not trying to pick on people that lack social skills. Obviously that's an unfortunate predicament. But I do think the general nerd meme that social skills "shouldn't" matter.. I don't like that. They do matter, a lot, there's no getting around it.

It takes years to learn them. In an unforgiving environment. If you were punished or mocked every time you got even one answer wrong on a math test growing up, would you be terribly interested in math?

It's not particularly fair, but social awkwardness does tend to send a signal about what people value. And what a socially awkward person clearly does not particularly value is time spent with other people.

Think of it this way: your brain has a number of very, very powerful "vector units" which do certain types of specialized processing insanely fast. Most standard "neurotypical" humans come with their "vector units" preconfigured to analyze and anticipate the reactions of other humans. Some of us don't have such preconfiguration, so we learn to apply them to interesting things we find in the world, like math or programming or board games or something and we become pretty good at intuiting about deep, complex systems. But we have to learn, from square one, things about sociality that everyone else just seems to assume you already know -- and, again, is willing to punish you for not knowing.

Local bars in cities tend to have very diverse crowds who are accepting of just about anyone as long as you're not a complete asshole. Even the creepy guy at my local bar who hits on every girl who walks in is part of the "crew".

From there, it's just a matter of talking to people and gauging reactions naturally. Your brain will adjust.

It's worth the effort though. It's definitely helped me!

It doesn't have to be, true. But in the same way that a tone-deaf or rhythmically-challenged individual can probably never be even a decent musician, there are plenty of people who can probably never become 'socially skilled'. Consider autism, for example (in all it's degrees), and also the fact that it's probably quite a bit more prevalent in our profession.

> I get what you're saying, but I also tend to think: if they're so smart, why not learn some social skills?

Why are so many very intelligent people alcoholics? Why are so many doctors smokers? Why do so many psychologists have psychological issues?

There's a massive gap between knowledge and practice, and I've become increasingly convinced that not being aware of that gap is one of the primary reasons people have trouble turning 'saying/thinking' into 'doing'. We underestimate the difficulty.

For example. As a student, me and a friend of mine were living rather unhealthy lifestyles. Then a few years ago she suddenly 'got serious'. She started working out, implemented a healthy diet, and applied herself more to her studies.

A month ago I remarked that I really admired her strength, as I still struggle with these things (to a degree). Her answer? She'd been raised with a strong emphasis on health, her family was always into sports and they're all over-achievers. From her perspective, she merely 'dropped' a habit that was deeply instilled in her, and had little trouble picking it up.

I've found that most of the 'changes' and personal development that I see are not a result of mind of matter, but more a result of upbringing, social environment, and being in the right place at the right time. It's not just that, and I think it should't ever be used as an excuse, but it's much more that case than we often suspect.

A socially awkward person who doesn't 'value' time spent with others more often than not 1) just hasn't proper experienced the value of this, 2) has been actively shunned or bullied socially, or 3) just hasn't found the particular people that they can enjoy time with.

tl;dr: the value we place on things is often a result, not a cause. Or at least it goes in both directions.

I just think a lot of what we call social skills really comes down to, frankly, giving a shit about the person in front of you.

For exceptionally smart people sometimes this is hard.

Interacting with average people can be mind numbing. I mean the average person is.. well, average. But I think 90% of social skills is finding a way to be interested in the people around you. Finding what's interesting about them. As annoying as the phrase is, I think "if you're bored than you're boring" is pretty much true.

Charismatic people don't have some fundamental gift, for the most part, charismatic people are charismatic because they seem to find a way to be interested in all the people around them. Or at least they can fake it.

Sometimes I think about 18 year old me versus 28 year old me. 18 year old me was undeniably smart, but shy and awkward. 28 year old me is (reasonably) socially skilled. The only particular difference between the two is 18 year old me only really wanted to talk about myself, or things I liked. 18 year old me was a total fucking narcissist. 28 year old me tries to figure out what other people are about, and engage them on their terms. It sounds small, but actually caring about other people is a thing some people have to learn, and it makes most social situations about 200% more interesting.

Very true. But first of all I'd argue that 'giving a shit' in itself is a skill. We are, to a large degree, taught to be nice. Watching the average eight-year-old in a school yard is a clear example of that. They're practically psychopathic: developed enough to understand the concept of 'the other', but they haven't necessarily learned how to empathize.

