281–290 of 376 posts
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At least for DoorDash you tip ahead of time so it doesn't really make sense to associate the tip with the quality of the driver.
I wonder if they use it to indicate the quality of the customer.
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> That's a model curriculum and has no mechanism for enforcment. The mechanism for enforcement is ABET accreditation. When I was at Cal Poly SLO, our CS program was up for re-accreditation, and yes, we were required to take an ethics course, mostly due to remarks from prior accreditation reviews. Edit: > I am not able to find more than a handful of CS degree programs with ethics prerequisites ABET accreditation allow…
This has digressed a bit. Let's recap: someone asked if ethics were an MBA requirement. I responded by asking if it was CS/CE requirement. Then someone brought up the ABET model curriculum, and now here we are. The general point is that it started with a altogether too common dig at MBAs. I think those are usually unwarranted without any further examination. But I also found some studies that indicate leadership in a…
However, I do disagree slightly with your point regarding the many people involved in this. While it's true that it takes several types of skills to build a product like Instacart, most companies don't give their engineers/designers the ability to push back against features that they're not comfortable building. You're paid to execute on a vision that's dictated higher up the food chain. That doesn't mean it's coming from an MBA per se, but just because an engineer wrote the code doesn't mean that they're culpable here, especially given our aversion to pushing back and whistle-blowing in corporate culture.
Speaking out against corrupt/unethical leadership can very easily cost you not just your job, but your career as well. This is one area I would love to see improvement in.
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I think you're missing the point. The problem is not that developers don't care about standards. And its not that developers are just trying to make as much money as possible. Most developers have financial obligations that require them to keep their jobs. The people making unethical decisions are their bosses. The developers cannot contradict their bosses in this way and keep their jobs. However, if you make the sta…
I'm not missing the point. Ethics isn't negotiable. This is not a place to be cynical. "Just following orders" isn't an acceptable excuse. You either quit or you're complicit. It's pretty straightforward actually. What we're trying to get to is a place where there is some incentive for organizations to do the process you described. At a certain point we're just going to legislate it, so we can wait for that blunt ham…
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I'm not a customer of either services since I'm not in the US but tipping upfront before you even receive the service seems a little odd. Doesn't one tip for getting an outstanding over-the-top customer service and in order to do that, one should undergo the entire workflow till receiving the goods?
In the US tipping is standard, not for over-the-top service. In general, higher pay for better quality goods and services is part of a negotiated sticker price. Tipping is the anamoly here. In the DoorDash context, if the user were given the option to tip after delivery, they’d most likely just forget about the app once they got their food and never tip. So there’d be little incentive for the drivers to work hard for…
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I'm not missing the point. Ethics isn't negotiable. This is not a place to be cynical. "Just following orders" isn't an acceptable excuse. You either quit or you're complicit. It's pretty straightforward actually. What we're trying to get to is a place where there is some incentive for organizations to do the process you described. At a certain point we're just going to legislate it, so we can wait for that blunt ham…
Have you ever been in a situation where you needed a paycheck to pay rent and you had to either miss rent or do something less than ethical that your boss was telling you to do?
There are costs involved in taking a stand. If any group has the capacity to take a financial hit in service to an ethical framework it's software engineers.
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I think you're missing the point. The problem is not that developers don't care about standards. And its not that developers are just trying to make as much money as possible. Most developers have financial obligations that require them to keep their jobs. The people making unethical decisions are their bosses. The developers cannot contradict their bosses in this way and keep their jobs. However, if you make the sta…
I'm not missing the point. Ethics isn't negotiable. This is not a place to be cynical. "Just following orders" isn't an acceptable excuse. You either quit or you're complicit. It's pretty straightforward actually. What we're trying to get to is a place where there is some incentive for organizations to do the process you described. At a certain point we're just going to legislate it, so we can wait for that blunt ham…
Corporate legislation and profit motives are the only real incentives in business, I don't care how much you try to isolate individuals taking part and shame them for complicity. It's not about people capable of making the right choice instead choosing the wrong choice. It's an inevitability of the incentive structures of capitalism and commerce. If someone chooses to take an action that sacrifices profit for ethics, they will be driven out of the market by people who take the "more profit" option. It is not the same players making good choices and bad choices. The only way to actually change the paradigm is if you can figure out a way to align incentives so that the person making the moral choice also makes the most money. This is the only way that the structures we've put in place will play out in the way you want. This has nothing to do with individual choice or free will, it is simply the output of a function.
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In the US tipping is standard, not for over-the-top service. In general, higher pay for better quality goods and services is part of a negotiated sticker price. Tipping is the anamoly here. In the DoorDash context, if the user were given the option to tip after delivery, they’d most likely just forget about the app once they got their food and never tip. So there’d be little incentive for the drivers to work hard for…
What if you give a good tip first but then the delivery turns out late?
On the other hand, what does the driver do if they go above and beyond to give you great service, but then you don’t tip?
The kick of the plot here is to not tip on Instacart as you're just handing money to VCs. Or maybe give the driver cash?
Why would you tip on any service where you are already literally paying for the service of delivery? It's like tipping has become completely divorced from any purpose.
Employers prefer tipping because they can advertise a lower price. Secondly tips are effectively a per customer payment vs a wage being hourly. So in times of few customers, the labor costs are lower on the employer.
This is a great example in my opinion of the apathy we need to combat as technologists. Why did NO ONE in any meetings when designing this "feature" or process say anything? "This is wrong/greedy/will have blowback." No one voiced concerns? Or, more specifically, if they did, no one listened? They didn't think this would leak out, with all the hatred regarding wage stagnation, income inequality, corporate greed? A ma…
I quit. I'm still furious about it. Those who didn't walk when they knew it was wrong are good people- just cowards. That's what really makes me angry.
If I publicly discuss it or name names, I'll probably be sued for violating my NDA. They made that very clear. So I'm a coward too. At least I'm not a part of it anymore.
The lesson is never tip with an app- use cash. I guess that most of these companies are playing these games now.