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Uber Fires More Than 20 Employees in Harassment Probe

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Re: Uber Fires More Than 20 Employees in Harassment Probe

#181

Post by CodeWriter23 »

macspoofing wrote: post #108
sulam wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have independently verified Susan Fowler's claim that her management chain didn't treat her case seriously. And by that I mean with a member of her management chain. If an entire chain of management and HR don't treat a claim like that seriously (no one has disputed the claim), there is absolutely a cultural problem.

>I have independently verified Susan Fowler's claim that her management chain didn't treat her case seriously. And by that I mean with a member of her management chain. I never doubted her account. But it is anecdotal, and you can't extrapolate her singular experience to the entire company.

It is categorically NOT anecdotal. The proper word is "testimonial". You cannot simultaneously "never doubt her account" and label it "anecdotal", look it up in the dictionary.

Re: Uber Fires More Than 20 Employees in Harassment Probe

#182

Post by TokenDiversity »

moomin wrote: post #121
ThrustVectoring wrote: post #6

The article doesn't discuss the seniority of the fired employees. It's very hard to distinguish between scapegoating and actually working to fix the problem without that information. The problem with Uber isn't that some employees engage in sexual harassment. The problem is that there's a culture where sexual harassment isn't taken seriously, is tolerated if the perpetrators are "high performing" in other respects, a…

The real question is: did senior people in HR have to walk? If they did, you can feel reasonably confident their replacements won't repeat their behaviours. I'll remind everyone that we're talking about an HR department that repeatedly lied to its employees and did their damndest to shield bad people. If that isn't fixed, you can be guaranteed it'll happen again, whether or not another Fowler decides to do the world…

You bring an important point which raises another point- who enabled/let HR do this? And what happened to them? HR doesn't exist in isolation and I've known big firms' HRs to be trigger happy as long as they can justify it.

Re: Uber Fires More Than 20 Employees in Harassment Probe

#183

Post by macspoofing »

CodeWriter23 wrote: post #181
macspoofing wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I have independently verified Susan Fowler's claim that her management chain didn't treat her case seriously. And by that I mean with a member of her management chain. I never doubted her account. But it is anecdotal, and you can't extrapolate her singular experience to the entire company.

It is categorically NOT anecdotal. The proper word is "testimonial". You cannot simultaneously "never doubt her account" and label it "anecdotal", look it up in the dictionary.

Ok. Maybe I used the wrong word.

Re: Uber Fires More Than 20 Employees in Harassment Probe

#185

Post by dang »

pyronik wrote: post #76

Are we really at the point in society if someone asks a coworker out on a date its sexual harassment? I imagine the answer to that is whether she said yes or not. Rule #1 ... be attractive.

"Please avoid introducing classic flamewar topics unless you have something genuinely new to say about them."

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14499713 and marked it off-topic.

Re: Uber Fires More Than 20 Employees in Harassment Probe

#187

Post by randyrand »

kevinburke wrote: post #173
randyrand wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If no one cared, the problem would be solved. That's simple logic right there. An odd unexpected consequence of this is that by trying to get fewer people to care, it is in fact helping to solve the problem.

Apply this logic to any other crime and you'll see it's nonsensical. "If no one cared about extrajudicial gangs roving the streets murdering people, the problem would be solved. After all, I wasn't murdered. That's simple logic right there"

You're right though. If no one cared about extrajudicial gangs roving the streets murdering people, then it wouldn't be a problem! I know it sounds crazy. But the argument is sound.

Let's put it this way. If everyone enjoyed extrajudicial gangs roving the streets murdering people, then it would be the opposite of a problem, wouldn't it? It would be a good thing.

A necessary requirement for a problem to be a problem is that we have to care about it, or at least the effects of it.

Re: Uber Fires More Than 20 Employees in Harassment Probe

#188

Post by grandalf »

TokenDiversity wrote: post #182
moomin wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The real question is: did senior people in HR have to walk? If they did, you can feel reasonably confident their replacements won't repeat their behaviours. I'll remind everyone that we're talking about an HR department that repeatedly lied to its employees and did their damndest to shield bad people. If that isn't fixed, you can be guaranteed it'll happen again, whether or not another Fowler decides to do the world…

You bring an important point which raises another point- who enabled/let HR do this? And what happened to them? HR doesn't exist in isolation and I've known big firms' HRs to be trigger happy as long as they can justify it.

Right. This is the core problem. Most people who wind up in HR are rule-followers who are acutely aware of the legal risks associated with harassment culture.

Re: Uber Fires More Than 20 Employees in Harassment Probe

#189

Post by kevinburke »

randyrand wrote: post #187
kevinburke wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apply this logic to any other crime and you'll see it's nonsensical. "If no one cared about extrajudicial gangs roving the streets murdering people, the problem would be solved. After all, I wasn't murdered. That's simple logic right there"

You're right though. If no one cared about extrajudicial gangs roving the streets murdering people, then it wouldn't be a problem! I know it sounds crazy. But the argument is sound. Let's put it this way. If everyone enjoyed extrajudicial gangs roving the streets murdering people, then it would be the opposite of a problem, wouldn't it? It would be a good thing. A necessary requirement for a problem to be a problem i…

The people being murdered would not enjoy it. Jesus. Please just stop, you're making a terrible argument.

Re: Uber Fires More Than 20 Employees in Harassment Probe

#190

Post by CodeWriter23 »

rwmj wrote: post #2

12,000 employees in Uber? (I'm assuming that doesn't include the drivers). What do they do all day?

Just enumerating the publicly-known and publicly-alleged activities of Uber: (WARNING to the humor averse: this is part true, and part tongue-in-cheek)

1. Running a rideshare app.

2. Customer Service.

3. Union Busting

4. Autonomous Vehicle Development.

5. Misappropriation of Trade Secrets.

6. Developing systems to deceive government regulators.

7. Figuring out how to cut the throats of other department heads aka "always be hustlin'".

8. Poaching drivers from other rideshare networks.

9. Subprime auto financing

10. Techblog rants about tech that breaks when Uber breaks it

11. Rental/leasing programs

12. Generating bogus ride requests on other rideshare networks.

13. Getting dates for CEO ("Boober", lest we forget)

14. Getting CEO invited to celebrity parties

15. Flying Cars.

16. Food Delivery.

17. Autonomous LTL and Truckload carriage.

18. Innovating new ways to break laws.

19. Fending off unwanted sexual advances.

And no, drivers are not included as they are not drivers. Also, there are a lot more than 12,000 Uber drivers. There's probably at least half that in California alone, possibly more.

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