[kristofferR]

It's a shame that people still think it's impossible to be aggressive without being a jerk, both in business and social life. Sure, a lot of jerks are aggressive, but that's only a correlation, not a causation.

"Nice" is not a positive thing. If someone calls you "nice" it's a sign you should change your personality. "Nice" is what you say about people you have nothing to say about: http://www.joelrunyon.com/two3/nice-people-dont-change-the-w...

To truly succeed you have to be aggressive. You must know what you truly want and have the courage to go get it. You must be confident in your vision and abilities. You can't worry what everyone thinks of you. You can't seek the approval of others. You must be able to express your thoughts and feelings without fearing to offend someone. If someone you hire sucks, you must be willing to fire them.

Kindness is a real, positive, desirable trait. Niceness is just the ability to be inoffensive and anonymous.

It's perfectly possible to be kind and aggressive at the same time. That's the perfect combination, the one you'll see in most successful entrepreneurs. Just look at PG for example.

[gmac]

I guess this is just semantics, but in my book 'aggressive' is by definition a bad thing. For the traits you cite I'd go with 'assertive' and/or 'self-assured'.

[zerostar07]

I think it's a good term, given that the opposite is passive. Why is it a bad thing by definition?

[dev_jim]

From Wikipedia:

Aggression, in its broadest sense, is behavior, or a disposition towards behavior, that is forceful, hostile or attacking. It may occur either in retaliation or without provocation. In narrower definitions that are commonly used in psychology and other social and behavioral sciences, aggression involves an intention to cause harm, even if only as a means to an end. It has alternatively been defined as acts intended to increase relative social dominance.

Not exactly an endearing definition. Dictionary.com has even less flattering definitions.

Passive (or passiveness) isn't the the antonym of aggression. Here's a few that I found: agreeableness, friendliness, friendship, gentleness, kindness, niceness. I would much rather be attributed those qualities.

[ricefield]

It really depends. You can be forceful in getting your work done. You can be hostile towards procrastination. You can be attacking big problems. Ultimately, its just a characterization of behavior. I think context and where that attitude are directed have more bearing on whether its 'positive' or 'negative.'

[nostrademons]

The opposite of aggressive is passive. Both are bad. What you want to be is assertive, which is the middle road where you look out for your own interests while still respecting others.

There're a bunch of other situations where both extremes are bad. The opposite of indifferent is obsessed, and both are negative qualities in a relationship - you want to be involved. The opposite of flat is sharp, and both are bad - you want to be in tune. The opposite of hypo-anything is hyper-anything, and both are bad - you want to be healthy.

[rue]

The antonym of passive is active.

[shmerl]

No, opposite of passive is active. What does it have to do with aggressive?

[rhizome]

Sure, a lot of jerks are aggressive, but that's only a correlation, not a causation.

That's nice in theory, but there are a lot of people with dysfunctional upbringings for whom "jerks" provide the only role models for success.

[billpatrianakos]

I'm someone who had such an upbringing and my male model (my father) was a jerk (the rest of the world called him an asshole). He was very successful in business and I always wanted to model that success for myself. The funny thing is, I actually turned out exactly opposite of him and it was because of his jerk-ness that it happened. Though he tried to make me in his image his fatal mistake was treating me like the rest of the world. Instead of learning how to be the boss like him I learned how to fear the boss and be passive, nice, agreeable, and generally like a door mat.

So I may have misunderstood what you were trying to say but what I thought you meant to say was that those who have been brought up by assholes end up being assholes themselves. I disagree and I'm living proof. The person being brought up like that wants to develop those "jerk" traits that make their parent(s) successful but they end up getting developing habits like pleasing people and following orders without question that get in the way of what they want to do.

[jasonjackson]

Absolutely agree with this 100%.

There's a lot of conflation between dominance and selfishness. These two traits can look very similar at a shallow level, but are completely othorgonal.

Pure selfishness is when you act without concern for others to your own benefit. Dominance is the desire to win in competitions, demonstrate power and/or independence over others.

I've definitely met many kind, bold, dominant people in the start-up world. These people can both simultaneously piss people off, and go wayyy out of their way to help you.

[shmerl]

Depends on what you understand by "aggressive". Energetic, active, pushing for opportunities and so on? Or being cruel, damaging to others and not caring about side effects for the sake of the goal?

[nevster]

I'd say most people would think Roger Federer is nice...