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My Day Interviewing for the Service Economy Startup from Hell

talltofu 12y ago
Wow! It's good to hear stories like this to balance out the usually euphoric stories around startups. Hopefully this an aberration, not the norm
- forgottenpass 12y ago
  Hopefully this an aberration, not the norm Startups that hire unskilled labor are only pulling back the curtain on the actual job market. If anything you can expect to hear more about it as the tech startup world starts building things that require more staff than an engineering department.
  - HeyLaughingBoy 12y ago
    I worked unskilled labor in NYC before and during college (and a short time after). I've seen attempts to scam jobseekers, I've been sexually harassed (I'm male) and I've worked for assholes but I have never seen a legitimate employer that was even remotely this bad.
comrh 12y ago
"It will be a full day of work, like an extended interview, and unpaid." Screw that noise. It is clear from just that they don't respect people's time.
- nhoven 12y ago
  I'm pretty certain this is illegal and a violation of the Fair Labor Standard act. http://www.dol.gov/whd/flsa/ http://www.dol.gov/whd/flsa/
  - CapitalistCartr 12y ago
    When I interview, I mention that I have to give my present employer 2 weeks notice, whether it's true or not. Then I carefully watch their reaction. Anything other than supportive is a deal-breaker. Either they have integrity or they don't.
    - YuriNiyazov 12y ago
      Could you clarify? I'm confused by what difference does it make what they say.
      - lostcolony 12y ago
        "Of course" - no red flags. "WHAT?! We expected you to start tomorrow! Can't you just quit? Don't you want to work here?!" - Aaaaand, we're done here.
        YuriNiyazov 12y ago
        I have interviewed a lot, and I have literally never experienced anything other than some variation of "of course".
    - Igglyboo 12y ago
      The ones that aren't supportive usually aren't supportive of you quitting without 2 weeks either.
    - indyz 12y ago
      On the flip side, when I am interviewing a candidate I always ask when they would be able to start if we were to make them an offer. A currently employed candidate who says "tomorrow" raises huge red flags.
    - VLM 12y ago
      Tell them 3 weeks. Get escorted politely off former employer when I give notice (its just policy, good luck). Vacation!
deleted 12y ago
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waylandsmithers 12y ago
> The next step in the process is a tryout day. It will be a full day of work, like an extended interview, and unpaid. Could you come in tomorrow? I liked this until the unpaid part. Maybe there are just too many impossible laws and logistics to get around, but I've always thought it would be cool if more companies tried something out like a 10-day contract (paid of course) to make sure the job is a good fit, and so both parties can make an initial decision without as much risk.
- imgabe 12y ago
  I don't think there's a lot of legal hurdles. Companies hire short-term 1099 contractors all the time.
  - jonknee 12y ago
    Yes, but you can't schedule a 1099 contractor to be in your office 8-8. That's likely why they won't give you a phone or computer, but that doesn't mean someone required to be in the office 12 hours a day to provide an essential function of your business is a contractor.
    - imgabe 12y ago
      Maybe it's not a 1099 situation then. You can, for example, hire an electrician and require they work only at night, or on the weekends, or whenever. It's clearly not outside the realm of possibility to pay someone to work in your office for a day. I have a hard time believing a Harvard MBA, McKinsey consultant couldn't wrap their head around the concept of contract work, not to mention labor laws.
      - jonknee 12y ago
        Don't ever doubt the willingness of a Harvard MBA / McKinsey consultant to call an employee a contractor to save on the taxes and hassles like fair employment practices. > It's clearly not outside the realm of possibility to pay someone to work in your office for a day. Of course not. But when you pay someone to work in your office on a set schedule every day to do the things that you tell them to do and those things are central to your business? Well, you got yourself an employee.
bkeroack 12y ago
This will never make the front page, no matter how many upvotes it receives.
- tptacek 12y ago
  It's at the top of the front page.
  - huhtenberg 12y ago
    It's a conspiracy then!
hardwaresofton 12y ago
This doesn't seem like it could have happened in real life. I can't believe someone, especially in tech, could justify working in such an atmosphere with those "benefits". Yes, big companies may stifle creativity a little, but from what little I read, this startup doesn't seem to be so great..
- declan 12y ago
  >I can't believe someone, especially in tech... Remember, the author of this article (who of course didn't continue working there) isn't in tech. She previously wrote about working at a non-profit theater company and about wanting to teach English. If you mean the programmers at this startup, yes, that seems odd. But this may be the least worst of the options they have available, or the author may have taken some liberties with her description of the office environment...
- ceejayoz 12y ago
  It seems to be real. The company's response is at http://valleywag.gawker.com/handys-nightmare-tryout-process-is-a-startup-stereotype-1649016476/ http://valleywag.gawker.com/handys-nightmare-tryout-process-... and reads basically "yeah but that was a while ago, we're different now".
song 12y ago
Sometimes I wonder if it would make sense for investors to send someone they trust to apply and interview for a position at a company they're considering. If what she wrote is accurate I don't really understand how they managed to raise $30 million in funding.
- arenaninja 12y ago
  > If what she wrote is accurate I don't really understand how they managed to raise $30 million in funding. Probably covered by the part where the founder was at Harvard
  - danielweber 12y ago
    It's not unusual at all to find very smart people that just lack the very basic common sense.
- dreamweapon 12y ago
  Nothing at all surprising about them being able to raise $30M. The lousiest people are usually also the best at kissing ass.
notch90 12y ago
yea, I had bad experiences there too. They are very bad with hiring contract. Really treat employees like bad
codezero 12y ago
This is probably hard for most engineers to relate to, unless part of your role is doing support. edit: when I say something is not insane or unexpected, I mean it in the context of a person looking for work in customer support. These are the things you run in to. So if you are shocked that they have to provide their own hardware, then you are shocked at the way support people are often actually treated. I'm not advocating for or supporting that. The interview process and criteria for being hired have really high variance compared to engineering interviews. The author of this piece made the classic, and often unavoidable mistake of being between a rock and a hard place and not vetting the company she interviewed at and ultimately worked for for a day. Even if you're not an engineer/designer/data scientist (or one of the typically highly desired people for a startup), you should be working at places you love and believe in, when you're not, you end up having bad experiences and those bad experiences are amplified by the environment. First, I didn't find Ajay's interview to be that weird, saying why you came up with the idea for your company and your qualifications should be expected, not interpreted as a way for the founder to diminish the potential future employee. If you don't believe in your leaders, and don't trust them, you are in a lot of trouble. edit: I think that not having interviewed with the actual support team members is a huge red flag here as well, but owing to the author's somewhat desperate situation, they moved forward anyways. 12 hour days is insane, and wrong. Having to provide your own device is not really that insane for small teams. Obviously it's great if a company provides it, and probably larger companies should always provide a workstation, but this doesn't come across as totally abnormal. The constant "want to hear a joke" and racist/sexist tone at the company is also not acceptable, but clearly was supported by the people working there at the time, if the anecdote is taken at face value. It's super easy to pay for a trial period, and as far as I'm aware, it's not even legal to have people work for free unless you are a nonprofit or government organization, so that's shady, even if only for one day. I've done two week trials that were fully paid, and it was a great way to get a feel for the company and vice versa. Not having any onboarding, given that the trial was for a day isn't too surprising, but that is clearly a problem with a one day trial. They should have absolutely been given some lead-in material to help them get prepped before starting. There appear to be a lot of growing pains at Handy, which isn't a surprise, but hopefully they can move fast and get their support/service wing to be as tight and focused as the rest of their team (assuming that is true).
arenaninja 12y ago
This is pretty bad. I'm debating whether it tops the job where I got fired for speaking Spanish, but it's bad nonetheless
- Igglyboo 12y ago
  Woah really? Sounds interesting, care to share the story?
  - psykovsky 12y ago
    Once I was "demoted" for having a bad relationship with my father because someone talked about it with the store manager...
jdhawk 12y ago
Sounds like the company is growing too quickly for them to implement things like Human Resources & a new hire training program. BYO Technology? that should be an OPTION, not a requirement...especially at 35K.
king_jester 12y ago
I'm not surprised that a company that would treat its service providers so shitty would also treat its employees that way. Between stories like this and the things I hear about other service startups like Task Rabbit it makes me never want to use one of these services ever.
joshstrange 12y ago
