The Tyranny of the Forced Smile

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/15/jobs/the-tyranny-of-the-forced-smile.html

by boh • 11 years ago

156 77 11 years ago

jamesli• 11 years ago

I have conducted a few hundred of interviews for software engineers and DBAs in the last three years. I do want to see the passions of the candidates at the professions. It is a big plus in my eyes.

On the other hand, I am not impressed by "unequivocal statement". For seniors positions, I don't ask questions with a fixed answer. I prefer to listen to the candidates's opinions, to analyze the pros and cons of an approach, etc. I consider it low intelligence by any "unequivocal statement" for these questions.

analog31• 11 years ago

In one of my sidelines, I'm a freelance musician. Over the years I've learned how to keep a smile on my face, under pretty much any circumstances. This has proven to be a valuable skill in my day job as well.

The smile is more subtle in the workplace -- just a cheerful disposition -- but it's still there. And it helps that I am in fact a generally cheerful person.

As for knowing how to show an appropriate level of passion, I would expect this of a senior level person as well, because they will be interacting with colleagues, customers, etc.

A_COMPUTER• 11 years ago

An artist friend of mine was mass-defriended on facebook after a vitrirolic angerpost about religion. Everybody there knew his opinion on religion I know for a fact many agreed with him, but they didn't want anger and unpleasantness thrown in their faces. This has undoubtedly affected his ability to get work in the future.

lisa_henderson• 11 years ago

In the USA, unemployment was elevated for several years, and is only now coming down to reasonable levels. More so, if you lack a college degree (and 74% of the USA population lacks a college degree) then your chance of getting a good job is non-existent. In Europe, the unemployment rate is still elevated in most of the 27 countries in the EU. So what could possibly justify this sentence:

"Admittedly, the dynamism of Western capitalism depends upon people who work with missionary zeal, who refuse to accept that a job is merely a job."

Is it the "the dynamism of Western capitalism" that causes people to pretend to like their job, or is it the scarcity of good jobs, which forces workers to engage in an exaggerated pantomime of missionary zeal?

ekanes• 11 years ago

Is it the "the dynamism of Western capitalism" that causes people to pretend to like their job, or is it the scarcity of good jobs, which forces workers to engage in an exaggerated pantomime of missionary zeal?

Where in your choices are the people who love their work?

icebraining• 11 years ago

Those aren't being forced to smile, which is the context here.

jes• 11 years ago

Thanks for an interesting comment.

I wonder if it's true that the unemployment rate is coming down to reasonable levels. As I understand it, the unemployment rate that is typically reported excludes people that have given up looking for work.

I don't know if this is correct, but let's say that you had an economy where there were no jobs available. Precisely none. Over the long term, the unemployment rate would have to drift down to almost zero, as more and more people realized that there were no jobs available and gave up looking for work.

As regards the sentence you ask about, I think I am one of the people that does not look at his work as merely a job. Perhaps it's because I do try to distinguish between my work, my craft, my trade, from the other aspects of who happens to be paying my invoices.

Thoughts?

jonas21• 11 years ago

You're right that the official unemployment rate reported by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics (U3) excludes "discouraged workers" who have given up looking for work.

However, the BLS also publishes a rate that includes discouraged workers (U4), as well as a rate that includes "marginally attached workers" who would like to work, but for whatever reason have not looked for work recently (U5). All 3 of these have returned to normal levels [1].

There's also the U6 rate, which includes workers who are part-time, but would like to work full-time. [2]

[1] http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?g=10Uy

[2] http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?g=10UE

maw• 11 years ago

I think you'll find that those aren't the only two possibilities.

im2w1l• 11 years ago

Just 13% of people feel passionate about their job (worldwide). In the US the figure is 30%.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/susanadams/2013/10/10/unhappy-em...

http://www.ryot.org/gallup-poll-70-americans-disengaged-jobs...

desdiv2• 11 years ago

The per country break down can be found here: http://www.gallup.com/poll/165269/worldwide-employees-engage...

