zlacker

The other day, I was in a Zoom meeting with another man and a woman. The call had too much latency, and the conversation was a tad heated, so we were all interrupting each other to some extent—but I noticed halfway through that I was interrupting the woman more, and she was speaking the least. Just like in all the research. While I certainly didn't go silent for the rest of the meeting, I made a concerted effort to let the woman talk more, and I'm glad I did, because she had good things to say.

I'm aware that I have the same biases as the rest of society. I do my best to recognize them, and, where applicable, to add a small mental counterweight before making decisions. I don't think this always leads to better outcomes, but I do think it's a net positive. And if investors act on similar frameworks, they've probably doomed some companies and saved others. The future is unknowable, and we'll never know what would have happened.

I wish this investor had acted out of a desire to be a better person, or a more successful VC, rather than from fear of a mob. I'm not a fan of mobs. But none of us are immune to cultural biases, and we should second-guess ourselves accordingly.

>>Wowfun+(OP)
It is not necessarily your bias against women. It is equally possible that the woman is not self-confident enough to interrupt you more often.

Recently I had a zoom meeting with two women. One of them was a bit shy and quiet, and the other one constantly interrupted me and the other woman. There was nothing gender-specific in that encounter.

Similarly, in other meetings there are often some men who stay quiet (but obvs nobody cares about them).

Possibly we should let shy people talk more. Regardless of whether they are women, men, black, gay or whatever.

Or maybe not. Maybe you need to be self-confident and a bit bold to lead, because if you don't, you won't be a good leader anyways even if you were given time to speak regardless of your sex. I don't know.

Don't look for sexism in every encounter.

>>lightg+P3
Sure, and there's plenty of men who don't speak up often enough. But knowing the societal trends helps me recognize problems and correct them.

>>Wowfun+(OP)
You shouldn't be interrupting people unless they go to unreasonable lengths without providing a pause for others to chime in.

>>fermie+A9
I don't actually think that's reasonable. The next time you're watching a conversation, really pay attention to when people chime in. They may not interrupt mid-word, but they'll often take advantage of mid-sentence pauses, when the other person otherwise would have kept going. It's a natural part of discussion.

This is also why call latency can really destroy the quality of a discussion, even when its presence isn't obvious.

>>Wowfun+(OP)
In general, on a high latency call, if you find yourself interrupting someone, you can just "pass the mike" back to them once you're done.

A simple "Sorry <name>, I cut you off, you were saying?" does wonders and makes it clear to everyone that the next person who should be speaking was the one who got interrupted.

>>fermie+A9
Its very hard in a high latency call to not interrupt people.

>>Wowfun+(OP)
You guys could implement a RTS-CTS protocol

>>Wowfun+wa
> It's a natural part of discussion.

It isn't natural, it's part of the culture.

The worst I've seen was so bad that when I refused to interrupt, I waited 45 minutes without an opportunity to speak and then the meeting was over. Literally a 45-minute chain of people interrupting each other. That's not natural, that's adapted behavior.

Fortunately, it's a rarity at my current place of work :)

All it takes is a few bad apples and everyone else will adapt and interrupt as well.

>>Wowfun+(OP)
Slightly off-topic, but I've found that dialing into Zoom calls via phone sometimes alleviates the latency, at least for audio. I'd rather have bad A/V sync with less audio latency than perfect sync but more latency.

Just a tip that's helped me in similar situations!

>>Wowfun+(OP)
The quietest person in our group meetings is a guy. Nobody will ever let him speak, I guess.

>>globul+Kw1
Is that outside your control? Or can you hand the "mic" to him

>>cutemo+ks3
He's a man. It's his fault.