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> I want to make a point about "culture fit" "culture fit" is one of the biggest causes of workplace discrimination and I still see it pushed in 'hiring traini

> I want to make a point about "culture fit" "culture fit" is one of the biggest causes of workplace discrimination and I still see it pushed in 'hiring training' as perfectly valid criteria. Things I've seen teams consider "culture" - will the candidate go to our weekly study session at the micro-brewery? - will the candidate stay after work to play multi-player games with us? - is the candidate entertained by all the Star Wars lingo we use? If you don't find these discriminatory, think about how well a recent poster from Gaza would have done with them. Not well, I suspect https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25849054 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25849054

UnpossibleJim 5y ago
As a side note (and a fully conjectural query), do you think that the desire of control of a branded monoculture in the work place is one of the reasons for the push to bring employees back to the workplace? You can separate the culture of Microsoft, Apple, Google, Facebook and Twitter as easily as any brand, like Nike and Reebok. Those cultural brands are surely dissolving without the guiding hand of in office guidelines.
- DaiPlusPlus 5y ago
  Speaking from experience, the “culture” at Microsoft and Google (at least) definitely varies more between teams and divisions than between those two companies on-the-whole.
  - UnpossibleJim 5y ago
    Fair enough. Nadella's hard push for the return is curious to me (I'm in the Seattle area, and close-ish to the campus with quite a few friends who work in a single team, so I'm a bit myopic, I suppose). They all seem to do well remotely, and I do also. I probably do work less hours, on the whole, but I produce more... so I dunno how that factors in. I can't speak to their quality of work, though.
    - mensetmanusman 5y ago
      It is strange, because the workers know that any slight uptick in productivity is going to be captured by Nadella and fellow 0.1%ers.
    - muffinman26 5y ago
      I'd be curious to see how the productivity data working remotely scales out for people at different levels. As a new college hire I found that both working in the office and open offices improved my productivity, often explicitly at the expense of productivity for more experienced developers (because they were spending time answering my questions). In the short term, it would be better for the more experienced developers to be more productive, because their time was worth more, but eventually the experienced developers will leave. If new people aren't trained to replace them fast enough, the system becomes unsustainable. There are several other areas where eliminating certain activities provides short-term productivity gains at the expense of long-term cohesion. All hands meetings about company direction can be delayed for a month with no negative impact, but if I skip all large company meetings for a year I'd have a much harder time prioritizing tasks (it's unclear which contribute directly to the company's long-term plans and which are busy work) and no idea how to route serious issue only tangentially related to my team. It's entirely possible there's a looming but currently well-hidden pipeline issue companies are anticipating and trying to avoid.
      - UnpossibleJim 5y ago
        Full disclosure, I'm in my late forties, so there's a definite impact on my work flow there. I honestly think that a hybrid style is the best, but I don't need to be in more than once a week (if that - usually) to be completely honest. Most of my communications are done over Slack, in office or not =[ my team is small and we just aren't that chatty of a group except on certain subjects. We're excited about Dune, and I'm sure everyone not in our team is ecstatic that we haven't gone back to the office yet. When we have a work question, we put it in the Slack channel. Stands ups have moved to Slack as well, which are great because I can reference exactly what was said and not a summary email by a "Scrum Master" like I'm in some corporate fantasy sports league- no offense to scrum masters out there. I've met some cool ones. We email our progress and it's handled and update on JIRA. I dunno, there seem to be enough tools for me. But, if you're starting out, it's a pain in the butt. When to ask questions and who to ask. Where to get guidance about what, and code reviews have to be done in person. They're super intimidating already (for me anyway). Meeting a core group of people your age at a company is important, as well. That's where you spend so much of your time and those social interactions can't be ignored. I keep in touch with people from jobs I worked at 20 years ago. They will help your network in life and career in the future, and that is all being stunted..... sorry. Got off track. But all important issues, depending on what stage of your life/career you're in.
- SuoDuanDao 5y ago
