Kim Scott

And because everybody else is so determined to be nice, they say things like, oh, she didn't mean any harm, or oh, he's a good guy.

And then the next thing you know, this person is promoted now.

Anybody ever see this happen?

There comes a moment on every team's history when the jerks begin to win, and that is when the culture begins to lose, because what happens next?

Everybody moves down to manipulative insincerity.

They're talking badly about this person, behind this person's back, but they are not talking to the person.

It does not have to be this way, folks.

If you notice this happening, your team sort of drifting over to ruinous empathy, it's possible to move over to radical candor.

That's not gonna solve all problems.

People will still make a mistake, but you can tell them about that mistake in a way that allows them to make things better.

Now, it's not only the culture on teams where this happens.

Sometimes it happens in a whole society.

Sometimes it turns out that a whole society is polarized.

Anybody ever know such a society?

We're polarized and we're not talking to each other, we're talking about each other and we're sticking with the people who agree with us.

And I am no better than the rest of us on this.

I recently was invited to give a talk at a company whose policies I disagreed with pretty vehemently.

And I was tempted not to go.

And then I thought, that does not seem like it's in the spirit of radical candor.

In fact, I believe very deeply that unchallenged beliefs become prejudices.