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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

#231

Post by dllthomas »

wikibob wrote: post #153
tedivm wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have the exact opposite experience- most of the people I know here in the bay area embrace "funemployment" by having a break between leaving their jobs and getting a new one. At a minimum I wouldn't use it as a heuristic for whether the person is hirable or not.

I've wondered how common this is in the bay. Can you expand on this with an anecdote or two? Do the people who you know that have done this seem to ever have problems getting hired again?

I just did this (left Uber, actually, a month and change ago). Found something since. "Why'd you leave" questions weren't any harder than "why are you leaving" questions.

Re: Uber Fires More Than 20 Employees in Harassment Probe

#232

Post by potatolicious »

5ilv3r wrote: post #75
timbuckley wrote: post #48

I guess other companies should be wary of persons who leave Uber in the past few weeks or so.

Nah, profiling is no good. Probably a better idea to work on a solid recruiting process that can shake out practitioners of bad behavior from the candidate pool. Then you can handle it and more.

> "Probably a better idea to work on a solid recruiting process that can shake out practitioners of bad behavior from the candidate pool."

I agree in principle - but how do you suggest this be done?

It's not as if harassers are going to cop to it in an interview.

I: "Have you sexually harassed your colleagues at previous jobs?"

C: "Oh yeah, sure, yep, I'll show myself out now."

Nor are companies permitted to answer whether or not someone was terminated for cause, or whether they received harassment-related reprimands.

I think everyone agrees that detecting and filtering out bad actors from your candidate pool is great - but is there actually a practical way to do so?

The "state of the art" around this is back-channeling - calling around to see if you can locate people who have worked with the candidate, and getting the unofficial word on whether or not they're bad actors. This has pretty glaring and obvious issues, and isn't always possible, but we don't really have a better way.

I think profiling people for leaving Uber is highly problematic - but what's the alternative? Ask them if they got canned for harassment, and when they inevitably deny it, just take them at their word?

Re: Uber Fires More Than 20 Employees in Harassment Probe

#233

Post by dllthomas »

int_19h wrote: post #227
ryandrake wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see how it's productive to put a scarlet letter on someone simply based on where he or she used to work as "third engineer from the left." Maybe one day the place where you currently happen to work will earn some kind of tarnished reputation--should your career suffer because of it? Should you have to quit out of fear of being put on a blacklist, putting your livelihood at risk?

The crucial part here is the nature of the reputation. We're not talking about some shady dealings of the upper management, that individual employees may or may not have been aware of. We're talking about employee culture inside the company - something that is, by definition, exposed to and shaped by employees. Given the magnitude of the problem in Uber, on the basis of reports we've seen so far, on the balance of pr…

Uber is big and the culture in any given pocket varies quite a bit. It's entirely possible not to have known what was going on 200 employees over.

Re: Uber Fires More Than 20 Employees in Harassment Probe

#235

Post by aokyler »

walshemj wrote: post #175
macspoofing wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because it's 20 people out 12,000 and I (we) have no idea what it is they were fired for exactly. We don't know the context, the exact infraction, and how it was dealt with initially. I can't even tell if that rate is high, average or low when compared with any other company of similar size who would create a special sexual-harassment probe to investigate itself.

> 20 out of only 12,000 is a huge number

12000/20 = 0.001666

.17% is not a huge number.

Re: Uber Fires More Than 20 Employees in Harassment Probe

#236

Post by ianamartin »

macspoofing wrote: post #34
hueving wrote: post #7

I wonder if events like this turn Uber employees who leave around this time into a market of lemons. Obviously nobody will put on their resume that they were fired for sexual harassment so hiring managers will have to wonder if a person who left Uber recently was fed up or fired. Seems risky to hire a recent Uber employee at this point because bringing a toxic sexist into the company can inflict massive damage.

>Seems risky to hire a recent Uber employee at this point because bringing a toxic sexist into the company can inflict massive damage. Jesus. They are still people. You want to ostracize them from all society and prevent them from earning a living in their chosen career? 'Sexual harassment' is also a catch-all term that can encompass all kinds of actions. It could involve a clueless, inexperienced 20-something asking…

Time to hope you had an education that was broader than a career that is based entirely on acting like a dick.

I would not ever hire anyone from Uber. The tech people I've met from there are technologically toxic and disgustingly gross as human beings.

Sorry kids. Is it anecdotal evidence? Yes. Is it based on going to hang with their hangouts? Yes. It is.

Soooooo messed up in every way.

20 is a good start.

Re: Uber Fires More Than 20 Employees in Harassment Probe

#237

Post by philipov »

bigiain wrote: post #226
epistasis wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wasn't the one asked, but I seriously want to know. Not sure what you mean with your question. Do you think it's obvious what the answer is, or do you mean it's not a question that should be asked?

I read it (correctly or not) as saying: "Travis started and runs the company, and his respect for women is well known and public. Of _course_ the people working in HR know this, and were quite likely selected/employed by him or one of his trusted douche-bros..." Is it _not_ as obvious to everyone else as it seems to be to me?

It is beside the point whether it's obvious or not; clearly it is not obvious enough. You treat it as if it's some purely academic pursuit, not of interest to anybody. No, the question should be repeated incessantly until the right people go to jail.

Re: Uber Fires More Than 20 Employees in Harassment Probe

#238

Post by graphememes »

throwaway2048 wrote: post #143
korzun wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I have independently verified > Nope. I don't need to be to have a conversation You can't publicly claim that you independently verified something and provide absolutely no information on that verification. You are not a Pope. You started the conversation and chose to share that piece information.

He is free to share it, and you are free to disbelieve it, this isn't a court of law.

The thread seems to be dismissing it as it is an unsubstantiated claim.

Re: Uber Fires More Than 20 Employees in Harassment Probe

#239

Post by nashadelic »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #31
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Someone has to write the app and maintain the backend.

You should be able to do both with far fewer than 12,000 people. I suspect that the bulk of those people are doing something else.

It surprises me that you think the tech aspect of Uber is the biggest. It's not; the biggest aspect of Uber is operations. For every city you have onboard, you need significant people on the ground that work on driver recruitment, dealing with local gov, training, driver support, local marketing. Some markets have their own apps (like Australia with its on driver-to-driver interim chat feature).

Re: Uber Fires More Than 20 Employees in Harassment Probe

#240

Post by graphememes »

seldo wrote: post #71
randyrand wrote: post #57

I just want to say, for every person in disgust of Uber and their sexual harassment scenario, there are many more of us that just don't care. Of course, most that don't care don't comment. So the comment section is not a good view of public opinion. Just the vocal minority.

I think you should probably re-examine your priorities in life, but that's just me. You do you.

We don't know their priorities so we can't really judge that.

I am sure there are many things that you don't care about that others would think you should, but it doesn't mean you are wrong and they are right. The world isn't black and white.

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