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A Difficult Situation

blog.sendgrid.com

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Re: A Difficult Situation

#271

Post by rosser »

donohoe wrote: post #162
mtrimpe wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unlike when he very publicly fired an employee in the heat of the moment after his company was being DDoS'ed. I think the fact that Paul Graham, after applying Occam's razor, preferred to think it was done from a compromised account speaks volumes here.

{{citation needed}} or put it another way - you're making a very reaching unsupported statement. You have no idea what they were thinking.

Downvoters, I think the "citation needed" was in reference to SendGrid's firing Adria in response to the DDoS, not to pg's take on the subject.

And he's right; [citation needed] on the DDoS being the motivating factor in her firing, as opposed, say, to her dragging her employer into the internet shitstorm that she started.

Re: A Difficult Situation

#272

Post by chc »

DannyBee wrote: post #207
taligent wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well this is the most ridiculous logic I've seen for a while. Just because I send two emails from my Gmail account doesn't mean they are related and/or relevant.

I'm sorry, are we really discussing whether a person having recently made jokes about penises in public is relevant to whether it's okay for that same person to publicly shame two guys she accused of making jokes about penises in public?

Your Twitter account is not exactly public in the same way that a crowded conference room is. One is a "pull" medium (i.e. I have to seek out your tweets), while the other is a "push" medium (i.e. I can't unsubscribe from your loud-talking). If you drive someone away from your Twitter feed with inappropriate jokes, that's OK, really — they just aren't a good fit for your feed and you'll both be happier. But if you drive someone away from a conference with your inappropriate jokes, that's not OK.

Re: A Difficult Situation

#273

Post by kanja »

mtrimpe wrote: post #250
harel wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Such a lawsuit would be a confirmed kill on her career though. At least now she has a chance to someday salvage her work. Adding a lawsuit to the mix will probably mean she'll never be hired by anyone (who can read and is on the web) again.

At least she'd be certain that her future employers care about womens rights as much as she does.

She doesn't really care though. This was an ego move, first and foremost. Calling it a women's rights issue is an insult to women.

Re: A Difficult Situation

#274

Post by _delirium »

14113 wrote: post #267
_delirium wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For example, ethically a company has to do everything it can for it's shareholders. It's legally required to do this, and has an ethical responsibility to. This is not really the case, either as a matter of ethics or a matter of law. It's a widespread myth that there is an overriding legal responsibility to "maximize shareholder value", but that is not the case, and the myth is based on an over-reading of a century…

Fair enough about shareholder obligations: I only have it on hearsay, from a business lecture as part of my CS course. To try and understand your perspective further though: do you think it was ethically responsible for PlayHaven to fire their guy? Also, were it not for the DDoS, would the posts on twitter and comments have been sufficient to ethically fire her? I find it difficult to rationalise how firing someone w…

On the PlayHaven question, I lean towards thinking that wasn't justified either. If I had to identify villains in this case, it'd be both PlayHaven and SendGrid, which, despite their pretenses to being 21st-century startups, are looking a lot like rather backwards 1950s pointy-headed HR places. If people dare to speak in public without corporate approval, they get fired for stirring the pot, as if we still lived in a world where blogs, twitter, tumblr, and HN didn't exist, and companies owned you 24/7. If you know what's good for you, spend your weekends golfing and don't say anything in public!

Re: A Difficult Situation

#275

Post by [deleted] »

taligent wrote: post #262
seivan wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh really? Well the question is, I am currently not sure how the person in question would react to a "Fork you" shirt. So...... that's the problem, that was my point. Where is the line? Because apparently that triggered. But somehow, "example" is a foreign concept to you, since you sorta got stuck on the "crude joke" portion. Way to go to miss the whole point.

The "line" for professional conduct is really simple. If you are thinking about doing something ask yourself this question, "Would I do this if the CEO of our company was standing next to me".

[deleted]

Re: A Difficult Situation

#276

Post by rooshdi »

fingerprinter wrote: post #93

Who didn't see this coming? And when she pulled SendGrid, her employer, publicly into the fray via her twitter feed, who didn't know it was simply a matter of time? I mean, what else could SendGrid possibly do? She basically forced them to fire her. Her value to the company is being a public face to developers . She very publicly destroyed that value. Further, she pulled SendGrid in with her tweet about them "support…

She didn't force them to fire her. People are just blowing this way out of proportion. Everybody needs to chill out, especially the corporate management of both companies.

