Facebook's Gen Y Nightmare • Hacker News Board

Re: Facebook's Gen Y Nightmare

#71

Post by tptacek » Sun, Sep 23, 2012, 11:32 PM UTC

michaelochurch wrote: post #57

m0nastic wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would seem like this doesn't actually buy you very much, because presumably the same places that would exclude your resume because of an ageist bias, would also pass on you after interviewing you (in which case lying about your graduation dates just causes you to have to sit through more interviews with places that won't hire you). I guess the assumption is that you might be able to "win them over" in person, assu…

It would seem like this doesn't actually buy you very much, because presumably the same places that would exclude your resume because of an ageist bias, would also pass on you after interviewing you Disagree. If you transform your career story from VP-at-48 to VP-at-43, your social status changes and the interview is a completely different conversation. Lying about actual skill is unethical, but people who are able t…

Can you imagine how unbelievably stupid and venal and untrustworthy you look when it's discovered that you deliberately lied about the timeline of your career? It's batshit that anyone would even consider it.

Re: Facebook's Gen Y Nightmare

#72

Post by yuhong » Sun, Sep 23, 2012, 11:52 PM UTC

DigitalJack wrote: post #21

majormajor wrote: post #15

If these companies learn everything about everyone, what happens if what they discover is that most people have their own little problems and health issues and craziness? The truly awesome people with absolutely nothing wrong with them? Good luck finding them! As far as the migraine bit goes: there are already some sorts of medical discrimination that are illegal to use for hiring in the US, though I don't know exact…

As long as they don't put it in writing, there would be no case. People are not hired or fired for illegal reasons all the time. You just don't state those reasons. If it is due to blatantly obvious handicaps, that's a different story. But good luck proving you we're passed over because the employer figured out you have headaches.

Personally I think these laws are probably fundamentally flawed for a while now.

Re: Facebook's Gen Y Nightmare

#73

Post by lollerpops » Sun, Sep 23, 2012, 11:57 PM UTC

michaelochurch wrote: post #57

m0nastic wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would seem like this doesn't actually buy you very much, because presumably the same places that would exclude your resume because of an ageist bias, would also pass on you after interviewing you (in which case lying about your graduation dates just causes you to have to sit through more interviews with places that won't hire you). I guess the assumption is that you might be able to "win them over" in person, assu…

It would seem like this doesn't actually buy you very much, because presumably the same places that would exclude your resume because of an ageist bias, would also pass on you after interviewing you Disagree. If you transform your career story from VP-at-48 to VP-at-43, your social status changes and the interview is a completely different conversation. Lying about actual skill is unethical, but people who are able t…

Cross your fingers and hope your new employer doesn't do the most basic of basic background checks.

Re: Facebook's Gen Y Nightmare

#74

Post by makomk » Mon, Sep 24, 2012, 12:00 AM UTC

mikeash wrote: post #40

DigitalJack wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As long as they don't put it in writing, there would be no case. People are not hired or fired for illegal reasons all the time. You just don't state those reasons. If it is due to blatantly obvious handicaps, that's a different story. But good luck proving you we're passed over because the employer figured out you have headaches.

Individual instances can be difficult to prove, but a systematic effort to discriminate based on these things should not be hard to detect within a decently sized company.

Unfortunately, the courts in many countries don't accept this as evidence of discrimination.

Re: Facebook's Gen Y Nightmare

#75

Post by michaelochurch » Mon, Sep 24, 2012, 12:01 AM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #71

michaelochurch wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would seem like this doesn't actually buy you very much, because presumably the same places that would exclude your resume because of an ageist bias, would also pass on you after interviewing you Disagree. If you transform your career story from VP-at-48 to VP-at-43, your social status changes and the interview is a completely different conversation. Lying about actual skill is unethical, but people who are able t…

Can you imagine how unbelievably stupid and venal and untrustworthy you look when it's discovered that you deliberately lied about the timeline of your career? It's batshit that anyone would even consider it.

I probably wouldn't consider it. When it comes to how people react to injustice, shallowness, stupidity (such as age discrimination) there are exploders and exploiters. Exploiters figure out how to use peoples' superficiality, stupidity, and moral deficiency to their benefit. Exploders get angry and try to rally the good to the cause-- they're the whistleblowers.

I'm an exploder, not an exploiter. It's my nature. I'm way too honest and blunt to be an exploiter. (Fuck, here I am being honest about the fact that I don't think dishonestly is always bad and that for many minor forms of it, even though I could never pull them off myself, I'm ethically OK with it.)

But ask your local Googler whether I'd recommend whistleblowing as a career move.

In movies, people like exploders and whistleblowers, but in real life, people think of exploders as a pain in the ass (killing the messenger) while exploiters get ahead. I used to think that exploiters were all unethical, but I've come to realize that some people can be exploiters without being harmful or unethical.

