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HR is not your friend, and other things I think you should know

rachelbythebay.com

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Re: HR is not your friend, and other things I think you should know

#311

Post by mcv »

jiggawatts wrote: post #14

Many people think that they live in a free democracy. In reality, something like 50% of all working people are employed in a strict hierarchical organisation that is essentially feudal in its nature. Most employees are the equivalent of serfs, overseen by lords, with a king in charge. The common employees don't get a vote. Their managers are not elected. They don't get a say in policy. The managers in turn form a str…

It is important to understand that in a lot of ways, corporations are completely contrary to how we like to see the world. We want democracy, but corporations are often essentially feudal, like you say. We like the free market, but internal economies of corporations are entirely plan-economy.

I often wonder if we shouldn't just ban large corporations. Make everything small business.

Re: HR is not your friend, and other things I think you should know

#312

Post by emphatizer2000 »

jiggawatts wrote: post #14

Many people think that they live in a free democracy. In reality, something like 50% of all working people are employed in a strict hierarchical organisation that is essentially feudal in its nature. Most employees are the equivalent of serfs, overseen by lords, with a king in charge. The common employees don't get a vote. Their managers are not elected. They don't get a say in policy. The managers in turn form a str…

You can quit your job, though. And you can negotiate with management. The only reason you are a serf is because you choose to be one. (Spare me the "many people can't afford to quit their job" comments - save money, or look for a better job)

Re: HR is not your friend, and other things I think you should know

#313

Post by digitaltrees »

klodolph wrote: post #307
digitaltrees wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am saying that assuming or accepting you have no power or less power than others is a sure way to create that reality. Are there limits. Sure. But there are countless examples of people that created more than society would have “allowed”. Put another way. Ignore inequality as it effects you, assume you can overcome it. But acknowledge its existence with respect to others and do everything in your power to create eq…

> Ignore inequality as it effects you, assume you can overcome it. But acknowledge its existence with respect to others and do everything in your power to create equality. This sounds hopelessly inconsistent to me. Why should I hold myself to a different standard than I hold other people to? If acknowledging inequality elsewhere is required to be kind to other people, that means that ignoring inequality when it affec…

Because it is effective.

If you assume you can’t do something you definitely won’t. If you assume you can, you may not succeed; you may be blocked by some external cause, but not by something you could have controlled.

In the case of helping others, you may play a role in clearing an obstacle that, not withstanding their own effort and belief, would have blocked them.

In both cases you are assuming you have power. Power to help yourself and power to reduce inequality by empowering others.

This isn’t a contradiction.

Re: HR is not your friend, and other things I think you should know

#314

Post by mcv »

klodolph wrote: post #307
digitaltrees wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am saying that assuming or accepting you have no power or less power than others is a sure way to create that reality. Are there limits. Sure. But there are countless examples of people that created more than society would have “allowed”. Put another way. Ignore inequality as it effects you, assume you can overcome it. But acknowledge its existence with respect to others and do everything in your power to create eq…

> Ignore inequality as it effects you, assume you can overcome it. But acknowledge its existence with respect to others and do everything in your power to create equality. This sounds hopelessly inconsistent to me. Why should I hold myself to a different standard than I hold other people to? If acknowledging inequality elsewhere is required to be kind to other people, that means that ignoring inequality when it affec…

It's a good rule of thumb. It's the difference between accepting and acknowledging. You can acknowledge the hardship of others but still fight against your own.

I don't tolerate inequality, but I do know it exists. It will continue to exist if we don't fight it.

Re: HR is not your friend, and other things I think you should know

#315

Post by k3nsa1 »

Faaak wrote: post #279
akmarinov wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure about Thailand and it really depends on your lifestyle, but 100k will get you through 2-3 years at most in the other countries, if you live in an urban setting, not really pinching pennies.

Spain's minimum wage is 1000 EUR/month. 100k$ (82k€) will give you 6 years of living if you don't spend it all on useless things. Portugal is even "better" with a minimum wage of 750€/month

You can always try Greece with 560 Euros/m (net)

Re: HR is not your friend, and other things I think you should know

#316

Post by marcus_holmes »

gumby wrote: post #78

What a cynical article. Also: what a realistic article. It's probably not obvious but management at most companies doesn't actually want HR to be like this, at least for exempt employees (more cynicism, this time mine). But if it doesn't converge this way the execs usually start to get upset with the result.