Notably, Syria is at the bottom of the list with 0% of their worker being "actively engaged" in their jobs.

lohengramm• 11 years ago

I live in Brazil, and I was born in a bad location in the country. My young ages have been a real pain and I learned not to smile. I started working as a programmer even before getting into college, because I needed money to actually pay the college, and so I have lived a very black and white life for ever. Today, I see that having a nice and beautiful past and present that makes it easy to smile everyday is a more valuable trait to get a job than actually having technical skills. I don't personally like the way it works but, hey, it's the real world.

ryan-allen2• 11 years ago

If you keep working hard and are good at your work employers and clients will hopefully see past your demeanour.

Some of the most competent people I know come across as grumpy and aloof. They get respect because they know their stuff and care about their work, and that shines through.

sethammons• 11 years ago

Lots of people go through bad times. No matter how terrible your life may have been, there is likely someone who had it worse off and appears today as happy and smiles. I know it can be hard, but try to not focus on the great advantage others may have due to their roll of the dice and the situation to which they were born. Do the best you can do. Learn what you can. Don't worry about what you can't change. Take joy in small victories. Choose to be happy. Best of luck.

HarryHirsch• 11 years ago

This Everything2 writeup explains way better than I can what's wrong with passionately loving your job: http://everything2.com/title/F%25C3%25BCr+sechs+Groschen%252...

There are limits to duty, but there are no limits to passion, that's why your employer wants you to be passionate about him. Especially in startuplandia. Hint, grasshopper, he is not passionate about you, he views you as a resource to be strip-mined. The personnel department is appropiately called "Human Resources" these days.

It's just this - why do employees internalize the "passion meme" without any trace of cynicism, and why do customers condone the state of affairs?

pimlottc• 11 years ago

The restaurant business, particular back-of-house, is particular bad in this respect. Working conditions in most kitchens are horrible - long hours, uncomfortable environments, physical demanding, often dangerous and horribly underpaid with few benefits.

But yet, people do it. They know they are getting screwed over, they know they are often destroying their bodies, but they keep on doing it. Because people who want to cook are truly passionate about it. Cooking for someone is an incredible intimate and loving act; one that no amount of corporatism or job function abstraction can dispel.

It is an act in which the symbolism and the functionalism are inseparable. When you are serving food, you are literally nourishing people. You are literally providing the substance they need to survive. You are literally crafting, with your own hands, the matter that will become a literal part of another human being.

Such a primal act naturally stirs a lot of passion, but likewise, as you say, great opportunities for abuse. Most kitchen employees don't make terribly much more than minimum wage. In expensive cities like San Francisco or New York, it's almost impossible to make a living wage. Even in high-end restaurants.

taivare• 11 years ago

Most of the back-of-house employees in restaurant sector have dependency issues, booze and drugs and management is always aware of it. Go in the back lot where they park and you will special plates on more then one car, in my state the plates are all yellow. If the restaurant industry ever drug tested like the drug store chains do they would easily lose sixty-percent of back of the house staff.

swayvil• 11 years ago

The cynicism is utter, grasshopper. It's simply that everybody lies constantly. And when everybody is lying constantly, habitually, the consensus reality becomes seriously donked. Many of us start questioning our sanity.

skore• 11 years ago

"Für sechs Groschen, Fritz, ist's heute genug"

I'm puzzled over the statement that this is supposedly hard to translate. Both translations offered miss the important distinction of tying the soldiers pay to their willingness to go above and beyond. Let me make an attempt:

"That's quite enough for six dimes, today, Fritz."

That being said: I'm not sure it's smart to insist on binding your passion only to the money you make from its product. For things like being a soldier, that may be more true than other professions, but there are very few challenges that can only ever be compensated monetarily.

I know it's a common exploitation trope to tell people to not think about the money too much and instead appreciate the experience. However, a lot of people are so focused on never being even slightly exploited in that way that they do miss out on all the potential experiences - sometimes precisely the kind of experiences that would put them in a position where they could be on the better end of that equation.

ohazi• 11 years ago

David Mitchell's customer service rant on QI is particularly on point here.

http://youtu.be/_LiDTKEF1ek

6d0debc071• 11 years ago

Perhaps the problem is less that it's asked that people love their jobs but more that the question is asked about jobs that it's difficult to see anyone honestly loving.