Sexism, racism, homophobia (I assume that's what was going on with the marketing guys and "Josh"), long hours, low pay, "boys club", overbearing/micromanaging boss, unpaid full day "interview", false hope (Seemed like the idea of getting your own franchise was a carrot dangled before them on a stick that they would never get), and little/no structure. Wow.... And these are the companies that are getting funded?
- potatolicious 12y ago
  I work in startups in NYC. None of the things described are even remotely close to shocking for me - I've seen all of the above first-hand either in offices or at startup events. That said, I've never seen all those things under the same roof, much less in a single day. The perfect storm of insanity makes me doubt the author's story a little bit, but each of the things she's brought up I've seen. Shit, I literally just read a racist internal email an hour ago about the new cleaning lady at the office. Plus the pointless credential-rundown you get every. single. goddamn. time. you meet a startup person in this city. Oh, you went to Harvard 10 years ago? That's so relevant considering we just met 2 minutes ago! You used to work at Goldman and now you're doing a consumer-tech startup? Yeah, that really needed to be in the first 3 sentences you've ever spoken to me.
  - ritchiea 12y ago
    Oh my god it is exactly like that. As though pushing spreadsheets at Goldman has anything to do with building a software product. But they know that, they just want you to know they worked at Goldman. Because Goldman. I once worked under a CTO who remarked "it's not like we're going to hire a woman" after interviewing a female dev candidate, which would be horribly offensive even if he was just kidding (he wasn't kidding, I was shocked he even took the time to interview her). There's definitely a sense of "startups are the new banking." It's frustrating because there are also a lot of good people, but man is there a glut of bros who fit all the worst stereotypes of old boys club business.
    - dccoolgai 12y ago
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arikrak 12y ago
In general, startups do not follow the professional practices of established companies. When you interview for an established company, they're usually professional and they get back to you afterwards. When you interview for a startup, you can run into all sorts of issues. The founder might not be there, the employees may have no idea what to do with you, or you might just have a 15-minute interview after traveling for 90 minutes to get there. They often won't get back to you. Though this example is particularly bad since they're asking applicants to do unpaid labor.
- darkhorse05 12y ago
  Are you kidding me. If this story was true, this startup was way beyond just unprofessional.
devanti 12y ago
No surprise here. The first thing a Harvard grad will tell you is that they graduated from Harvard.
- ryanSrich 12y ago
  How do you spot an MBA from Harvard? Don't worry they'll tell you...
- gone35 12y ago
  Interesting. Informally (anecdotally), I think the norm is quite the opposite: noblesse obliges to never drop the H-bomb in conversation --whence the irksome "went to school near Boston" trope [1,2]. It could well be a HBS-only thing, though. They have their own thing going on. [1] http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2011/9/15/harvard-students-go-people/ http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2011/9/15/harvard-students... [2] http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2014/05/30/harvard_grads_say_i_went_to_college_in_boston_and_call_it_the_h_bomb_get.html http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2014/05/30/harvard_grads...
  - waterlesscloud 12y ago
    In my anecdotal experience, I only find out people I meet went to Harvard when I see them in a school sweatshirt. Or if they write for The Simpsons, in which case I just assume it. Heh. Wharton grads, on the other hand... Never more than 10 minutes before they drop it in.
- golgappi 12y ago
  my graduate advisor had studied CS from Harvard. She never mentioned it. I got to know one day when I was going through her Bio. I mentioned it in the next meeting and all she did was smile faintly. People with substance don't need to flash their Ivy League emblem everywhere.
eastbayjake 12y ago
I don't know why she changed the founder's name, it's pretty easy to figure out when there are only two founders.[1] It looks like Umang Dua, HBS '13[2]. He's on Twitter as @umangdua if anyone would like to ask him about this incident. [1] https://www.handy.com/about https://www.handy.com/about [2] https://www.linkedin.com/in/umangdua https://www.linkedin.com/in/umangdua [3] https://twitter.com/umangdua https://twitter.com/umangdua
- fuzzywalrus 12y ago
  Honestly, I thought it took a lot of gall to even name the startup by name. There's always a fear of retribution even minor.
  - MBCook 12y ago
    I had assumed the name of the company was fake until I read the line at the end about them changing their name and getting a former Amazon CFO.
  - danielweber 12y ago
    I admire gall.
  - throwaway_- 12y ago
    Less fear of being blackballed when you're an industry outsider.
  - steve-benjamins 12y ago
    Naming the startup gave this article extra teeth for me.
  - eastbayjake 12y ago
    According to Valley Wag, she was writing under a pseudonym: http://valleywag.gawker.com/handys-nightmare-tryout-process-is-a-startup-stereotype-1649016476 http://valleywag.gawker.com/handys-nightmare-tryout-process-...
- hsod 12y ago
terramars 12y ago
Full work day interviews where you do actual work for the company are technically illegal. If you want to mess with them, you can file a suit in small claims court for whatever hourly rate you feel like, and it'll be a huge pain in the ass unless they settle and pay you quickly :)
- mattzito 12y ago
  Do you have any documentation or links on this? I am in no way doubting you, but this is such a common occurrence I hear about that I'd like to have a few links in my pocket to give people who either a) think this is a good idea, or b) have to experience this. The other angle is understanding at which point an interview turns into an illegal full-day interview with actual work.
  - ne0n 12y ago
    The point where an interview becomes illegal is when you do actual work. In an interview, they should run through mock scenarios to gauge if it will be a good fit. You do actual work after they hire you. Companies pay for training employees for a reason. Here's a flowchart for if you internship is illegal. http://www.moneysideoflife.com/illegal-internship-flowchart/ http://www.moneysideoflife.com/illegal-internship-flowchart/ It's pretty much exactly the same in this scenario. Included in there, is a link to the Labor Department's regulations on the subject.
- why-el 12y ago
  I am in the process of agreeing to a similar arrangement but it is payed and can go on while I interview with other companies. Win win and the best part is that everything is transparent between me and the startup. This is in Germany.
- mahyarm 12y ago
  For visa people, you can't really get paid either when you do interviews. You usually don't know if it's 'actual work' or not before hand.
- danielweber 12y ago
deleted 12y ago
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- Igglyboo 12y ago
  I really can't believe that. I'm not even out of school working in the midwest making twice that. It's unfathomable that a software developer would make only $30k, especially in NYC.
  - S4M 12y ago
    She's not software developer, but "Customer Experience Associate", which apparently consists in taking calls from customers. 30k seems very low for NYC though.
- arjie 12y ago
  The article talks about being a "Customer Experience Associate". It also talks about her job being to handle sales, customer support, and act as liaison when necessary between customers and "service providers".
- malcote 12y ago
  It was a customer-service job. Dealing with customers on the phone and so forth.
jonknee 12y ago
Where are all the attorneys? This is a company with flagrantly illegal practices and a ton of money in the bank. People live for that sort of scenario. Anyone let go by these clowns should leave with a nice chunk of change.
- dccoolgai 12y ago
  We've spent the last 30-odd years electing people that stuff the books and court benches with laws and people that make sure that - by and large - attorneys and the victims they represent can't hold companies like this responsible or accountable - for almost anything, let alone misdeeds with needy victims. Go look up "forced arbitration"... these "service providers" probably have, at best, the right to a loser-pays "arbitrator" who is paid and picked by Handybook. The risk that any of them might opt for any quasi-legal proceeding (let alone the rigged arbitration system they are likely limited to) given that many of them most likely have some kind of liminal citizenship status is effectively nil. If I were doing the liabilities/risk business analysis for this, I would delete the row this was on just to clean up the spreadsheet a little bit. The concept of companies being held responsible for things they do that hurt or exploit people is a humorous anachronism from a bygone era.
  - danielweber 12y ago
    It doesn't look like the "candidate/employee" signed anything. And if they did, the contract isn't enforceable without consideration. "We are considering you for the job" is not consideration.
    - jordanb 12y ago
      The way companies do forced arbitration now is by providing the employee with an opt out form that they have to fill out and mail to the legal department within 30 days. Sharp-eyed employees will notice this in their new hire documentation but most will not. The company can then claim that they did not make forced arbitration a condition of employment and did give the employee an opportunity to opt out, which they declined to take. Courts have upheld this as legal: http://www.dglaw.com/images_user/newsalerts/Litigation_Employees_Who_Dont_Opt_Out.pdf http://www.dglaw.com/images_user/newsalerts/Litigation_Emplo...
drtse4 12y ago
> "I started this company while I was getting my MBA at Harvard. Before this, I worked for McKinsey & Company…" he paused to gauge my reaction, “which is one of the top business consulting firms in the world.” I wonder how he would have reacted to my utterly uninterested facial expression. Nothing of that is of any interest when trying to asses his value as a person or if his idea/company is good or not.
