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Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

nytimes.com

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Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#301

Post by metaphorm »

muglug wrote: post #125
camdenlock wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's trendy right now to "listen and believe." Outrage can score you some serious Internet popularity points, particularly when your claims are about men being sexist pigs. Don't ask for any evidence, just grab the pitchforks! That being said, it's tempting to just believe everything Fowler wrote and hope for sweet justice. We all love a good story, after all. Unfortunately, what makes for a gripping story of justice…

She's staked her reputation (and, at this point, probably her career as well) on not lying about the harassment. She says she has both documentary evidence and other female Uber employees to back up her claims. "Guilty until proven innocent" is how our courts work, and rightly so. But, as a layperson, there's nothing wrong in assessing the evidence and saying: "the chance these claims are false is vanishingly small,…

> "Guilty until proven innocent" is how our courts work, and rightly so.

um....

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#302

Post by metaphorm »

xor1 wrote: post #85
blazespin wrote: post #8

The problem is that men misconstrue the natural social and friendly tendency of most women as sexual advances. There needs to be more education in this respect with men. Just because a woman is chatty and willing to collaborate doesn't mean she wants to sleep with you. I know that sounds sexist, but honestly, I think women just are naturally or at least culturally (does the difference matter in this case, really?) mo…

>I think women just are naturally or at least culturally (does the difference matter in this case, really?) more social This is really sexist.

you throw that accusation around too lightly. why don't you ask what the person meant?

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#303

Post by HelloNurse »

alexandercrohde wrote: post #16
jen729w wrote: post #2

When someone senior gets fired, I'll start taking them seriously. Until then, it's all PR.

I think one senior person isn't enough in a case like this. What is described here is an entire malfunctioning department, which in my opinion, couldn't be attributed to anywhere below the C-level. Sure perhaps there is somebody who can be fingered "VP of HR" or whatever, but anybody who has so little visibility into their department that this type of scenario could evolve is clearly not auditing what's happening lev…

I don't see how a free-willed HR department with actual managers could accept managers adjusting performance reviews to suit their personal purposes. Even the most callous and treacherous evil HR officers would want to be in control.

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#304

Post by mcculley »

It's very common that startups have such issues. You've got a bunch of younger inexperienced managers and an inexperienced HR department.

What I don't understand is, why don't investors compel such valuable startups to get experienced HR? Do they calculate that the lawsuits will cost less than outsourcing HR or otherwise getting adult supervision? Or are they just blind to it?

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#305

Post by debacle »

random_upvoter wrote: post #185

As a meta, it seems to be an infallible rule of Hacker News that any discussion about the relationship between men and women turns into an angry painful mess in no time. Maybe we should look into this anger itself rather than draw all sorts of conclusions from cases of which we don't know half of what really happened.

It might be helpful if there was some sort of statistic for comment threads. % of readers that read the comments vs % of readers that commented. It might be a valuable way to determine when comment threads are inhabited by vocal minorities.

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#306

Post by obstacle1 »

ygjb wrote: post #127
matt_wulfeck wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What?? Everywhere I worked a screenshot like what she's describing would get you fired. Over office chat even?? It's not even hearsay. Someone can bring up the exact chat history.

That's great! It sounds like you have worked at places that follow the rules. Please don't use your personal observations to discount the growing collection of evidence that this sort of thing is happening at tech companies around the world, and not just in the bay area.

Think about what you are saying using your brain. It is equivalent to "please stop giving me your anecdotes, because they conflict with these other anecdotes that I like better".

If you're going to use personal experience as evidence for some phenomenon, you need to accept personal experience from every angle, not just the angle that agrees with your perception of the phenomenon.

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#307

Post by mud_dauber »

beachy wrote: post #171
thewhitetulip wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Should be able to go Yes, in theory. But most HRs "protect the org" in the most short sighted way possible

That's a sweeping statement that I utterly disagree with. We do HR software, I've interacted with many HR people at many companies and I've never even heard of anything as outrageous as the behavior described in this case. In no way is it the way"most HRs" behave.

33 years across 6 companies, from Fortune 500 to 20-person startups. HR departments have been, without exception, absolutely useless except to protect the company's hide.

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#309

Post by idiot_stick »

alexandercrohde wrote: post #16
jen729w wrote: post #2

When someone senior gets fired, I'll start taking them seriously. Until then, it's all PR.

I think one senior person isn't enough in a case like this. What is described here is an entire malfunctioning department, which in my opinion, couldn't be attributed to anywhere below the C-level. Sure perhaps there is somebody who can be fingered "VP of HR" or whatever, but anybody who has so little visibility into their department that this type of scenario could evolve is clearly not auditing what's happening lev…

>I think one senior person isn't enough in a case like this.

How can you make a statement like this without knowing anything about the details of the case? We have an allegation; a big one, but that's it. How many heads would you like to see in advance?

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#310

Post by balladeer »

bambax wrote: post #187
beachy wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a sweeping statement that I utterly disagree with. We do HR software, I've interacted with many HR people at many companies and I've never even heard of anything as outrageous as the behavior described in this case. In no way is it the way"most HRs" behave.

My experience is different. Every HR person I have ever interacted with was either entirely clueless or immensely evil.

This has been my experience too. Always. Without fail.

Though I still believe it must be because many (if not most) firms invest very little in their HR departments and hence they get what they pay for and employees make do with it until something blows up; e.g. scenarios like this. And I am sure there are stellar HR departments out there I have never interacted with.

But then again an industry, a field, or a practice is usually stereotyped based on the reputation of the majority and majority in this case, in my humble opinion, seems to be lying somewhere down south.

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