4 ms·

I should have explained better: why are smart people so bad at navigating the workplace? Gebru’s email was insane.

by pbreit 6y ago

fuzzfactor 6y ago
>why are smart people so bad at navigating the workplace? Maybe the workplace just isn't made for them?
whoooooo123 6y ago
Maybe they're not actually that smart? Or maybe it's about more than IQ?
pas 6y ago
https://www.platformer.news/p/the-withering-email-that-got-an-ethical https://www.platformer.news/p/the-withering-email-that-got-a... this one? I'm not familiar with US (nor FAANG) workplace culture, could you please explain what's so insane about it and why?
- pbreit 6y ago
  It's extremely poorly written and mostly nonsense.
  - pas 6y ago
    I agree it's poorly written - just like her twitter, and it even sounds nonsensical, but why is it nonsense? The basic point seems to be that she has been handled differently than others (discrimination), made to wait a lot; and that she has been handled a "final decision" without any explanation, which she tries to present as a big no-no and against any inclusion effort that Google officially virtue signals. Furthermore her point about how OKRs don't incentivize what officially is Google's policy (diversity, equity/egality, inclusion) seems like a solid point. Ironically Damore's memo tried to make the same "data driven" argument, and that made Google's blessed diversity team look pretty foolish, so he got fired because his style was also poor and nonsensical. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
  - dragonwriter 6y ago
    None of it's nonsense that I can see; a lot of it is jargon laden and clearly expecting people not have a lot of context people outside of Google wouldn't to understand details beyond the general shape of the point. And it's “poorly written” from the perspective of a formal document as it's fairly stream of consciousness without a lot of editing for structure, but it was a posting to an internal, by most accounts I've seen fairly informal, discussion group, but Google seems to be notorious for (1) having these, (2) encouraging their use for informal internal discussion aimed at improving the environment including critiquing internal cultural problems, and (3) intermittently deciding to treating the fact that people took them seriously about #2 as key factors in termination.
dragonwriter 6y ago
Maybe they aren't trying to navigate through the workplace as much as steer society including the workplace? Some people take a job for pay, and maybe would like to have an impact if they can fit it in. Some people take a job for impact, but don't mind the paycheck while they are there.

I should have explained better: why are smart people so bad at navigating the workplace? Gebru’s email was insane.

by pbreit 6y ago

I should have explained better: why are smart people so bad at navigating the workplace? Gebru’s email was insane.

fuzzfactor 6y ago

>why are smart people so bad at navigating the workplace? Maybe the workplace just isn't made for them?

whoooooo123 6y ago

Maybe they're not actually that smart? Or maybe it's about more than IQ?

pas 6y ago

https://www.platformer.news/p/the-withering-email-that-got-an-ethical https://www.platformer.news/p/the-withering-email-that-got-a... this one? I'm not familiar with US (nor FAANG) workplace culture, could you please explain what's so insane about it and why?

pbreit 6y ago
It's extremely poorly written and mostly nonsense.
- pas 6y ago
  I agree it's poorly written - just like her twitter, and it even sounds nonsensical, but why is it nonsense? The basic point seems to be that she has been handled differently than others (discrimination), made to wait a lot; and that she has been handled a "final decision" without any explanation, which she tries to present as a big no-no and against any inclusion effort that Google officially virtue signals. Furthermore her point about how OKRs don't incentivize what officially is Google's policy (diversity, equity/egality, inclusion) seems like a solid point. Ironically Damore's memo tried to make the same "data driven" argument, and that made Google's blessed diversity team look pretty foolish, so he got fired because his style was also poor and nonsensical. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
- dragonwriter 6y ago
  None of it's nonsense that I can see; a lot of it is jargon laden and clearly expecting people not have a lot of context people outside of Google wouldn't to understand details beyond the general shape of the point. And it's “poorly written” from the perspective of a formal document as it's fairly stream of consciousness without a lot of editing for structure, but it was a posting to an internal, by most accounts I've seen fairly informal, discussion group, but Google seems to be notorious for (1) having these, (2) encouraging their use for informal internal discussion aimed at improving the environment including critiquing internal cultural problems, and (3) intermittently deciding to treating the fact that people took them seriously about #2 as key factors in termination.

dragonwriter 6y ago

Maybe they aren't trying to navigate through the workplace as much as steer society including the workplace? Some people take a job for pay, and maybe would like to have an impact if they can fit it in. Some people take a job for impact, but don't mind the paycheck while they are there.