- goodJobWalrus 12y ago
  yeah, I'm imagining her saying: 'aw, that's nice' with a deadpan face.
- grecy 12y ago
  I enjoy being from Australia and listening to Americans yammer on about their education or work history. I honestly say "I've never heard of <institution>" - the reactions are great :)
Mandatum 12y ago
It sickens me how close that article/post is to my experience working for a small business in Auckland, New Zealand.
7Figures2Commas 12y ago
> “Congratulations! Ajay thinks you’d be a great fit. The next step in the process is a tryout day. It will be a full day of work, like an extended interview, and unpaid. Could you come in tomorrow?” This may be a violation of wage and hour laws. > “Great! You’ll need to bring your own laptop and smart phone. Will that be a problem for you?” Many states forbid companies from requiring that their employees bear the costs of business expenses. I wonder if employees at this company are being reimbursed. > “Okay, our Customer Experience Associates normally begin work at 8 a.m. and wrap up the day around 8 p.m. They work five days per week, plus one rotating weekend shift. Is that okay?” She looked at me warily. It would be interesting to know if the company is treating "Customer Experience Associates" as exempt or non-exempt employees. Customer service roles are almost always non-exempt, and non-exempt employees are entitled to overtime pay. Given that the author wrote she was offered a $35,000 salary and made no mention of overtime pay, it sounds like there might be a misclassification issue here. These misclassifications can be very, very costly (unpaid overtime plus interest, numerous statutory penalties, attorney's fees, etc.) so they're incredibly attractive to plaintiff's attorneys. > “Service provider” was a pleasant euphemism for Handybook’s fleet of freelance cleaners and handymen. After signing up with Handybook, service providers received text alerts about available jobs, which they could claim for themselves by texting back, on a first-come, first-serve basis. > A programmer giggled and called out, “Ashley, do your Chinese washer woman impression again!” “My Chinese washa wo-men?” she pulled back the skin on the sides of her face. “I do you laund-wy! Own-wy ten dollah!” She laughed hysterically, “I clean you house!” The programmers sniggered loudly. “Ching chong!” someone yelled out and collapsed into laughter. > “Want to hear a joke I heard today?” a programmer asked, eying me and giggling. “What’s the difference between a woman and a refrigerator?” “…what,” I said. “Refrigerators don’t moan when you put meat in them!” This behavior is toxic to businesses that want to remain in business. > “Service provider” was a pleasant euphemism for Handybook’s fleet of freelance cleaners and handymen. After signing up with Handybook, service providers received text alerts about available jobs, which they could claim for themselves by texting back, on a first-come, first-serve basis. A lot of these "on demand" companies are built on classifying their service providers as independent contractors. In many cases, however, independent contractor classification is questionable. In this case specifically, the description of how the company dealt with Lupe raises serious questions. The more funding these companies receive, and the bigger they get, the more attractive they're going to be to plaintiff's counsel. One of Handy's competitors is already on the radar of a prominent Boston class action attorney[1]. [1] http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/storyline/wp/2014/09/10/at-the-uber-for-home-cleaning-workers-pay-a-price-for-convenience/ http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/storyline/wp/2014/09/10/a...
incision 12y ago
I must be old... I feel like I read stories about horrible jobs and tough times finding work from young college grads regularly and the news would seem to corroborate them [1]. Apparently, these people end up serving coffee or answering phones for clown shop start-ups. Meanwhile, I know people trying to hire for what I'd consider traditional entry level jobs (clerks, reception, no-risk security, no-experience necessary apprenticeships) offering full benefits plus 35-45k+ salaries who would be overjoyed to see a single college-educated applicant. What's going on here? Do people believe in this Amway-esque pitch for a "world of opportunities"? Do traditional jobs feel like giving up? Are they too restricting? 1: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/she-the-people/wp/2014/09/05/why-sally-cant-get-a-good-job-with-her-college-degree/ http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/she-the-people/wp/2014/0...
- jacalata 12y ago
  Well, do you have links to the open job positions for 'traditional jobs'? Are they in nowhere, midwest? Are you sure they really exist? Are they advertising entirely on the bulletin board of nursing homes? Are they just advertising for 'secretary' without listing salaries and benefits? Lots of reasons why they might not get applicants, but I don't think any of those reasons are 'kids these days'.
- cddotdotslash 12y ago
  I'm not "old," but I'll give it a shot... I agree - it seems like every day I read a story about how my peers can't find jobs, how the job market is terrible, etc. But then I see thousands of postings for those typical desk jobs. I don't fully understand it, but if I had to venture a guess, I'd say it has to do with the "coolness" of the job. It seems much more superior these days to say you work for the latest startup over a traditional multi-national corporation. Also, people entering the job market today really seem to value the work environment. I read an article on HN recently about how the finance industry is losing applicants to the tech industry. Recent grads hate the stuffy 9 to 5 culture, not getting free lunches, wearing suits to a job where they sit at a desk all day, etc. etc. Regardless, I would think they'd rather have a job somewhere like that than no job at all, but that's been my limited experience talking to 30 or so new grads.
- 12y ago
robodale 12y ago
If I was the guy being interviewed, I would have punched that "Ajay" in the fucking neck halfway through the interview...but looks like the company is punching itself in the neck anyway. Good riddance.
S4M 12y ago
I thought this article was written about a fictitious company as a satire, but after couple of search it turns out that Handy actually exists and has raised quite a lot - as a competitor of HomeJoy? I don't know if everything there is true, but this article has the indirect effect of making my opinion of michaelochurch going up.
- atomical 12y ago
  Why?
joezydeco 12y ago
Still wishing fuckedcompany.com was still around to start collecting stories like this as the bubble starts to pop...
- RockyMcNuts 12y ago
  Soon there will be an app for that, probably called Unter (Uber for going under).
Animats 12y ago
Not only is this employer acting like an asshole, they're doing it stupidly. They let candidates for employment bring in their own computer and plug it into their internal network. Someone is going to drain out all their internal records. You can see their web site at "http://www.handy.com/" http://www.handy.com/". The page source is amusing. They seem to be more interested in ad networks than booking actual business.
- aaronem 12y ago
  > Someone is going to drain out all their internal records What could they possibly have worth stealing?
  - Eiriksmal 12y ago
    That's easy--the answer to where all that $45,000,000 in venture capital funding went!
pbreit 12y ago
The unpaid day of work sounds illegal but is at least pathetically unprofessional for that type of position.
AndrewKemendo 12y ago
These tales are infuriating.
danielweber 12y ago
As much as things sometimes sucked during my recent job hunt, holy cow, this is over-the-top awful. The worst of my experiences were exceeded within three paragraphs. I did have to deal with one company that said they had trouble "finding senior people" when the whole office was a playground. But no one told me any sexist or racist jokes.
Disruptive_Dave 12y ago
Have a seemingly decent idea. Build a seemingly workable product. Know people / have a shiny thing on your resume. Why the surprise at all this? Here in NYC I speak to funded startup founders and employees every other day who lack basic business, business management, and people management skills and experience. Investor actions (i.e. $$$$) seriously devalue these things now. (But we have advisors!!!!!!!) /jadedrant
Killah911 12y ago
This is interesting: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V36Nn9UpBxk http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V36Nn9UpBxk
tptacek 12y ago
The experience of this CSR candidate is obviously the lede of the piece, but my problem with businesses like this is deeper: I think all these companies that put a pretty UI over a bunch of low-skill 1099 workers are exploitative. Reread the section about Lupe's attempt to reach the client in time. I feel like companies in these markets will eventually reap the whirlwind when the USG decides not to allow people filling these roles to be classified as 1099s, and the whole segment falls apart. Or maybe I just hope it.
- incision 12y ago
  >"I think all these companies that put a pretty UI over a bunch of low-skill 1099 workers are exploitative." While I totally agree with this I wonder about whether / why people working this jobs would be re-classified? Many if not most people I know in work in technology on 1099 and are applied in ways which would seem to be more clearly misclassified than these workers.
  - tptacek 12y ago
    The USG decided how the classification works today (own supplies, control over the method of how the work is done, &c). They can change the classification system.
- zo1 12y ago
  So the first definition I found for exploitation: "the action or fact of treating someone unfairly in order to benefit from their work." Is that how you view it, and then go on to classify it as exploitation? The fact that these individuals are somehow treated unfairly? Following from that, how would you change it so that it fits within your definition of fair?
- jordanb 12y ago
