This is pretty solid advice, I think, but I think there is also a lot to be gained by “trust but verify” approaches to assuming good faith.
Being too pragmatic about assuming potential bad faith has significant risks, and even being “wrong” about assuming good faith can carry benefits and help push incentives back into alignment.
Basically, outwardly assume good faith but internally remain ambivalently skeptical.
Other than that small add on, I think this is pretty solid advice based on my 3.5 decades of business follies.
Yeah I think the two examples in the post are clearly areas where “assume good faith” would have been a superior approach to the initial state. I agree with the author that bad actors can and do weaponize the “assume good faith” mandate and that it can be particularly frustrating when used to excuse frequently encountered but plausibly denied problems (sexism etc.).
This is very explicitly the strategy I use for tracking down wierd behaviour when programming- think about all the things that could be happening, and then think how to test those theories.
I like the idea of using the same approach for more soft skills based problems!
the prompts for assessing intent are valuable and the reflex to find those alternate explanations is immensely valuable, though there's an edge case I'd raise because (applying the prompt) the antagonist was just someone confident in their motivations.
generally, an asshole is someone who insults a consensus, particularly one that involves compromises. the 'just kidding,' (schrodinger's) asshole is someone who challenges the sincerity of a belief vs. whether it is the artifact of a compromise.
looking at this on hard mode the question is, does this prompt to ask for alternative possibilities include personalities whose strategy is to compromise first and then renegotiate as more advantageous circumstances evolve?
someone who lacked agreeableness (an asshole) would ask questions or make comments that humiliate the people who had compromised and were working an angle. however, over time, someone who compromised out of agreeable instinct is made to become dishonest and nobody's going to admit protecting that position as an alternative motivation.
I'm suggesting that this is where "assuming the best intentions" fails- in organizations full of overly agreeable people, who psychologically have to protect what is essentially shame from early compromises, and angle for an advantageous opportunity to renege to a more powerful position. startups don't work like this, but this is the base institutional dynamic.
does this alternate hypothesis formation prompt include people motivated by the resentment that grows from inferior choices? (e.g. inferior in the economic sense of what you choose when you can't afford better)
