Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee • Hacker News Board

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#81

Post by rdtsc » Mon, Feb 20, 2017, 6:35 AM UTC

gkoberger wrote: post #19

One thing that every employee needs to understand is that HR is not your friend. No matter how friendly or helpful they seem, their job is not to protect you. It's to protect the company.

Good point. I gotta wonder about their general competence. What are the credentials to be an HR person? Here, even if they really wanted to discredit her and protect the company (so assuming they completely were not prepared to take her side, ever) they acted in a very stupid manner it seems.

Is there an HR major? Or is it MBA student who never graduate? How does one end up picking a good HR person vs just a friend-of-a-friend? Programmers go to an interviews and they get slammed with whiteboard silly algorithm questions. What kind of question do HR people have to answer to pass the test?

It seems here protecting the company would have been firing the person proposing sex on the spot. Blog author even had the chat logs as evidence from what I understand!

Now the answer is probably they had defended and covered up that manager's behavior before. Blog alludes to that. So it became a pattern. Then just when another similar complaint popped up, admitting it was wrong and doing anything besides what they did before, would have meant acknowledging how wrong they have been in the past. "But we've already covered up for him 10 times, why is this special now..." kind of deal.

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#82

Post by chimeracoder » Mon, Feb 20, 2017, 6:35 AM UTC

pjmlp wrote: post #77

chimeracoder wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In countries where unions do work, that is another door to go search for help. That assumes your union rep is inclined to help you. In practice (not principle), they have the same incentives as the other managers and HR do in this story. The union rep could decide that the harasser is more important to their union, politically, than you are, and decide not to take action. Plus, the union can simply terminate your m…

Which is why I added the remark "do work", not when they are just yet another way to take vacations.

> Which is why I added the remark "[in countries where unions] do work", not when they are just yet another way to take vacations.

That's not a matter that's specific to a particular country, though. It's inherent in the nature of a union structure (and arguably inherent in the nature of any hierarchical human structure, which is a superset of "unions").

You can find situations like the one I described in any country, not just the US.

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#83

Post by searealist » Mon, Feb 20, 2017, 6:35 AM UTC

justonepost wrote: post #69

searealist wrote: post #45

I have a hard time believing HR really behaved the way they are portrayed in that article. They really claimed that if she elected to stay in her current department she should expect to receive a negative review from the boss she rejected for a sexual relationship? This is just too much. And for someone as savvy and with as large an internet presence as the author, I can't imagine she would accept this resolution. Th…

It's easy to believe. The thinking HR probably was expressing that Susan couldn't expect positive reviews just because she had a valid harassment complaint. You have to look at HR as CYA for the company. Looking at it any other way is naive.

> The thinking HR probably was expressing that Susan couldn't expect positive reviews just because she had a valid harassment complaint.

That's very different than what the author claimed. But even so, why would HR even go there? It makes no sense.

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#84

Post by linuxkerneldev » Mon, Feb 20, 2017, 6:36 AM UTC

packetized wrote: post #20

blazespin wrote: post #8

The problem is that men misconstrue the natural social and friendly tendency of most women as sexual advances. There needs to be more education in this respect with men. Just because a woman is chatty and willing to collaborate doesn't mean she wants to sleep with you. I know that sounds sexist, but honestly, I think women just are naturally or at least culturally (does the difference matter in this case, really?) mo…

The problem is that there seems to be a terrible, unbelievably toxic culture pervading nearly every department at Uber. Also, "I know that sounds sexist" is a fucking terrible caveat.

> The problem is that there seems to be a terrible, unbelievably toxic culture pervading nearly every department at Uber.

I wonder if such things are limited to Uber or more widespread than we believe it to be. I have a fear that these incidents are more common than I believe them to be and that because we have our heads down and focusing on an end-goal, we don't notice that some of our colleagues are being traumatized by people we admire/put in positions of power.

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#85

Post by xor1 » Mon, Feb 20, 2017, 6:37 AM UTC

blazespin wrote: post #8

The problem is that men misconstrue the natural social and friendly tendency of most women as sexual advances. There needs to be more education in this respect with men. Just because a woman is chatty and willing to collaborate doesn't mean she wants to sleep with you. I know that sounds sexist, but honestly, I think women just are naturally or at least culturally (does the difference matter in this case, really?) mo…

>I think women just are naturally or at least culturally (does the difference matter in this case, really?) more social

This is really sexist.

