This bakery will hire anyone • Hacker News Board

Re: This bakery will hire anyone

#91

Post by jqm » Sun, Mar 08, 2015, 12:54 AM UTC

I think this is awesome. The routine and self respect of getting up and going to a job every morning is something people trying to re-integrate back into society really need. Not to mention money to buy things.

But I do have a story to relate. I was a construction project manager in my early 30's. We did land reclamation in disturbed areas like mines. We had a large project reclaiming a mine in Arizona. The company I worked for hired lots of former convicts without discrimination, and fired them just about as quickly and also without discrimination. One of the water truck drivers had a cousin who had killed some people in his teens and had just gotten out of prison. The guy was I think late 20's. He was living with his aunt and uncle. We had him out on the job staying at a motel with the rest of the crew for a few months. He was a bit odd, but he did OK work. When the job was over, we didn't need the big crew anymore and he was laid off. About a month later he killed the aunt and uncle he was staying with and went right back to prison.

So even though this is a good program and I fully approve and think we need more programs like this.... there are qualifiers. Recently violent people may need more help or supervision after release, before they are ready to enter a workforce.

Re: This bakery will hire anyone

#92

Post by ryanbrunner » Sun, Mar 08, 2015, 12:55 AM UTC

spopejoy wrote: post #80

ryanbrunner wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're assuming that a conviction record is the only variable. Chances are, you're not going to have 2 applicants who are otherwise identical save for a felony conviction (the fact that one of them has a felony conviction almost guarantees there's probably a lot of other differences between them as well).

felony conviction almost guarantees there's probably a lot of other differences Do you have some statistics you'd like to share? Otherwise this seems like the exact bias that silently justifies relegating felons to sub-citizenship.

I wasn't implying that the differences were negative, only that it's probably a fair assumption that the life experience of someone incarcerated is going to be different from someone who never has been.

Re: This bakery will hire anyone

#93

Post by MichaelGG » Sun, Mar 08, 2015, 1:00 AM UTC

rdl wrote: post #65

cubano wrote: post #15

As someone with several drug related felonies on my record, I can do nothing but applaud the efforts of this CEO, although on a different level I wonder if any adult working a minimum wage job isn't living a very bleak existence anyway, and in fact isn't being exploited for having a brain disorder we currently call "addiction" The problem with people who let drugs seriously affect their life is that...they let drugs…

I wonder if a Silicon Valley tech company would care about drug related convictions. I don't think possession/distribution/etc. alone would really be an issue (except if it were extremely recent and potentially ongoing), but clearly "I was high and raped/killed my neighbor" would, and either could arguably be "drug related". "Was an addict and broken into cars to get money for drugs" would be a more interesting corne…

Taking "drug convictions" into account is a form of discrimination. If the FDA revoked the licensing of Prozac or the DEA scheduled it tomorrow, suddenly tons of people would be guilty of drug-crimes. It'd criminalize being depressed.

The same is true for the current state of drug laws. We're criminalizing people with anxiety, with existential pain, stress, curiosity, etc.

What's different about stealing cars for money for medications, versus stealing cars for money for bread? Or robbing to afford rent? Are people that steal money for opiates less likely to cause a work incident than people that steal money to fund a kickstarter campaign?

Medical issues should only be taken into account if they're relevant to the job at hand, which, at a tech company, is relatively rare. Otherwise, acceptable job performance should be the only measurement considered as far as medical is concerned.

Re: This bakery will hire anyone

#94

Post by emiliobumachar » Sun, Mar 08, 2015, 1:06 AM UTC

Dylan16807 wrote: post #85

gadders wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't skip it because it's HuffPo, skip it because it's Johann Hari. He's a plagiarist and a cyber stalker. http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann_Hari

What cyber stalking are you talking about? This page only talks about plagiarism and wikipedia vandalism. Making negative edits about people you don't like on wikipedia involves exactly zero stalking. Is information missing here? And it sounds like the 'plagiarism' was him using quotes he did not personally acquire, which is pretty minor and wouldn't turn me away from reading anything.

Hypothetically, imagine gadders would now edit some public information about you with lies, because you criticized him. Would that not feel a little bit stalky?

Re: This bakery will hire anyone

#95

Post by ars » Sun, Mar 08, 2015, 1:12 AM UTC

arsenide wrote: post #82

gadders wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't skip it because it's HuffPo, skip it because it's Johann Hari. He's a plagiarist and a cyber stalker. http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann_Hari

Why are you judging the merits of an article by the author and not the content?

Because if the subject matter is in a domain that is outside someone's expertise they don't really have a way to judge by the content. It's possible to make really good arguments for things that are simply untrue.

So instead we judge by the author - i.e. is the writer at least trustworthy.

