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A janitor at Frito-Lay invented Flamin’ Hot Cheetos (2017)

thehustle.co

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Re: A janitor at Frito-Lay invented Flamin’ Hot Cheetos (2017)

#251

Post by School-Cotton »

mindcrime wrote: post #226
thundergolfer wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

thehustle.co as a publication is catered to young 'hustlers' who very much buy into the capitalist American Dream. This is a hype-article for the 'anyone can make it' myth, a myth that fuels culture of overworked young people[1] struggling against structural changes they're told to ignore. [1]. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/02/religion-w...

thehustle.co as a publication is catered to young 'hustlers' who very much buy into the capitalist American Dream. Good. We need more of this kind of thing around here, and less negativity and the "luck is everything, effort is irrelevant, sit on your ass and wait for the government to fix all your problems" bullshit that we've been overrun with lately. This is a hype-article for the 'anyone can make it' myth There's…

> If you're working in the fields for less than minimum wage in 110° temperatures, the become a manager at McDonalds could easily count as "making it."

This is something I thought was cool about this guy’s story: by the time he became a janitor, he had already “made it” relative to his campesino upbringing (or at least how the article makes it sound).

But he didn’t stop there.

Re: A janitor at Frito-Lay invented Flamin’ Hot Cheetos (2017)

#252

Post by 9nGQluzmnq3M »

sverige wrote: post #248
9nGQluzmnq3M wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With all due respect, if you were born in the US and grew up speaking English, you have a lot more common with those "Bavarians" than you do with Swedish people in Sweden.

Probably true in some ways, yes, though I grew up with relatives who came here from Sweden. And I definitely identify more as American than Swedish. At the same time, though, should we then say that all English-speaking Americans have more in common than whatever ethnic stock they came from in another country, whether Mexicans or Asians or whatever group? Or do you say that just because the Bavarians are "white"?

Broadly speaking, yes. Social class is probably more relevant than race: my own kids are mixed-race, with parents from different cultures who are both first-gen immigrants, and they identify much more with the country they were born in and have lived all their life than either of us.

Re: A janitor at Frito-Lay invented Flamin’ Hot Cheetos (2017)

#253

Post by droithomme »

arkades wrote: post #187

This article ends right before the actual interesting part begins. Janitor takes some food his company produces, adds spices, makes a shitty pitch deck and profit? Cool, but... this could have easily happened in a dozen different configurations and gone nowhere. This is more luck than anything else. The interesting story begins after that. This guy didn't end his career there - so, presumably, he was't a one-hit wond…

Good questions. Even if he really did drop out of school in elementary school, he would not be illiterate at that point. That aspect of the story seems reasonably questionable and is probably exaggerated for drama.

Re: A janitor at Frito-Lay invented Flamin’ Hot Cheetos (2017)

#254

Post by droithomme »

mindcrime wrote: post #226
thundergolfer wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

thehustle.co as a publication is catered to young 'hustlers' who very much buy into the capitalist American Dream. This is a hype-article for the 'anyone can make it' myth, a myth that fuels culture of overworked young people[1] struggling against structural changes they're told to ignore. [1]. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/02/religion-w...

thehustle.co as a publication is catered to young 'hustlers' who very much buy into the capitalist American Dream. Good. We need more of this kind of thing around here, and less negativity and the "luck is everything, effort is irrelevant, sit on your ass and wait for the government to fix all your problems" bullshit that we've been overrun with lately. This is a hype-article for the 'anyone can make it' myth There's…

> 110° temperatures

110° temperatures has a tendency to kill off whatever crop you are growing. It's not a common growing condition and most areas with these temperatures regularly are not considered suitable regions for efficient agricultural production.

Re: A janitor at Frito-Lay invented Flamin’ Hot Cheetos (2017)

#255

Post by fma »

axiom92 wrote: post #45
WalterBright wrote: post #25

I love this story. It's not about how Montañez "got lucky" - it's about how he, in several key spots, set himself up so luck would find him. It's a great American success story.

Also from the article: > Six months later, with Montañez’s help, Frito-Lay began testing Flamin’ Hot Cheetos in small Latino markets in East Los Angeles. > If it performed well, the company would move forward with the product; if it didn’t, they’d scratch it — and Montañez would likely return to janitorial duties. > So Montañez assembled a small team of family members and friends, went to the test markets, and bought…

If I remember correctly, Sid Meiers would call up computer stores and ask if they had his games in stock because he wanted to buy it. He'd call several times and eventually the stores would reach out to him to buy it.

