Working with someone who’s so socially awkward they come across rude.

[peptual]

I work with a guy, he’s about 30 and very good at his job, very focused. But he comes across rude. He seems to struggle to call people by their names, it’s like it’s too personal for him. And he doesn’t ever ask questions about what someone did on their day off. He’s lacking the standard adult interactions you should have around your working day.
Is it appropriate to say something? I understand some people are painful shy but as an older person I except a bit more personal skills and think mentioning might help him out.

How will mentioning help him out? More likely he'll feel even less comfortable. If he's good at his job, I'm not sure what the problem is. (I spent the first three months of a new job avoiding interactions with all but one person - into the fourth now and occasionally feeling comfortable talking to someone but usually limit it to work stuff.)

I’d drop the ‘should’ here. I assume, unless you’re the only two people in the workplace, that there are other people to chat to about what you did on your day off. Just do that. Let him just work. He may find your prattle irritating and distracting, but is polite enough not to pick you up on it.

It wouldn’t help, it will make the chap feel awful, I’ll take the mn bingo and start off that he may be on the spectrum at some point and doesn’t find social interaction easy, he’s very good at his job, what does it matter if he doesn’t care to ask you what flavour ice cream you had on the common on Saturday.

No, obviously don’t say something! That would be a very unkind thing to do and make him even more self conscious. Or maybe he’s just quite private and doesn’t want to engage in chatter. Or likes to keep work and home seperate. Or has some kind of personal issue atm. If it impacts his work then it’s for his line manager to deal with.

He sounds like he could be autistic. If he's not saying anything actively unprofessional and is good at his job I think his colleagues should be accepting of who he is. Not everyone is good at small talk and that's OK.

It's no more appropriate for you to say something than it would be for him to say something about how you are over social at work and could do with improving your focus on the task at hand.

I don’t see how you could say something without sounding a bit mad “can you please ask people what they did on their day off, I’ve noticed that you never do”

This reads like a scenario in a training about neurodiversity or just generally how to be a human being. I think if you take the salient points 'he's very good at his job' and your view of 'standard adult interactions' and that 'you might help him out' by telling him his way of being is unacceptable to 'standard adults' I think you know the answer if you really think about it.

Im autistic I don’t care what my colleagues did on their day off and I don’t want to waste work time finding out just to be polite. I’d be very careful approaching this because if it’s not part of his job and he’s performing well you risk looking like you are finding fault for no good reason.

No don't say anything, it's not really going to help. I had a lot of trouble with these things when I was young and had to teach myself to ask people questions and use their names more. I still don't use people's name very often, I couldn't even explain why! But it's not an easy thing to just start doing that, so by saying something I expect that will make him (more) uncomfortable. In my case it came from self-consciousness and shyness.

This.

I am autistic, painfully introverted and excellent at my job. The office small talk and other bullshit politics wipe me out. Sadly the NTs don’t seem to value being truly excellent at a job or at least they didn’t in my workplace, the chatty time wasters were the ones who were given the most praise!

No leave him alone. Unless he’s actively being unprofessional.

Come across as rude - so you know they have no rude intentions ? You know it’s just how they are ?

so it’s just not performing corrrcetky for you ?

bet he finds all the social interactions quite stomach churning and unnecessary but he is putting up with it

I'm not ND and I never ask what people do on their day off...for all I know they might have used it for something deeply personal.

This is the work place equivalent of the ‘smile love it might never happen’ thing that used to make want to commit homicide in broad daylight on a pavement. One benefit of getting older is being spared this ‘advice’.

My exact thought. Autism is a disability and you would potentially be asking him to do something that his disability prevents him from doing. If he has a special interest, he would probably enjoy talking about that. That might make him open up a little more.

Is he actually rude, or just not sociable enough for you?

It sounds like the latter. It's perfectly acceptable not to ask someone about their day off. I actually think it's more acceptable than asking and then not being interested in the answer (which is most of my work colleagues).

It is perfectly possible to be shy or not interested in small talk without being autistic though - and also completely fine!! He may just want to crack on with work and find chatter irritating.

Was it on the job spec?

Just leave him to get on with his job; after all, that’s what he’s there for.

So he obviously struggles with social skills point this out to him with achieve nothing if anything will make him struggle more knowing you are judging him

Rip into his personality just because you're not keen on it by all means.

But don't get all hurt and tearful when he tells you exactly what he thinks of yours.

I don't know how big your organisation is but perhaps he struggles to remember people's names? It takes me ages to learn new names and even then under pressure I sometimes get brain freeze.

I don't think it would be at all helpful to point out his behaviour or "help him out of his shell". Just keep on being friendly and appreciative that he's a good worker.

I never ask questions about what my colleagues did on their day off or at the weekend, does that make me socially awkward? No, I couldn’t give a toss what they did, so not interested.

Just let him do his job.

I'm not Autistic but introverted with social anxiety.

I don't see why everyone has to be expected to be the same so long as they're doing their jobs.

I could equally say it's rude to ask people questions when they haven't invited a conversation.

Let people be.

My manager is like this, rarely interacts with his staff unless about work and even then it's only what needs to be said, I think he's asked me once how was my weekend. Although when started as manager he did tell me straight that he was extremely introverted.

It was a little strange at first but it's the new normal, and most importantly he is an extremely competent and intelligent man. My last manager could yarn for ages on iddle chatter but he was extremely useless and lazy. I much prefer the current boss man even if he barely cracks a smile.