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Dell Autism Hiring Program

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Re: Dell Autism Hiring Program

#81

Post by dbg31415 »

BadassFractal wrote: post #34
tdfx wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think OP has a valid point. How do we differentiate the discourageable bad behavior from someone's disabilities? Trying to draw a line there is almost an exercise in futility. I would not want to be the HR person that has to handle a situation like that.

That's exactly it. As of today, if someone says something "inappropriate" to another employee, they either get a warning or get booted right away depending on the severity. Nobody's digging into whether this person is actually on the spectrum, unless they had given clear signs in the past to justify it. You conform, or you're out. However, once the company is making an explicit effort to be welcoming and inclusive to…

I don’t think it’s anything to lose sleep over. Just assume someone with ASD can apologize, the same as anyone else who says something stupid. And that they feel bad when embarrassing things slip out.

I’ve worked with a lot of people with ASD over the years, it’s never caused any serious problems. You have worked with them too; once you know what to look for you see them all over tech.

Re: Dell Autism Hiring Program

#82

Post by BadassFractal »

DanBC wrote: post #68
BadassFractal wrote: post #10

I'm curious to see what's going to happen when an employee, secretly part of a neurodiversity hiring program, says something that makes someone uncomfortable and that gets reported to HR. Will someone's comfort levels take precedence over the desire to employ someone with difficulty with social cues? Or will we visibly "tag" employees who are neurodiversity hires so that you know that if they somehow offend you, that…

The assumption here - "autistic people are arseholes" - is probably untrue, and is a perception caused by the number of arseholes who self-diagnose but who wouldn't get an actual dx, and who then use that as an excuse to continue to behave like arseholes. I know a lot of autistic people, and a few of them are arseholes, but they are entirely ordinary arseholes. Their arseholery is very much the same as the arseholery…

I don't think that's the assumption. The point I was making is that that even for non-neurodiverse people it's exceptionally difficult to communicate in a way that never leads to someone taking offense or being made feel uncomfortable when working with people from different backgrounds, cultures and experiences, all under high stakes conditions.

We all constantly put feet in our mouths despite our best intentions (see the whole concept of micro aggressions) and being able to navigate subtle social situations when that inevitably happens is difficult for everybody. Much more so for someone who is worse at reading nonverbal cues and struggling with anticipating "how will this make them feel?"

There is plenty of room for offense and misinterpretation between the most benign accidental faux pas and giant asshole moves, and that's where I suspect most of the rope to hang yourself with lies.

There's a quote from He Who Shall Not Be Named here that is an interesting datapoint from a recent event, echoing my point: https://tech.slashdot.org/story/17/11/19/043243 . I suspect he wasn't a giant asshole, but maybe others would argue otherwise.

In reality I don't expect neurodiverse individuals to end up as cases on HR's desks: I would be shocked to see harassment anywhere near the top of the list of situations that might arise from this push for inclusion. Awkward situations in intra-team interpersonal dynamics? Sure. But real harassment, not likely.

Re: Dell Autism Hiring Program

#83

Post by Shmebulock »

YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #80

A recent article posted on HN offering funding to women to study programming sparked a flamewar, with many users claiming that special hiring policies for women in the tech industry discriminate against men. The current article is about a special hiring policy for autistic persons in Dell. Luckily there doesn't seem to be a flamewar this time around. Of course, I wonder why. To be honest, I don't understand why so ma…

Because autism is a disability. Being a woman is not a disability.

Re: Dell Autism Hiring Program

#84

Post by YeGoblynQueenne »

Shmebulock wrote: post #83
YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #80

A recent article posted on HN offering funding to women to study programming sparked a flamewar, with many users claiming that special hiring policies for women in the tech industry discriminate against men. The current article is about a special hiring policy for autistic persons in Dell. Luckily there doesn't seem to be a flamewar this time around. Of course, I wonder why. To be honest, I don't understand why so ma…

Because autism is a disability. Being a woman is not a disability.

I don't understand. What does autism being a disability have to do with special hiring practices being discriminatory or not?