Do I love my job? Sure. And I'd love any job analogous with it as well.... But I can't say that I've loved or even vaguely enjoyed all the jobs I've had, to do so would have made me a schmuck.

mc323• 11 years ago

I think he brings up a few good points, but he muddles through the whole article and peppers it with irrelevant things --which make me wonder about his rigor. I mean, what does his "astrological sign" have to do with anything? It's absolutely silly.

In addition, he comes to this from only an American experience. This is not a symptom you only see in the US. It's saccharine in many places. That said, saccharine or not, it does have a purpose as much as any other line of questioning. In other words, passion, love, whatever, while they may or may not be an indicator of how well someone will execute their job --the main purpose of such questions, in my mind, is to see how well prepared you are for something you can expect.

In other words, it's not that they expect a sincere answer or they are trying to torture you and see how you wiggle yourself out, but it's rather to gauge how adept you are at preparation. You know the questions is coming, yet, did you take the preparation to come up with a sensible answer. That is the function of the question.

On the other hand, if we were to take these questions literally, yes, then they are quite silly expectations. I have had them at just about every professional job and they are absurd. But we know it's all part of meta-communication. Do I wish it were simpler and didn't recourse to this style of communication, yes, but I think I understand its function.

On the other hand, I do enjoy people regarding their job as an act. A role to fulfill. When we understand our jobs to be essentially a role to fulfill, it's liberating in a way. It's no longer you, it's your job personae. Compare service workers in Japan and Europe. Which ones deal with their situation better? I believe the Japanese worker has a better understanding of the situation. They put on their persona and take it from there. To see it any other way is to see an actor performing a dark character and feeling bad for the actor. No, to the actor it makes no difference. It's an act.

That said, I've come across very good service workers in Europe as well. They very well understood their function and were happy to play it out.

spcoll• 11 years ago

I think she brings up a few good points, but she

Although the article might feel like it could have been written by a woman, its author Paul Jaskunas is a man.

mc323• 11 years ago

Thanks for the heads up, fixed.

arnarbi• 11 years ago

It's interesting to think why it feels like written by a woman, I had the same assumption the whole time.

Maybe it's as simple as the opening sentence, "I'm a Libra", which has a grammatically feminine noun. I wonder if the feeling depends on the native language of the reader.

acbart• 11 years ago

The fact that they led off with being a "Libra of Libras" immediately made me dismissive. Had to overcome a lot of bias right from the get-go.

phabian• 11 years ago

I think Jim Carrey pointed one obvious thing about laughing in his hillarious way. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRyYT62VZdY

nakedrobot2• 11 years ago

Here in the Czech Republic, there is no forced smile. It is not a part of the culture, people generally don't do it, and people here generally see americans (especially americans) as fake, superficial, and insincere.

I'm a bit on the fence about it. Central Europeans, including Czechs are a rather gloomy bunch :-) especially in the winter. Americans are definitely more cheerful, and it is not fake. Ok, sometimes it is but generally speaking Americans are in fact more cheerful and optimistic. Ok, Czechs have five centuries of being conquered and subjugated of course, so let's not draw too many conclusions.

In terms of smiling strangers, well, I'd like a bit more of it than we have here in the Czech Republic (where there is very little)

Swizec2• 11 years ago

Ha, five centuries! We Slovenians have had 12. From 828 AD to 1991 AD.

But yes, us Slavs are a gloomy bunch. But only on the outside and only to strangers. Particularly Americans. Whenever I'm in the States I commonly get accused of being emotionless and of having a deadpan face. At the same time, I feel everybody I meet there is a clown and I always make sure to tune down their enthusiasm. If an American says something is super awesome and the best thing ever, it's probably kinda okayish.