I suspect there's a strong correlation between being socially outcast or awkward (whether biological, developmental or contextual in nature) and taking up programming and computers as a hobby. For me that was the case, and for most geeks I know it was too. In fact, the very definition of a nerd is someone who focuses unusually a lot on one thing, at the detriment of other things (usually social).

Plus, it's a relatively recent development that 'social' kids are also into computers, on account of wanting to make games, or emulating 'skater geeks' like Kevin Rose. I still remember that it was rather 'uncool' to be in chat rooms, for example. Or reddit being the nerd version of digg.

And finally, people have a tendency to conform their views to their experiences (more than the other way around, I suspect). So it kind of makes sense that a person with few friends, or a history of no partners, will conclude that 'people are shit'. Misanthropy is usually not innate. I've met a shocking amount of people who are eerily similar in their deeply negative view of society with no real experience of friendship. Some of them, in their late twenties or thirties, seem beyond help.

Yes. No doubt. I think for intellectual people, the tendency is always to move to a higher level of abstraction and generalize. Works well for ideas, but not for people. A lot of times, the interesting thing about people or situations is in exploring the details.

(That's probably not going to make it on a motivational poster any time soon.)

I've definitely noticed this in myself. By constantly abstracting things (perhaps exacerbated by my work), I lose the human connection sometimes and only later realize that I wasn't as empathic or caring as I wanted to be, simply because I got caught up in the abstractions.

Honestly, I don't think that that is always true. It's possible to have great social skills and not care about people at all. We sometimes call people like that sociopaths. And on the contrary, some people can care greatly but not understand how to express their care/interest.

Was it worth all this effort? Maybe. However most people will think that they should probably have spent their time on something else.

It's pretty much the same situation for socially unfit types - why spend so much time on something they'll never be good at no matter how hard they try. In the end they would just end up being both socially and technically mediocre.

If I learned social skills with the same abilities that made me smart, I wouldn't use that knowledge to interview, I would use it to build an AI.

The comparison is invalid because so far no one has learned social skills that way.

If we understand others by imagining how we ourselves would react, then the things that make it hard to learn social skills will be things that make you different, even if they also help you with something else.

Not learning crucial skills is just lazy and self-centred.

I've met amazing devs with no social skills because they didn't want to put effort into learning anything except what they enjoyed.

The world doesn't owe you anything - it's up to yourself to do your best to acquire what you want. You don't get what you want just because in your own opinion, you deem yourself to be deserving of it.

But these, I believe, are relatively rare. I like to believe so anyways, and I try to give nasty people the benefit of the doubt. Because this: http://www.ic.sunysb.edu/Clubs/buddhism/story/oldmanscorpion....

In my process of becoming a 'functioning adult', perhaps the most important steps involved realizing what my limitations were, and then learning to accept them.

And looking back, I often 'punished' myself for not trying hard enough, or for being lazy. I only later realized that some things are just much more difficult for me, and the better solution was to shape my lifestyle and environment around those limitations.

The problem of concepts 'lazy' or 'incapable' is that if you apply these concepts to yourself or others, they can easily become just a vehicle for whatever mood or state you're in.

Go fuck yourself. Why not learn to be understanding of struggle?

I have worked in company where people had generally good social skills, were helpful, able to listen carefully and receive feedback and criticism without going mad. On the other hand, have worked in environment where most people were passive-aggressive, unable to compromise or negotiate, unwilling to empathize with other teams. It should come as no surprise that in the latter situation, projects were always running very late behind schedule. (Causation could also have been the other way round, since everyone was stressed out, the basic defense mechanism was to stop worrying about other people, which in turn was slowing down the project further...)

I would add that the different behavior were not really due to individuals but rather to the overall "culture", and modeled after the top manager behavior.

Maybe I am wrong, but early in my career, I used to believe that SW project were technical challenges, but for bigger project, it is much more an organizational challenge, and the way people interact with each other is a big part of that. And being able to listen is as important as being able to communicate clearly.

Absolutely! I didn't mean to imply that social skills are unimportant. If I were to hire a programmer to work for me in a team context, the better choice from a business perspective, often, would be to hire the less-competent but socially-skilled.