  Piketty observes that the rise of the monthly wage was essential to the rise of what he calls the "patrimonial middle class". It gave labor a degree of income stability that they did not enjoy under the previous system of daily wages and piecework. These startups are essentially converting monthly wage jobs back into piecework jobs. Not satisfied with rolling back the new deal, we're now rolling back the progressive era.
swang 12y ago
They've responded on Twitter. They don't really mention what they're talking about so you won't understand unless you've read the story. I guess to purposely not connect others to the story > This is disturbing and in no way represents working at Handy. Companies go through growing pains and these facts have no bearing on us today > When Amanda says she applied 1.5 yrs ago, our company was newer, smaller and still figuring out best practices. Things have changed since. > We do not stand for racism or sexism of any kind. That kind of behavior is not tolerated and never will be. > We understand that our employees and professionals are the lifeblood of our business and we work every day to ensure their happiness. They don't seem to deny what Amanda is saying. And I don't see how they can say they've changed if some of those same people still remain...
- TarpitCarnivore 12y ago
  > This is disturbing and in no way represents working at Handy. Companies go through growing pains and these facts have no bearing on us today I take issue with this statement the most. The author clearly identifies the CEO, whom is still there, was present when the comments and inappropriate jokes were being made. It's entirely possible the CEO did say something, but I'm guessing based on the tone of the article they did not. While it's natural for a company to go through growing pains I've never heard it used in reference to office culture how customers are treated. If this was going on 18 months ago it means it's still there today.
  - MBCook 12y ago
    I saw that as nothing but an admission of guilt. I wonder if the tweet will stay up. I bet their corporate lawyer won't be happy when they see it.
  - organsnyder 12y ago
    Exactly. Symptoms of "growing pains" include struggling to meet obligations, disorganized management, etc. A blatant disrespect for others is a symptom of a person lacking in morals and empathy.
petercoolz 12y ago
This reminds me of the all-too-true joke. Question: How do you know somebody has an MBA? Answer: They tell you. Full disclosure... I have an MBA!
deleted 12y ago
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aaron695 12y ago
FYI in cased you missed it - This is a story about the world of telemarketing, not startups.
- unclesaamm 12y ago
  Eh. It's very much about the differential treatment that different types of employees get in startup. I don't think it's uncommon for programmers to be far more spoiled within companies than say, sales
mathrawka 12y ago
Here's a video on Handy's hiring strategy: https://www.33voices.com/authors/umang-dua/media/handys-hiring-strategies https://www.33voices.com/authors/umang-dua/media/handys-hiri...
kaeawc 12y ago
And now I'm never going to use Handybook again.
discardorama 12y ago
I'm no lawyer, but: by law, if you are expected to work 12-hour days, isn't the company supposed to pay you overtime? My understanding was that even if you are an 'exempt' employee, if the _expectation_ is that you have to work more than 40 hours/week, you should be paid overtime?
- moron4hire 12y ago
  I know that to be the case in Pennsylvania and Virginia, as those are the states I've lived in. I believe it to be the case in New York.
  - greenyoda 12y ago
    In the U.S., this is actually governed by a Federal law, the Fair Labor Standards Act. The U.S. Department of Labor has lots of information about it: http://www.dol.gov/dol/topic/wages/overtimepay.htm http://www.dol.gov/dol/topic/wages/overtimepay.htm
- danielweber 12y ago
  Any employee of theirs who is reading this should just call the NY DOL and ask. Even if they don't work there any more. They might get a nice check from Handy's. It doesn't matter which employee calls in; if they do an audit, all employees who were underpaid will get payments.
- greenyoda 12y ago
  A "Customer Experience Associate" is almost certainly not an exempt employee, so U.S. law would require them to be paid overtime for any hours in excess of 40 hours a week. If you're an exempt employee, there's no requirement that you be paid overtime, no matter how many hours a week you're required to work.
- cdcarter 12y ago
  The salary could be calculated based on 72 hr weeks. At current NY state law, a gross annual salary of 35k assuming 48 paid weeks of employment at 72 hours a week would come to an hourly wage of $8.67, with overtime paid.
notastartup 12y ago
Handy.com seems like a really honest and humane company to work for. Just look at the co-founder's face, it exudes an all caring expression, the type you can only acquire by going to Harvard and working for McSomething consulting firm.
- hiddentao 12y ago
  Hahaha :)
redwood 12y ago
Sounds terrible but I have to point out that I don't like the way she described Ajay as an "Indian guy". I don't know why it rubbed me the wrong way
- general_failure 12y ago
  Yeah,same here. Nobody says "american guy". So she definitely wanted to get that fact through.
  - austinhutch 12y ago
    She says the marketing team was filled with a bunch of "white guys". I don't see what the issue is.
    - general_failure 12y ago
      Indeed :)
  - phaemon 12y ago
    > Nobody says "american guy" Yes they do. All the time. Well, probably not in America, cause that would be stupid (I doubt they say "Indian guy" in India for the same reason) but I've certainly heard it in the UK and Ireland. I've no reason to believe it's isolated to those countries. Edit: I feel I should now say something about "Family Dad", but I'm not sure that's right...
  - nandemo 12y ago
    I see it as just a way to out the guy without actually spelling out his name.
DanielBMarkham 12y ago
At the risk of saying something terribly unpopular, I've got about six more of these in me, then I'm done. Seriously. Let's get real. There are what? Say thirty thousand or so startups in the U.S., with ten thousand joining and dropping out in any given year? So if 1% were fuckups, we'd be able to run several of these stories a day. Forever. I think people like them because it feels good to see young jerks acting like, well, young jerks. Don't we know so much more than them? Wonder how they feel, now, those assholes! You can get the holier-than-thou feeling and you can riff off the righteous indignation. Lots of folks just can't get enough righteous indignation. Then you can sit around and share stories from the good old days. The problem is, not only can you run these ad infinitum without actually doing more than sharing a ton of anecdotes -- it doesn't lead to any sort of productivity. It gives me nothing to go and accomplish, it offers no insights into what public policy changes might be required to stop it (if it did, it'd be politics, and we don't want to go there). It's just -- nothing. Like driving by a fender bender and talking to the other people in the car about what happened and who must be at fault. A waste of time. I really wish there was something useful here. Best I've got is "People who don't understand employment law are going to make lots of mistakes" So I got that. I got that with the first of these. Maybe we're seeing the start of a new genre, like FuckedCompany. If so, perhaps there's a subreddit for it somewhere? After a few dozen of these, it ain't going to be stuff hackers are interested in, unless they're some pretty monotonous hackers.
_RPM 12y ago
Highland Capital Partners is one of their investors. Prior investments by the firm include http://www.hcp.com/companies/ http://www.hcp.com/companies/
lettercarrier 12y ago
The biz: Going rate where I deliver in Joisey for cleaners is $60 (min) for 2 hours. Homeowner/patrons I deliver to are too smart and would never call Handy back for next time.. just arrange it when they leave and the tip is given. Her story: : It's about revenge (or opportunity to gain satisfaction). Does not matter if 0 or 100% is true - impersonal bashing is just now so easy and like this post, can lead to tons of reaction and attention. At my other job a man gets coffee each morning (at a C-store on Rt 15) and text's the district manager with his version of how bad the store is that morning. Each day, every day. No Joke. "Out of lids" - "Didn't say Good Morning" "bla bla bla" He does it because he can.. it's not revenge.. (we need a new word) Her story v2.0 - It's about eyeballs. Making a post "pop" - The billfold (says) is a site about money, earning, spending, etc.. Her post is like having watermelon for Thanksgiving dessert. Satisfaction from eyeballs and keystrokes for certain to a site that is a stretch for relevance. Her story v3.0 - Just another (engaging) article about a not so good place to work, of which we should never be surprised when we hear stories like this again and again. I re read her words more than three times and something does not smell quite right. Just my gut. Perfect quotes, predictable responses, outrageous behavior of 'strangers' (the brandy new co-workers)- even the AHs in my Gov't job know when to not talk, especially around new faces. New faces are always thought of as spies until proven otherwise. [like the old phrase "a first impression has to be disproven"]
- icecreampain 12y ago
  Oh come now. Surely you don't doubt the words of someone who has written and spread the article under her own name, ready to be indexed by search engines and read by people who have to look at ads at the same time? Surely she wrote it to spread a warning to other poor souls and not as something to brag about and with which to get herself some click money and perhaps a job offer or two? Right right?
DanBC 12y ago
> “Okay, our Customer Experience Associates normally begin work at 8 a.m. and wrap up the day around 8 p.m. They work five days per week, plus one rotating weekend shift. Is that okay?” She looked at me warily. 12 * 5 = 60 hours per week. That's illegal in the EU. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Working_Time_Directive http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Working_Time_Directive https://www.gov.uk/maximum-weekly-working-hours https://www.gov.uk/maximum-weekly-working-hours