Anyway, the interesting thing I've found comparing Slavs to Americans is that while Slavs are weary of strangers, they open up much sooner. You can be friends with Americans for months and years, but if you haven't gone to the same kindergarten together, you will never be a true friend. Whereas with Slavs, you could have met at a bar three hours ago, and already you're confessing your deepest darkest secrets to each other and are practically best friends.

Source: having lived in the States for some time

PS: to be fair, most Europeans I've met both in Europe and in the US share this immediately friends trait. So far none of the Americans I've met have, possibly because of The Big City effect.

beachstartup• 11 years ago

you're european, so you can make instant-friends with europeans quite easily.

i'm american, and i can make instant friends with americans. i did it throughout my 20s when traveling here in the US and overseas. in fact i've done it all over 4 continents now. this doesn't seem to be a racial or cultural trait. some people are friendly, some aren't.

perhaps the fact that you describe yourself as 'gloomy' is the reason americans do not find it easy to befriend you even after a few drinks.

agilebyte2• 11 years ago

In terms of cultural comparison, I find that the Anglo-Saxon culture is more about making friends, not discussing iffy topics etc. While as Czechs we will totally argue. Maybe that's where the gloomy/smiley split comes from.

RK• 11 years ago

I don't know how we are in relation to Czechs, but one of things I hear as an American is that we are often too quick to talk about politics. Whereas, in many cultures, politics is considered almost taboo to talk about with all but the closest friends and family.

threatofrain• 11 years ago

One thing I have found interesting is that as you go more north in the US, a culture of explicit niceness becomes palpable. I have always though weather may have some relationship, as Canada by reputation would fit this view.

santaclaus• 11 years ago

Interesting, my experience has been the opposite. On the west coast I find that people from San Diego are, on average, a bit more cheery than people from Seattle. Similarly, the average resident of New Orleans seems to have a rosier outlook on life than the average Manhattanite or Montrealer.

goodJobWalrus• 11 years ago

As a Slav, I actually really enjoy giving and receiving smiles (from strangers and friends). Also, I find Americans (especially in the service sector) a lot more smiley and cheery than Canadians, so it's more than US vs Europe, I think it's a uniquely US trait (I lived in all three)

I found this bit interesting: "Admittedly, the dynamism of Western capitalism depends upon people who work with missionary zeal, who refuse to accept that a job is merely a job. It must be something more — a vocation, an adventure, a journey to higher heights."

He has something there. Easiest way to make people your slaves (this is a metaphor, in case it's not obvious) it's to convince them that pushing papers in some dreary cubicle for peanuts is somehow a mission, a source of pride.

NickPollard• 11 years ago

In the immortal words of Antoine de Saint-Exupery:

“If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up the men to gather wood, divide the work, and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea.”

glogla• 11 years ago

We are? I mean, perhaps, on the tram, people are neutral. And cashiers don't smile, ever.

But whenever you see a group of Czechs doing something, we are all laughs and smiles. Friends, colleagues, coworkers ... even at work, we spend a lot of time telling stupid jokes, laughing and goofing around.

There's no forced smile, no, but there's a lot of fun.

chestnut-tree• 11 years ago

Slight digression, but speaking of fake smiles...I'm reminded of a quiz on the BBC website called Spot the Fake Smile.

There are 20 short clips of people smiling. Can you spot which ones are fake and which ones are genuine? (The test takes about 10 mins)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/humanbody/mind/surveys/smiles/

beaumartinez2• 11 years ago

I tried to take the test—but the fifth time I pressed "next" it gave me a 404.

The key to faking a real smile is in wrinkling the eyes.

didsomeonesay• 11 years ago

The key to faking a real smile is in wrinkling the eyes.

The wrinkling is not a very reliable indicator of fake smiles [1]. A real smile does indeed involve muscles around the eyes, but wrinkling could be caused by the cheek muscles pushing upward too.