  I suspect the majority of it is that a lot of managers are finding themselves at loose ends. A typical manager in an office environment spends a lot of time interacting with the people working under them. Now they're not able to do the majority of their work and... the people under them are still performing, often better. It would take an exceptionally self-aware person not to flinch from that truth.
  - mbrodersen 5y ago
    You are absolutely right. Most middle managers are negatively productive. People working from home makes that obvious.
jonathanlb 5y ago
Recently, I saw a paradigm that I liked. Instead of seeking candidates for "culture fit" seek them for "culture value-add". In other words, a candidate may fit the culture now, but not necessarily in the future. The value-add paradigm forces one to think about the direction in which the current culture should grow.
AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
Someone in another thread suggested that this is basically what you expect to happen when a bunch of college kids from well off families leave school and form a startup: They want to pretend they are still in college, but now getting paid for it.
Kiro 5y ago
Is it discrimination if I own a company and only hire my friends who are into the same things as me? Serious question because I don't understand how that's different, if it is.
- tolbish 5y ago
  Serious answer: Yes, but it's legal discrimination. If you were doing so based on sex, race, or other protected class it would be illegal discrimination.
- dragonwriter 5y ago
  > Is it discrimination if I own a company and only hire my friends who are into the same things as me? Yes, any time you make a decision which treats people differently on any basis, is it is discrimination. What you probably mean to ask is whether it is illegal discrimination. For which the answer is more complicated. It doesn't seem to be directly illegal discrimination, unless “into the same things” itself directly involves protected characteristics like religion. But it could still be illegal as disparate impact discrimination [0], if it has differential impact on a protected axis without sufficient business necessity. [0] https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/tools-and-samples/hr-qa/pages/disparateimpactdisparatetreatment.aspx https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/tools-and-samples/hr-...
  - mensetmanusman 5y ago
    ‘any time you make a decision‘ is a discrimination between choice A and B.
- nineplay 5y ago
  Are you hiring them because you know them and you trust them? That is not discrimination. Are you hiring them because you want to win the tech-company beach volleyball tournament? That's discrimination. You could probably get away with it. Would you feel good about yourself? Would you feel pissed if you found out that you didn't get a job you really wanted, only because another company was trying to fill out their rugby team?
bennysomething 5y ago
So if I'm hiring someone at what point am I allowed to use my own personal discretion? Am I allowed to dislike someone? Am I allowed to say I don't like them so please don't hire them?
- nineplay 5y ago
  Why don't you like them _and_ which of those reasons will affect their job performance? Do they dismiss any approaches besides their own? Do they think mentoring is a waste of time? Do they think that their code is so obvious that there's no point in documenting? Do they think their code is so perfect that unit tests are unnecessary? These are good reasons to dislike someone and not hire them. Do you dislike them because they seem kind of boring? Get over yourself.
  - cronix 5y ago
    They made Steve Jobs work the graveyard shift at Atari because he stunk so bad (he'd go weeks without showering) no one wanted to work with him. That had nothing to do with his skills or job performance, but everything to do with disrupting the work environment to the point where others couldn't perform to the best of their ability.
  - AOsborn 5y ago
    > Why don't you like them _and_ which of those reasons will affect their job performance? > Do they dismiss any approaches besides their own? Do they think mentoring is a waste of time? Do they think that their code is so obvious that there's no point in documenting? Do they think their code is so perfect that unit tests are unnecessary? These are good reasons to dislike someone and not hire them. > Do you dislike them because they seem kind of boring? Get over yourself. This is an interesting discussion that brings a lot of vitriolic comments. A counterpoint that you seem to be dismissing: building a successful team often requires a good cultural and team fit. Hiring just on 'merit' alone doesn't guarantee success. Consider the example of hiring a 'superstar' that the other team members do not like which would consequently impact the performance of the team as a whole because they don't work optimally. For the manager in charge of the team, culture fit is an important factor alongside others.
vsareto 5y ago
