8 ms·

As a woman who worked at MSFT through the Ballmer era, I have to agree with this whole article. It really nailed it. Especially this part near the end where

by cbanek 7y ago

As a woman who worked at MSFT through the Ballmer era, I have to agree with this whole article. It really nailed it. Especially this part near the end where I never felt it would get better: "But my former female colleagues who reviewed this document in advance of its publication are unconvinced. None of them report feeling emboldened by the new Microsoft. They continue to withhold reports of discriminatory management practices. They relate stories of reports of abuse going unpunished and continue to fear reprisals for speaking out. In fact, multiple reviewers noted, independently, the irony that the only reason I am comfortable enough to speak out is that I am a “50-year old white dude” and, thus, girded against reprisal from the body politic. So they remain silent when, in fact, they are among the voices Microsoft needs to hear the most. Apparently, Microsoft has dipped only a single toe in the river that flows to the future."

kylec 7y ago
According to Satya Nadella, the system is "long term efficient", so it'll all work itself out eventually https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2014/10/10/microsoft-ceo-nadella-comments-social-media/17031569/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2014/10/10/microsoft-ceo...
- BubRoss 7y ago
  Anyone can sell the future.
- bjornsing 7y ago
  > "All HR systems are long term efficient, short term inefficient." That’s an amazingly stupid comment from an obviously very smart person (Nadella). I’m quite sure it’s not true for women who do not ask for raises, but in my experience it’s not true in general either. Most HR systems tend to produce, promote and reward a certain kind of behavior - and that behavior is seldom very value creating. Paraphrasing Nadella I’d rather say “All HR systems are short term inefficient, and most are long-term inefficient. Some are even outright ruinous, at least for the company and it’s shareholders, who (unlike employees) have no escape.”
anon1m0us 7y ago
How do you get your employer to hear you? I don't think these problems are isolated to women. I think women just don't understand that there's an "old boys club" that attacks other men too. I know lots of men who say the same things. Pitting employees against each other. The masters recruiting spies from among the ranks to report dissenting comments from the servants. Cutting back on coffee breaks. Not being allowed to report actual time worked because you're an exempt employee so your boss can say, "I'm not aware of any overtime being worked." Uh that's because you won't allow me to enter more than the minimum. This happens to more than just women. Instead of pitting one bullied group against another, bullied people need to rise up against a system that rewards bullies at the expense of the employees with integrity! Companies are losing SO much value from their greatest employees because they are afraid to be noticed. You do something great for your employer and everyone else says, "Show off." or "You're making the rest of us look bad." or "Overachiever". They force great employees to be mediocre. Even managers do the same thing. If you find a problem with your boss's code -- watch out! This is not a problem women experience. It's a problem people experience.
- mieseratte 7y ago
  > How do you get your employer to hear you? I don't think these problems are isolated to women. I think women just don't understand that there's an "old boys club" that attacks other men too. I know lots of men who say the same things. If anyone thinks this is a problem exclusive to men, conservatives, or whatever group it's en vogue to pillory they're flat-out ignorant. I've seen women in power be utterly despicable to their fellow woman. I've seen #woke managers belittle the pious. The real test of character is, when discussing these issues, do you assume immutable aspects are to blame or do you consider alternative realities. Maybe "those people" are bad for being "those people," maybe they just suck. Edit: The no comment downvote brigade is here, go ahead and flag me too. While you're at it, leave a comment telling me you're downvoting me because I said something about it.
  - Infinitesimus 7y ago
    A lot of people do not realize this. The reality is that corporate culture has incentivized and rewarded certain behaviors (manifesting as sexism, racism, bullying, extroversion, whatever ) over and over again and people are slowly pushing back. It took a while for 'executive' to not only mean "older caucasian male in a suit". For all its thorny parts, the increase in exposure of these issues will help more employees realize the power imbalance and try to define a better and more inclusive corporate culture
thomasmeeks 7y ago
That paragraph tracks with what I've heard from female peers that work at Microsoft too. Microsoft talks a good game but fails to do the right thing when the going gets tough (e.g. senior leaders can, and do, retaliate against individual contributors that annoy them with the full support of HR business partners). I'm expecting a massive backlash against the "culture-forward" style of running a company as the article describes. There's always been a lot of cynicism around things like company values, but that cynicism appears to be increasing at a rapid pace with a meaningful portion of employees (see all the recent articles about Google's internal culture). It doesn't have to be a majority of employees, 20-30% is plenty to materially affect an organization. Personally, the reason is that a company ultimately isn't "culture-forward" unless if it's willing to take a financial hit in order preserve its culture. Few companies are willing to do that, and that's OK, we are a capitalist society after all. It just isn't OK to hammer culture like its the most important thing while twisting themselves in logical knots to justify highly-profitable activities and actions that the employees call out as being counter-cultural. Some of those conflicts become public & newsworthy (ICE contracts), most of it doesn't (retaining that effective asshole). Importantly, whether or not senior leadership agrees with the vocal (often significant minority) employees is besides the point. It's a communication issue -- they've created an expectation that isn't being matched -- not an issue of truth. Many of these "culture-forward" companies are losing the ability to tell their employees to "shut up and work" because they've explicitly said they don't want day-to-day work to operate in that manner. But for some reason senior leadership hasn't figured out that they can't operate like that anymore either when they push a culture like Microsoft has. I think the end game here is companies like Microsoft painting themselves into a corner where a big, big, fight over unionization is all but inevitable. Knowledge workers want a seat at the table precisely because companies have told them they should have that precisely because it improves the bottom line on a small team to be self-organizing (see: Google's project aristotle for more).
ryuukk_ 7y ago
you start your sentence with "as a woman" therefore you loose all credibility

by cbanek 7y ago

kylec 7y ago

According to Satya Nadella, the system is "long term efficient", so it'll all work itself out eventually https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2014/10/10/microsoft-ceo-nadella-comments-social-media/17031569/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2014/10/10/microsoft-ceo...