Wow! It's good to hear stories like this to balance out the usually euphoric stories around startups. Hopefully this an aberration, not the norm

forgottenpass 12y ago
Hopefully this an aberration, not the norm Startups that hire unskilled labor are only pulling back the curtain on the actual job market. If anything you can expect to hear more about it as the tech startup world starts building things that require more staff than an engineering department.
- HeyLaughingBoy 12y ago
  I worked unskilled labor in NYC before and during college (and a short time after). I've seen attempts to scam jobseekers, I've been sexually harassed (I'm male) and I've worked for assholes but I have never seen a legitimate employer that was even remotely this bad.

comrh 12y ago

"It will be a full day of work, like an extended interview, and unpaid." Screw that noise. It is clear from just that they don't respect people's time.

nhoven 12y ago
I'm pretty certain this is illegal and a violation of the Fair Labor Standard act. http://www.dol.gov/whd/flsa/ http://www.dol.gov/whd/flsa/
- CapitalistCartr 12y ago
  When I interview, I mention that I have to give my present employer 2 weeks notice, whether it's true or not. Then I carefully watch their reaction. Anything other than supportive is a deal-breaker. Either they have integrity or they don't.
  - YuriNiyazov 12y ago
    Could you clarify? I'm confused by what difference does it make what they say.
    - lostcolony 12y ago
      "Of course" - no red flags. "WHAT?! We expected you to start tomorrow! Can't you just quit? Don't you want to work here?!" - Aaaaand, we're done here.
      - YuriNiyazov 12y ago
        I have interviewed a lot, and I have literally never experienced anything other than some variation of "of course".
  - Igglyboo 12y ago
    The ones that aren't supportive usually aren't supportive of you quitting without 2 weeks either.
  - indyz 12y ago
    On the flip side, when I am interviewing a candidate I always ask when they would be able to start if we were to make them an offer. A currently employed candidate who says "tomorrow" raises huge red flags.
  - VLM 12y ago
    Tell them 3 weeks. Get escorted politely off former employer when I give notice (its just policy, good luck). Vacation!

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

waylandsmithers 12y ago

> The next step in the process is a tryout day. It will be a full day of work, like an extended interview, and unpaid. Could you come in tomorrow? I liked this until the unpaid part. Maybe there are just too many impossible laws and logistics to get around, but I've always thought it would be cool if more companies tried something out like a 10-day contract (paid of course) to make sure the job is a good fit, and so both parties can make an initial decision without as much risk.

imgabe 12y ago
I don't think there's a lot of legal hurdles. Companies hire short-term 1099 contractors all the time.
- jonknee 12y ago
  Yes, but you can't schedule a 1099 contractor to be in your office 8-8. That's likely why they won't give you a phone or computer, but that doesn't mean someone required to be in the office 12 hours a day to provide an essential function of your business is a contractor.
  - imgabe 12y ago
    Maybe it's not a 1099 situation then. You can, for example, hire an electrician and require they work only at night, or on the weekends, or whenever. It's clearly not outside the realm of possibility to pay someone to work in your office for a day. I have a hard time believing a Harvard MBA, McKinsey consultant couldn't wrap their head around the concept of contract work, not to mention labor laws.
    - jonknee 12y ago
      Don't ever doubt the willingness of a Harvard MBA / McKinsey consultant to call an employee a contractor to save on the taxes and hassles like fair employment practices. > It's clearly not outside the realm of possibility to pay someone to work in your office for a day. Of course not. But when you pay someone to work in your office on a set schedule every day to do the things that you tell them to do and those things are central to your business? Well, you got yourself an employee.

bkeroack 12y ago

This will never make the front page, no matter how many upvotes it receives.

tptacek 12y ago
It's at the top of the front page.
- huhtenberg 12y ago
  It's a conspiracy then!

hardwaresofton 12y ago

This doesn't seem like it could have happened in real life. I can't believe someone, especially in tech, could justify working in such an atmosphere with those "benefits". Yes, big companies may stifle creativity a little, but from what little I read, this startup doesn't seem to be so great..

declan 12y ago
>I can't believe someone, especially in tech... Remember, the author of this article (who of course didn't continue working there) isn't in tech. She previously wrote about working at a non-profit theater company and about wanting to teach English. If you mean the programmers at this startup, yes, that seems odd. But this may be the least worst of the options they have available, or the author may have taken some liberties with her description of the office environment...
ceejayoz 12y ago
It seems to be real. The company's response is at http://valleywag.gawker.com/handys-nightmare-tryout-process-is-a-startup-stereotype-1649016476/ http://valleywag.gawker.com/handys-nightmare-tryout-process-... and reads basically "yeah but that was a while ago, we're different now".

song 12y ago

Sometimes I wonder if it would make sense for investors to send someone they trust to apply and interview for a position at a company they're considering. If what she wrote is accurate I don't really understand how they managed to raise $30 million in funding.

arenaninja 12y ago
> If what she wrote is accurate I don't really understand how they managed to raise $30 million in funding. Probably covered by the part where the founder was at Harvard
- danielweber 12y ago
  It's not unusual at all to find very smart people that just lack the very basic common sense.
dreamweapon 12y ago
Nothing at all surprising about them being able to raise $30M. The lousiest people are usually also the best at kissing ass.

notch90 12y ago

yea, I had bad experiences there too. They are very bad with hiring contract. Really treat employees like bad

codezero 12y ago

This is probably hard for most engineers to relate to, unless part of your role is doing support. edit: when I say something is not insane or unexpected, I mean it in the context of a person looking for work in customer support. These are the things you run in to. So if you are shocked that they have to provide their own hardware, then you are shocked at the way support people are often actually treated. I'm not advocating for or supporting that. The interview process and criteria for being hired have really high variance compared to engineering interviews. The author of this piece made the classic, and often unavoidable mistake of being between a rock and a hard place and not vetting the company she interviewed at and ultimately worked for for a day. Even if you're not an engineer/designer/data scientist (or one of the typically highly desired people for a startup), you should be working at places you love and believe in, when you're not, you end up having bad experiences and those bad experiences are amplified by the environment. First, I didn't find Ajay's interview to be that weird, saying why you came up with the idea for your company and your qualifications should be expected, not interpreted as a way for the founder to diminish the potential future employee. If you don't believe in your leaders, and don't trust them, you are in a lot of trouble. edit: I think that not having interviewed with the actual support team members is a huge red flag here as well, but owing to the author's somewhat desperate situation, they moved forward anyways. 12 hour days is insane, and wrong. Having to provide your own device is not really that insane for small teams. Obviously it's great if a company provides it, and probably larger companies should always provide a workstation, but this doesn't come across as totally abnormal. The constant "want to hear a joke" and racist/sexist tone at the company is also not acceptable, but clearly was supported by the people working there at the time, if the anecdote is taken at face value. It's super easy to pay for a trial period, and as far as I'm aware, it's not even legal to have people work for free unless you are a nonprofit or government organization, so that's shady, even if only for one day. I've done two week trials that were fully paid, and it was a great way to get a feel for the company and vice versa. Not having any onboarding, given that the trial was for a day isn't too surprising, but that is clearly a problem with a one day trial. They should have absolutely been given some lead-in material to help them get prepped before starting. There appear to be a lot of growing pains at Handy, which isn't a surprise, but hopefully they can move fast and get their support/service wing to be as tight and focused as the rest of their team (assuming that is true).

arenaninja 12y ago

This is pretty bad. I'm debating whether it tops the job where I got fired for speaking Spanish, but it's bad nonetheless

Igglyboo 12y ago
Woah really? Sounds interesting, care to share the story?
- psykovsky 12y ago
  Once I was "demoted" for having a bad relationship with my father because someone talked about it with the store manager...

jdhawk 12y ago

Sounds like the company is growing too quickly for them to implement things like Human Resources & a new hire training program. BYO Technology? that should be an OPTION, not a requirement...especially at 35K.

king_jester 12y ago

I'm not surprised that a company that would treat its service providers so shitty would also treat its employees that way. Between stories like this and the things I hear about other service startups like Task Rabbit it makes me never want to use one of these services ever.

joshstrange 12y ago

Sexism, racism, homophobia (I assume that's what was going on with the marketing guys and "Josh"), long hours, low pay, "boys club", overbearing/micromanaging boss, unpaid full day "interview", false hope (Seemed like the idea of getting your own franchise was a carrot dangled before them on a stick that they would never get), and little/no structure. Wow.... And these are the companies that are getting funded?