What companies do those things? That actually sounds like fun. The Star Wars lingo probably gets old though. It should really be Expanse lingo if they want to stay cool.
- jimmygrapes 5y ago
  I really doubt that listening to people try to emulate the belter language and lingo is any better than listening to jar jar impressions (or klingon...), but it's hard to be say until it happens, so... bring it on
  - psyc 5y ago
    I always thought the belters were doing jar jar impressions.
  - raxxorrax 5y ago
    There is fan made poetry and short stories in Klingon. It is estimated that there are 20-30 people that can even speak it fluently. No way anyone of those would ever be uncool.
yarg 5y ago
Culture fit doesn't have to stretch that far - it does not need to be pervasive and it does not need to be toxic. We had a guy from Gaza in our office - he complained about informal emails sent to invite people for drinks because it was sinful, he complained about a manikin that got dressed up at special occasions because it was immodest. I don't know what lines to draw here - but be careful when playing with double-edged swords.
- jacobrussell 5y ago
  > he complained about a manikin that got dressed up at special occasions because it was immodest Uhhhh... dare I ask to explain what was going on with said mannequin? What kind of “special occasion” requires this... ritual? Also, I can’t tell whether you are implying that it would have been better for your coworker to have been filtered out because you think they are too sensitive, or if you are implying that your office asks weird things of people. What is the “double-edged sword”?
  - yarg 5y ago
    She'd dress up for christmas and halloween, nothing that bad. Other than that she sat in the corner (nearish the pool table) being inoffensive. The second edge: there is the risk that healthy aspects of a prevailing culture will be eroded for the sake of an overly vocal regressive minority.
    - scotuswroteus 5y ago
      OR some of these squabbles over lifestyle preferences should not be contested in an office space because people should not be living out their personal lives through office decorations or in anyway identifying with the office in such a way that the hefty and meaningful word "culture" implies. Everyone should have ample personal space and personal time and lives of their own. You shouldn't remember whether the office mannequin needed to be removed. That's a trifle.
      - yarg 5y ago
GuB-42 5y ago
It reminds me of an article about MDMA and fascist groups and how one leads to the other. I don't have a link, the article was terrible anyways, but the base idea, supported by scientific studies was interesting. I don't know if a friend of yours took MDMA, but my friend told me that it is pretty much impossible to be aggressive under its influence, you can't help but love everyone. So, how can it lead to hate? The explanation was that MDMA strengthens the bounds between people, and the closest people are within that group, the more the outside of the group is seen as a threat, a threat you have to protect your group against. Think of an aggressive mother protecting her baby. So yes, I see how "culture fit", can lead to harmful discrimination, even when centered around positive values and topics as harmless as Star Wars and craft beer.
- antpol 5y ago
  This is quite a stretch to start connecting "love of your neighbor" to fascism. Now I start to understand the shift of Coinbase and Basecamp no politics policies. You can't win these games
deertick1 5y ago
As a compliment to this point : Tgings I'd consider valid culture fit criteria : 1) does this candidate have a positive attitude about the work that they do? 2) is this candidate respectful to the clients they work with? (E.g. a coworker of mine routinely calls our client contacts a "fucking bitch" on internal calls. These aren't really possible to evaluate in the hiring process, but can be a big problem once theyve already been hired.
- nlitened 5y ago
  I think these two things are not examples of “culture fit”, but rather common work requirements. I don’t think there’s a company hiring specifically people that have negative attitude about the work they do and who are disrespectful to clients. In my opinion, evaluation of culture fit is about things that are specific to the company, not “good” vs “bad”, but rather “we do this way, although other ways might be valid in other companies” and “we don’t do this way, although doing so in other companies has merit”. For example, “we work as a family”. Surely work in this kind of company might bring more joy to some people, but will degrade work-life balance. Other company might have a culture of “work-life balance”, and if observed strictly, it will reduce the quality of team work, but will be much better long term for mental health of employees. Both cultures are possible, and there are certainly people with strong preference for one culture or the other. I think it is crucial to articulate what kind of culture you have in your company, and select candidates who fit.
blindmute 5y ago
Why is discrimination in this sense bad?