Re: A Difficult Situation

#277

Post by base698 »

seivan wrote: post #150
powertower wrote: post #98

They need to update that statement with the fact that the joke was not about her, nor directed at her. Their statement leaves that very important part out, making the reader think otherwise - that she was the victim. At the same time (or around that time) this was happening, here is a conversation she was having - http://i.imgur.com/nRC5J7f.png Another gem from years ago - http://imgur.com/5tbXR2c I'd imagine she was…

Exactly, just two guys making forking jokes (get it?). Even Github sells merch with the words "Fork you". Zealous oversensitive jaded person like her, taking her time to get the phone out, take a picture, possible geo-tagged of two guys who might not want to be on her Twitter. She has no right to do that. Especially when there was no communication between them. You don't like their jokes, tell them or move away. Look…

What happened was bad taste to be sure, but it isn't sexism. If they made a comment asking why all the women in the audience aren't bringing them beer that would be sexist. Using sexual language is not by itself sufficient for sexism. It is bad taste and an argument could be made it should be rooted out in a professional environment, but it shouldn't be confused with actual sexism.

Sexism: Belief one of the sexes can inherently not do a task due to their sex (write code, vote, make brownies).

Bad taste: Abercrombie ads, Fork You shirts, South Park, Maxim.

Re: A Difficult Situation

#278

Post by rscale »

powertower wrote: post #98

They need to update that statement with the fact that the joke was not about her, nor directed at her. Their statement leaves that very important part out, making the reader think otherwise - that she was the victim. At the same time (or around that time) this was happening, here is a conversation she was having - http://i.imgur.com/nRC5J7f.png Another gem from years ago - http://imgur.com/5tbXR2c I'd imagine she was…

Let's remember: she never asked for him to get fired. And I don't think that was a reasonably foreseeable outcome of her comments.

The fact that he was fired leads me to two probable conclusions:

1) that his management was terrible and he'll end up someplace better; or

2) that he was about to be fired anyway.

If his management was terrible, it's not a sad story for him in the long-term. If they were going to fire him anyway, it's just blame-shifting.

His reputation wasn't even meaningfully harmed, as his name doesn't seem to appear in any of the discussions. So if he's half-decent, he'll be fine.

I find the whole thing very strange, because I sure as shit wouldn't fire a good employee just because they'd offended one person, once.

Re: A Difficult Situation

#279

Post by jsmeaton »

taligent wrote: post #262
seivan wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh really? Well the question is, I am currently not sure how the person in question would react to a "Fork you" shirt. So...... that's the problem, that was my point. Where is the line? Because apparently that triggered. But somehow, "example" is a foreign concept to you, since you sorta got stuck on the "crude joke" portion. Way to go to miss the whole point.

The "line" for professional conduct is really simple. If you are thinking about doing something ask yourself this question, "Would I do this if the CEO of our company was standing next to me".

My CEO? Absolutely. If I worked at another company, probably not. You have to judge the company you're in, and if someone takes offence, apologise, and be more mindful next time.

Re: A Difficult Situation

#280

Post by vacri »

MartinCron wrote: post #111
GhotiFish wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yah. One common factor in everybody involved is that they're incredibly human. Pride, self-righteousness, and immaturity are a few of the qualities on display, but since they're human I accept that a few of these qualities are tolerable, as should we all. No one committed any action that was overtly horrible on it's own. In a vacuum: Two guys were making childish jokes, and a woman was offended and told her friends a…

No one committed any action that was overtly horrible on its own That's the remarkable thing about this whole mess. Lots of people are making what appear to be bad choices, but only mildly bad choices. Nobody needed to be crucified here. Until you get into the whole DDOS and threats of violence business, those are truly bad choices.

I think there was a significant bad choice - Playhaven firing the guy instead of retraining him. It says 'make the slightest misstep and we will abandon you'. If they were interested in maintaining developers, the response would instead be 'please do some sensitivity training; we can grow together' - showing the company's interest in developing the developer. Unless of course he was already on notice and this was the last straw, although reading his apologies he seems like he is receptive and willing to respond to constructive criticism.

Besides, without Playhaven's overly-strong response, the hackles of the antifeminists wouldn't have been raised, and we wouldn't be talking about this right now. The keystone of this story is actually Playhaven's response, not Richards'.

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