3 ms·

I read the whole thing and I feel for her, especially around all the gendered language she has had to deal with, but had some thoughts. I want to make construc

I read the whole thing and I feel for her, especially around all the gendered language she has had to deal with, but had some thoughts. I want to make constructive criticisms (which is extremely difficult in the context of someone perceiving harm), but I'd prefer not to get downvoted, so I will try to be as empathetic as possible when stating the following. > I have a strong opinion about diversity hires: Although I don’t think they are a perfect solution, I consider them an effective measure to break the ceiling glass that excludes minorities from certain roles. > Was I only selected because I was the only female applicant? Would I have passed the technical assessment? Would I keep moving up the company hierarchy only because I had a minority pass? Did they think that I wouldn’t mind knowing my own recruitment criteria? These things are exactly why some people are against this way of increasing diversity. Critics of forced diversity hiring see this as a direct and obvious (at least to them) consequence of this practice; her experiencing the result is rather unsurprising (her surprise, however, is). She also does not suggest a better solution, so this just seems like whining (the definition of which is "complaining about a situation without a known solution"). I'd suggest that she probably wasn't informed that she was a diversity hire because intuitively, people know this is a shameful practice without great consequences... > I have never considered that “having chemistry with the team” could be a reason for being let go. Guess what? After a quick Google search about “cultural fitting in tech,” I discovered that is an argument often used by tech companies to disguise a discriminatory preference. She links to an example of this, but the example is just another person pulling the racism card when the only example that person gave was not drinking after work with coworkers. You can't expect people to not see you as a diversity hire, but only when it is convenient for you... if you want them to not see you as one when hiring you, but if when letting go of you for some given reason, you want to jump to conclusions based on diversity... you're gonna need much better evidence than that. "Cultural fit" is unfortunately a very valid condition for hire, at least if the goal is productivity and happiness: https://smallbusiness.chron.com/importance-relationships-workplace-10380.html https://smallbusiness.chron.com/importance-relationships-wor... The fact that "lack of cultural fit" SEEMS TO sometimes fall along diversity lines, is not so much a problem with diversity hiring as it is a problem of people just hanging out too much with other people who seem more like them, something that is (unfortunately) a natural inclination and something that literally every one of us should be consciously fighting. But it's a subpar situation, for sure.

em-bee 6y ago
i disagree with the validity of cultural fit. if there is a problem with someone fitting into the culture, then it is the culture that needs to change. letting someone go because they don't participate in after-work activities or because they don't drink alcohol is unacceptable. as is letting someone go because of gender differences. yes, some people have a problem working together. carl in the story is a good example. carl is someone i would let go because he is uncooperative. this again has nothing to do with cultural fit. and especially if the difference in cultures falls along diversity lines, i would very carefully examine what the actual culture is and make a strong effort to push for a culture change.
- pmarreck 6y ago
  > if there is a problem with someone fitting into the culture, then it is the culture that needs to change. I don't think this is realistic. Suppose I move to Texas and manage to start working for a company that likes to watch rodeos on weekends and listens to country music all day in the office. Meanwhile, I'm a techno guy who can't stand rodeos nor country music. I start to get irritated with the all-day-country thing, and (as it turns out) work sometimes gets discussed at these rodeos everyone else is going to that I'm missing, so I always end up a little behind where everyone's at regarding work stuff. The rest of the team starts to perceive this as me "not really caring" or whatever, and eventually I get fired due to "lack of fit". I cannot claim veiled discrimination because I am a white male getting fired by other white males (and perhaps some females, but not 50%). Do you really expect the entire company to conform to my taste in things? I took race and gender out of the picture here to try to show that this is unrealistic. > carl is someone i would let go because he is uncooperative. Honestly it's weird that he was even kept around. Sometimes, people who are willing to butt heads on something are good workers, though. > if the difference in cultures falls along diversity lines, i would very carefully examine what the actual culture is and make a strong effort to push for a culture change. I think the best time to do this is at the start, because I also think that after you get above, say, 20 people, the cultural trajectory has already been set and it becomes massively harder to change.
  - em-bee 6y ago

em-bee 6y ago

i disagree with the validity of cultural fit. if there is a problem with someone fitting into the culture, then it is the culture that needs to change. letting someone go because they don't participate in after-work activities or because they don't drink alcohol is unacceptable. as is letting someone go because of gender differences. yes, some people have a problem working together. carl in the story is a good example. carl is someone i would let go because he is uncooperative. this again has nothing to do with cultural fit. and especially if the difference in cultures falls along diversity lines, i would very carefully examine what the actual culture is and make a strong effort to push for a culture change.

pmarreck 6y ago
> if there is a problem with someone fitting into the culture, then it is the culture that needs to change. I don't think this is realistic. Suppose I move to Texas and manage to start working for a company that likes to watch rodeos on weekends and listens to country music all day in the office. Meanwhile, I'm a techno guy who can't stand rodeos nor country music. I start to get irritated with the all-day-country thing, and (as it turns out) work sometimes gets discussed at these rodeos everyone else is going to that I'm missing, so I always end up a little behind where everyone's at regarding work stuff. The rest of the team starts to perceive this as me "not really caring" or whatever, and eventually I get fired due to "lack of fit". I cannot claim veiled discrimination because I am a white male getting fired by other white males (and perhaps some females, but not 50%). Do you really expect the entire company to conform to my taste in things? I took race and gender out of the picture here to try to show that this is unrealistic. > carl is someone i would let go because he is uncooperative. Honestly it's weird that he was even kept around. Sometimes, people who are willing to butt heads on something are good workers, though. > if the difference in cultures falls along diversity lines, i would very carefully examine what the actual culture is and make a strong effort to push for a culture change. I think the best time to do this is at the start, because I also think that after you get above, say, 20 people, the cultural trajectory has already been set and it becomes massively harder to change.
- em-bee 6y ago