This is Signal vs. Noise, a weblog by 37signals about design, business, experience, simplicity, the web, culture, and more. Established 1999 in Chicago. Visit the Product Blog for more information on our products.

Absolutely….!......life is too short to do stuff you don’t enjoy or work with people who make it harder ….most people (me included) spend the majority of their waking life working….it has to fun!

I work with a person (who shall remain nameless) who needs a real slap upside the head sometimes. She’s rude, pushy, disrespectful and complains and whines about everything.

I agree with Mr. Mark Payne; work has to be fun, and those who bring people down with their poor attitudes deserve to be pushed to the side.

Ugh, funsters. Must be youngin’s. Nobody produces like a boomer. That’s well known.

DHH is taking notes, presumably.

This reads more like an excuse for the exercise of raw power.

These things should be worked out and people should be made aware when they behave badly, but in the end you have to accept that we do sometimes. You can’t expect everyone to be all smiles all the time. Then you’re the one with a problem and who needs a reality check. No one deserves to be ‘pushed to the side’ for whatever reason. People are people. Be overbearing as you can and at the end of the day you just have to deal with it and concentrate on your own attitude. If everyone does that instead of making too much commentary, things can only get better.

In the web dev industry, this rings incredibly true. It’s really hard to find and build a team that can bounce of each other. The industry is saturated with talented programmers with bad attitudes and use taking down other people as a method improving the perception of their self worth. An important caveat of what I’m not talking about: everyone has bad days (ask my team about me), what I’m talking about is those who don’t ever have the stones to pull their weight as part of a team.

Absolutely right. And yes, Mark, life is short and has to be enjoyed.

We spend most of the time working, probably, because our job is fun, exciting and creates continuously challenges for us that give hell of a lot of value to our life.

We should avoid as much as possible to fall in the stress trap (and following your http://gettingreal.37signals.com advices surely helps). A rude boss or co-worker just makes things tougher (for himself/herself as well), less enjoying, less qualitative and annoying. I cannot see any good point in that.

And yes, B.E., sometime we have just to deal with it. As a personal advice, I would say “never get submissive AND never get angry”.

Just let it flow.

Sometime we are the ones that should start smiling to get some smiles back.

Interestingly, this doesn’t apply only to programmers. Everyone has the capability of being an asshole to others.

Real extensive knowledge will make you humble. Sharing your knowledge will make your knowledge grow. People who are egoistic and boss around don’t know anything.

What about R-rated individuals? :P

Wonder what brought that on? Luckily I’ve only observed this only a few times in my career and I find those that exhibit this are usually mid-level programmers with a new sense of entitlement after shaking off the “noob” years. But it all seems to mellow out eventually…at least that has been my experience.

In my last job one of my guys would always wander into my office every day and start whining and complaining about anything and everything. I finally got fed up and asked that unless he had something constructive to say then stay out of my office. I didn’t see much of him after that.

...and there was much rejoicing!

Wrong. There occasionally comes a time when someone with truly extraordinary skills is allowed a few personality quirks, social awkwardness being one of them.

Fictional examples are often glorified but I’d hire the likes of Dr. House, Fox Mulder or Corporal Klinger in a heart beat – so would you.

Sounds like if Catherine doesn’t like you, she can be difficult to work with. All sounds a bit cranky…

What’s with all of the negativity on 37s??

I’m sometimes guilty of this myself, but only to people who can’t even be bothered to properly indent their code!

This is the reason why I have to work harder because everyone bypasses my boss for this very reason and comes straight to me. It gets old. Quick.

That’s fairly ironic. A negative comment about negativity. Positivity happens with self. :)

I agree with @sensei. Adding two negative in the context of math makes a positive. Adding two negative in the context of emotion makes a double negative