6 ms·

I understand some of the reasons why some managers think that way, but you can't have such simplistic rules. An ultimatum like this is an opportunity for a res

by cmsj 6y ago

I understand some of the reasons why some managers think that way, but you can't have such simplistic rules. An ultimatum like this is an opportunity for a responsible manager to talk and rethink, but it seems like Google jumped at the opportunity to double-down on their mistake and then send out cowardly emails claiming the employee had actually resigned. If I were to apply a simplistic rule here, I would actually invert it - if you get to a point where you are sufficiently undervalued that you feel the need to issue an ultimatum, you basically have to resign.

nickff 6y ago
The problem with accepting anti-social behavior is that you encourage it. This individual or another will use the same strategy against you in the future, and it will create antagonism and toxicity. No, an ultimatum is a choice between two options; she offered Google a choice, and they selected. Expecting them to try to carve out a 'third way' is just unrealistic. I agree that you can frame this many ways; she could have portrayed this as her resigning in protest, instead of blaming Google for being vindictive.
- saagarjha 6y ago
  > No, an ultimatum is a choice between two options; she offered Google a choice, and they selected. Expecting them to try to carve out a 'third way' is just unrealistic. But you're claiming that for a company there shouldn't be a choice, it should just lead to termination.
  - nickff 6y ago
    Well, the company is in slightly different position from the manager. They can abrogate the manager's authority, but that would permanently undermine that individual. On the other hand, they can also choose to accept the subordinate's resignation. They could try to transfer the subordinate somewhere else, but that's also risky, and wouldn't really address the ultimatum in this case. Accepting a resignation achieves three separate objectives: -resolves the ultimatum -discourages future ultimatums -preserves the status quo ante
    - saagarjha 6y ago
      I think you're coming at the ultimatum from some sort of strange power dynamic perspective, where an employee who successfully gets their ultimatum approved somehow disenfranchises their manager of their authority, enabling future employees to…what? Vie for the managerial position? This has a "crush dissent" kind of vibe. In every employment contract there is a balance of things and employee is willing to do and an employer is willing to provide in exchange. If my boss said that they wouldn't pay me anymore I would rightfully respond with an "ultimatum" of "pay me or I quit". That's the ultimatum they respond to every day by paying me; they look at the balance of things I offer, consider what I provide to the company to be adequate, and then give me the money I ask for. The same is true for any ultimatum: you come to the table with one final negotiation; the negotiation of "do you value me? Then you must provide me this". It's an entirely transactional exchange. Now, ultimatums are general to be discouraged not because they undermine some sort of authority, but because they are a sign that negotiations have broken down on both sides. As a manager, your goal should be to try to reach a compromise far before that point–not only does to hurt your relationship if you don't, even when the ultimatum is "successful" from the point of the employee, but by letting a conflict reach an ultimatum point you're exposing yourself to significant risk and often poor deals. The way to handle an ultimatum is to forestall "pay me x or I quit" with "I'll pay you almost x if you show good performance for the next three months". If you are at the point where the argument is "I'm going to quit" then yes, you may have to carry through with the termination if you think what they provide is less valuable than what they want from you, but you should really be looking at what you did to get to that point instead.
      - free_rms 6y ago
        Critical race/gender theory is all about power dynamics permeating every interaction. You might think that's exhausting, I certainly do, but that's what we're dealing with here.
        dvtrn 6y ago
        You might think that's exhausting, I certainly do Why? Is there something about CRT that threatens your means and way of living, or is it forcing a type of introspection about what minorities have and continue to go through in various forms and machinations you'd rather not entertain?
