There is a huge difference between Bridgewater&#x27;s approach, which I think is called radical honesty, and radical candor, at lesas as I see it (but tell me why I&#x27;m wrong and I&#x27;ll learn something:)<p>Here is why Bridgewater&#x27;s approach is obnoxious aggression in my book. There, employees are encouraged to be brutal in their criticism, a policy called “radical honesty.”  In one meeting, the criticism got so harsh that somebody started to cry.  The conversation was taped, and an executive decided it would be a good idea to send the taped conversation, tears and all, out to the whole company to listen to.  He thought people could learn a lot from the incident.  My friend who worked there learned he wanted to get a job at a company with a different kind of culture.<p>The intentions here were probably not as bad as the results.  The leaders at the company wanted everyone to say what they really thought.  The idea of radical honesty is really appealing to me.  But, I saw two big problems with this approach to encouraging criticism.  The obvious one was encouraging public rather than private criticism.  Public debate and disagreement, yes. Public criticism, no.  This mistake was compounded--criticism wasn’t just public, it was  publicized in a way that humiliated an employee.  The less obvious mistake was that the policy of “radical honesty” inadvertently sowed the seeds of arrogance, not humility.  Why?  If honesty is good, surely radical honesty is better.  Interestingly, it was the words of a Jesuit missionary in the Congo who best explained the problem with honesty to me.  “It’s very important to tell the truth,” he said, and then looked heavenward.  “But who knows what the Truth is???”  When somebody says, “I’m going to be honest with you,” it implies they know the truth and you don’t.  There’s not a lot of humility in that.<p>This is why I use the term “candor.”  “Honesty” can lead to arrogance.