I recognize myself in this story, but I wouldn't say that I mean to be mean or dismissive or superior. Usually it's that I fall into the trap of being 'too literal'. We spend all day being very precise about the conditions and cases where we are making changes, amendments, or extending capabilities. It drives me crazy when people won't just get to the point of the story or ask that can be scoped-out if-and-as necessary. I'm not talking about interacting with inexperienced people either, they're otherwise very intelligent and articulate but have a way of speaking that seems all so inefficient or ineffective, often adding lots of emotional embellishments that don't change the problem statement.
Now, I'm not usually as unaware of insensitive as that description may sound, but you may be able to see some truth in the patterns.
[I kind-of feel like I'm on a rant, so I'll add this too. The worst is when engineers at a meeting debate the 'root cause' theorizing all the permutations and possibilities to identify the correct one, taking as long as that takes. Often a simple search through the source-code or log files would have narrowed it down to but a few to easily verify--but they'd rather be playing RCA golf out loud.]
Now, I'm not usually as unaware of insensitive as that description may sound, but you may be able to see some truth in the patterns.
[I kind-of feel like I'm on a rant, so I'll add this too. The worst is when engineers at a meeting debate the 'root cause' theorizing all the permutations and possibilities to identify the correct one, taking as long as that takes. Often a simple search through the source-code or log files would have narrowed it down to but a few to easily verify--but they'd rather be playing RCA golf out loud.]