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Bek Brace
Bek Brace

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How do you deal with Senior Arrogant developers?

How do you deal with senior Arrogant developers and colleagues at work ? Have you had a personal experience with arrogant pr;#ks at work ?

Top comments (6)

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steelwolf180 profile image
Max Ong Zong Bao

Figure out a way to understand the person?

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bekbrace profile image
Bek Brace

True.
Can you ignore him/her ?

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andrewbaisden profile image
Andrew Baisden

Thats a good way to go about it.

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michaeltharrington profile image
Michael Tharrington • Edited

You know the phrase "kill them with kindness"?

From Merriam-Webster:

to cause discomfort to someone by treating him or her in a way that is extremely kind or helpful
// Instead of returning the insult, you might try killing her with kindness.

I find this is how I usually respond to folks who are arrogant and dismissive. Just go hard the other way and don't get pulled into their negativity or feel like you need to be defensive. By being kind in response to their bad attitude, it often disarms them and makes it clear that they are being a jerk.

That said, it doesn't work on everybody. If someone is being a jerk regularly to you, take note of some solid examples and ideally confront them about it first, letting them know exactly what it is they are doing that is bothering you. If they won't accept responsibility or worse double-down on their bad attitude, then take that same list of examples to your manager and tell them the whole story.

Another thing, remember that it's not you, it's them. Like @steelwolf180 said, try your best to understand them... perhaps there's a reason that they act like this. Maybe they have something rough going on in their life. Maybe they have a rough sense of humor and think that they are being funny/don't understand that they are being a jerk. Maybe this is their defense mechanism. Whatever it may be though, it doesn't justify them being a jerk, just might help you to understand where they are coming from.

Lastly, try hard to keep your own positivity in tact and know that you're the real winner here because you don't have to go through life being a jerk to other folks; cause hey, being a jerk has gotta be a pretty miserable experience for them.