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#86

Post by tomlock » Mon, Feb 20, 2017, 6:37 AM UTC

tiglilly329 wrote: post #61

gravyboat wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably because a good number of people have worked for SF startups and seen this behavior first hand.

That doesn't excuse all the guilty-until-proven-innocent pitchforking going on right now.

You should abandon your throwaway and talk to some of your lady friends in tech about their experiences. See for yourself if their anecdotes build up into something approaching quantitative - and ask them if anything was ever done about their complaints - or if they even felt safe enough to complain to the people they ought to feel safe around.

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#87

Post by aisofteng » Mon, Feb 20, 2017, 6:38 AM UTC

Gatsky wrote: post #78

aisofteng wrote: post #60

> If they will discipline and fire people and put processes in place to keep the problem fixed You're assuming that that allegations are true. They have been neither proven nor corroborated, and the author advertises her book in her post. Edit: This comment has gone strongly negative in the matter of minutes. I offered no opinion and only stated fact; either there is vote manipulation on HN, or at least some portion…

It is valid to point out that the allegations are not corroborated. To suggest that the author invented a sexual harassment fantasy to advertise her book is however quite crazy.

It wouldn't be the first time such a thing has happened. I'm not implying that's what this is, because I have no verifiable knowledge of the sitauations.

I was pointing out a (possibly chance) correlation that should give pause. That is not "crazy". If the alleged events happened to me, I would find it serious enough of an issue that it would not occur to me to advertise my book when writing about it; conflating a moral stance with a moneymaking one makes no sense to me.

Calling the idea of not judging until proof has been presented "crazy" is what is crazy.

The allegations may well be true; if they are, there should be severe consequences. As it stands, though, all we have is one person's story, containing a self advertisement but no examples of supposedly recorded proof.

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#88

Post by csharpminor » Mon, Feb 20, 2017, 6:38 AM UTC

rdtsc wrote: post #81

gkoberger wrote: post #19

One thing that every employee needs to understand is that HR is not your friend. No matter how friendly or helpful they seem, their job is not to protect you. It's to protect the company.

Good point. I gotta wonder about their general competence. What are the credentials to be an HR person? Here, even if they really wanted to discredit her and protect the company (so assuming they completely were not prepared to take her side, ever) they acted in a very stupid manner it seems. Is there an HR major? Or is it MBA student who never graduate? How does one end up picking a good HR person vs just a friend-o…

HR is subordinate to management. It sounds as though management was unwilling to take action to remove the responsible individual.

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#89

Post by forrestthewoods » Mon, Feb 20, 2017, 6:39 AM UTC

aisofteng wrote: post #68

jen729w wrote: post #2

When someone senior gets fired, I'll start taking them seriously. Until then, it's all PR.

You are assuming that the allegations are true. From what I've heard, it seems plausible that the alleged culture may exist at this company. But I don't take allegations to be true simply because they have been made - as is, in my opinion and in the opinion of the legal system of the United States, the correct perspective.

The allegations are trivially falsifiable. Did multiple women report the same person for harassment? Were multiple accusers told that it was his first offense? If the answer is yes then heads should roll.

Why were reporters of harassment falsely told it was the accused harasser's first offense? Good question. There are several possible answers. Some more malicious than others. But they all end with several high level someone's losing their head.

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#90

Post by LandoCalrissian » Mon, Feb 20, 2017, 6:40 AM UTC

camdenlock wrote: post #79

sychophant wrote: post #23

I see nothing wrong with the manager's behavior. Given: ------ - The manager indirectly fished for mutual sexual interest with a subordinate. - Managers and subordinates engage in workplace relationships across the country and the world. They all start with a "proposition" of one kind or another. Only when a manager is shown to abuse their power in support of a personal agenda should there be damages imposed. Not sim…

It's pretty sad that this comment is being flagged into /dev/null. The points are at least thoughtfully constructed and deserve proper responses from those who disagree, not just knee-jerk slamming of the flag button. Conversation is all we have. Let's make use of it.

OK, let's have the conversation, tell me how this wasn't blatant sexual harassment?