I don't know about you guys, but I've been to sexual harassment training. What Susan documented could be translated to tens of millions in fines and damages.
If it's this egregious, it's could be much, much, higher.
Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber
391–400 of 1001 posts
Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber
#392Earlier quoted context omitted.
If an Uber recruiter contacts you, bring this up and tell them their nonfunctioning HR department makes working for their company a non starter. If you work at Uber, quit, and/or contact the board and tell them that this behavior is unacceptable and the people responsible need to be fired. If the culture won't change, the CEO needs to be fired. If you work in tech, bring up this article with your manager or CEO and t…
Thinking about the attrition rate of female engineers, I wonder if there's a similar rate of male engineers who leave due to how badly their female colleagues are treated in addition to the other factors listed in this thread and Fowler's piece. If so, that would imply that the engineering culture is being distilled into an evermore toxic workplace, since those who stay are those who make the place toxic or are simpl…
I really doubt this. A lot of men are totally unaware of how women are treated, which fellow men on their team are harassers, or don't believe women when they report harassment. My evidence for this is every man in tech reacting with shock to this story, and every woman I know saying "yep, I have a story like this," or "I know many women with stories like this"
Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber
#393If you are sexually harassed, and HR doesn't do anything about it, you should sue. Don't expect HR to change. If the stories in this article are true, and if the evidence is as strong as the article says it is, this is a slam-dunk case for sexual harassment, hostile work environment, retaliation, etc.
Everyone is talking about why she didn't sue. Given the way the courts have ruled recently on binding arbitration, is it possible that she has no recourse to actual courts, just to arbiters? (She never says if such a clause was included in her employment contract, but I know that it has been included in the last two contracts that I signed.) Wouldn't that foreclose her opportunity to sue, and just to go into the much less favorable (for her) arbitration process?
Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber
#394Earlier quoted context omitted.
That speaks to me. After salary negotiations, HR within companies has never done anything for me when I approached them. They seemed to be there only to defend the boss and register me as a complainer. It took me several jobs and this post to learn that.
> HR within companies has never done anything for me when I approached them.... The thing you need to keep in mind about HR is this: they aren't there to help you, to have your back. They're there to protect the company from you . Incidental to that, they've traditionally managed the benefits the company is either required or chooses to give you, and acts as a place for you to take concerns such as sexual harassment.…
How does one protect oneself in cases of sexual impropriety then? This seems like a pretty dangerous flaw. To be completely honest I've always felt that HR has been the "police" of the workplace, there to keep issues like this from getting out of control (as it most certainly did in the case of OP). Now I feel much more exposed...
Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber
#395In case anyone isn't sure why the original interaction is harassment: relationships within a reporting chain are generally prohibited, for both legal, ethical, and practical reasons. Sex becoming part of the effective job description crosses both legal and ethical lines, and team effectiveness is hindered when people wonder whether someone is getting special treatment because they're sleeping with the boss. A manager…
I don't understand how anyone could be unsure about that being harassment. It's about as clear-cut as you can get.
He should have been fired the day that surfaced. If someone who worked for me ever did something like that, they'd be out the door pronto. It speaks volumes that he wasn't, to the point which I am irrationally tempted to doubt the veracity of her claims.
Don't proposition anyone in your reporting chain. Don't flirt with them. Don't do anything with them. It's really not that complicated. If you are attracted to someone who works for you (it happens), do the adult thing and ignore it.
Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber
#396HR fucked up and the manager should not have talked to her that way. Absolutely agree. I believe she has grounds to sue if she wishes. Now, I think it's easy to take this type of situations and overeact. The behavior Susan described is not appropriate. That said, I think there is a trend to classify any romantic behavior or advances as sexual assault and innpapropriate behavior. Nowadays I would have a very hard time…
> I have had 2 girls ask me out at work in the past 3 years.
> I have also had girls approach me in professional settings such as conferences and ask me for my number and invite me for drinks
Lucky son of a gun
Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber
#397Earlier quoted context omitted.
Second. The writer and the others should sue, not only to be compensated for their own injuries but to protect others who might be harassed as well.
There are huge professional and personal costs to suing. She has done more by most to protect others by going public. Isn't her job to fix Uber via lawsuit.
Someone needs to do it. It's not any particular person's duty, and she has definitely gone above and beyond by writing this up, but it would be a great public service for someone to bring a (preferably class-action) lawsuit.
Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber
#398Earlier quoted context omitted.
Where did you hear the pay is terrible? From what I've heard, it seems pretty normal for the industry, at least for software engineers.
If you dig into the package, a lot of the value is locked up in unsellable shares. Vs immediately liquid RSUs of any public company.
That is any startup / private company. That isn't unique to Uber at all. IPOs are usually done when your profitable or have no other choice. You want to do an IPO when your profitable / break even or usually it becomes a bad deal for everyone.
Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber
#399Earlier quoted context omitted.
Isn't that due to the perception that they broke the recent anti-Trump taxi strike, rather than their internal work culture?
Among my peer group (Denver) it's been the same. It has alot more to do with what we hear from drivers about the respective companies. For whatever reason drivers are happy to shill for Lyft and are often almost hostile towards Uber. At some point you just get the feeling that Uber isn't what we really wanna be supporting. I should note: my peer group isn't particularly tech oriented.
The few drivers I've spoken to say the Lyft app is simply way more reliable, for a start.
Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber
#400Earlier quoted context omitted.
The problem is that workers don't have leverage like they used to due to globalization and a general labor surplus. We need to think of something that would work better than a union.
Software developers have incredible leverage right now, perhaps more than any cohort of employees in the country, and while most don't have salary to organize around, there are plenty of other practices --- transparency and liquidity of equity compensation being a great example --- that generate a broad base of support across the whole industry. People hear the term "union" and they think "shop rules" and "union cont…
> People hear the term "union" and they think "shop rules" and "union contract salary".
The problem is that a significant number of the people who push "unions" (especially on places like HN) are actually trying to push for those things. Just look in this thread to find people arguing over whether there actually are large differences in developer performance.
If people want a professional association (I do!) let's call it that and avoid all this union talk. Think lawyers, not factories.