UnpossibleJim 5y ago

As a side note (and a fully conjectural query), do you think that the desire of control of a branded monoculture in the work place is one of the reasons for the push to bring employees back to the workplace? You can separate the culture of Microsoft, Apple, Google, Facebook and Twitter as easily as any brand, like Nike and Reebok. Those cultural brands are surely dissolving without the guiding hand of in office guidelines.

DaiPlusPlus 5y ago
Speaking from experience, the “culture” at Microsoft and Google (at least) definitely varies more between teams and divisions than between those two companies on-the-whole.
- UnpossibleJim 5y ago
  Fair enough. Nadella's hard push for the return is curious to me (I'm in the Seattle area, and close-ish to the campus with quite a few friends who work in a single team, so I'm a bit myopic, I suppose). They all seem to do well remotely, and I do also. I probably do work less hours, on the whole, but I produce more... so I dunno how that factors in. I can't speak to their quality of work, though.
  - mensetmanusman 5y ago
    It is strange, because the workers know that any slight uptick in productivity is going to be captured by Nadella and fellow 0.1%ers.
  - muffinman26 5y ago
    I'd be curious to see how the productivity data working remotely scales out for people at different levels. As a new college hire I found that both working in the office and open offices improved my productivity, often explicitly at the expense of productivity for more experienced developers (because they were spending time answering my questions). In the short term, it would be better for the more experienced developers to be more productive, because their time was worth more, but eventually the experienced developers will leave. If new people aren't trained to replace them fast enough, the system becomes unsustainable. There are several other areas where eliminating certain activities provides short-term productivity gains at the expense of long-term cohesion. All hands meetings about company direction can be delayed for a month with no negative impact, but if I skip all large company meetings for a year I'd have a much harder time prioritizing tasks (it's unclear which contribute directly to the company's long-term plans and which are busy work) and no idea how to route serious issue only tangentially related to my team. It's entirely possible there's a looming but currently well-hidden pipeline issue companies are anticipating and trying to avoid.
    - UnpossibleJim 5y ago
      Full disclosure, I'm in my late forties, so there's a definite impact on my work flow there. I honestly think that a hybrid style is the best, but I don't need to be in more than once a week (if that - usually) to be completely honest. Most of my communications are done over Slack, in office or not =[ my team is small and we just aren't that chatty of a group except on certain subjects. We're excited about Dune, and I'm sure everyone not in our team is ecstatic that we haven't gone back to the office yet. When we have a work question, we put it in the Slack channel. Stands ups have moved to Slack as well, which are great because I can reference exactly what was said and not a summary email by a "Scrum Master" like I'm in some corporate fantasy sports league- no offense to scrum masters out there. I've met some cool ones. We email our progress and it's handled and update on JIRA. I dunno, there seem to be enough tools for me. But, if you're starting out, it's a pain in the butt. When to ask questions and who to ask. Where to get guidance about what, and code reviews have to be done in person. They're super intimidating already (for me anyway). Meeting a core group of people your age at a company is important, as well. That's where you spend so much of your time and those social interactions can't be ignored. I keep in touch with people from jobs I worked at 20 years ago. They will help your network in life and career in the future, and that is all being stunted..... sorry. Got off track. But all important issues, depending on what stage of your life/career you're in.
SuoDuanDao 5y ago
I suspect the majority of it is that a lot of managers are finding themselves at loose ends. A typical manager in an office environment spends a lot of time interacting with the people working under them. Now they're not able to do the majority of their work and... the people under them are still performing, often better. It would take an exceptionally self-aware person not to flinch from that truth.
- mbrodersen 5y ago
  You are absolutely right. Most middle managers are negatively productive. People working from home makes that obvious.

jonathanlb 5y ago

Recently, I saw a paradigm that I liked. Instead of seeking candidates for "culture fit" seek them for "culture value-add". In other words, a candidate may fit the culture now, but not necessarily in the future. The value-add paradigm forces one to think about the direction in which the current culture should grow.

AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago

Someone in another thread suggested that this is basically what you expect to happen when a bunch of college kids from well off families leave school and form a startup: They want to pretend they are still in college, but now getting paid for it.

Kiro 5y ago

Is it discrimination if I own a company and only hire my friends who are into the same things as me? Serious question because I don't understand how that's different, if it is.

tolbish 5y ago
Serious answer: Yes, but it's legal discrimination. If you were doing so based on sex, race, or other protected class it would be illegal discrimination.
dragonwriter 5y ago
> Is it discrimination if I own a company and only hire my friends who are into the same things as me? Yes, any time you make a decision which treats people differently on any basis, is it is discrimination. What you probably mean to ask is whether it is illegal discrimination. For which the answer is more complicated. It doesn't seem to be directly illegal discrimination, unless “into the same things” itself directly involves protected characteristics like religion. But it could still be illegal as disparate impact discrimination [0], if it has differential impact on a protected axis without sufficient business necessity. [0] https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/tools-and-samples/hr-qa/pages/disparateimpactdisparatetreatment.aspx https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/tools-and-samples/hr-...
- mensetmanusman 5y ago
  ‘any time you make a decision‘ is a discrimination between choice A and B.
nineplay 5y ago
Are you hiring them because you know them and you trust them? That is not discrimination. Are you hiring them because you want to win the tech-company beach volleyball tournament? That's discrimination. You could probably get away with it. Would you feel good about yourself? Would you feel pissed if you found out that you didn't get a job you really wanted, only because another company was trying to fill out their rugby team?

bennysomething 5y ago

So if I'm hiring someone at what point am I allowed to use my own personal discretion? Am I allowed to dislike someone? Am I allowed to say I don't like them so please don't hire them?

nineplay 5y ago
Why don't you like them _and_ which of those reasons will affect their job performance? Do they dismiss any approaches besides their own? Do they think mentoring is a waste of time? Do they think that their code is so obvious that there's no point in documenting? Do they think their code is so perfect that unit tests are unnecessary? These are good reasons to dislike someone and not hire them. Do you dislike them because they seem kind of boring? Get over yourself.
- cronix 5y ago
  They made Steve Jobs work the graveyard shift at Atari because he stunk so bad (he'd go weeks without showering) no one wanted to work with him. That had nothing to do with his skills or job performance, but everything to do with disrupting the work environment to the point where others couldn't perform to the best of their ability.
- AOsborn 5y ago
  > Why don't you like them _and_ which of those reasons will affect their job performance? > Do they dismiss any approaches besides their own? Do they think mentoring is a waste of time? Do they think that their code is so obvious that there's no point in documenting? Do they think their code is so perfect that unit tests are unnecessary? These are good reasons to dislike someone and not hire them. > Do you dislike them because they seem kind of boring? Get over yourself. This is an interesting discussion that brings a lot of vitriolic comments. A counterpoint that you seem to be dismissing: building a successful team often requires a good cultural and team fit. Hiring just on 'merit' alone doesn't guarantee success. Consider the example of hiring a 'superstar' that the other team members do not like which would consequently impact the performance of the team as a whole because they don't work optimally. For the manager in charge of the team, culture fit is an important factor alongside others.

vsareto 5y ago

What companies do those things? That actually sounds like fun. The Star Wars lingo probably gets old though. It should really be Expanse lingo if they want to stay cool.

