The Validation Of Your Own Brilliance

This is why work, and modern conversations, sometimes feel so hard.

I think the hardest thing about white-collar work for people is that most, when they analyze it, they completely ignore the psychology involved and just analyze it as if everyone has the same motivations, incentives, and is generally on the same page. That’s good in a “control group” setting, sure, but the incentives and inherent personality of executives and people who want to be executives is very, very different than someone who just wants a check to make their own ends meet. It’s almost night and day. Because we try to tackle some new work trend without acknowledging the massive difference in psychology, we often end up in frustrating, circular places when attempting to discuss work.

Sadly, political discourse has been the same since about 2015 — although that has more to do with ideology and information-processing and the need for tribes as a source of meaning than anything else.

Here’s a new Paul Krugman column: