15 ms·

How brave of a company to say they will only hire those who will contribute the most to the bottom line!

by ipnon 2y ago

catapart 2y ago
While also providing no actual metrics for their so-called "merit"-based system. Oh, you prefer "smart" people, you say?! What a concept! It's like the screechers about "meritocracy" never get the memo that the issue people have with it is not it's conceptual structure, but that its details aren't ever (in any situation I've seen) spelled out with the kind of logical consistency that they pretend they are relying on. Does "smarter" mean "came up with a working solution in the shortest time"? Or maybe "came up with the most robust solution during an allotted time"? What if they both come through, which one has more merit? Is it contextual? If so, when does the context determine precedence? In short: How would a rational actor plan for upward mobility using actual metrics (no wiggle-words like "think nimbly", in your so-called "meritocracy"? I mean, I get that it's easier to just handwave the details and blame any counter-argument on "woke"-ism or an affinity for DEI, but I've never had a single person be able to satisfy my very simple logical questions about their meritocracy with any kind of truly actionable information. And most people who try to convince me haven't even - themselves - experienced these meritocracies. The people who work for these companies usually say they're not meritocracies. It's mostly the people on the outside, looking in, (or on the top, looking down) preaching the company lines rather than trying to hone in on specifics. But I'm sure Scale is different...
- mdp2021 2y ago
  > Is it contextual? Yes. How decided? Pretty easily sometimes. (In your example, it depends whether the impact of the solution exceeds or not the time bargain or constraint). Do you see that those metrics you are requesting are very doable, just sometimes not worth expliciting - common sense should do?
  - catapart 2y ago
    When you say not "worth" expliciting... worth it to whom? All I see is someone saying "don't worry, it's obvious. When the time comes, we'll make decisions based on what we believe to be metrics, but we will back that up with literally nothing." If you wanted me to believe you, you should provide some examples. And, again, I've never received any actual examples of specific binary evaluations for specific actions. And the handwave is always the same as the one you're trotting out now: 'if you need everything to be spelled out, you're probably not smart enough'. Good line. Great dodge! But do you see how "we'll know what to do, based on the circumstances and, thus, the more meritorious will be obvious in any given situation" is functionally the same as "the bosses will make whatever decisions in the moment they want, and back it up with whatever they choose to decide is 'merit' for the purposes of their current framing (subject to change for the next situation)"? But if you're completely sold on it, let's start with an easier question than "how do you metric your merit?"; let's just see if you have an answer for how any employee could determine between the two scenarios I described in the previous paragraph? If a boss passes me over even though I did great work and achieved an agreed-upon goal, but I didn't do some other thing (that was never mentioned) - how would I know that, and how could I possibly petition for redress?
    - mdp2021 2y ago
      > When you say not "worth" expliciting... worth it to whom? To the to-do list - it is (normally) not worth it to the one who should spend the time writing that metrics. It would also then become potentially heavy if those metrics become "red-tape", obligatory bureaucratic process, which consumed time and resources without returning benefits. > And the handwave is always the same as the one you're trotting out now: 'if you need everything to be spelled out, you're probably not smart enough' Err... Noo? It was not what I meant. But, following your example, if somebody could not discriminate after "Please pass me a pen" that which picks an adequate and that who invests time in finding an out-of-context "perfect", and after "Please design our flagship" that which attempts to polish an enviable craft and that who lazily cuts the effort at a potato-head, then there would be a problem of smarts. > But do you see how ... the bosses will Yes I see that we require common sense in the whole of active society. It seems you are depicting a reality in which the judgement from management can be subjective. As if (no detraction from the actual situation meant implied) people accused Greg Davies to give unfair subjective marks at Taskmaster. The solution to such problem would probably not be algorithmic until good AGI, because sophistication of judgement is needed and Expert Systems in the '80s failed in being recognized as useful.
- Manuel_D 2y ago
  A meritocratic system doesn't have to be perfect or exactly defined. It's enough for a system to be based on work-related capabilities and output, rather than the gender, race, etc. of candidates and workers. An automatically graded leetcode interview is a meritocratic system, even if leetcode performance is not an exact measure of an employee's potential performance. It's totally viable to define meritocracy in contrast to gender-conscious and race-conscious DEI policies.

How brave of a company to say they will only hire those who will contribute the most to the bottom line!

by ipnon 2y ago

How brave of a company to say they will only hire those who will contribute the most to the bottom line!

While also providing no actual metrics for their so-called "merit"-based system. Oh, you prefer "smart" people, you say?! What a concept! It's like the screechers about "meritocracy" never get the memo that the issue people have with it is not it's conceptual structure, but that its details aren't ever (in any situation I've seen) spelled out with the kind of logical consistency that they pretend they are relying on. Does "smarter" mean "came up with a working solution in the shortest time"? Or maybe "came up with the most robust solution during an allotted time"? What if they both come through, which one has more merit? Is it contextual? If so, when does the context determine precedence? In short: How would a rational actor plan for upward mobility using actual metrics (no wiggle-words like "think nimbly", in your so-called "meritocracy"? I mean, I get that it's easier to just handwave the details and blame any counter-argument on "woke"-ism or an affinity for DEI, but I've never had a single person be able to satisfy my very simple logical questions about their meritocracy with any kind of truly actionable information. And most people who try to convince me haven't even - themselves - experienced these meritocracies. The people who work for these companies usually say they're not meritocracies. It's mostly the people on the outside, looking in, (or on the top, looking down) preaching the company lines rather than trying to hone in on specifics. But I'm sure Scale is different...

mdp2021 2y ago
> Is it contextual? Yes. How decided? Pretty easily sometimes. (In your example, it depends whether the impact of the solution exceeds or not the time bargain or constraint). Do you see that those metrics you are requesting are very doable, just sometimes not worth expliciting - common sense should do?
- catapart 2y ago
  When you say not "worth" expliciting... worth it to whom? All I see is someone saying "don't worry, it's obvious. When the time comes, we'll make decisions based on what we believe to be metrics, but we will back that up with literally nothing." If you wanted me to believe you, you should provide some examples. And, again, I've never received any actual examples of specific binary evaluations for specific actions. And the handwave is always the same as the one you're trotting out now: 'if you need everything to be spelled out, you're probably not smart enough'. Good line. Great dodge! But do you see how "we'll know what to do, based on the circumstances and, thus, the more meritorious will be obvious in any given situation" is functionally the same as "the bosses will make whatever decisions in the moment they want, and back it up with whatever they choose to decide is 'merit' for the purposes of their current framing (subject to change for the next situation)"? But if you're completely sold on it, let's start with an easier question than "how do you metric your merit?"; let's just see if you have an answer for how any employee could determine between the two scenarios I described in the previous paragraph? If a boss passes me over even though I did great work and achieved an agreed-upon goal, but I didn't do some other thing (that was never mentioned) - how would I know that, and how could I possibly petition for redress?
  - mdp2021 2y ago
    > When you say not "worth" expliciting... worth it to whom? To the to-do list - it is (normally) not worth it to the one who should spend the time writing that metrics. It would also then become potentially heavy if those metrics become "red-tape", obligatory bureaucratic process, which consumed time and resources without returning benefits. > And the handwave is always the same as the one you're trotting out now: 'if you need everything to be spelled out, you're probably not smart enough' Err... Noo? It was not what I meant. But, following your example, if somebody could not discriminate after "Please pass me a pen" that which picks an adequate and that who invests time in finding an out-of-context "perfect", and after "Please design our flagship" that which attempts to polish an enviable craft and that who lazily cuts the effort at a potato-head, then there would be a problem of smarts. > But do you see how ... the bosses will Yes I see that we require common sense in the whole of active society. It seems you are depicting a reality in which the judgement from management can be subjective. As if (no detraction from the actual situation meant implied) people accused Greg Davies to give unfair subjective marks at Taskmaster. The solution to such problem would probably not be algorithmic until good AGI, because sophistication of judgement is needed and Expert Systems in the '80s failed in being recognized as useful.
Manuel_D 2y ago
A meritocratic system doesn't have to be perfect or exactly defined. It's enough for a system to be based on work-related capabilities and output, rather than the gender, race, etc. of candidates and workers. An automatically graded leetcode interview is a meritocratic system, even if leetcode performance is not an exact measure of an employee's potential performance. It's totally viable to define meritocracy in contrast to gender-conscious and race-conscious DEI policies.