potatolicious 12y ago
I work in startups in NYC. None of the things described are even remotely close to shocking for me - I've seen all of the above first-hand either in offices or at startup events. That said, I've never seen all those things under the same roof, much less in a single day. The perfect storm of insanity makes me doubt the author's story a little bit, but each of the things she's brought up I've seen. Shit, I literally just read a racist internal email an hour ago about the new cleaning lady at the office. Plus the pointless credential-rundown you get every. single. goddamn. time. you meet a startup person in this city. Oh, you went to Harvard 10 years ago? That's so relevant considering we just met 2 minutes ago! You used to work at Goldman and now you're doing a consumer-tech startup? Yeah, that really needed to be in the first 3 sentences you've ever spoken to me.
- ritchiea 12y ago
  Oh my god it is exactly like that. As though pushing spreadsheets at Goldman has anything to do with building a software product. But they know that, they just want you to know they worked at Goldman. Because Goldman. I once worked under a CTO who remarked "it's not like we're going to hire a woman" after interviewing a female dev candidate, which would be horribly offensive even if he was just kidding (he wasn't kidding, I was shocked he even took the time to interview her). There's definitely a sense of "startups are the new banking." It's frustrating because there are also a lot of good people, but man is there a glut of bros who fit all the worst stereotypes of old boys club business.
  - dccoolgai 12y ago

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

arikrak 12y ago

In general, startups do not follow the professional practices of established companies. When you interview for an established company, they're usually professional and they get back to you afterwards. When you interview for a startup, you can run into all sorts of issues. The founder might not be there, the employees may have no idea what to do with you, or you might just have a 15-minute interview after traveling for 90 minutes to get there. They often won't get back to you. Though this example is particularly bad since they're asking applicants to do unpaid labor.

darkhorse05 12y ago
Are you kidding me. If this story was true, this startup was way beyond just unprofessional.

devanti 12y ago

No surprise here. The first thing a Harvard grad will tell you is that they graduated from Harvard.

ryanSrich 12y ago
How do you spot an MBA from Harvard? Don't worry they'll tell you...
gone35 12y ago
Interesting. Informally (anecdotally), I think the norm is quite the opposite: noblesse obliges to never drop the H-bomb in conversation --whence the irksome "went to school near Boston" trope [1,2]. It could well be a HBS-only thing, though. They have their own thing going on. [1] http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2011/9/15/harvard-students-go-people/ http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2011/9/15/harvard-students... [2] http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2014/05/30/harvard_grads_say_i_went_to_college_in_boston_and_call_it_the_h_bomb_get.html http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2014/05/30/harvard_grads...
- waterlesscloud 12y ago
  In my anecdotal experience, I only find out people I meet went to Harvard when I see them in a school sweatshirt. Or if they write for The Simpsons, in which case I just assume it. Heh. Wharton grads, on the other hand... Never more than 10 minutes before they drop it in.
golgappi 12y ago
my graduate advisor had studied CS from Harvard. She never mentioned it. I got to know one day when I was going through her Bio. I mentioned it in the next meeting and all she did was smile faintly. People with substance don't need to flash their Ivy League emblem everywhere.

eastbayjake 12y ago

I don't know why she changed the founder's name, it's pretty easy to figure out when there are only two founders.[1] It looks like Umang Dua, HBS '13[2]. He's on Twitter as @umangdua if anyone would like to ask him about this incident. [1] https://www.handy.com/about https://www.handy.com/about [2] https://www.linkedin.com/in/umangdua https://www.linkedin.com/in/umangdua [3] https://twitter.com/umangdua https://twitter.com/umangdua

fuzzywalrus 12y ago
Honestly, I thought it took a lot of gall to even name the startup by name. There's always a fear of retribution even minor.
- MBCook 12y ago
  I had assumed the name of the company was fake until I read the line at the end about them changing their name and getting a former Amazon CFO.
- danielweber 12y ago
  I admire gall.
- throwaway_- 12y ago
  Less fear of being blackballed when you're an industry outsider.
- steve-benjamins 12y ago
  Naming the startup gave this article extra teeth for me.
- eastbayjake 12y ago
  According to Valley Wag, she was writing under a pseudonym: http://valleywag.gawker.com/handys-nightmare-tryout-process-is-a-startup-stereotype-1649016476 http://valleywag.gawker.com/handys-nightmare-tryout-process-...
hsod 12y ago

terramars 12y ago

Full work day interviews where you do actual work for the company are technically illegal. If you want to mess with them, you can file a suit in small claims court for whatever hourly rate you feel like, and it'll be a huge pain in the ass unless they settle and pay you quickly :)

mattzito 12y ago
Do you have any documentation or links on this? I am in no way doubting you, but this is such a common occurrence I hear about that I'd like to have a few links in my pocket to give people who either a) think this is a good idea, or b) have to experience this. The other angle is understanding at which point an interview turns into an illegal full-day interview with actual work.
- ne0n 12y ago
  The point where an interview becomes illegal is when you do actual work. In an interview, they should run through mock scenarios to gauge if it will be a good fit. You do actual work after they hire you. Companies pay for training employees for a reason. Here's a flowchart for if you internship is illegal. http://www.moneysideoflife.com/illegal-internship-flowchart/ http://www.moneysideoflife.com/illegal-internship-flowchart/ It's pretty much exactly the same in this scenario. Included in there, is a link to the Labor Department's regulations on the subject.
why-el 12y ago
I am in the process of agreeing to a similar arrangement but it is payed and can go on while I interview with other companies. Win win and the best part is that everything is transparent between me and the startup. This is in Germany.
mahyarm 12y ago
For visa people, you can't really get paid either when you do interviews. You usually don't know if it's 'actual work' or not before hand.
danielweber 12y ago

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

Igglyboo 12y ago
I really can't believe that. I'm not even out of school working in the midwest making twice that. It's unfathomable that a software developer would make only $30k, especially in NYC.
- S4M 12y ago
  She's not software developer, but "Customer Experience Associate", which apparently consists in taking calls from customers. 30k seems very low for NYC though.
arjie 12y ago
The article talks about being a "Customer Experience Associate". It also talks about her job being to handle sales, customer support, and act as liaison when necessary between customers and "service providers".
malcote 12y ago
It was a customer-service job. Dealing with customers on the phone and so forth.

jonknee 12y ago

Where are all the attorneys? This is a company with flagrantly illegal practices and a ton of money in the bank. People live for that sort of scenario. Anyone let go by these clowns should leave with a nice chunk of change.

dccoolgai 12y ago
We've spent the last 30-odd years electing people that stuff the books and court benches with laws and people that make sure that - by and large - attorneys and the victims they represent can't hold companies like this responsible or accountable - for almost anything, let alone misdeeds with needy victims. Go look up "forced arbitration"... these "service providers" probably have, at best, the right to a loser-pays "arbitrator" who is paid and picked by Handybook. The risk that any of them might opt for any quasi-legal proceeding (let alone the rigged arbitration system they are likely limited to) given that many of them most likely have some kind of liminal citizenship status is effectively nil. If I were doing the liabilities/risk business analysis for this, I would delete the row this was on just to clean up the spreadsheet a little bit. The concept of companies being held responsible for things they do that hurt or exploit people is a humorous anachronism from a bygone era.
- danielweber 12y ago
  It doesn't look like the "candidate/employee" signed anything. And if they did, the contract isn't enforceable without consideration. "We are considering you for the job" is not consideration.
  - jordanb 12y ago
    The way companies do forced arbitration now is by providing the employee with an opt out form that they have to fill out and mail to the legal department within 30 days. Sharp-eyed employees will notice this in their new hire documentation but most will not. The company can then claim that they did not make forced arbitration a condition of employment and did give the employee an opportunity to opt out, which they declined to take. Courts have upheld this as legal: http://www.dglaw.com/images_user/newsalerts/Litigation_Employees_Who_Dont_Opt_Out.pdf http://www.dglaw.com/images_user/newsalerts/Litigation_Emplo...

drtse4 12y ago

> "I started this company while I was getting my MBA at Harvard. Before this, I worked for McKinsey & Company…" he paused to gauge my reaction, “which is one of the top business consulting firms in the world.” I wonder how he would have reacted to my utterly uninterested facial expression. Nothing of that is of any interest when trying to asses his value as a person or if his idea/company is good or not.

goodJobWalrus 12y ago
yeah, I'm imagining her saying: 'aw, that's nice' with a deadpan face.
grecy 12y ago
I enjoy being from Australia and listening to Americans yammer on about their education or work history. I honestly say "I've never heard of <institution>" - the reactions are great :)

Mandatum 12y ago

It sickens me how close that article/post is to my experience working for a small business in Auckland, New Zealand.