- tempest_ 6y ago
  Ah the old I don't want to do my job and accept that there "was nothing I could do" which is middle management bullshit. It is fine if you think that, but accept that you are the weak one here. If you want to err on the side of keeping your job it's fine, but don't pretend you didn't make a trade off. You do not have to accept anti social behavior but a good manager would have handled this and it would never have reached this point, public or otherwise. This whole episode is failure of management top to bottom.
  - nickff 6y ago
    Respectfully, we don't have enough information to judge whether she was net-positive to the team who was acting reasonably. That's a complex calculation, and I don't know whether management triumphed or failed. It does seem like she judged the situation incorrectly, as she is now complaining, not gloating.
    - tempest_ 6y ago
      That is sorta my entire point. The fact that this has over-flowed into the public sphere is a failure. If they handled the situation correctly it should have been sorted internally. Whether the person in question spilled the beans at all is proof of that. Managing people is a skill, and being good at computer science does not make you a good manager. They should know that complaining to social media is an option that someone might take and they should consider that when dealing with these issues. The fact that we are here discussing anything at all proves the above, It isnt 1995, if someone feels slighted for whatever reason, expect it show up on Twitter, true or not. You don't want to be chasing the narrative with a potentially one sided google doc. No one is giving the mega corp the benefit of the doubt in 2020 which means it is bad PR either way.
      - nickff 6y ago
        You asserted: "a good manager would have handled this and it would never have reached this point, public or otherwise. This whole episode is failure of management top to bottom." My point is that I do not know whether this situation could have been handled better. We don't know enough to judge whether this could have been sorted out neatly. You seem to think that a clean resolution was possible, and you might be right, or you might be wrong.
- ska 6y ago
  > The problem with accepting anti-social behavior is that you encourage it. Not saying it's wrong or right, but couldn't she make the exactly symmetric argument?
  - nickff 6y ago
    She definitely could, and she could present herself as the hero of the story who resigned in protest, but she has chosen a different narrative.
    - mempko 6y ago
      She is clearly the hero. Public seems to be on her side.
  - kortilla 6y ago
    No, they didn’t give her an ultimatum.
    - ska 6y ago
      Is that the only form of anti-social behaviour? The description of the rejection process is similarly inflexible...
- GVIrish 6y ago
  Is it anti-social behavior if a company tells you, 'do X or else'? Even recently plenty of companies have told employees that they can move and work remotely but they had better report it so their salary can be adjusted. The penalty for not reporting being firing. Ultimatums shouldn't be a frequent occurrence but they are a part of business relationships. It seems a bit unfair for an employer to treat an employee ultimatum as a fireable offense when company policies are sometimes the equivalent. Employees sometimes decide that an employer ultimatum is offensive and quit sometimes too. But I don't think it is nor should be a set-in-stone rule that an employee that issues an ultimatum should be terminated.
jariel 6y ago
"an opportunity for a responsible manager to talk and rethink" Mostly it's an opportunity to let the staffer know that such ultimates are unacceptable, and that taken literally by her own terms - she could be called out and let go. Which is what happened. It's very doubtful that if they wanted to keep her, that they couldn't have found terms. Surely the manager would have bent, indicated the wording was a little bit strong, and found a way forward. It seems clear they were wavering, she crossed a line and offered them the path out and they took it. If there were material issues being covered up, there was material suppression of information, this story would look completely different - but there wasn't. This was the right thing to do by Google in a tricky situation.

