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Possibly that such a recruitment filter would exclude a lot of people with depression or anxiety-related mental illness. To clarify, I hate talking about my ac

Possibly that such a recruitment filter would exclude a lot of people with depression or anxiety-related mental illness. To clarify, I hate talking about my accomplishments, it makes me feel deeply anxious and uncomfortable, and will say as much if asked. But I’ll also do it if that’s what’s required of me.

jodrellblank 8y ago
.. so you're saying it would be an effective filter, for the suggested purpose?
- myhf 8y ago
  It would be an effective way to commit illegal discrimination.
  - hawkice 8y ago
    I mean, discussing your work with your coworkers is a pretty reasonable workplace responsibility. What's illegal about asking if someone was comfortable doing it?
    - hnra 8y ago
      Not discussing, talking about. Not work, accomplishments. Not comfortable, liking it. I guess those would be the differences. "Do you like talking about your accomplishments with the rest of your team?" "Are you comfortable discussing your work with the rest of your team?"
      - ascar 8y ago
        But why shouldn't companies be able to hire only employees that like and fit into how the company is run, i.e. culture fit. Every company is different and attracts different kinds of employees for various reasons. Anti-discrimination is important, but it shouldn't go too far.
        andrewingram 8y ago
        The key is to make your culture filter not cause people who actually would be a good fit to self-filter. Mental illness is insidious because it can make people who actually would enjoy something if given the right push instead think/assume that they don't want to do it. It affects a large enough percentage of the population that it's something companies need to be thinking about. One of my friends worked for a company where one of the official values was "100%", and to me this was problematic because different people would understand it to mean different things. Some would assume that it just means that everyone works hard, that it's not a cushy job. Whilst others would interpret it to mean that everyone works crazy hours and is expected to give their life to the business at the expense of other commitments. My friend couldn't recognise that different people would interpret the value differently, so believed it was a perfectly reasonable way to get the wrong kinds of candidates to self-filter.
      - hawkice 8y ago
        I'm not sure there's any legal significance to those minute phrasing changes.
    - jodrellblank 8y ago
      I was wondering this, I thought the discrimination was about disability, particularly, and "depression and social anxiety" are casually considered illnesses rather than disabilities. https://www.gov.uk/reasonable-adjustments-for-disabled-workers https://www.gov.uk/reasonable-adjustments-for-disabled-worke... says "Employers must make reasonable adjustments to make sure workers with disabilities, or physical or mental health conditions, aren’t substantially disadvantaged when doing their jobs." and the examples given on the gov.uk site include a specific mention of an anxiety disorder "doing things another way, such as allowing someone with social anxiety disorder to have their own desk instead of hot-desking" But I don't know where "reasonable adjustments" comes in with this. "I have social anxiety and don't want to present in front of a group, may I send an email instead" sounds reasonable to me. "I don't want to send an email, someone else will have to do this part of the job" doesn't sound reasonable. You don't reasonably hire one person to do a job, then hire another person to the parts the first person cannot do, right? But I'm no lawyer.
      - hawkice 8y ago
        Considering it is an email in the case of Stripe, I think you're analysis is correct.
ascar 8y ago
And there are many companies that value humbleness. I love sharing my accomplishments. I know what's socially expected from me, but not sharing feels really bad to me. It feels as all the work I've done and that cool accomplishment don't matter at all. Therefore I mostly share with friends, though most of them lack the necessary tech-knowledge to really understand it. I also love hearing about others accomplishments in an easy to digest way. These shipped emails seem like great way to spread knowledge and a positive attitude of getting stuff done. What I, and the comment you replied to want to say, everyone is different. Let me work at a company that encourages sharing accomplishments and go work for one that values humbleness. But at least please don't take it away from me, just because you don't like it, especially if it's optional.
- andrewingram 8y ago
  To clarify, I’m not criticising the idea of sharing accomplishments. I’m referring to having to like doing it being a criteria for recruitment. I was proposing a possible reason as to why the comment I was replying to was receiving downvotes.
80386 8y ago
I've been diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorder. I don't have a tech job yet (I have a hard time applying to jobs, for... obvious reasons), but I keep a public log of accomplishments for my weekend projects, announce them when other people might be interested in new features, and so on. Different people are different. It'll exclude a lot of people, but not all of them, and it certainly wouldn't be clear-cut discrimination.