7Figures2Commas 12y ago

> “Congratulations! Ajay thinks you’d be a great fit. The next step in the process is a tryout day. It will be a full day of work, like an extended interview, and unpaid. Could you come in tomorrow?” This may be a violation of wage and hour laws. > “Great! You’ll need to bring your own laptop and smart phone. Will that be a problem for you?” Many states forbid companies from requiring that their employees bear the costs of business expenses. I wonder if employees at this company are being reimbursed. > “Okay, our Customer Experience Associates normally begin work at 8 a.m. and wrap up the day around 8 p.m. They work five days per week, plus one rotating weekend shift. Is that okay?” She looked at me warily. It would be interesting to know if the company is treating "Customer Experience Associates" as exempt or non-exempt employees. Customer service roles are almost always non-exempt, and non-exempt employees are entitled to overtime pay. Given that the author wrote she was offered a $35,000 salary and made no mention of overtime pay, it sounds like there might be a misclassification issue here. These misclassifications can be very, very costly (unpaid overtime plus interest, numerous statutory penalties, attorney's fees, etc.) so they're incredibly attractive to plaintiff's attorneys. > “Service provider” was a pleasant euphemism for Handybook’s fleet of freelance cleaners and handymen. After signing up with Handybook, service providers received text alerts about available jobs, which they could claim for themselves by texting back, on a first-come, first-serve basis. > A programmer giggled and called out, “Ashley, do your Chinese washer woman impression again!” “My Chinese washa wo-men?” she pulled back the skin on the sides of her face. “I do you laund-wy! Own-wy ten dollah!” She laughed hysterically, “I clean you house!” The programmers sniggered loudly. “Ching chong!” someone yelled out and collapsed into laughter. > “Want to hear a joke I heard today?” a programmer asked, eying me and giggling. “What’s the difference between a woman and a refrigerator?” “…what,” I said. “Refrigerators don’t moan when you put meat in them!” This behavior is toxic to businesses that want to remain in business. > “Service provider” was a pleasant euphemism for Handybook’s fleet of freelance cleaners and handymen. After signing up with Handybook, service providers received text alerts about available jobs, which they could claim for themselves by texting back, on a first-come, first-serve basis. A lot of these "on demand" companies are built on classifying their service providers as independent contractors. In many cases, however, independent contractor classification is questionable. In this case specifically, the description of how the company dealt with Lupe raises serious questions. The more funding these companies receive, and the bigger they get, the more attractive they're going to be to plaintiff's counsel. One of Handy's competitors is already on the radar of a prominent Boston class action attorney[1]. [1] http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/storyline/wp/2014/09/10/at-the-uber-for-home-cleaning-workers-pay-a-price-for-convenience/ http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/storyline/wp/2014/09/10/a...

incision 12y ago

I must be old... I feel like I read stories about horrible jobs and tough times finding work from young college grads regularly and the news would seem to corroborate them [1]. Apparently, these people end up serving coffee or answering phones for clown shop start-ups. Meanwhile, I know people trying to hire for what I'd consider traditional entry level jobs (clerks, reception, no-risk security, no-experience necessary apprenticeships) offering full benefits plus 35-45k+ salaries who would be overjoyed to see a single college-educated applicant. What's going on here? Do people believe in this Amway-esque pitch for a "world of opportunities"? Do traditional jobs feel like giving up? Are they too restricting? 1: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/she-the-people/wp/2014/09/05/why-sally-cant-get-a-good-job-with-her-college-degree/ http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/she-the-people/wp/2014/0...

jacalata 12y ago
Well, do you have links to the open job positions for 'traditional jobs'? Are they in nowhere, midwest? Are you sure they really exist? Are they advertising entirely on the bulletin board of nursing homes? Are they just advertising for 'secretary' without listing salaries and benefits? Lots of reasons why they might not get applicants, but I don't think any of those reasons are 'kids these days'.
cddotdotslash 12y ago
I'm not "old," but I'll give it a shot... I agree - it seems like every day I read a story about how my peers can't find jobs, how the job market is terrible, etc. But then I see thousands of postings for those typical desk jobs. I don't fully understand it, but if I had to venture a guess, I'd say it has to do with the "coolness" of the job. It seems much more superior these days to say you work for the latest startup over a traditional multi-national corporation. Also, people entering the job market today really seem to value the work environment. I read an article on HN recently about how the finance industry is losing applicants to the tech industry. Recent grads hate the stuffy 9 to 5 culture, not getting free lunches, wearing suits to a job where they sit at a desk all day, etc. etc. Regardless, I would think they'd rather have a job somewhere like that than no job at all, but that's been my limited experience talking to 30 or so new grads.
12y ago

robodale 12y ago

If I was the guy being interviewed, I would have punched that "Ajay" in the fucking neck halfway through the interview...but looks like the company is punching itself in the neck anyway. Good riddance.

S4M 12y ago

I thought this article was written about a fictitious company as a satire, but after couple of search it turns out that Handy actually exists and has raised quite a lot - as a competitor of HomeJoy? I don't know if everything there is true, but this article has the indirect effect of making my opinion of michaelochurch going up.

atomical 12y ago
Why?

joezydeco 12y ago

Still wishing fuckedcompany.com was still around to start collecting stories like this as the bubble starts to pop...

RockyMcNuts 12y ago
Soon there will be an app for that, probably called Unter (Uber for going under).

Animats 12y ago

Not only is this employer acting like an asshole, they're doing it stupidly. They let candidates for employment bring in their own computer and plug it into their internal network. Someone is going to drain out all their internal records. You can see their web site at "http://www.handy.com/" http://www.handy.com/". The page source is amusing. They seem to be more interested in ad networks than booking actual business.

aaronem 12y ago
> Someone is going to drain out all their internal records What could they possibly have worth stealing?
- Eiriksmal 12y ago
  That's easy--the answer to where all that $45,000,000 in venture capital funding went!

pbreit 12y ago

The unpaid day of work sounds illegal but is at least pathetically unprofessional for that type of position.

AndrewKemendo 12y ago

These tales are infuriating.

danielweber 12y ago

As much as things sometimes sucked during my recent job hunt, holy cow, this is over-the-top awful. The worst of my experiences were exceeded within three paragraphs. I did have to deal with one company that said they had trouble "finding senior people" when the whole office was a playground. But no one told me any sexist or racist jokes.

Disruptive_Dave 12y ago

Have a seemingly decent idea. Build a seemingly workable product. Know people / have a shiny thing on your resume. Why the surprise at all this? Here in NYC I speak to funded startup founders and employees every other day who lack basic business, business management, and people management skills and experience. Investor actions (i.e. $$$$) seriously devalue these things now. (But we have advisors!!!!!!!) /jadedrant

Killah911 12y ago

This is interesting: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V36Nn9UpBxk http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V36Nn9UpBxk

tptacek 12y ago

The experience of this CSR candidate is obviously the lede of the piece, but my problem with businesses like this is deeper: I think all these companies that put a pretty UI over a bunch of low-skill 1099 workers are exploitative. Reread the section about Lupe's attempt to reach the client in time. I feel like companies in these markets will eventually reap the whirlwind when the USG decides not to allow people filling these roles to be classified as 1099s, and the whole segment falls apart. Or maybe I just hope it.

incision 12y ago
>"I think all these companies that put a pretty UI over a bunch of low-skill 1099 workers are exploitative." While I totally agree with this I wonder about whether / why people working this jobs would be re-classified? Many if not most people I know in work in technology on 1099 and are applied in ways which would seem to be more clearly misclassified than these workers.
- tptacek 12y ago
  The USG decided how the classification works today (own supplies, control over the method of how the work is done, &c). They can change the classification system.
zo1 12y ago
So the first definition I found for exploitation: "the action or fact of treating someone unfairly in order to benefit from their work." Is that how you view it, and then go on to classify it as exploitation? The fact that these individuals are somehow treated unfairly? Following from that, how would you change it so that it fits within your definition of fair?
jordanb 12y ago
Piketty observes that the rise of the monthly wage was essential to the rise of what he calls the "patrimonial middle class". It gave labor a degree of income stability that they did not enjoy under the previous system of daily wages and piecework. These startups are essentially converting monthly wage jobs back into piecework jobs. Not satisfied with rolling back the new deal, we're now rolling back the progressive era.

swang 12y ago

They've responded on Twitter. They don't really mention what they're talking about so you won't understand unless you've read the story. I guess to purposely not connect others to the story > This is disturbing and in no way represents working at Handy. Companies go through growing pains and these facts have no bearing on us today > When Amanda says she applied 1.5 yrs ago, our company was newer, smaller and still figuring out best practices. Things have changed since. > We do not stand for racism or sexism of any kind. That kind of behavior is not tolerated and never will be. > We understand that our employees and professionals are the lifeblood of our business and we work every day to ensure their happiness. They don't seem to deny what Amanda is saying. And I don't see how they can say they've changed if some of those same people still remain...

