That phrase "emergency mode" really hits home the underlying mental mode that drives an understanding of the situation.
It only takes a few trigger words or phrases to take us back to past trauma and difficulties, like the tremors before an earthquake.
I have first-hand experience of the "caste" system that can emerge in tech environments. It was my experience that our colleagues in the lower caste told scare stories (and you see the odd firing/letting go early to feel they are real) and you feel distant from the "upper" caste. But actual factual reality in my specific experience was a basically fair system with strong accountability. I was grateful, and benefitted from the experience overall. It is hard in such environments to "be normal" because the primitive part of the brain is in "fear mode". That part of the brain actually makes the most important decisions in your life.
What is the way through? My opinion is to try and make honest real connection at a human level with your colleagues but that is actually hard to do. That is why the part of the story I found most painful was the comment about "bleached cotton". It was a delicate moment where friendship could have started but was cut off.
Lastly, I thought it was an endearing turn of phrase to first introduce the engineer as someone from Harvard. And then later refer to the person as "Harvard" (instead of the engineer's actual name or some pronoun).
It only takes a few trigger words or phrases to take us back to past trauma and difficulties, like the tremors before an earthquake.
I have first-hand experience of the "caste" system that can emerge in tech environments. It was my experience that our colleagues in the lower caste told scare stories (and you see the odd firing/letting go early to feel they are real) and you feel distant from the "upper" caste. But actual factual reality in my specific experience was a basically fair system with strong accountability. I was grateful, and benefitted from the experience overall. It is hard in such environments to "be normal" because the primitive part of the brain is in "fear mode". That part of the brain actually makes the most important decisions in your life.
What is the way through? My opinion is to try and make honest real connection at a human level with your colleagues but that is actually hard to do. That is why the part of the story I found most painful was the comment about "bleached cotton". It was a delicate moment where friendship could have started but was cut off.
Lastly, I thought it was an endearing turn of phrase to first introduce the engineer as someone from Harvard. And then later refer to the person as "Harvard" (instead of the engineer's actual name or some pronoun).