Some more indicators of a real smile are, IIRC - curling corners of the mouth - corners of the eye pushing inward - short duration - it starts and ends smoothly - symmetry

[1] Source: Having recently read "Telling Lies" by Paul Ekman (and that was a HN recommendation too)

araes• 11 years ago

This article starts to touch on something profound but then mostly skims over an in-depth discussion with reasoning.

At its core, this is really about human social response and compelled social behavior. The article could be about "bitchy resting face" or tipping, or any other form of compelled social niceity and it could delve into the same topics.

People see certain social cues, and they interpret them based on past experience. People who smile at you, and talk in a certain frequency range, and use certain words, must be nice and want to help you. Anyone who owns a business wants all customers to feel that emotion whenever they associate with your business, and implicit social contracts evolve that basically codify that.

It's like "The Game" in some respects. There are certain social cues / responses that most people have internalized so deeply that they're barely aware they respond to them. Most people interpret offhand compliments from a person with apparent detatched interest as intriguing. They interpret questions about them as interest. Easy smiles as confidence. Ect...

With the aforementioned tipping, it's a similar mechanism that reinforces certain behavior in wait staff. In a sense, it's a way that those with money can compel behavior from those that don't. An aspect of the symbolic power that wealth effectively represents.

Anyhow, lunch arrived, so I'm done, and I'll have to make that very choice in a few moments.

rosstex• 11 years ago

I will never succumb to forced indifference!

ryan-allen2• 11 years ago

Give it a few years, you wont have to force anything!

DanielBMarkham• 11 years ago

I am a consultant. I help teams perform better. So I get to travel to a lot of places, work in a lot of organizations, and "start over" with each new gig.

A few years ago I thought I would try something different. I decided that no matter how I felt each day, I was going to smile and be as friendly as possible to everybody I met. At times, walking through the hallways of the new job, I felt like an idiot. But I didn't care. I just smiled and tried to be friendly.

I know that many times I probably smiled and said hello to the same people twice -- as if I had never seen them that day. I know that at times I must have appeared simple-minded. It was a horrible feeling that first week.

Then something strange happened. People started smiling back. I would be working off to the side of a large room, and folks would come over and say hello. People -- I had no idea what their names were or what their jobs were -- would ask me how I was doing.

So I kept the experiment going. After a month, I had some really bad personal news and I know I came in to work very downtrodden. At this point, all of that "fake happiness" I had put in the bank came back to me. The anonymous people I had smiled at? They now made an effort to cheer me up. No effort was required on my part. If I came in upset, within a couple of hours of having other people smile at me, I felt like smiling back at everybody else.

This went on for a few months. It was one of the most enjoyable jobs I've ever had, and when I left, about a dozen people came over and told me that I had done a great job and they would miss me. (I just did my normal job)

Lesson? Smiles are very, very powerful social tools, even if they are forced. They cheer other people up, they cheer you up, and over time they provide some kind of weird social insurance that you can tap into when you're having a bad day. What blew my mind was that the fake part wasn't even important. Simply by trying you got all of the benefits.

fishnchips2• 11 years ago

I remember this director from a Big Company pitching that I join his team after I decided to maybe change jobs. His enthusiasm was insane and eventually I ended up accepting the offer (which was like 20% better than what I got in my old place) and on my 1st day I learned that the guy not only left but went with a bang, too. Having been raised in the Eastern Block I still can't help but wonder how Americans do it.

pacala• 11 years ago

Hi there, comrade. Perhaps Americans are using the same coping mechanism we were using to deal with the exuberant and completely inane "party line". As outsiders, and engineers on top of it, we just don't pick up the inanity cues that everybody else in the room understands instinctively. Kind of like everyone would sing the International at the beginning of the day, or read an omage to the party once a quarter, but think nothing of it other than being happy to be done with a slightly ridiculous but overall insignificant chore.

fishnchips2• 11 years ago

I was born in 1983 so I never experienced much in terms of ideological indoctrination. Before I went to school (aged 7) the communism was over. Before that I only had friendly Soviet soldiers visiting my creche dressed up as Santa Claus and giving us Christmas presents (the irony of that!) but I would blame that for my current tone deafness when it comes to American excitement ;)

meric• 11 years ago

By bang do you mean "gun"?

