5 ms·

In the military we work with all sorts of people, at least with respect to gender, race, religion, and to a lesser extent sexuality. At the same time, admitted

by VLM 9y ago

In the military we work with all sorts of people, at least with respect to gender, race, religion, and to a lesser extent sexuality. At the same time, admittedly most were Republican and none of us did drugs. If you're willing work with Republicans and/or non-drug users (most tech people are super far left and absolutely will not) then working for an ex-mil manager or with ex-mil coworkers will likely be an extremely pleasant experience as they're very comfortable around people of color and women. On the other hand, if weed smoking on duty and membership in Antifa is also required (why?), the ex-mil department might not be as good of a fit. On a larger scale piece of advice, even if you don't apply this specific match, it is useful to consider that its highly unlikely that your definition of the progressive stack perfectly and precisely matches everyone else on the planets individual definition of the progressive stack, so hopefully inspired by this post, you'll pay close attention to variations in progressive stack composition, assuming you pick your next job solely on political compatibility.

hfkeysrdhf 9y ago
If you're willing work with Republicans and/or non-drug users (most tech people are super far left and absolutely will not) The vast majority of tech workers either do not care or would dislike it if their co-workers did drugs. To say that they would only work with people who use drugs is preposterous. Also, even at the Silicon Valley companies whose workers you are presumably referring to, political ideologies are, in my own experience, much more diverse than you may expect.
bethly 9y ago
That was not my experience working at a defense contractor, and it was obviously not because I do drugs. I haven't found military service a relevant signal for levels of sexism, either positive or negative.
- VLM 9y ago
  I find that last observation very interesting. Decades ago, my Reserves unit was extremely diverse compared to every IT environment I've ever worked in since then. I had a female sergeant, a black SFC platoon leader... In my civilian career I had exactly one female superior and I worked with exactly three black people, ever, so far, as numerous people have noted IT is super non-diverse. The prevailing strategy in the civilian world to improve things, under the assumption that non-diversity is bad, seems to be to bring the diversity numbers up, surely achieving military support unit levels of diversity is numerically impossible but a little higher would be realistic, and pounding out bad behavior although surely not as effectively as the military pounds out bad behavior. Then things will magically be better. Apparently at least sometimes that strategy is unsuccessful as the military is obviously vastly far superior to civilian environments by both metrics yet the result is not superior. Of course there might be sample size anecdotal issues, etc. If the observed primary civilian strategy is measurably and comparatively a failure mode, then what strategies DO work?
  - bethly 9y ago
    I suspect part of the disconnect is that not all the ex-mil folks I've worked with were coming from support units: overall the military still has a lower percentage of women than software development does, and it was even lower when some of the people I was working with were enlisted. Also, although as a civilian I would never make such generalizations, it does seem that different branches attract different kinds of people. Military hiring, of taking all comers over certain transparently-published bars and then turfing out bad actors and training the rest, is a strategy I'm not sure any tech company has tried. I've long wanted to compare our interviewing strategies to "random" to see if our screening actually contributing anything to outcomes. It's not that there is nothing that could be learned, but as a woman I wouldn't use someone's veteran status as signal on whether or not they are likely to be sexist.
    - icco 9y ago
      > Military hiring, of taking all comers over certain transparently-published bars and then turfing out bad actors and training the rest, is a strategy I'm not sure any tech company has tried. I've long wanted to compare our interviewing strategies to "random" to see if our screening actually contributing anything to outcomes. This is an amazing point. I've never really thought about it before. Thanks!
camtarn 9y ago
...dude, what?! You have an incredibly weird, and adversarial, opinion of 'most tech people'. I'd work with Republican ex-military folks as long as they didn't force their political opinions on me, and I'd know that I should keep my (British moderate, so from American POV very far left) views to myself. I've worked on events with a couple of ex British army guys, and they are extremely competent and very interesting people.
viraptor 9y ago
To be honest, if anything, your preconception of other environments does not advertise your own environment well. I can't even tell if there's actually a tech company somewhere stupid enough to say they require someone to agree with antifa, or it's just made up. But mentioning that as something more than a crazy outlier is silly.
- astrodev 9y ago
  I don't think the remark about antifa was meant to be taken literally. Of course, no one will put it in the job description. Do you think it's easy to be supportive of the current US president, supportive of Brexit and sceptical of climate alarmism while working in tech (or in academia, for that matter)? I do not find it easy at all.
  - viraptor 9y ago
    Supportive, or actively promoting? I don't think it's any problem to be supportive - there's no reason it needs to be known in the workplace. You don't have to engage with your peers about your political views. I worked with people I don't agree with and we just didn't talk about it. (at work) It's a different thing if you want to actively talk about it, but then you need to be ready to receive the responses.
  - roguecoder 9y ago
    Not if that job relies on being able to evaluate evidence or change your beliefs on the basis of observed outcomes. But that's not because of value-less "political beliefs"; it's because people who prioritize partisanship over evidence, on either side of the political divide, are going to have problems in environments that reward responding to feedback. Anti-capitalist anarchists who don't believe in supply-and-demand probably have the same problem. Though openly supporting racist, anti-immigrant policies in a field with so many talented immigrants may actually be a unique challenge. Promoting policies that attack your coworkers seems like it would alienate a lot of people, at least if you expect to be able to share your beliefs about how people like them shouldn't exist.