jodrellblank 8y ago

.. so you're saying it would be an effective filter, for the suggested purpose?

myhf 8y ago
It would be an effective way to commit illegal discrimination.
- hawkice 8y ago
  I mean, discussing your work with your coworkers is a pretty reasonable workplace responsibility. What's illegal about asking if someone was comfortable doing it?
  - hnra 8y ago
    Not discussing, talking about. Not work, accomplishments. Not comfortable, liking it. I guess those would be the differences. "Do you like talking about your accomplishments with the rest of your team?" "Are you comfortable discussing your work with the rest of your team?"
    - ascar 8y ago
      But why shouldn't companies be able to hire only employees that like and fit into how the company is run, i.e. culture fit. Every company is different and attracts different kinds of employees for various reasons. Anti-discrimination is important, but it shouldn't go too far.
      - andrewingram 8y ago
        The key is to make your culture filter not cause people who actually would be a good fit to self-filter. Mental illness is insidious because it can make people who actually would enjoy something if given the right push instead think/assume that they don't want to do it. It affects a large enough percentage of the population that it's something companies need to be thinking about. One of my friends worked for a company where one of the official values was "100%", and to me this was problematic because different people would understand it to mean different things. Some would assume that it just means that everyone works hard, that it's not a cushy job. Whilst others would interpret it to mean that everyone works crazy hours and is expected to give their life to the business at the expense of other commitments. My friend couldn't recognise that different people would interpret the value differently, so believed it was a perfectly reasonable way to get the wrong kinds of candidates to self-filter.
    - hawkice 8y ago
      I'm not sure there's any legal significance to those minute phrasing changes.
  - jodrellblank 8y ago
    I was wondering this, I thought the discrimination was about disability, particularly, and "depression and social anxiety" are casually considered illnesses rather than disabilities. https://www.gov.uk/reasonable-adjustments-for-disabled-workers https://www.gov.uk/reasonable-adjustments-for-disabled-worke... says "Employers must make reasonable adjustments to make sure workers with disabilities, or physical or mental health conditions, aren’t substantially disadvantaged when doing their jobs." and the examples given on the gov.uk site include a specific mention of an anxiety disorder "doing things another way, such as allowing someone with social anxiety disorder to have their own desk instead of hot-desking" But I don't know where "reasonable adjustments" comes in with this. "I have social anxiety and don't want to present in front of a group, may I send an email instead" sounds reasonable to me. "I don't want to send an email, someone else will have to do this part of the job" doesn't sound reasonable. You don't reasonably hire one person to do a job, then hire another person to the parts the first person cannot do, right? But I'm no lawyer.
    - hawkice 8y ago
      Considering it is an email in the case of Stripe, I think you're analysis is correct.

ascar 8y ago

And there are many companies that value humbleness. I love sharing my accomplishments. I know what's socially expected from me, but not sharing feels really bad to me. It feels as all the work I've done and that cool accomplishment don't matter at all. Therefore I mostly share with friends, though most of them lack the necessary tech-knowledge to really understand it. I also love hearing about others accomplishments in an easy to digest way. These shipped emails seem like great way to spread knowledge and a positive attitude of getting stuff done. What I, and the comment you replied to want to say, everyone is different. Let me work at a company that encourages sharing accomplishments and go work for one that values humbleness. But at least please don't take it away from me, just because you don't like it, especially if it's optional.

andrewingram 8y ago
To clarify, I’m not criticising the idea of sharing accomplishments. I’m referring to having to like doing it being a criteria for recruitment. I was proposing a possible reason as to why the comment I was replying to was receiving downvotes.

80386 8y ago

I've been diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorder. I don't have a tech job yet (I have a hard time applying to jobs, for... obvious reasons), but I keep a public log of accomplishments for my weekend projects, announce them when other people might be interested in new features, and so on. Different people are different. It'll exclude a lot of people, but not all of them, and it certainly wouldn't be clear-cut discrimination.