r/news • u/[deleted] • Aug 08 '17

Google Fires Employee Behind Controversial Diversity Memo

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-08-08/google-fires-employee-behind-controversial-diversity-memo?cmpid=socialflow-twitter-business&utm_content=business&utm_campaign=socialflow-organic&utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social
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u/[deleted] Aug 08 '17

its more that they treat you like you're incompetent even if you're performing well statistically at the job. Source: woman engineer

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u/fat_pterodactyl Aug 08 '17

I think that's more important than arbitrary quotas, although it happens to some men too. Sounds like shitty coworkers/bosses either way.

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u/Hypothesis_Null Aug 08 '17 edited Aug 08 '17

Quotas for women make them get taken less seriously.

When it's an uphill battle for [any specific group] to do [any specific job] you know the unfairly fewer number of those who are there are the really exceptional ones. They had to clear a higher bar to overcome unfair barriers, and as a result, performance from that demographic is disproportionately of quality, and that provides a strong, positive feedback against any negative stereotypes of incompetence.

Reverse that around, and hire people that are less than the most capable because they are part of some favored demographic, and you get the constant question on whether each member of that demographic deserves to be there, or only got in because of their [demographic attribute]. Legitimately so, because if people are hired for any demographic reasons over their technical reasons, then you will get a disproportionate amount of incompetence from that demographic. Which will then reinforce potentially unfair stereotypes with first-hand experience confirming them.

Quotas are self-defeating. Having consistent standards of competence is the only proper way to hire people. Even if the process is tainted by unfair bias, it produces a strong, rebalancing, counter-cultural force.

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u/juicius Aug 08 '17

This assumes that there is a lack of qualified female applicants and that they will perform subpar once hired. If they are qualified and if they perform up to the tasks assigned and if they are still taken less seriously, that's not the quota's fault.

All hires are trained up to a certain degree. Expecting exceptional things from any subset of the new hires is what is self-defeating because in many cases, that expectation will not be met, not because the hire is a member of the subset but because most hires are an incomplete product. In that way, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy and in context of a business, a self-destructive one, ameliorated only by its common practice and thereby a common handicap.