by cmsj 6y ago

nickff 6y ago

The problem with accepting anti-social behavior is that you encourage it. This individual or another will use the same strategy against you in the future, and it will create antagonism and toxicity. No, an ultimatum is a choice between two options; she offered Google a choice, and they selected. Expecting them to try to carve out a 'third way' is just unrealistic. I agree that you can frame this many ways; she could have portrayed this as her resigning in protest, instead of blaming Google for being vindictive.

saagarjha 6y ago
> No, an ultimatum is a choice between two options; she offered Google a choice, and they selected. Expecting them to try to carve out a 'third way' is just unrealistic. But you're claiming that for a company there shouldn't be a choice, it should just lead to termination.
- nickff 6y ago
  Well, the company is in slightly different position from the manager. They can abrogate the manager's authority, but that would permanently undermine that individual. On the other hand, they can also choose to accept the subordinate's resignation. They could try to transfer the subordinate somewhere else, but that's also risky, and wouldn't really address the ultimatum in this case. Accepting a resignation achieves three separate objectives: -resolves the ultimatum -discourages future ultimatums -preserves the status quo ante
  - saagarjha 6y ago
    I think you're coming at the ultimatum from some sort of strange power dynamic perspective, where an employee who successfully gets their ultimatum approved somehow disenfranchises their manager of their authority, enabling future employees to…what? Vie for the managerial position? This has a "crush dissent" kind of vibe. In every employment contract there is a balance of things and employee is willing to do and an employer is willing to provide in exchange. If my boss said that they wouldn't pay me anymore I would rightfully respond with an "ultimatum" of "pay me or I quit". That's the ultimatum they respond to every day by paying me; they look at the balance of things I offer, consider what I provide to the company to be adequate, and then give me the money I ask for. The same is true for any ultimatum: you come to the table with one final negotiation; the negotiation of "do you value me? Then you must provide me this". It's an entirely transactional exchange. Now, ultimatums are general to be discouraged not because they undermine some sort of authority, but because they are a sign that negotiations have broken down on both sides. As a manager, your goal should be to try to reach a compromise far before that point–not only does to hurt your relationship if you don't, even when the ultimatum is "successful" from the point of the employee, but by letting a conflict reach an ultimatum point you're exposing yourself to significant risk and often poor deals. The way to handle an ultimatum is to forestall "pay me x or I quit" with "I'll pay you almost x if you show good performance for the next three months". If you are at the point where the argument is "I'm going to quit" then yes, you may have to carry through with the termination if you think what they provide is less valuable than what they want from you, but you should really be looking at what you did to get to that point instead.
    - free_rms 6y ago
      Critical race/gender theory is all about power dynamics permeating every interaction. You might think that's exhausting, I certainly do, but that's what we're dealing with here.
      - dvtrn 6y ago
        You might think that's exhausting, I certainly do Why? Is there something about CRT that threatens your means and way of living, or is it forcing a type of introspection about what minorities have and continue to go through in various forms and machinations you'd rather not entertain?
tempest_ 6y ago
Ah the old I don't want to do my job and accept that there "was nothing I could do" which is middle management bullshit. It is fine if you think that, but accept that you are the weak one here. If you want to err on the side of keeping your job it's fine, but don't pretend you didn't make a trade off. You do not have to accept anti social behavior but a good manager would have handled this and it would never have reached this point, public or otherwise. This whole episode is failure of management top to bottom.
- nickff 6y ago
  Respectfully, we don't have enough information to judge whether she was net-positive to the team who was acting reasonably. That's a complex calculation, and I don't know whether management triumphed or failed. It does seem like she judged the situation incorrectly, as she is now complaining, not gloating.
  - tempest_ 6y ago
    That is sorta my entire point. The fact that this has over-flowed into the public sphere is a failure. If they handled the situation correctly it should have been sorted internally. Whether the person in question spilled the beans at all is proof of that. Managing people is a skill, and being good at computer science does not make you a good manager. They should know that complaining to social media is an option that someone might take and they should consider that when dealing with these issues. The fact that we are here discussing anything at all proves the above, It isnt 1995, if someone feels slighted for whatever reason, expect it show up on Twitter, true or not. You don't want to be chasing the narrative with a potentially one sided google doc. No one is giving the mega corp the benefit of the doubt in 2020 which means it is bad PR either way.
    - nickff 6y ago
      You asserted: "a good manager would have handled this and it would never have reached this point, public or otherwise. This whole episode is failure of management top to bottom." My point is that I do not know whether this situation could have been handled better. We don't know enough to judge whether this could have been sorted out neatly. You seem to think that a clean resolution was possible, and you might be right, or you might be wrong.
ska 6y ago
> The problem with accepting anti-social behavior is that you encourage it. Not saying it's wrong or right, but couldn't she make the exactly symmetric argument?
- nickff 6y ago
  She definitely could, and she could present herself as the hero of the story who resigned in protest, but she has chosen a different narrative.
  - mempko 6y ago
    She is clearly the hero. Public seems to be on her side.
- kortilla 6y ago
  No, they didn’t give her an ultimatum.
  - ska 6y ago
    Is that the only form of anti-social behaviour? The description of the rejection process is similarly inflexible...
GVIrish 6y ago
Is it anti-social behavior if a company tells you, 'do X or else'? Even recently plenty of companies have told employees that they can move and work remotely but they had better report it so their salary can be adjusted. The penalty for not reporting being firing. Ultimatums shouldn't be a frequent occurrence but they are a part of business relationships. It seems a bit unfair for an employer to treat an employee ultimatum as a fireable offense when company policies are sometimes the equivalent. Employees sometimes decide that an employer ultimatum is offensive and quit sometimes too. But I don't think it is nor should be a set-in-stone rule that an employee that issues an ultimatum should be terminated.

jariel 6y ago

"an opportunity for a responsible manager to talk and rethink" Mostly it's an opportunity to let the staffer know that such ultimates are unacceptable, and that taken literally by her own terms - she could be called out and let go. Which is what happened. It's very doubtful that if they wanted to keep her, that they couldn't have found terms. Surely the manager would have bent, indicated the wording was a little bit strong, and found a way forward. It seems clear they were wavering, she crossed a line and offered them the path out and they took it. If there were material issues being covered up, there was material suppression of information, this story would look completely different - but there wasn't. This was the right thing to do by Google in a tricky situation.