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A note to our employees

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Re: A note to our employees

#331

Post by shard972 »

williamaadams wrote: post #121
thoughtexplorer wrote: post #4

Serious question: Does the Chief Diversity Officer include diversity of ideas and experience? Or is it just skin deep like it sounds? Edit: Lots of up and down votes. Why is this question so controversial? I'd like to see an argument as to why it's an invalid or flawed question.

I work for Microsoft, and the back of my employee badge says: Our Mission; Empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more. To me, this implies that our engineering organizations, and entire company, need to have an appropriate amount of empathy across a broad spectrum of geographies, cultures, experiences, perspectives, and the like. You only get that by having a diversity of talent, and mo…

So what would be the benefits in DNA diversity at all? If you can get a diverse views of perspectives, why bring in the DNA diversity which is going to lead to conflicts as people won't be able to talk as effectively as people who are more homogeneous?

Re: A note to our employees

#332

Post by JJMcJ »

philip1209 wrote: post #52
ericabiz wrote: post #48

One of the more interesting pieces is buried in the linked PDF: "Excessive alcohol: Harassment is never acceptable and alcohol is never an excuse. But one of the most common factors among the harassment complaints made today at Google is that the perpetrator had been drinking (~20% of cases). Our policy is clear: Excessive consumption of alcohol is not permitted when you are at work, performing Google business, or at…

Why not just ban alcohol at work? Why can't work be work, and social stuff can happen outside of it? I know it sounds a bit extreme. But, after reading "It doesn't have to be crazy it work," I feel like companies use alcohol to bribe employees to stay at the office after-hours. A midground would be drinking only with sit-down food. Nobody is doing shots while having dinner. Another idea could be making company social…

Once upon a time, most companies banned alcohol completely from worksites, and certainly for company meetings, except for offsites like picnics and dinners and parties.

Re: A note to our employees

#333

Post by EForEndeavour »

zbentley wrote: post #276
Aeolun wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having a drink in the workplace aftera day of hard work works great for morale.

> Having a drink in the workplace aftera day of hard work works great for morale. So do many other things. If the only thing that keeps morale acceptable is providing alcohol, then you have a problem either with the people you hire, the work you make them do, or the amount of resources you're willing to expend on morale.

The fact that other things also boost morale does not invalidate the point that having a drink in the workplace boosts morale. And nobody has even implied that workplace alcohol is the _only_ thing that keeps morale acceptable.

Re: A note to our employees

#334

Post by blinko12 »

ericabiz wrote: post #48

One of the more interesting pieces is buried in the linked PDF: "Excessive alcohol: Harassment is never acceptable and alcohol is never an excuse. But one of the most common factors among the harassment complaints made today at Google is that the perpetrator had been drinking (~20% of cases). Our policy is clear: Excessive consumption of alcohol is not permitted when you are at work, performing Google business, or at…

Whoa! Yes, that is a huge step in the right direction.

As someone who spent a summer in college working for a prominent Silicon Valley startup with open bars and a frat-like culture... I had fun at the time, but in restrospect, that's no kind of work environment I'd want to stay in full time. And I imagine it would be very alienating as a woman.

Re: A note to our employees

#335

Post by int_19h »

amatecha wrote: post #182
reaperducer wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having a beer is I engrained in American work culture Ummm... no, it's not. Having had dozens of jobs in five industries over the decades, I've never worked for one where drinking on company time isn't a fireable offense. The only exceptions were at the company Christmas parties, and overnight DJ's who were tolerated doing lines of coke off of CD cases. But that's another problem altogether.

"Beer o'clock", typically on a Friday afternoon, is a very common phenomenon in North American software & game companies. :)

That's exactly the point - it's common in software, but virtually unheard of everywhere else. So it's the software industry that's out of touch with the broader American work culture here.

Re: A note to our employees

#336

Post by golergka »

erwan wrote: post #309
ericabiz wrote: post #48

One of the more interesting pieces is buried in the linked PDF: "Excessive alcohol: Harassment is never acceptable and alcohol is never an excuse. But one of the most common factors among the harassment complaints made today at Google is that the perpetrator had been drinking (~20% of cases). Our policy is clear: Excessive consumption of alcohol is not permitted when you are at work, performing Google business, or at…

A few years ago, I attended my company's happy hours. I was an intern and too young to drink at the time. There was an open bar and more or less everyone was intoxicated. I join a coworker and we start chatting. Fifteen minutes later, the office manager joins in, interrupting, and starts hitting on me in a pretty blunt way. I enjoy female attention but that was a bit much. I tactfully hint that I'm not interested but…

That sounds like the most typical work party story ever. People make romantic advances, often can't judge the reaction correctly and it's awkward afterwards when everybody sobers up.