TarpitCarnivore 12y ago
> This is disturbing and in no way represents working at Handy. Companies go through growing pains and these facts have no bearing on us today I take issue with this statement the most. The author clearly identifies the CEO, whom is still there, was present when the comments and inappropriate jokes were being made. It's entirely possible the CEO did say something, but I'm guessing based on the tone of the article they did not. While it's natural for a company to go through growing pains I've never heard it used in reference to office culture how customers are treated. If this was going on 18 months ago it means it's still there today.
- MBCook 12y ago
  I saw that as nothing but an admission of guilt. I wonder if the tweet will stay up. I bet their corporate lawyer won't be happy when they see it.
- organsnyder 12y ago
  Exactly. Symptoms of "growing pains" include struggling to meet obligations, disorganized management, etc. A blatant disrespect for others is a symptom of a person lacking in morals and empathy.

petercoolz 12y ago

This reminds me of the all-too-true joke. Question: How do you know somebody has an MBA? Answer: They tell you. Full disclosure... I have an MBA!

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

aaron695 12y ago

FYI in cased you missed it - This is a story about the world of telemarketing, not startups.

unclesaamm 12y ago
Eh. It's very much about the differential treatment that different types of employees get in startup. I don't think it's uncommon for programmers to be far more spoiled within companies than say, sales

mathrawka 12y ago

Here's a video on Handy's hiring strategy: https://www.33voices.com/authors/umang-dua/media/handys-hiring-strategies https://www.33voices.com/authors/umang-dua/media/handys-hiri...

kaeawc 12y ago

And now I'm never going to use Handybook again.

discardorama 12y ago

I'm no lawyer, but: by law, if you are expected to work 12-hour days, isn't the company supposed to pay you overtime? My understanding was that even if you are an 'exempt' employee, if the _expectation_ is that you have to work more than 40 hours/week, you should be paid overtime?

moron4hire 12y ago
I know that to be the case in Pennsylvania and Virginia, as those are the states I've lived in. I believe it to be the case in New York.
- greenyoda 12y ago
  In the U.S., this is actually governed by a Federal law, the Fair Labor Standards Act. The U.S. Department of Labor has lots of information about it: http://www.dol.gov/dol/topic/wages/overtimepay.htm http://www.dol.gov/dol/topic/wages/overtimepay.htm
danielweber 12y ago
Any employee of theirs who is reading this should just call the NY DOL and ask. Even if they don't work there any more. They might get a nice check from Handy's. It doesn't matter which employee calls in; if they do an audit, all employees who were underpaid will get payments.
greenyoda 12y ago
A "Customer Experience Associate" is almost certainly not an exempt employee, so U.S. law would require them to be paid overtime for any hours in excess of 40 hours a week. If you're an exempt employee, there's no requirement that you be paid overtime, no matter how many hours a week you're required to work.
cdcarter 12y ago
The salary could be calculated based on 72 hr weeks. At current NY state law, a gross annual salary of 35k assuming 48 paid weeks of employment at 72 hours a week would come to an hourly wage of $8.67, with overtime paid.

notastartup 12y ago

Handy.com seems like a really honest and humane company to work for. Just look at the co-founder's face, it exudes an all caring expression, the type you can only acquire by going to Harvard and working for McSomething consulting firm.

hiddentao 12y ago
Hahaha :)

redwood 12y ago

Sounds terrible but I have to point out that I don't like the way she described Ajay as an "Indian guy". I don't know why it rubbed me the wrong way

general_failure 12y ago
Yeah,same here. Nobody says "american guy". So she definitely wanted to get that fact through.
- austinhutch 12y ago
  She says the marketing team was filled with a bunch of "white guys". I don't see what the issue is.
  - general_failure 12y ago
    Indeed :)
- phaemon 12y ago
  > Nobody says "american guy" Yes they do. All the time. Well, probably not in America, cause that would be stupid (I doubt they say "Indian guy" in India for the same reason) but I've certainly heard it in the UK and Ireland. I've no reason to believe it's isolated to those countries. Edit: I feel I should now say something about "Family Dad", but I'm not sure that's right...
- nandemo 12y ago
  I see it as just a way to out the guy without actually spelling out his name.

DanielBMarkham 12y ago

At the risk of saying something terribly unpopular, I've got about six more of these in me, then I'm done. Seriously. Let's get real. There are what? Say thirty thousand or so startups in the U.S., with ten thousand joining and dropping out in any given year? So if 1% were fuckups, we'd be able to run several of these stories a day. Forever. I think people like them because it feels good to see young jerks acting like, well, young jerks. Don't we know so much more than them? Wonder how they feel, now, those assholes! You can get the holier-than-thou feeling and you can riff off the righteous indignation. Lots of folks just can't get enough righteous indignation. Then you can sit around and share stories from the good old days. The problem is, not only can you run these ad infinitum without actually doing more than sharing a ton of anecdotes -- it doesn't lead to any sort of productivity. It gives me nothing to go and accomplish, it offers no insights into what public policy changes might be required to stop it (if it did, it'd be politics, and we don't want to go there). It's just -- nothing. Like driving by a fender bender and talking to the other people in the car about what happened and who must be at fault. A waste of time. I really wish there was something useful here. Best I've got is "People who don't understand employment law are going to make lots of mistakes" So I got that. I got that with the first of these. Maybe we're seeing the start of a new genre, like FuckedCompany. If so, perhaps there's a subreddit for it somewhere? After a few dozen of these, it ain't going to be stuff hackers are interested in, unless they're some pretty monotonous hackers.

_RPM 12y ago

Highland Capital Partners is one of their investors. Prior investments by the firm include http://www.hcp.com/companies/ http://www.hcp.com/companies/

lettercarrier 12y ago

The biz: Going rate where I deliver in Joisey for cleaners is $60 (min) for 2 hours. Homeowner/patrons I deliver to are too smart and would never call Handy back for next time.. just arrange it when they leave and the tip is given. Her story: : It's about revenge (or opportunity to gain satisfaction). Does not matter if 0 or 100% is true - impersonal bashing is just now so easy and like this post, can lead to tons of reaction and attention. At my other job a man gets coffee each morning (at a C-store on Rt 15) and text's the district manager with his version of how bad the store is that morning. Each day, every day. No Joke. "Out of lids" - "Didn't say Good Morning" "bla bla bla" He does it because he can.. it's not revenge.. (we need a new word) Her story v2.0 - It's about eyeballs. Making a post "pop" - The billfold (says) is a site about money, earning, spending, etc.. Her post is like having watermelon for Thanksgiving dessert. Satisfaction from eyeballs and keystrokes for certain to a site that is a stretch for relevance. Her story v3.0 - Just another (engaging) article about a not so good place to work, of which we should never be surprised when we hear stories like this again and again. I re read her words more than three times and something does not smell quite right. Just my gut. Perfect quotes, predictable responses, outrageous behavior of 'strangers' (the brandy new co-workers)- even the AHs in my Gov't job know when to not talk, especially around new faces. New faces are always thought of as spies until proven otherwise. [like the old phrase "a first impression has to be disproven"]

icecreampain 12y ago
Oh come now. Surely you don't doubt the words of someone who has written and spread the article under her own name, ready to be indexed by search engines and read by people who have to look at ads at the same time? Surely she wrote it to spread a warning to other poor souls and not as something to brag about and with which to get herself some click money and perhaps a job offer or two? Right right?

DanBC 12y ago

> “Okay, our Customer Experience Associates normally begin work at 8 a.m. and wrap up the day around 8 p.m. They work five days per week, plus one rotating weekend shift. Is that okay?” She looked at me warily. 12 * 5 = 60 hours per week. That's illegal in the EU. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Working_Time_Directive http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Working_Time_Directive https://www.gov.uk/maximum-weekly-working-hours https://www.gov.uk/maximum-weekly-working-hours