Re: Dell Autism Hiring Program

#85

Post by mariuolo »

YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #80

A recent article posted on HN offering funding to women to study programming sparked a flamewar, with many users claiming that special hiring policies for women in the tech industry discriminate against men. The current article is about a special hiring policy for autistic persons in Dell. Luckily there doesn't seem to be a flamewar this time around. Of course, I wonder why. To be honest, I don't understand why so ma…

> Of course, I wonder why. To be honest, I don't understand why so many users were upset about the former article but not this one. It just seems dissonant to me.

Only a minority subscribes to the neurodiversity idea. Autism is considered a disability by most people, therefore this is not controversial.

Quotas for women can be, because we are taught they're equal to men.

Re: Dell Autism Hiring Program

#86

Post by YeGoblynQueenne »

mariuolo wrote: post #85
YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #80

A recent article posted on HN offering funding to women to study programming sparked a flamewar, with many users claiming that special hiring policies for women in the tech industry discriminate against men. The current article is about a special hiring policy for autistic persons in Dell. Luckily there doesn't seem to be a flamewar this time around. Of course, I wonder why. To be honest, I don't understand why so ma…

> Of course, I wonder why. To be honest, I don't understand why so many users were upset about the former article but not this one. It just seems dissonant to me. Only a minority subscribes to the neurodiversity idea. Autism is considered a disability by most people, therefore this is not controversial. Quotas for women can be, because we are taught they're equal to men.

I did not mention neurodiversity.

From what I've seen in the other thread, most people complaining about "reverse discrimination" felt that one should get a job only based on their ability to do the job, regardless of gender or antyhing else.

It follows that if a person with a disability can't do the job then they shouldn't be hired over someone who can, but doesn't have the disability, in the same way that one who can't do the job but is female should not be hired over someone who can but isn't.

Re: Dell Autism Hiring Program

#87

Post by enraged_camel »

serf wrote: post #48
justinclift wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ugh. It's a part of their disabilities website, even featuring "an engineer who has Asperger's syndrome". Wow. :(

>X-ray vision is clearly not a disability. >Aspergers isn't either. X-ray vision was never considered a developmental disorder, because it didn't put Clark Kent at any significant disadvantage during his development. Asperger's, unfortunately, does. (I don't count my wheelchair as a super-power because more often than not I have to push up-hill, not glide down. It's a net negative effect on my ableness to cope with n…

>>X-ray vision was never considered a developmental disorder, because it didn't put Clark Kent at any significant disadvantage during his development.

Perhaps a better analogy is his super-hearing, which did make his early life on Earth very difficult until he learned to control it.

Re: Dell Autism Hiring Program

#88

Post by 0815test »

YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #80

A recent article posted on HN offering funding to women to study programming sparked a flamewar, with many users claiming that special hiring policies for women in the tech industry discriminate against men. The current article is about a special hiring policy for autistic persons in Dell. Luckily there doesn't seem to be a flamewar this time around. Of course, I wonder why. To be honest, I don't understand why so ma…

Maybe people with autism are just less likely to feel condescended-at and "upset" by this whole misguided notion that "just" teaching people to program is the solution to every problem in society. People have wildly different backgrounds, experiences and inclinations; it's easy to see this in the case of autism-spectrum neurodiversity, but the idea that maybe lots of women just aren't that attracted to the whole programming thing is seen as more contentious for some reason.

Re: Dell Autism Hiring Program

#89

Post by sabas123 »

Shmebulock wrote: post #83
YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #80

A recent article posted on HN offering funding to women to study programming sparked a flamewar, with many users claiming that special hiring policies for women in the tech industry discriminate against men. The current article is about a special hiring policy for autistic persons in Dell. Luckily there doesn't seem to be a flamewar this time around. Of course, I wonder why. To be honest, I don't understand why so ma…

Because autism is a disability. Being a woman is not a disability.

While in a perfect world does not need to be one, couldn't you say that by just the way a large chunk of the tech community (not necessarily devs but also gamers ect) reacts to them they on average have more bad social experiences just like austic people do? (For totally different reasons ofcourse)

Re: Dell Autism Hiring Program

#90

Post by rtpg »

Sniffnoy wrote: post #74

Here's what I'm wondering: if they think this separate process is more reliable than traditional interviewing... why keep it a separate process rather than using it for everyone?

Probably a cost issue? Cost being not just money but time involvement required
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