pcurve• 11 years ago

Probably more like this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qIqeXSYc8nE

elchief2• 11 years ago

I made the mistake of studying for and taking the Canadian Border Services exam, where you have to discriminate between fake and real smiles. I got perfect on that section. But now I can't un-see it. Fake smiles. Fake smiles everywhere.

sumitviii• 11 years ago

Interesting. Does this effect wear down?

elchief2• 11 years ago

SixSigma2• 11 years ago

When I trained as an actor I learned the curious phenomena :

Happiness leads to smiling and smiling leads to happiness.

rifung• 11 years ago

True! On the other hand, being forced to smile leads to unhappiness

SixSigma2• 11 years ago

Anyone that's worked as a waiter / bar-tender knows there's no-one more hated than our beautiful customers.

I door find "Tell us why you're passionate about Supply Chain Management" a curious question (my profession).

"I'm not, I'm interested in it and good at it" is insufficient. Of course, it is one of those interview situation questions to be ready for. Passion comes in many forms.

janethenew2• 11 years ago

"I am a Libra of Libras" - I could have stopped reading there. "...the interview was over and I was leaving the room. As I shut the door behind me, the committee erupted into laughter" - of course they did. He probably had just told them that alignment of planets made him suitable for the job.

Relevant SMBC: http://www.smbc-comics.com/?id=3634#comic

walshemj• 11 years ago

In japan they ask you for your blood group on job applications

janethenew2• 11 years ago

That's odd. At least, they don't ask about astrological signs. I hope that they don't. "I am a Libra of Libras" sounds like "I'm a crackpot of crackpots" to me.

Udik• 11 years ago

I have the suspect that "libra of libras" shouldn't be intended necessarily in its literal sense (of astrological sign), even if it were true. The symbol of the libra is a scale, so the author is just saying, as made clear in the next period, that he usually keeps his moods and opinions very balanced between the positive and the negative, in contrast with the fully optimistic attitude he sees in the Americans.

kolev• 11 years ago

We're living in times of fakeness as our modus operandi - fake boobs, fake smiles, fake love skills (Viagra), fake friendliness, fake human rights, fake Eiffel tower (Vegas), fake everything. It's because people today lack class, are abusive materialists and consumerists, and lack any trace of philosophical thinking. And this will not end well!

unclesaamm• 11 years ago

Seems like HN could do well with an introduction to Arlie Hochschild and "The Managed Heart" http://www.amazon.com/The-Managed-Heart-Commercialization-Fe....

Here's a bit of the blurb from Amazon:

"In private life, we try to induce or suppress love, envy, and anger through deep acting or "emotion work," just as we manage our outer expressions of feeling through surface acting. In trying to bridge a gap between what we feel and what we "ought" to feel, we take guidance from "feeling rules" about what is owing to others in a given situation. Based on our private mutual understandings of feeling rules, we make a "gift exchange" of acts of emotion management. We bow to each other not simply from the waist, but from the heart.

But what occurs when emotion work, feeling rules, and the gift of exchange are introduced into the public world of work? In search of the answer, Arlie Russell Hochschild closely examines two groups of public-contact workers: flight attendants and bill collectors. The flight attendant’s job is to deliver a service and create further demand for it, to enhance the status of the customer and be "nicer than natural." The bill collector’s job is to collect on the service, and if necessary, to deflate the status of the customer by being "nastier than natural." Between these extremes, roughly one-third of American men and one-half of American women hold jobs that call for substantial emotional labor. In many of these jobs, they are trained to accept feeling rules and techniques of emotion management that serve the company’s commercial purpose."

smilefreak• 11 years ago

I think that a smile should never be forced, for two reasons.

1. I want to find people who are genuinely passionate about what they do.

2. If people are truly unhappy not being o.k with that, and not faking it may bring attention to a problem they or society faces. This may help highlight, and could lead to solutions. Do not go silent.

The Tyranny of the Forced Smile

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