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Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs

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Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs

#111

Post by jeffbee »

rapsey wrote: post #28
jandrese wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It only seems bizarre if you didn't consider DEI programs to be largely symbolic corporate puffery in the first place. For all of the hate they received from some political spheres they were largely just PR initiatives right from the start, especially in larger companies.

[flagged]

There was a flagged post here on HN recently from some right wing grievance YouTube channel, it was talking about how Microsoft refuses to hire white people, but the evidence for this clearly incorrect claim was coming from a guy who says on LinkedIn that he is a principal software engineer, at Microsoft. So, it doesn't exactly scan.

DEI programs in software companies boil down to this: if you only hire your friends from Stanford then you are going to severely under-represent Black candidates and massively over-represent Asian candidates, because you are simply copying and pasting the entrenched bias of that institution. To compensate, you go and set up your recruiting table at the job fair at Howard. It's all actually quite straightforward.

Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs

#112

Post by romellem »

Contrast Meta's stance with Costco's, when [Costco responded][1] to a shareholder that proposed Costco prepare a report on "the risks of the Company maintaining its current DEI roles, policies and goals."

  Our success at Costco Wholesale has been built on service to our critical stakeholders: employees, 
  members, and suppliers. Our efforts around diversity, equity and inclusion follow our code of ethics: 
  For our employees, these efforts are built around inclusion – having all of our employees feel valued and 
  respected. Our efforts at diversity, equity and inclusion remind and reinforce with everyone at our Company 
  the importance of creating opportunities for all. We believe that these efforts enhance our capacity to attract 
  and retain employees who will help our business succeed. This capacity is critical because we owe our 
  success to our now over 300,000 employees around the globe.
[1]: https://materials.proxyvote.com/Approved/22160K/20241115/NPS...

Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs

#113

Post by Animats »

SketchySeaBeast wrote: post #95
Animats wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 1) Twitter has imploded, and is on the road to Myspace level relevance Revenue is down, yes. But when a head of state wants to say something to the world, they put it in a tweet. 189 countries have an official presence on X.

Sure, but government bureaucracies are also famously slow to adapt and move on. Is it actually a vote of continued confidence?

Yes, it is. Here's a list of world leaders congratulating Trump on his election. Almost all of them did it on X.[1] Now that's market share.

[1] https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/list-of-world-leaders-c...

Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs

#114

Post by ein0p »

rapsey wrote: post #28
jandrese wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It only seems bizarre if you didn't consider DEI programs to be largely symbolic corporate puffery in the first place. For all of the hate they received from some political spheres they were largely just PR initiatives right from the start, especially in larger companies.

[flagged]

Idk about how it is now, probably the same, but a few years back, at Microsoft hiring managers would need a VP permission to hire a straight white male candidate if their "diversity" quotas weren't yet met.

I was a part of an interesting convo at Google as well, about 9 years or so ago, back when women were at the top of the DEI hierarchy. A female hiring committee member told me that they often give "a second look" to female candidates, while men never get such preferential treatment. I tried to convince her that this is discrimination but never got anywhere.

And yes I get it, it's "anecdotal" etc. But surely you don't expect companies to willingly disclose plainly illegal discrimination themselves?

Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs

#115

Post by blackeyeblitzar »

AndyNemmity wrote: post #67
blackeyeblitzar wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They may have been a dog and pony show but were definitely real and forced executives to change how they hire and promote in illegal, discriminatory ways.

Perhaps in your experience, I would be for them if they "forced executives to change how they hire". From my perspective, that has not happened. My problem is their lack of teeth to do what they say they do.

There were teeth, in that your own performance review (as a leader) would be affected by it. Depending on your level, your own promotion would require certain stats for your teams for it to be approved. So people made all sorts of decisions - including hiring people they shouldn’t have hired - in order to push those numbers to where they were forced to. The same happened behind closed doors on promotions.

Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs

#116

Post by mempko »

AtlasBarfed wrote: post #15

This comment is based upon n two assumptions: 1) Twitter has imploded, and is on the road to Myspace level relevance 2) that implosion is due to a removal of moderation I'll try to keep it politically neutral. But this and other Facebook announcements means inexorable collapse is on the medium term horizon, because they mirror what Twitter did These actions could possibly be done with social network circa early to mi…

I created a new account on Twitter to see what new users see and the website is unusable. It's basically 4chan now with Elon Musk and sports.

Anyone defending people should try it. See how long you don't see and Elon Musk post or other hateful far right content.

Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs

#117

Post by mmooss »

The problem isn't evil, but the lack of any leader standing up for good (using simplistic terms). The evil is always there, in our souls and in our society, as is the good; we just need to choose and use the latter to check the former. Who of any serious stature is standing up to Zuckerberg, Musk, Trump, etc.? The absence - the empty stage - is shocking.

It is one of Biden's great responsibilities, but he has long abandoned the country and the world in this essential sense and bears great responsibility for the outcome.

As a simple example, who is standing up for the LA fire chief? Is the mayor, the governor, national leaders? If they have, they are highly ineffectual - I haven't heard a thing - which is also failure on their part.

It's the responsibilities of many others. It's the responsibility of people here, in our own small community. If you are the leader, and now we all are, it's not your role to toy with the latest thought experiment; it is to make a just community. This isn't hacking the new thing, it is building critical human-rated systems on which lives, freedom, justice, and the future depend.

It shouldn't be hard for organizations to implement just policies: Agree to eliminate anything that favors one group. Agree it should be equal to everyone. And that means majority and minority, powerful and vulnerable: Eliminate anything that favors a group, including what favors the powerful majority group - which is mostly what is favored.

Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs

#119

Post by gitremote »

jandrese wrote: post #9
JohnMakin wrote: post #3

I'm a PoC, and stuff like this reads extremely bizarre to me. On the one hand, you're acknowledging rolling back DEI initiatives in part because of the "political landscape," and that you were already committed to diversity on your teams. That's all well and good, but then, why the initiative in the first place? It seems to me you're doing at least 1 thing here, and acknowledging that such DEI program was performativ…

It only seems bizarre if you didn't consider DEI programs to be largely symbolic corporate puffery in the first place. For all of the hate they received from some political spheres they were largely just PR initiatives right from the start, especially in larger companies.

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