Re: Facebook's Gen Y Nightmare

#76

Post by genwin » Mon, Sep 24, 2012, 12:01 AM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #16

michaelochurch wrote: post #14

LinkedIn scares me more, because I think most 22-year-olds don't really foresee that they might have the need to change their career histories. The idea that you might have to bump your college degree by 5 years is unimaginable at age 22. I don't foresee myself ever needing an explicit lie, but it's hard to keep a story consistent over 20 years. The online paper trail is a bit scary. I wouldn't even have a LinkedIn p…

It is a little hard for me to feel sympathetic with the need to conceal dishonesty on resumes. Meanwhile, we talk to lots of great people who don't have LinkedIn profiles; it is by no means a standard requirement. If you can't be honest to LinkedIn, just keep your profile off it. No matter who gets elected in November, by 2015 guaranteed-issue health insurance is going to be the norm, so this health insurance story a…

It's a little hard for me to feel sympathetic with the need to conceal problems with products, trash the environment, lobby the gov't to be allowed to trash the environment or whatever, set up shell companies for nefarious reasons, etc. Yet companies do all that. Lying on a resume is small potatoes in comparison, as horrible as it is.

Re: Facebook's Gen Y Nightmare

#77

Post by ChuckMcM » Mon, Sep 24, 2012, 12:01 AM UTC

wmf wrote: post #39

ChuckMcM wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect you are correct, if you had this data on everyone you would find that everyone had issues. Now some would have more issues than other but it wouldn't be like you had some sparkling clean alternative choice. At the end of the day the costs our blogger is suggesting are influential are, in the large, smoothed over the entire population. Now folks who've done really stupid things? They might have problems. The…

Of course, they won't have data on everyone — just young(ish) people. The result might be reverse age discrimination.

And then that becomes its own problem, "Uh Chuck, we can't find out anything about you (ed: as if :-)) so we're not sure you are who you say you are ..."

Re: Facebook's Gen Y Nightmare

#78

Post by makomk » Mon, Sep 24, 2012, 12:02 AM UTC

guard-of-terra wrote: post #5

So what? Company A does not want you because of some stupid unscientific mumbo-jumbo, you just head to Company B on the other side of the street. This is only a problem if no employer wants you at all - if they have enough safe applicants so they can reject anybody even slightly unsafe. But that, even if it would happen, not a Facebook fault.

Then Company C decides to do business with Company A rather than Company B because Company B isn't following the latest mumbo-jumbo, and ao on...

Re: Facebook's Gen Y Nightmare

#79

Post by michaelochurch » Mon, Sep 24, 2012, 12:27 AM UTC

lollerpops wrote: post #73

michaelochurch wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would seem like this doesn't actually buy you very much, because presumably the same places that would exclude your resume because of an ageist bias, would also pass on you after interviewing you Disagree. If you transform your career story from VP-at-48 to VP-at-43, your social status changes and the interview is a completely different conversation. Lying about actual skill is unethical, but people who are able t…

Cross your fingers and hope your new employer doesn't do the most basic of basic background checks.

I've never lied in a job search, so I don't think I have anything to worry about. First, I've never needed to do so and, second, I wouldn't perform well under that kind of cognitive load. For someone with my makeup, that style of career repair has little upside and adds a lot of risk. So it's extremely unwise.

As I said above, I'm an exploder, not an exploiter. I get angry at a rigged game and prefer to expose the worst players, rather than joining them. Call it pathological honesty. I also know that exploiters tend to do better at the corporate-ladder game than we exploders do, and I don't think all exploiters are unethical or bad people.

On average, exploders are better people than exploiters, but a decent person who's an exploiter has a much better shot at getting ahead.

If someone took credit for my accomplishment and it damaged by career, I'd be angry and want to get him back. I'd be incensed if he lied about something material (such as having a skill he lacked) and I hired him, and I'd probably fire him. If he lied about his age or family connections and got ahead on account of the charlatanry, well... it's not good, but I'd rather that he use victimless deceptions instead of the kind that actually hurt people.

Re: Facebook's Gen Y Nightmare

#80

Post by aswanson » Mon, Sep 24, 2012, 12:32 AM UTC

Bud wrote: post #44

tptacek wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would never want to work with someone who felt like lying about the year they got their college degree was "ethical". In fact, I'd really rather not have to think too much about where the ethical line is on "lying" with anyone. Does that mean I never lie? Of course it doesn't. We've all done unethical things. Ethical people call those "mistakes" and don't paper over them.

Ethical people call those "mistakes" and don't paper over them. Well, sort of. They call them "mistakes" after they get caught, or, rarer, after they have admitted what they did. Before such time, however, said ethical people don't call their unethical foibles anything, because they aren't talking about them. I have to agree with the GP's specific point, here. It is a bit sad that the ability to bump your age a bit a…

Right. So sick of the ethical high-horse most employers/corporations seem to be on re: honesty, etc. when they show no such respect towards employees. They have no problem smiling in your face and calling you family, knowing that they'll downsize/ax your ass in a millisecond, should the numbers dictate. Classic socio/psychopathic Jedi mind tricks...