link to the spreadsheet?
What happens when you talk about salaries at Google
121–130 of 382 posts
Re: What happens when you talk about salaries at Google
#122Earlier quoted context omitted.
> the whole thing just crumbled into a victim story for me Are you sure you're not being an Angry Jack[0] and using that as an easy excuse to reject the story firsthand? > Also, generally shit will hit the fan if you tell anyone to fuck off, especially if they're your manager. Again, we don't know that she told her manager to fuck off for being racist Were do you see her telling her manager to fuck off at all ? She's…
I'm pretty sure the "telling her manager to fuck off" comment was a reference to refusing to be illegally intimidated over salary information sharing. Assuming that's an accurate reading of GP's comment, I think it's quite telling that, again, an employee's refusal to be illegally intimidated should be constructed as "telling her manager to fuck off". The sympathies and attitudes thus revealed make me very glad that…
Leaving gender out of this (which is a massive hand-wave on my part), HN skews very heavily towards people who bifurcate the world into two kinds: Entrepreneurs and little people (I am referencing Bladerunner, not persons short in physical stature).
Had this story been rewritten to describe the situation as Google (and other BigCos like Apple) erecting arcane and anti-competitive mechanisms to manipulate a market for talent, and the protagonist quitting to found a web-based startup to disrupt their 19th century attitude to business, we might be toasting her as starting the next Uber for people.
How dare those fat cats do dirty deals to prevent the ordinary person from sharing a spreadsheet! SecretSalary to the rescue!
Re: What happens when you talk about salaries at Google
#123Earlier quoted context omitted.
http://www.govdocs.com/can-employees-discuss-pay-salaries/ TL;DR It's illegal to fire your employees for discussing salary in the US. California isn't special, neither is Google.
That's so cute. I bet you also have a link that says union-busting is illegal, too. I'm not making a normative statement about the way things "ought to be", I'm making a positive statement about the way things "actually are" across most of the world ( http://beta.tutor2u.net/economics/reference/positive-and-nor... ). Shoot the messenger if you like.
> Google operates in a parallel universe called "California", where employees can share each other's salaries on a company-wide shared spreadsheet without getting fired.
So reality is a parallel universe ?
Re: What happens when you talk about salaries at Google
#124The article format is completely busted by Twitter's display rules and made unreadable. In this case, formatting the text in a readable way would probably get you sued. Those tweets belong to Twitter now and are good for nothing else but ferrying ads. I won't have my time wasted by trying to read that crap.
That's nonsense. The person who wrote the tweets retains ownership, they have simply licensed Twitter to display them in a certain way with certain requirements.
Slight variations in legal details don't make the article any more readable. Even the reasons why it can't be formatted otherwise stay exactly the same. The difference you're pointing out makes no difference at all.
Re: What happens when you talk about salaries at Google
#125Was stringing together a couple dozen tweets really the best format to share a story like this? There is a lot that's left out. Once she vaguely mentions that another employee who was "involved" was still getting all of his peer bonuses (which may or may not have been PB's for his "involvement", we don't know), the whole thing just crumbled into a victim story for me. OF COURSE the MALE coworker can do WHATEVER HE WA…
> tl;dr she got exactly what you would expect when you're intentionally stirring shit up at any company. I'm not sure what she expected. What? Sharing salary information is a protected employee activity, and retaliation is illegal.. so maybe she expected there wouldn't be retaliation?
The fact that she's a woman is neither here nor there... on the surface where it can be seen. Behind the scenes however, you have politics. When you piss people off that are in power, they find ways to make your life uncomfortable - that goes whether you're male or female.
To expect there will be no retaliation for pissing off higher ups would be incredibly naive. Even if what you are doing (strictly speaking) is legal and retaliation is illegal. You can't expect to not suffer any repercussions for pissing off those that ultimately are in charge of your pay cheque. That's just not how people operate - even if that's how the law (and society, on the surface) says they should.
It takes a long time for ideas and beliefs to become embedded in your culture - look at racism, look at sexism, look at the LBGT community. Gradually society is becoming more tolerant, more accepting and less judgmental, but we've still got a long road ahead of us before equality for all is anything more than a surface ideal that the younger generations long for.
Many like the status quo, they are truly uncomfortable with what change represents to themselves personally. Getting these people to accept that future generations ideals and beliefs are not their own, and are becoming the norm is a hard pill for them to swallow.
When a tiger is cornered and they perceive they have no place left to run, the only thing they will do is lash out and hurt you.
Re: What happens when you talk about salaries at Google
#126Earlier quoted context omitted.
It can be, but , women are also socially pressured, by both men and women, not to negotiate salary. It's a complex issue and you should avoid people on either side who try to scrunch it down to one sound bite.
The social pressure is a cop out. There's social pressure to drink alcohol, eat fast food, keep up with celebrities, etc. and there are plenty of people that don't do it. I think it's derogatory to women that we treat them like they can't think and act for themselves. Half my team are women and they make more money on average then the guys because they don't take shit from anyone. It doesn't matter if you are a man o…
It's in the best interest of every company to pay as
little as the employee will take so every employee has
to stand up for themselves.
Otherwise I kind of agree with you.
Re: What happens when you talk about salaries at Google
#127Re: What happens when you talk about salaries at Google
#128I hate that wage disparity is being heralded as a gender issue. It's really a negotiating problem. My coworker and I were hired together, same position, same experience, and offered the same salary. When I was offered the position, I asked for $15,000 more and they gave it to me. My coworker didn't ask for more and is therefore now making $15,000 less than me. After six months, I asked for a raise of $5,000. He never…
It has to be for them (people who believe there is a gender pay gap) to try and make any change. There are plenty of examples where pay is different regardless of gender: sports and entertainment would be two big ones. With sports, people are payed differently even if they fill the same position on a team. Why? They aren't the same. They bring different skillsets. It's the same with movies. The main character will ma…
> But with tech everyone should be paid the same if you share the same title regardless of how different you are or how much value you bring to the table.
Why? Different people bring different value. The same title can have wildly different roles, some positions with the same titles can be much harder to replace than others.
For example: at my company my team has a very specialized role that is far outside the domains of all other developers (we're talking about a large multinational here, with thousands of employees). You bet your ass we make a decent chunk more than most other devs, replacing any one of us would cost a ton of money and require over a year of learning about our stuff; replacing one of the devs who works on our main product? In half a year you could get someone to full productivity.
In other words: some employees are more expensive to replace than others, either shower them with €€€ or pay a much higher cost when they go work elsewhere.
Re: What happens when you talk about salaries at Google
#129Earlier quoted context omitted.
Most people also agree that in ideal circumstances you wouldn't have to negotiate your wages (because you're effectively being rewarded for your negotiating skill, which is probably completely irrelevant to your actual productivity and value).
I would agree but I think there is something about a person who believes in themselves enough to negotiate that can be a differentiator. For instance, my coworker is a total slacker, comes in late and leaves early. I come in early and leave late and take on extra work. Someone who is determined enough to feel they are worth more money will probably statistically work harder. I know it isn't the same for all people, b…
It would be a interesting study to read if that is true. I could see the exact opposite be proven, as people who invest in trade skill don't the same energy and time to spend on negotiating and improving their social/political standing in the company. People have a limited number of hours on the day and focusing ones attention on one thing should naturally result in higher results in that area.
Re: What happens when you talk about salaries at Google
#130Earlier quoted context omitted.
> tl;dr she got exactly what you would expect when you're intentionally stirring shit up at any company. I'm not sure what she expected. What? Sharing salary information is a protected employee activity, and retaliation is illegal.. so maybe she expected there wouldn't be retaliation?
"retaliation is illegal" I'm not sure what world you think we inhabit. Are we humanoid automatons? The whole welter of human emotion more or less always outweighs a programmatic injunction like "retaliation is illegal." Companies are still people working together. They'll probably never be anything but people working together. It does not matter how protected the activity allegedly is; a giant embarrassment campaign…
It seems rather clear from the article that many coworkers liked sharing salaries, so I am unsure where your "Because your coworkers, above and below, don't like what you've done to their company" came from.