6 ms·

while Uber's culture problems are legendary...I've seen this type of complain at every single company I worked for (which is almost 2 dozens at this point), inc

by shados 10y ago

while Uber's culture problems are legendary...I've seen this type of complain at every single company I worked for (which is almost 2 dozens at this point), including when it was not true at all and people were just whiny that their idea for office decoration did not get accepted. So we're starting to suffer from a "boy who cried wolf" syndrome, where when the complain is real, no one cares. That's a big problem.

Balgair 10y ago
I mean, it may just be you and/or your close associates. Saying the industry is suffering from false reporting is kinda a stretch, though you do bring up a good point about sites like GlassDoor and all: take everything with not just a grain of salt, but a boulder.
ryanisnan 10y ago
> So we're starting to suffer from a "boy who cried wolf" syndrome It seems like you're somewhat sympathizing with Uber HR's decisions regarding this individual on account of the "boy cried wolf" syndrome. This seems like hardly that at all. The events at Uber read like a systemic failure to deal with problems, and an extreme indifference to sexual harassment for the benefit of retaining "good" engineers. Fuck this mentality. edit: Forgive me if I am misunderstanding your comments.
- harlanlewis 10y ago
  Not the poster, but I think he means that Uber is the very wolf we've become too desensitized to recognize. But I have not seen the endemic spiteful complaints he has. My impression is this place is full of wolves that are seldom called out.
  - GauntletWizard 10y ago
    To take the middle ground - I think there's been a lot of wolves crying wolf - Mostly on sheep, because that provides good cover. Sheep are afraid to cry wolf, even when being attacked, because of fear of ostracization - and unfortunately, we're very bad at telling wolves from sheep in a fight, particularly as a herd.
- shados 10y ago
  Yes, you're misunderstanding. I was not even talking about the Uber case at all. I'm saying how everyone who works at every company says they make complains about everything and never get heard. That makes it hard to figure out which companies are ACTUALLY bad at dealing with complains BEFORE something like the Uber bullshit actually happens. It prevents us from being proactive.
mundo 10y ago
> I've seen this type of complain at every single company I worked for Er, have you? Fowler's post said she was sexually propositioned over Slack, by her manager, on her first day, and that HR did not do anything about it, even though multiple women had complained about the same manager doing the same thing. That's the most egregious story of harassment I've ever heard of, including the made-up scenarios in the "workplace sensitivity" training I had to take last week.
- lefstathiou 10y ago
  Ah but did you witness it? We are all reasonable people here and can agree that this behavior, if true, is disgusting and unacceptable. But is a "claim" evidence and should we assume it is by default "truth"? This is the crux of the issue. If you stood accused of sexual harassment I'm sure you would hope society would take a moment to gather the facts before judging you, even if on an individual level you weren't a likeable person. Because being likeable and condoning sexual harassment are two different things.
  - the_common_man 10y ago
    Yeah, I somehow do not understand why she resorted to blog about it and not just file a law suit (I just asked this in a top level comment).
    - danielweber 10y ago
      A lawsuit would not really pay out that much. She got another job, so her damages are, what, a few tens of thousands of dollars? And it would mark her, for life, as someone who sues. A friend has worked on sexual harassment suits and says it's unfortunate that, as far as he's experienced, every single one he's been involved in has been bogus. Meanwhile, he knows there are several people with good cases who don't bring them, because the social penalties are too high. Part of the reason I believe her is that she isn't bringing suit. She's not trying to make a payday out of this. Further, she has alleged specific acts which can be definitely proven or disproven. If she made it up, it would be trivial for Uber to show she did so.
LordHumungous 10y ago
>I've seen this type of complain at every single company I worked for Wow, I have never encountered that kind of thing (admittedly I've only worked at 3 companies)
- shados 10y ago
  Everyone took what I said the wrong way, so Im pretty sure I worded it very poorly. That's on me. I'm not saying that all companies are bad at dealing with complains. I'm saying that for every company with a non-trivial amount of employees, there will be a bunch of said employees complaining that they made big complains that were ignored. "Management never listens to my brilliant ideas!" "We're all underpaid!" "People cry under their desk every day!" "The CEO doesn't understand my brilliant idea I figured out in 30 seconds!" There's always people like that everywhere, and it makes it very hard to distinguish companies that actually take their employees seriously from companies like Uber without actually working there. That's all I meant.
watwut 10y ago
There must be something wrong with the way you choose companies to work for. My employers were pretty low on this kind of drama.
shados 10y ago
For anyone reading my above comment and who will not go through the sub threads: I did not mean that I see sexual harassment claims like this one everywhere. When I said "Ive seen this type of complain", I was talking about the person I was replying to. Employees who say the company never do anything when they bitch about stuff. Employees bitch a lot, so its hard to tell apart companies like what Uber seems to be, from companies with a lot of whiny employees, without actually working there. Short of the Apple and Googles of the world, or the little koolaid trendy startups, all companies have a percentage of fussy employees who will say their employers screwed them over, so we have to take what people say with a grain of salt. Because we have to take so much with a grain of salt, we can't proactively find real offenders (as easily).