BubRoss 7y ago
Anyone can sell the future.
bjornsing 7y ago
> "All HR systems are long term efficient, short term inefficient." That’s an amazingly stupid comment from an obviously very smart person (Nadella). I’m quite sure it’s not true for women who do not ask for raises, but in my experience it’s not true in general either. Most HR systems tend to produce, promote and reward a certain kind of behavior - and that behavior is seldom very value creating. Paraphrasing Nadella I’d rather say “All HR systems are short term inefficient, and most are long-term inefficient. Some are even outright ruinous, at least for the company and it’s shareholders, who (unlike employees) have no escape.”

anon1m0us 7y ago

How do you get your employer to hear you? I don't think these problems are isolated to women. I think women just don't understand that there's an "old boys club" that attacks other men too. I know lots of men who say the same things. Pitting employees against each other. The masters recruiting spies from among the ranks to report dissenting comments from the servants. Cutting back on coffee breaks. Not being allowed to report actual time worked because you're an exempt employee so your boss can say, "I'm not aware of any overtime being worked." Uh that's because you won't allow me to enter more than the minimum. This happens to more than just women. Instead of pitting one bullied group against another, bullied people need to rise up against a system that rewards bullies at the expense of the employees with integrity! Companies are losing SO much value from their greatest employees because they are afraid to be noticed. You do something great for your employer and everyone else says, "Show off." or "You're making the rest of us look bad." or "Overachiever". They force great employees to be mediocre. Even managers do the same thing. If you find a problem with your boss's code -- watch out! This is not a problem women experience. It's a problem people experience.

mieseratte 7y ago
> How do you get your employer to hear you? I don't think these problems are isolated to women. I think women just don't understand that there's an "old boys club" that attacks other men too. I know lots of men who say the same things. If anyone thinks this is a problem exclusive to men, conservatives, or whatever group it's en vogue to pillory they're flat-out ignorant. I've seen women in power be utterly despicable to their fellow woman. I've seen #woke managers belittle the pious. The real test of character is, when discussing these issues, do you assume immutable aspects are to blame or do you consider alternative realities. Maybe "those people" are bad for being "those people," maybe they just suck. Edit: The no comment downvote brigade is here, go ahead and flag me too. While you're at it, leave a comment telling me you're downvoting me because I said something about it.
- Infinitesimus 7y ago
  A lot of people do not realize this. The reality is that corporate culture has incentivized and rewarded certain behaviors (manifesting as sexism, racism, bullying, extroversion, whatever ) over and over again and people are slowly pushing back. It took a while for 'executive' to not only mean "older caucasian male in a suit". For all its thorny parts, the increase in exposure of these issues will help more employees realize the power imbalance and try to define a better and more inclusive corporate culture

thomasmeeks 7y ago

That paragraph tracks with what I've heard from female peers that work at Microsoft too. Microsoft talks a good game but fails to do the right thing when the going gets tough (e.g. senior leaders can, and do, retaliate against individual contributors that annoy them with the full support of HR business partners). I'm expecting a massive backlash against the "culture-forward" style of running a company as the article describes. There's always been a lot of cynicism around things like company values, but that cynicism appears to be increasing at a rapid pace with a meaningful portion of employees (see all the recent articles about Google's internal culture). It doesn't have to be a majority of employees, 20-30% is plenty to materially affect an organization. Personally, the reason is that a company ultimately isn't "culture-forward" unless if it's willing to take a financial hit in order preserve its culture. Few companies are willing to do that, and that's OK, we are a capitalist society after all. It just isn't OK to hammer culture like its the most important thing while twisting themselves in logical knots to justify highly-profitable activities and actions that the employees call out as being counter-cultural. Some of those conflicts become public & newsworthy (ICE contracts), most of it doesn't (retaining that effective asshole). Importantly, whether or not senior leadership agrees with the vocal (often significant minority) employees is besides the point. It's a communication issue -- they've created an expectation that isn't being matched -- not an issue of truth. Many of these "culture-forward" companies are losing the ability to tell their employees to "shut up and work" because they've explicitly said they don't want day-to-day work to operate in that manner. But for some reason senior leadership hasn't figured out that they can't operate like that anymore either when they push a culture like Microsoft has. I think the end game here is companies like Microsoft painting themselves into a corner where a big, big, fight over unionization is all but inevitable. Knowledge workers want a seat at the table precisely because companies have told them they should have that precisely because it improves the bottom line on a small team to be self-organizing (see: Google's project aristotle for more).

ryuukk_ 7y ago

you start your sentence with "as a woman" therefore you loose all credibility