jimmygrapes 5y ago
I really doubt that listening to people try to emulate the belter language and lingo is any better than listening to jar jar impressions (or klingon...), but it's hard to be say until it happens, so... bring it on
- psyc 5y ago
  I always thought the belters were doing jar jar impressions.
- raxxorrax 5y ago
  There is fan made poetry and short stories in Klingon. It is estimated that there are 20-30 people that can even speak it fluently. No way anyone of those would ever be uncool.

yarg 5y ago

Culture fit doesn't have to stretch that far - it does not need to be pervasive and it does not need to be toxic. We had a guy from Gaza in our office - he complained about informal emails sent to invite people for drinks because it was sinful, he complained about a manikin that got dressed up at special occasions because it was immodest. I don't know what lines to draw here - but be careful when playing with double-edged swords.

jacobrussell 5y ago
> he complained about a manikin that got dressed up at special occasions because it was immodest Uhhhh... dare I ask to explain what was going on with said mannequin? What kind of “special occasion” requires this... ritual? Also, I can’t tell whether you are implying that it would have been better for your coworker to have been filtered out because you think they are too sensitive, or if you are implying that your office asks weird things of people. What is the “double-edged sword”?
- yarg 5y ago
  She'd dress up for christmas and halloween, nothing that bad. Other than that she sat in the corner (nearish the pool table) being inoffensive. The second edge: there is the risk that healthy aspects of a prevailing culture will be eroded for the sake of an overly vocal regressive minority.
  - scotuswroteus 5y ago
    OR some of these squabbles over lifestyle preferences should not be contested in an office space because people should not be living out their personal lives through office decorations or in anyway identifying with the office in such a way that the hefty and meaningful word "culture" implies. Everyone should have ample personal space and personal time and lives of their own. You shouldn't remember whether the office mannequin needed to be removed. That's a trifle.
    - yarg 5y ago

GuB-42 5y ago

It reminds me of an article about MDMA and fascist groups and how one leads to the other. I don't have a link, the article was terrible anyways, but the base idea, supported by scientific studies was interesting. I don't know if a friend of yours took MDMA, but my friend told me that it is pretty much impossible to be aggressive under its influence, you can't help but love everyone. So, how can it lead to hate? The explanation was that MDMA strengthens the bounds between people, and the closest people are within that group, the more the outside of the group is seen as a threat, a threat you have to protect your group against. Think of an aggressive mother protecting her baby. So yes, I see how "culture fit", can lead to harmful discrimination, even when centered around positive values and topics as harmless as Star Wars and craft beer.

antpol 5y ago
This is quite a stretch to start connecting "love of your neighbor" to fascism. Now I start to understand the shift of Coinbase and Basecamp no politics policies. You can't win these games

deertick1 5y ago

As a compliment to this point : Tgings I'd consider valid culture fit criteria : 1) does this candidate have a positive attitude about the work that they do? 2) is this candidate respectful to the clients they work with? (E.g. a coworker of mine routinely calls our client contacts a "fucking bitch" on internal calls. These aren't really possible to evaluate in the hiring process, but can be a big problem once theyve already been hired.

nlitened 5y ago
I think these two things are not examples of “culture fit”, but rather common work requirements. I don’t think there’s a company hiring specifically people that have negative attitude about the work they do and who are disrespectful to clients. In my opinion, evaluation of culture fit is about things that are specific to the company, not “good” vs “bad”, but rather “we do this way, although other ways might be valid in other companies” and “we don’t do this way, although doing so in other companies has merit”. For example, “we work as a family”. Surely work in this kind of company might bring more joy to some people, but will degrade work-life balance. Other company might have a culture of “work-life balance”, and if observed strictly, it will reduce the quality of team work, but will be much better long term for mental health of employees. Both cultures are possible, and there are certainly people with strong preference for one culture or the other. I think it is crucial to articulate what kind of culture you have in your company, and select candidates who fit.

blindmute 5y ago

Why is discrimination in this sense bad?