Re: A janitor at Frito-Lay invented Flamin’ Hot Cheetos (2017)

#256

Post by rolltiide »

slg wrote: post #194
rolltiide wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the cultural ideal of meritocracy needs to be addressed, and this is conflating two separate issues: 1) People of certain backgrounds want to and need to prove they CAN compete. 2) People of certain backgrounds should be helping make decisions even without credentials. so there are both competent and less competent people that need to be included. "wait what why? I wasted way too much of my life to accept why…

The idea that a push for diversity is somehow in conflict with a meritocracy is deeply flawed because it relies on the idea that people with diverse backgrounds either haven't shown they are capable or that there are no people with diverse backgrounds that are capable. A good diversity program does two things: 1. It identifies and removes certain unnecessary credentials that might rule out people with diverse backgro…

> The idea that a push for diversity is somehow in conflict with a meritocracy is deeply flawed because it relies on the idea that people with diverse backgrounds either haven't shown they are capable or that there are no people with diverse backgrounds that are capable

I’m saying thats only part of the dilemma and is muddied by that specific binary approach

People talk about interest in certain fields amongst demographics, pipeline problems, resent any perception of undermining a meritocratic process and this hurts everyone

But the kicker is that its not JUST about proving that a proportional distribution of people in a currently underrepresented demographic is competent, there and in the pipeline

Its that companies wont grow to address larger markets if meritocratic diversity is the only thing they look for and try to approve

People - like what you expressed - are barking up just one of multiple trees. Even if you reach peak underrepresented minority, you’ve still failed to bring diverse ideas to the market

Re: A janitor at Frito-Lay invented Flamin’ Hot Cheetos (2017)

#257

Post by BurningFrog »

opportune wrote: post #166
slimsag wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I 100% agree. But it's important that diversity be considered in all forms, not just based on race/sex. If your "diverse" team is made up of different ethnicities and genders but only consists of ivy league members who grew up in California... well, not really diverse then, is it?

Class diversity is pretty hard to achieve because you usually need some baseline class to actually be able to succeed in a role, i.e. you can't show up to a meeting with customers or shareholders chewing dip and wearing camo jorts. And social mobility from lower classes into corporate-ready roles is rather low in this country, so while there certainly are people who grew up poor and would be useful for companies to f…

Here's the real divider: Viewpoint diversity.

Are you ready to have some conservatives/Republicans on your team?

Re: A janitor at Frito-Lay invented Flamin’ Hot Cheetos (2017)

#259

Post by School-Cotton »

droithomme wrote: post #254
mindcrime wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

thehustle.co as a publication is catered to young 'hustlers' who very much buy into the capitalist American Dream. Good. We need more of this kind of thing around here, and less negativity and the "luck is everything, effort is irrelevant, sit on your ass and wait for the government to fix all your problems" bullshit that we've been overrun with lately. This is a hype-article for the 'anyone can make it' myth There's…

> 110° temperatures 110° temperatures has a tendency to kill off whatever crop you are growing. It's not a common growing condition and most areas with these temperatures regularly are not considered suitable regions for efficient agricultural production.

Phoenix gets to 110 every year and you can definitely grow oranges and cotton there, at least.

Re: A janitor at Frito-Lay invented Flamin’ Hot Cheetos (2017)

#260

Post by wutbrodo »

cm2012 wrote: post #148
wutbrodo wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(Note that I reductively throw around cultural class labels like "lower-middle class" in this comment for purposes of clarity: I don't mean to suggest that a person's social class is fixed, or well-defined, but it's just a brief way to get at the concept of different subcultures and their mannerisms, as well as the rough income bands that people tend to associate with them) > Also interesting is the backlash he faced…

This bottom up class dynamic is called tall poppy syndrome, or the crab bucket.

I'm not sure that quite fits what I'm describing. AIUI, those phenomena describe tearing down someone perceived to be rising above his station, whereas I'm describing the subtle enforcement of segregation by class. Namely, these people werent punishing a member of their group with "pretensions" to a higher one (a disgusting enough impulse), they were trying to tear down someone who they already thought was of a different group (unintentionally imo: these were fairly close friends and there were many ways that they connected very deeply, which made these cases all the more noticeable).
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