I still can't think of situations where it paid off for the dissenter.
Maybe I'm limited by the small number of experiences I've had at work related to someone being disagreeable, or maybe it is rare to be rewarded for dissent even when "you're right"
Couple jobs ago they set a list of action items for everyone to follow to help productivity or whatever. One was stand at standups. I followed all the items to a T, including standing when everyone went back to sitting. I led new initiatives. I got more work done than my equal engineers. When the axe came, it was me who was let go first. The lesson I refuse to learn: stay in line, don't stand out.
> I followed all the items to a T, including standing when everyone went back to sitting [...] When the axe came, it was me who was let go first.
It doesn't sound like you were rewarded for your dissent from the group behavior, like standing up in a meeting (which is weird if everyone else is seated).
If you choose to act differently than "everyone" else (which can seem unusual, like you can't read the room), you're dissenting. You say something about being in line or out of line, but from your comment I don't know what you think you were doing.
Why did you choose to dissent from the team by being obliviously obedient and following rules "to the T" rather than going along with the team?
We were literally told to stand, so I stood. Just because everyone else got tired of following the rules that the C Suite took time to make, does that mean I should also stop following the rules? And standing during a standup so they don't go on and on and on like they always did made perfect sense to me. So the more wrongs, the more right?
But everyone else could tell that wasn't a rule that needed to be followed "to a T" as you describe
> Just because everyone else got tired of following the rules that the C Suite took time to make, does that mean I should also stop following the rules?
If someone asked me to do something dumb, wasn't there to talk about it, and everyone else present realized it was a dumb request that didn't need my rigourus obedience, yes. I would not follow a dumb rule that no one else was following. Standing when everyone else sits is dissent behavior among the group you are part of (you're not part of the C suite).
> And standing during a standup so they don't go on and on and on like they always did made perfect sense to me.
It sounds like this is the reason you chose to stand, even when everyone else around you indicated they were going to sit and be more comfortable and casual, you chose to be rigid and probably loomed over the meeting if everyone else was staring at your belt buckle.
> So the more wrongs, the more right?
No. I would suggest the takeaway here is that you may have been blind to how your actions were actually self-serving (you wanted short meetings, and standing made others feel rushed ... at least you hoped) and the reason you stuck to the rules when everyone else was relaxed was because you wanted to use the C suite rules to manipulate other people's behavior to shorten the meeting you didn't want to be part of. Again, you were the dissenter in this situation based on your own retelling.
Maybe I'm limited by the small number of experiences I've had at work related to someone being disagreeable, or maybe it is rare to be rewarded for dissent even when "you're right"