It's much more awkward the next day after drunk sex in a deserted office though.

Re: A note to our employees

#337

Post by habosa »

philip1209 wrote: post #52
ericabiz wrote: post #48

One of the more interesting pieces is buried in the linked PDF: "Excessive alcohol: Harassment is never acceptable and alcohol is never an excuse. But one of the most common factors among the harassment complaints made today at Google is that the perpetrator had been drinking (~20% of cases). Our policy is clear: Excessive consumption of alcohol is not permitted when you are at work, performing Google business, or at…

Why not just ban alcohol at work? Why can't work be work, and social stuff can happen outside of it? I know it sounds a bit extreme. But, after reading "It doesn't have to be crazy it work," I feel like companies use alcohol to bribe employees to stay at the office after-hours. A midground would be drinking only with sit-down food. Nobody is doing shots while having dinner. Another idea could be making company social…

[Googler here] We have much less company-provided alcohol at work than most tech companies that I'm aware of. Mostly beers once a week, and most people don't participate.

This change is mostly talking about work social events that take place off site. My team's company holiday party last year was piloting this and gave each person two drink tickets upon entering.

I think banning alcohol completely would reduce the attendance of these social events, so this is a good step where we can keep the social benefits without letting it get out of hand. For instance the holiday party I mentioned was on a Friday night. I really enjoy having a few drinks on a Friday night, and I'm much more likely to attend a Google party with 2 drinks tickets than one with zero. I know that sounds silly and immature, but it's honest.

Re: A note to our employees

#338

Post by habosa »

duxup wrote: post #45

This reminds me of a company I worked at where they deiced people were spending too much on travel. So they came out with new rules about travel expenses every 6 months until large swaths of people simply couldn't travel (me included). But the problem wasn't solved at all because the bulk of the absurd spending was caused by people who the rules didn't apply to....

[Googler] This is how I feel when I see an increased emphasis on training. Making a bunch of leaf-node employees like me sit through more simple online training is not going to fix the problem we have (although it can't hurt). It doesn't address the harassment that comes from extreme differences in power and a lack of accountability.

Still, I am cautiously optimistic about today's announced changes.

Re: A note to our employees

#339

Post by maroonblazer »

mcguire wrote: post #269
zaroth wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Feel free to ban anything you want at work. And the people who work there will select for if they want to be a part of it by becoming or remaining employees. (There are, of course, things that are illegal to ban) I personally want to work somewhere who values me as a responsible human being, and expects me to behave like one. The more a workplace feels like they have to micromanage their employees like children, the…

" (~20% of cases) " Apparently, many of the people Google is hiring are not intelligent, respectful, ethical, empathetic, or mature. The problem is, once you've hired them, firing them requires investigations, proofs, lawsuits, internet drama, and so forth. I'd imagine going after managers would be even more problematic. I'd just as soon work for a place that bans alcohol, including at the unofficial, optional-mandat…

20% of cases where the perp had been drinking. It doesn't necessarily mean they were drinking to excess. Someone who wants to harass another employee doesn't need an excessive amount of alcohol to do so.

It seems almost taboo to say this in 2018 but in my experience alcohol, when used by intelligent, respectful, mature adults facilitates healthy bonds that would not be there otherwise and persist long after the effects of the alcohol have worn off.

Re: A note to our employees

#340

Post by always_good »

roenxi wrote: post #207
zaroth wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Feel free to ban anything you want at work. And the people who work there will select for if they want to be a part of it by becoming or remaining employees. (There are, of course, things that are illegal to ban) I personally want to work somewhere who values me as a responsible human being, and expects me to behave like one. The more a workplace feels like they have to micromanage their employees like children, the…

> I personally want to work somewhere who values me as a responsible human being, and expects me to behave like one. Responsible human beings don't drink alcohol in the workplace. If a person is drawing a salary, they should be presenting to work fit & as prepared as possible to do it. There is no good reason for employees to be drinking at or prior to work. Unless, I suppose, there is some well-replicated study show…

I'm not a coding robot that needs to be min/maxed for my productivity output all day at work. I'm certainly not even programming all day at work.

So I would not want to work where you're in charge where everything I may want to do (or consume) is judged on its productivity basis.

You probably have habits that sacrifice your work performance. There's a good chance, at the very least, you weigh more than you should, work out less than you should, and eat fewer vegetables than you should. You might even have children or plan to have them one day. Yikes!

And all of these cost you much more than the morale boosting beer I get to share with my team as is tradition towards the end of a Friday.

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