Re: This bakery will hire anyone

#96

Post by ars » Sun, Mar 08, 2015, 1:14 AM UTC

MichaelGG wrote: post #93

rdl wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if a Silicon Valley tech company would care about drug related convictions. I don't think possession/distribution/etc. alone would really be an issue (except if it were extremely recent and potentially ongoing), but clearly "I was high and raped/killed my neighbor" would, and either could arguably be "drug related". "Was an addict and broken into cars to get money for drugs" would be a more interesting corne…

Taking "drug convictions" into account is a form of discrimination. If the FDA revoked the licensing of Prozac or the DEA scheduled it tomorrow, suddenly tons of people would be guilty of drug-crimes. It'd criminalize being depressed. The same is true for the current state of drug laws. We're criminalizing people with anxiety, with existential pain, stress, curiosity, etc. What's different about stealing cars for mon…

> What's different about stealing cars for money for medications, versus stealing cars for money for bread

They are totally different!

Someone stealing for bread, i.e. to survive, will never consider crime if they don't absolutely have to. So they may have committed a crime, but they are not a criminal.

But someone stealing for drugs demonstrate a level of selfishness that does make them a criminal, i.e. someone who does not care about other people. This is something will not change even if they have enough money to buy their drugs. That selfishness does not go away.

Re: This bakery will hire anyone

#97

Post by mb_72 » Sun, Mar 08, 2015, 1:15 AM UTC

rdl wrote: post #65

cubano wrote: post #15

As someone with several drug related felonies on my record, I can do nothing but applaud the efforts of this CEO, although on a different level I wonder if any adult working a minimum wage job isn't living a very bleak existence anyway, and in fact isn't being exploited for having a brain disorder we currently call "addiction" The problem with people who let drugs seriously affect their life is that...they let drugs…

I wonder if a Silicon Valley tech company would care about drug related convictions. I don't think possession/distribution/etc. alone would really be an issue (except if it were extremely recent and potentially ongoing), but clearly "I was high and raped/killed my neighbor" would, and either could arguably be "drug related". "Was an addict and broken into cars to get money for drugs" would be a more interesting corne…

When I still worked for a company and not myself, and was assisting in the hiring process, I was much more inclined to overlook drug-related crimes as I felt then - as now - that these very often should be crimes in the first place. On the other hand, I remember once we had a job application from a recently-released convict (jailed for kidnapping, resisting arrest and assault of the arresting officers). The nature of his crimes, along with the high profile of his case, meant that we replied 'thanks for your interest, but you don't meet our criteria' and binned his application. We didn't want any attention from media, and our clients (many whom of which where schools) would likely not have appreciated our employment of such a person.

Re: This bakery will hire anyone

#98

Post by jheriko » Sun, Mar 08, 2015, 1:22 AM UTC

I especially like the point about criminal records not labelling criminals... just the ones who have been caught.

I've met plenty of people with criminal records who are in fact extremely capable employees, and many criminals who have just not yet been caught.

... not to mention that drug addiction is an excellent motivator for making money. :P

Re: This bakery will hire anyone

#99

Post by croon » Sun, Mar 08, 2015, 1:22 AM UTC

powertower wrote: post #89

21echoes wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Plenty of companies have quarter to year-long contract-to-hire paths for all new hires. Are all of these companies also failures? This is how all skilled work was for centuries, if not millennia. Were all businesses and guilds back then failures as well? Either way you seem to be missing the point-- being able to choose who you retain vs. who you fire is a factor of applicant volume , not some objective measure of th…

So basically what you are saying is with the way this bakery hires/fires and the way Microsoft and Google hires/fires - while there might be some slight differences between the two - at the end, the overall effect is the same. And that what's really happening here with this no-interview no-skills-asked-for open-hire policy (and its high turnover rate), is that they are keeping the cream of the crop and shedding the w…

The difference is interviews reject people based on what's on the paper, and in-the-interview tests are usually limited enough due to time constraints that you can't get a good picture of a persons proficiency.

If you give anyone the chance to show their worth in a 10 month program, that's sure as hell a lot less discriminatory and IMHO equates to a more qualitative hire.

Sure you can only keep the amount of people you have openings for (in this case 35%), but you are very certain you hire the person you want working for you, and not the person with the shiniest resume.

Re: This bakery will hire anyone

#100

Post by jim_greco » Sun, Mar 08, 2015, 1:31 AM UTC

bequanna wrote: post #63

sgift wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This isn't 'right' or 'wrong', it's just reality. Government-supported reality. You can say that this is okay, but please do not make it look like this is just the way it is: The government could disallow access to all felony records (probably with an exemption for police) and even (if it wanted) provide people with a fake background story for the time they were in prison. Discrimination can only be based on things…

> The government could disallow access to all felony records (probably with an exemption for police) and even (if it wanted) provide people with a fake background story for the time they were in prison. Discrimination can only be based on things someone else knows, if the government didn't provide the information, how could the employers be "picky"? No. We have this system because that is what people want. Maybe not…

> We have this system because that is what people want. Maybe not you, but clearly the majority.

Laws and regulations are usually designed to protect the minority. Our country would have made very little social progress if we only enacted reforms that the majority wanted.