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Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber

susanjfowler.com

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Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber

#561

Post by ThrustVectoring »

rifung wrote: post #408
srpablo wrote: post #323

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm of the opinion that the average software engineer in the USA is already overpaid and underworked with excellent benefits and low incentive to unionize. I happen to agree that, relative to other industries, we're overpaid and get to live pretty lavishly for the little sacrifice that working on building systems with code entails. That said, when you look at the value we generate for the people we work for, and re…

I don't think the value you generate actually matters in regards to compensation though. What matters is how easy you are to replace.

It does, because value generated helps with your best alternative to negotiated agreement. Specifically, there's more money floating around trying to woo freelancers, technical cofounders, etc.

Also, it sets their BATNA as well - how much value they miss out on while working on replacing you.

Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber

#562

Post by kennywinker »

home_boi wrote: post #271
knucklesandwich wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tech workers (across all disciplines) need to unionize to combat this kind of thing. As has been pointed out below, HR that is staffed and incentivized by the company management only serves the interests of the management. A union is the only structure that can actually win demands for workers by organizing workers to withhold their labor. It's not a panacea, and there are several historical examples of union leaders…

I'm of the opinion that the average software engineer in the USA is already overpaid and underworked with excellent benefits and low incentive to unionize. I'm simplifying it a bit but if you don't like your job, just grab a copy of Cracking the Coding Interview and apply to big companies. The big companies pay very well, have good benefits and interview everyone because of the need for a high head count

The Apple / Google / Adobe / Intel etc antipoaching lawsuit seems to indicate otherwise.

https://www.cnet.com/news/apple-google-others-settle-anti-po...

Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber

#563

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

dkarapetyan wrote: post #66

Susan is ~an industry veteran~ a somewhat experienced engineer and her interactions with HR are typical of what I've seen so I would have expected her to know how things would play out. In my experience HR is never there to protect the employees. HR is there to make sure the company doesn't get into any hot legal waters. Most of the time the easiest way to do that is to just suppress any wrongdoing and sideline whoev…

> HR is there to make sure the company doesn't get into any hot legal waters.

Yes, this I totally agree with. In these situations, HR is there to minimize risk for the company.

> Most of the time the easiest way to do that is to just suppress any wrongdoing and sideline whoever is being wronged.

This, however, I totally disagree with. I see a lot of comments saying that you can't trust HR because they are only there to protect the company, but that's why in cases like this you usually can trust HR, because their incentives (which are "don't expose the company to lawsuits") line up with yours.

I'm sure other HR people are reading this blog post in complete horror, because Uber's HR org did basically everything you DON'T do in a professional HR org, and in the process have exposed the company to what could be a slam dunk lawsuit, not to mention horrible press. If even an iota of what Susan Fowler described was accurate, everyone up the chain in the HR org should be fired.

Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber

#564

Post by moises_silva »

mikejones85 wrote: post #521

It's easy to blame Uber given their track records. I don't disagree that Uber should have fired that manager and let that be the end of the story. However, from the upper management's perspective, it was probably difficult for Uber to let go an experienced manager because of a complaint from a relatively new employee. Her LinkedIn profile tells me that she's also quite inexperienced. Please correct me if I'm wrong: A…

Wow, I'm in genuine disbelief of what makes you call drama queen a woman that was so clearly sexually harassed? comments over chat from her manager telling her about his sexual life is something he should just let go? hearing stories of other women going thru the same? she should just 'grow a pair' and let it go?

And then you condone what management does because it is a difficult decision to let go a performant manager, so you're going to ignore evidence (screen shots of the sexual harassment, and, apparently not the first time either)?? Holy cow, if you think that's ok and management had a "hard" choice, then we live in parallel universes.

If you want to argue she's lying, fine, we have no proof other than her word so far, but if we're going to discuss the article content, how is that not harassment and how does she end up as a drama queen?

Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber

#565

Post by misingnoglic »

dmritard96 wrote: post #529
calcsam wrote: post #15

In 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…

it is interesting that sex is the hot button. in general we special case sex in the US. While I dont mean to say sexual harrasment isnt a real problem, its interesting to me more philosophically that propositioning for sex is ultra problematic but propostioning for a platonic relationship is less so, or drinking, or anything else beyond strict job fulfillment labor. its obviously a problem when a power dynamic is abu…

I would say that if the manager asked her out on a platonic date on her first week, that would be almost as wildly inappropriate.

Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber

#566

Post by kennywinker »

weberc2 wrote: post #512
knucklesandwich wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tech workers (across all disciplines) need to unionize to combat this kind of thing. As has been pointed out below, HR that is staffed and incentivized by the company management only serves the interests of the management. A union is the only structure that can actually win demands for workers by organizing workers to withhold their labor. It's not a panacea, and there are several historical examples of union leaders…

I think if this post teaches us anything, it's that the system works very well, at least for well-performing software engineers. In this case, Susan found a better job with a different company where she presumably won't have to face the same levels of confusion and mistreatment. Unionization seems to come with its own cultural (and procedural) baggage, so I'm wary of invoking needlessly.

Suffers in kafkaesque work environment for a year... gets new job. The system works!

Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber

#567

Post by smm2000 »

kartickv wrote: post #430
owenmarshall wrote: post #411

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most companies operate on the myth that the people responsible for doing work are interchangeable cogs that can be eliminated and replaced by a new doer with little to no impact to how the company functions. So if you have enough traumatic brain damage to buy that line, stack ranking makes a ton of sense.

I had this exact same conversation with a manager who seemed suprised when I told him people are not interchangeable cogs. He said that some people may be quicker at a particular technology / domain / whatever, or quicker to ramp up, or do slightly better work, but smart engineers can and do learn anything needed and do work that's good enough after a ramp-up that's short enough. Beyond that, he says, there are minor…

Outside of truly unique skills, it's basically true - engineers are interchangeable with sufficient time to ramp up.

I learned this lesson pretty early in my career when most senior engineer on the team left. I and everyone else freaked out because he was the only one on the team who fully understood how everything works. But you know who was not freaked out? My manager. And he was right, we did not even miss deadlines. In two month everything was back to normal with other people filling his shoes.

Obviously you can't replace Principal engineer with fresh grad and expect success but most of the work done is not that unique or hard.

Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber

#569

Post by scurvy »

scurvy wrote: post #126

What is Uber doing with 150 SRE's? Wow talk about bloat. The rest of the story is horrible to hear, too.

Asking why Twitter is so bloated gets 300 upvotes, but asking why Uber SRE is so bloated gets downvoted? My, what a fickle crowd HN is.

My assumption was that Uber SRE's played roles similar to Google SRE's. If that's not the case, someone can please say so instead of just downvoting? If you lump all ops people (DBA, sysadmin, network, storage) into the SRE term then 150 isn't huge. But if it's mainly sysadmin and devops, that's really high for a company that's mainly in the cloud.

Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber

#570

Post by gedy »

MAGZine wrote: post #344
bifocald wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. Culture is CEO's responsibility. Period.

Once a culture exists, it is very, very difficult to change, even (especially) if you get a new CEO or an acquisition, etc. It is true that if you are going to _attempt_ to change a culture, it must be motivated from top-down. However, placing that responsibility on the CEO alone is misunderstanding of how culture works. It's a little akin to saying that culture is the President's responsibility. No, it's everyone's…

> It's a little akin to saying that culture is the President's responsibility. No, it's everyone's responsibility, and if you want to change it, the influential people in your org (country) must lead and reinforce that change.

To a point, but when HR gets involved and does not help, that IMHO is often due to the upper leadership being a big part of the problem. I've seen HR blow off inappropriate behavior when the CEO does or is okay with it.

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