But that sucks. Because the best way a socially awkward or socially underdeveloped individual will learn the very essential skill of being more social is through acceptance, a safe environment, and constructive feedback.

Furthermore, it's often not the real problem. A big problem in almost all companies I've worked for is that the managers (who usually are very socially capable non-geeks) were just not skilled at dealing with their developers. And in my opinion that's a core element of their job, to learn how to handle introverts or those less skilled in the social things.

Some of the developers I've worked with were very socially awkward, but if you figured out how to talk to them, they had no trouble communicating what needed to be communicated. To a degree, I think the ones who are socially skilled should use their strength to help those who are not. And if you're a manager, I'd say you're partly paid to do exactly that.

There are so many facets to this argument I won't attempt to cover them in this comment but people with solid social skills are not only easier and more pleasant to hire but are also better hires in many ways due to organizational social cohesion and the fact that the "hacker" may have a better understanding of the customer or recipient.

That's what I don't buy about his Xah Lee's argument that he's terrible at it - if he's written tutorial material that people find useful, he's more socially capable than he thinks. My suspicion is that his drop-out and autodidactic arc are social inhibitors for him; I think he lacks self-esteem due to it (no matter how well self-educated you are). I know that all too well because I wrestle with it myself as a highschool dropout and self-studied person.

'why i didn't seek job all these years? well, i can only say i procrastinate and is ok living on a dime.'

Maybe it's not that he doesn't interview well, its that he would be horrible employee.

Isn't that the perfect employee?

the folks who don't need the money (either because they're willing to live like a grad student their either life, or because they're wealthy and working for entertainment) are generally flaky. they won't work their promised hours, give two weeks notice and then just stop showing up, etc.

Needless to say, that was foolish of me. Other people are humans just like me, with their own strengths and weaknesses just like me.

Maybe this was on my mind because of the "RMS FAQ" also on the front page. Enough people want to deal with RMS that he is able to give checklists of what he does and doesn't need. And even he still has trouble making ends meet with speaking engagements, since the $10 check-clearing fee needs to be covered.

We are not alone.

I'm someone who doesn't naturally get social cues. I don't recognize faces. I was bullied, ostracized, and grew up in an abusive household until I convinced my mother to divorce. While children were being children I was protecting my mother, becoming her key social support by 13. I had to be a man before I hit puberty, never having the luxury to act out, cry, or lament the injustice of my situation. There were starving child soldiers in Africa; I had it pretty good. I was a serious A student and got along with adults.

As a result, I was quietly arrogant and unsympathetic. I shunned social interaction with the children around me whom I perceived to be stupid, emotionally weak, rebellious, attention-craving, and suicidal for no valid reason, instead deciding to wait until they grew up.

They never did.

To my surprise, I did. I finally realized that one of the single most important skills for success in society is the ability to handle people and social situations. A person is not competent or above average without it. At some point, you are going to hit the limit of what one person can do and will have to leverage the competencies of others. They will have some you won't, plus one the most valuable commodity of all: time. It is still possible to be a single person success, like Markus Frind from POF, but it often requires social skills and I don't like the odds.

Had I realized this sooner, I would be much further ahead. Turns out I wasn't so smart. Luckily, I only need a decent foundation; this ability can be bought like any other.

I have invested a ton of effort into addressing this with the help of a couple close friends. Progress can be frustrating. Things can be obvious to others yet when you ask them it turns out they either cannot explain, or don't really understand themselves. Everything Is Obvious examines the difficulty in creating a socially capable AI/robot: "social skills" are in fact a collection of often disparate, complex, illogical, and incongruous data points.

We all have challenges in life. This is one of my greatest. If you share it with me, I understand. It is every person's responsibility to choose to improve themselves and to help those around them who've done the same. We can guide people to this choice, but we cannot make it for them.

If you meet us, give us your patience and compassion as you would to any person who doesn't intuitively grasp something incredibly obvious and fundamental to you. I will do my best to do the same for you, though it might not always come off that way.

I've never struggled with social cues by nature, but through circumstances I've had similar struggles with the actual social 'practice'. Working hard at 'fixing' this definitely helped, but a crucial aspect was the help, support, or simply acceptance of those who were better at this than I was. And I try to do that too, in turn.

Good luck on your journey.