Radical Candor: Be A Kickass Boss Without Losing Your Humanity Quotes
"We undervalue the 'emotional labor' of being the boss."
"Ultimately, though, bosses are responsible for results."
"Building a cohesive team means figuring out the right people for the right roles."
"Your relationships and your responsibilities reinforce each other positively or negatively."
"Radical Candor is what happens when you put 'Care Personally' and 'Challenge Directly' together."
"It's not just business; it is personal, and deeply personal."
"Challenging others and encouraging them to challenge you helps build trusting relationships."
"The key to getting everyone used to being direct when challenging each other is emphasizing that it's necessary to communicate clearly enough so that there's no room for interpretation, but also humbly."
"Most people shift between a steep growth trajectory and a gradual growth trajectory in different phases of their lives and careers, so it’s important not to put a permanent label on people."
"It’s a basic axiom that people do better work when they find that work meaningful."
"There’s nothing wrong with working hard to earn a paycheck that supports the life you want to lead. That has plenty of meaning."
"Your job is not to provide purpose but instead to get to know each of your direct reports well enough to understand how each one derives meaning from their work."
"Be a partner, not an absentee manager or a micromanager."
"One of the most common mistakes bosses make is to ignore the people who are doing the best work because 'they don’t need me' or 'I don’t want to micromanage.'"
"Moving from great to stunningly great is more inspiring for everyone than moving from bad to mediocre."
"Keep them challenged (and figure out who’ll replace them when they move on)."
"Raise the bar—there’s no such thing as a B-player."
"You already know you’re supposed to listen, and you probably already know how (and how not) to listen."
"The spirit with which a debate is launched often determines the tenor of what follows."
"What you say is less important than the tone it conveys, and the mood it sets for what follows."
"Don't grab a decision just because the debate has gotten painful."
"Push decisions into the facts, or pull the facts into the decisions, but keep ego out."
"The decider should get facts, not recommendations."
"Persuasion at this stage can feel unnecessary and make the decider resentful of people on the team who aren’t fully in agreement."
"Emotion. Credibility. Logic." - Aristotle, Rhetoric
"Consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds." - Ralph Waldo Emerson, Self-Reliance
"You can't give a damn about others if you don’t give a damn about yourself."
"Figure out your 'recipe' to stay centered and stick to it."
"Unspoken criticism explodes like a dirty bomb."
"Being in a remote office is hard... It’s really important to have quick, frequent interactions."
"Adapt to an individual’s preferences... when you’re praising people, your goal is to let them know what they did well."
"Group learning... whenever I praised in public I would explain that I wasn’t doing so because the person wanted public praise, but so that everybody could learn."
"There is a big difference between caring personally and personalizing... Caring personally is good. Personalizing is bad."
"Say 'that’s wrong' not 'you’re wrong'... 'I think' was humbler, and saying 'that' instead of 'you' didn’t personalize."
"The phrase 'don’t take it personally' is worse than useless... feedback is personal for the person receiving it."
"GAUGE YOUR IMPROMPTU GUIDANCE, GET A BASELINE, TRACK YOUR IMPROVEMENTS."
"Visual cues... are invaluable. One of the most effective ways to become more Radically Candid is to explain the framework to your team and then ask them to gauge your guidance each week."
"BEING RADICALLY CANDID WITH YOUR BOSS... It is not your moral obligation to criticize your boss if it will cost you your job."
"If you’re not dying to hire somebody, don’t make an offer."
"Firing people is hard, and it ought to be hard."
"Making all feedback visible to all interviewers after they’ve submitted theirs will help these hiring-committee meetings go more quickly."
"Being sued is far worse than spending time on a well-documented Performance Improvement Plan."
"Remember, the reason you have to fire them is not that they suck. It’s not even that they suck at this job. It’s that this job—the job you gave them—sucks for them."
"No engineer has ever been promoted at Google just by ass-kissing alone."
"A thank-you goes beyond praise. A thank-you expresses personal gratitude."
"The most effective solution is simply to fight fire with fire. Block off time in your calendar to be alone and execute."
"Being ruthless about making sure your team has time to execute is one of the most important things you can do as a boss."