The problem with Nice/Jerk is it's purely subjective. Whenever you hear a peer review that says "They're a jerk" you, as a people leader, need to be very on guard about the situation
1. The person making the claim maybe poorly calibrated, burnt out, or have an ego
2. In so far as peers compete for political will and promotions they have a vested interest to use whatever weapons they can against others, subjective / data free ones are the low hanging fruit
3. The person being called a jerk maybe desperately trying to fix something -- the tech debt, the broken culture, overwork/oncall etc. attacking their character in this scenario is the work equivalent of victim blaming
The truth is it's maddening being the only (or minority) competent ones in the room, and with apathetic peers suddenly you're the jerk because they'd rather rest and vest than do effortful things to improve the situation.
In my matrix doing the job is the base line. Can you do the job? Are you doing the job well? Are you not being blatantly terrible? (disagreeable is fine, abusive is not) Veing able to do the job is necessary, else there's not point carrying your dead weight.
So, you are explaining that the person that says "they're a jerk" is, basically, a jerk. So you are saying "they're a jerk". So what you say should be apply to you?
1. The person making the claim maybe poorly calibrated, burnt out, or have an ego
2. In so far as peers compete for political will and promotions they have a vested interest to use whatever weapons they can against others, subjective / data free ones are the low hanging fruit
3. The person being called a jerk maybe desperately trying to fix something -- the tech debt, the broken culture, overwork/oncall etc. attacking their character in this scenario is the work equivalent of victim blaming
The truth is it's maddening being the only (or minority) competent ones in the room, and with apathetic peers suddenly you're the jerk because they'd rather rest and vest than do effortful things to improve the situation.
In my matrix doing the job is the base line. Can you do the job? Are you doing the job well? Are you not being blatantly terrible? (disagreeable is fine, abusive is not) Veing able to do the job is necessary, else there's not point carrying your dead weight.