If every manager was a good manager, there'd be no need for HR. Good managers don't cause HR-type problems, and can deal with any problems in their teams without involving HR.

So, yeah, kinda - management at most companies don't want HR to be like this. The bad managers because HR keeps getting involved with them, the good ones because HR imposes restrictions that they don't need. But HR is like this because it needs to protect the organisation from bad management.

Re: HR is not your friend, and other things I think you should know

#317

Post by kubanczyk »

doc_gunthrop wrote: post #59

Here's another thing to note: At least a few people here have probably heard the words "culture fit" uttered when a decision is being made to bring a new employee onboard. That's basically just a socially acceptable way of validating discrimination in hiring (with ageism being a typical example).

Socially acceptable? Just a reminder: while one can legally discriminate against multitude of traits, any of HN crowd who interviews candidates probably should consider that age discrimination is simply illegal against 40+ aged people in US (ADEA - federal level). Don't break the law and don't help to whitewash it.

Re: HR is not your friend, and other things I think you should know

#318

Post by pjc50 »

_nrv9 wrote: post #90
firecall wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. And nor does anyone have a 'career'. You have a job. When you lose that job, you may not get another one. It's an illusion. One minute you think you are a high profile manager with budgets and power. The next you are packing your desk up into a box and rethinking your entire life. We are not our careers!

I am always terrified of losing my job. It's a fear I've had even though I've been a top performer the entire five years I've been professionally working. Maybe it's because I grew up poor or because I think things are too good in tech and about to crash any day. My antidote? $100k in liquidity. Preferably not invested in the NASDAQ. If tech crashes, you can take your liquid $100k and move to Thailand, Spain, Portuga…

> $100k in liquidity.

That of course puts you into the 1% of people in terms of liquidity. Quite a lot of people are a long way below that: https://www.federalreserve.gov/publications/2019-economic-we...

Retirement saving are interesting because for a whole bunch of public policy reasons most people have illiquid retirement savings.

> move to Thailand, Spain, Portugal, Turkey

Check your visa requirements: can you really move there without a job? While $100k is a 1% number it may not be enough to qualify for the "entrepreneur" visa.

Re: HR is not your friend, and other things I think you should know

#319

Post by buran77 »

d--b wrote: post #284

HR is neither your friend nor it is some evil secret police that’s here to root out the saboteurs in your company... HR is an agent between you and the company. It’s there to run the negotiations between what the company wants and what you want. If you don’t understand that, you won’t be able to use HR to your benefit. HR is there for you to ask stuff. You want a shower on your floor? Ask them. You want a course in R…

It's an agent but like any agent they act on behalf of someone and represent their interests first or only. And that's the company's. Sure you can extract value from them as an employee but you have to keep in mind that HR is there for you only as long as your interests almost perfectly align with the company's interests and not a step further.

That shower? Keeps you working longer in the office. Same goes for most of these perks. The course in React? You can deliver in more projects or upsell you to a customer. Try to ask for something when you underdeliver and you'll see whether HR or the company value your happiness or your happiness derived productivity.

Re: HR is not your friend, and other things I think you should know

#320

Post by rocqua »

I really don't enjoy the tone here. The derision with which it speaks about managers, like they are either evil or incompetent, is unfair in my experience.

(my) Managers are just people. They have a task, they do their best to get that task done. Sometimes they decisions that seem bad to me. Often that is because I misunderstand their goals. Sometimes, it is because I know something they don't, and something they couldn't verify if I told them. And other times, they just made a mistake, or weren't told the relevant information by me or others.

Indeed, sometimes their goals are somewhat self serving. But often it just has to do with wider business goals than what I am working at. I am grateful for them keeping an eye on those. Leaving me to worry less about the biggest of pictures. That however, doesn't mean I should just bog down on the small picture of my work, and deem everything that seems bad in that context as stupid.

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