by shados 10y ago

Balgair 10y ago

I mean, it may just be you and/or your close associates. Saying the industry is suffering from false reporting is kinda a stretch, though you do bring up a good point about sites like GlassDoor and all: take everything with not just a grain of salt, but a boulder.

ryanisnan 10y ago

> So we're starting to suffer from a "boy who cried wolf" syndrome It seems like you're somewhat sympathizing with Uber HR's decisions regarding this individual on account of the "boy cried wolf" syndrome. This seems like hardly that at all. The events at Uber read like a systemic failure to deal with problems, and an extreme indifference to sexual harassment for the benefit of retaining "good" engineers. Fuck this mentality. edit: Forgive me if I am misunderstanding your comments.

harlanlewis 10y ago
Not the poster, but I think he means that Uber is the very wolf we've become too desensitized to recognize. But I have not seen the endemic spiteful complaints he has. My impression is this place is full of wolves that are seldom called out.
- GauntletWizard 10y ago
  To take the middle ground - I think there's been a lot of wolves crying wolf - Mostly on sheep, because that provides good cover. Sheep are afraid to cry wolf, even when being attacked, because of fear of ostracization - and unfortunately, we're very bad at telling wolves from sheep in a fight, particularly as a herd.
shados 10y ago
Yes, you're misunderstanding. I was not even talking about the Uber case at all. I'm saying how everyone who works at every company says they make complains about everything and never get heard. That makes it hard to figure out which companies are ACTUALLY bad at dealing with complains BEFORE something like the Uber bullshit actually happens. It prevents us from being proactive.

mundo 10y ago

> I've seen this type of complain at every single company I worked for Er, have you? Fowler's post said she was sexually propositioned over Slack, by her manager, on her first day, and that HR did not do anything about it, even though multiple women had complained about the same manager doing the same thing. That's the most egregious story of harassment I've ever heard of, including the made-up scenarios in the "workplace sensitivity" training I had to take last week.

lefstathiou 10y ago
Ah but did you witness it? We are all reasonable people here and can agree that this behavior, if true, is disgusting and unacceptable. But is a "claim" evidence and should we assume it is by default "truth"? This is the crux of the issue. If you stood accused of sexual harassment I'm sure you would hope society would take a moment to gather the facts before judging you, even if on an individual level you weren't a likeable person. Because being likeable and condoning sexual harassment are two different things.
- the_common_man 10y ago
  Yeah, I somehow do not understand why she resorted to blog about it and not just file a law suit (I just asked this in a top level comment).
  - danielweber 10y ago
    A lawsuit would not really pay out that much. She got another job, so her damages are, what, a few tens of thousands of dollars? And it would mark her, for life, as someone who sues. A friend has worked on sexual harassment suits and says it's unfortunate that, as far as he's experienced, every single one he's been involved in has been bogus. Meanwhile, he knows there are several people with good cases who don't bring them, because the social penalties are too high. Part of the reason I believe her is that she isn't bringing suit. She's not trying to make a payday out of this. Further, she has alleged specific acts which can be definitely proven or disproven. If she made it up, it would be trivial for Uber to show she did so.

LordHumungous 10y ago

>I've seen this type of complain at every single company I worked for Wow, I have never encountered that kind of thing (admittedly I've only worked at 3 companies)

shados 10y ago
Everyone took what I said the wrong way, so Im pretty sure I worded it very poorly. That's on me. I'm not saying that all companies are bad at dealing with complains. I'm saying that for every company with a non-trivial amount of employees, there will be a bunch of said employees complaining that they made big complains that were ignored. "Management never listens to my brilliant ideas!" "We're all underpaid!" "People cry under their desk every day!" "The CEO doesn't understand my brilliant idea I figured out in 30 seconds!" There's always people like that everywhere, and it makes it very hard to distinguish companies that actually take their employees seriously from companies like Uber without actually working there. That's all I meant.

watwut 10y ago

There must be something wrong with the way you choose companies to work for. My employers were pretty low on this kind of drama.

shados 10y ago

For anyone reading my above comment and who will not go through the sub threads: I did not mean that I see sexual harassment claims like this one everywhere. When I said "Ive seen this type of complain", I was talking about the person I was replying to. Employees who say the company never do anything when they bitch about stuff. Employees bitch a lot, so its hard to tell apart companies like what Uber seems to be, from companies with a lot of whiny employees, without actually working there. Short of the Apple and Googles of the world, or the little koolaid trendy startups, all companies have a percentage of fussy employees who will say their employers screwed them over, so we have to take what people say with a grain of salt. Because we have to take so much with a grain of salt, we can't proactively find real offenders (as easily).