by VLM 9y ago

hfkeysrdhf 9y ago

If you're willing work with Republicans and/or non-drug users (most tech people are super far left and absolutely will not) The vast majority of tech workers either do not care or would dislike it if their co-workers did drugs. To say that they would only work with people who use drugs is preposterous. Also, even at the Silicon Valley companies whose workers you are presumably referring to, political ideologies are, in my own experience, much more diverse than you may expect.

bethly 9y ago

That was not my experience working at a defense contractor, and it was obviously not because I do drugs. I haven't found military service a relevant signal for levels of sexism, either positive or negative.

VLM 9y ago
I find that last observation very interesting. Decades ago, my Reserves unit was extremely diverse compared to every IT environment I've ever worked in since then. I had a female sergeant, a black SFC platoon leader... In my civilian career I had exactly one female superior and I worked with exactly three black people, ever, so far, as numerous people have noted IT is super non-diverse. The prevailing strategy in the civilian world to improve things, under the assumption that non-diversity is bad, seems to be to bring the diversity numbers up, surely achieving military support unit levels of diversity is numerically impossible but a little higher would be realistic, and pounding out bad behavior although surely not as effectively as the military pounds out bad behavior. Then things will magically be better. Apparently at least sometimes that strategy is unsuccessful as the military is obviously vastly far superior to civilian environments by both metrics yet the result is not superior. Of course there might be sample size anecdotal issues, etc. If the observed primary civilian strategy is measurably and comparatively a failure mode, then what strategies DO work?
- bethly 9y ago
  I suspect part of the disconnect is that not all the ex-mil folks I've worked with were coming from support units: overall the military still has a lower percentage of women than software development does, and it was even lower when some of the people I was working with were enlisted. Also, although as a civilian I would never make such generalizations, it does seem that different branches attract different kinds of people. Military hiring, of taking all comers over certain transparently-published bars and then turfing out bad actors and training the rest, is a strategy I'm not sure any tech company has tried. I've long wanted to compare our interviewing strategies to "random" to see if our screening actually contributing anything to outcomes. It's not that there is nothing that could be learned, but as a woman I wouldn't use someone's veteran status as signal on whether or not they are likely to be sexist.
  - icco 9y ago
    > Military hiring, of taking all comers over certain transparently-published bars and then turfing out bad actors and training the rest, is a strategy I'm not sure any tech company has tried. I've long wanted to compare our interviewing strategies to "random" to see if our screening actually contributing anything to outcomes. This is an amazing point. I've never really thought about it before. Thanks!

camtarn 9y ago

...dude, what?! You have an incredibly weird, and adversarial, opinion of 'most tech people'. I'd work with Republican ex-military folks as long as they didn't force their political opinions on me, and I'd know that I should keep my (British moderate, so from American POV very far left) views to myself. I've worked on events with a couple of ex British army guys, and they are extremely competent and very interesting people.

viraptor 9y ago

To be honest, if anything, your preconception of other environments does not advertise your own environment well. I can't even tell if there's actually a tech company somewhere stupid enough to say they require someone to agree with antifa, or it's just made up. But mentioning that as something more than a crazy outlier is silly.

astrodev 9y ago
I don't think the remark about antifa was meant to be taken literally. Of course, no one will put it in the job description. Do you think it's easy to be supportive of the current US president, supportive of Brexit and sceptical of climate alarmism while working in tech (or in academia, for that matter)? I do not find it easy at all.
- viraptor 9y ago
  Supportive, or actively promoting? I don't think it's any problem to be supportive - there's no reason it needs to be known in the workplace. You don't have to engage with your peers about your political views. I worked with people I don't agree with and we just didn't talk about it. (at work) It's a different thing if you want to actively talk about it, but then you need to be ready to receive the responses.
- roguecoder 9y ago
  Not if that job relies on being able to evaluate evidence or change your beliefs on the basis of observed outcomes. But that's not because of value-less "political beliefs"; it's because people who prioritize partisanship over evidence, on either side of the political divide, are going to have problems in environments that reward responding to feedback. Anti-capitalist anarchists who don't believe in supply-and-demand probably have the same problem. Though openly supporting racist, anti-immigrant policies in a field with so many talented immigrants may actually be a unique challenge. Promoting policies that attack your coworkers seems like it would alienate a lot of people, at least if you expect to be able to share your beliefs about how people like them shouldn't exist.