love women. love women in tech. hired and promoted many women at google in technical roles ... years before it became topic of discussion or fashionable groupthink obsession ... before training, c level diversity staff, or self loathing reports about how googlers are not right colors and genders etc. in addition to technical skill sets, I sought diversity (women) for obvious, non abstract benefits -- soft skills to supplement/balance/complement team with respect to critical functions (eg cooperative efforts with other teams / orgs, perf management, internal team building, relationship building, ...). not exhaustive and not universal ... just our reality and experience. it worked well. also sought diversity of education, life experience, technical domain, mindset ... and did not key explicitly on gender etc ... focus was on actual/valuable diversity and 'diversity' just resulted. not for points or external stats or virtue signal. after many years I came to recognize that my work, while lucrative and intellectually stimulating, did not align fully with my value system. in short, I felt there were important real world problems deserving attention beyond ads/search/etc. having such fortunate experience and learning ... I felt the responsibility to use this to contribute something positive to benefit others. this was before ai/military before China v2 before Sundar was ceo. it was a quiet, internal, and incredibly difficult decision (giving up status, safety, and significant (to me) wealth in appreciated/unvested stock/options. I always felt pride and gratitude, overwhelmingly, toward Google. in particular, it was extraordinary and rare privilege to learn from and work with the best. including Eric, founders, and countless other women and men at top of their game. it was and has been the most amazing gift. many (most) were difficult to work with in certain respects and situations. not just men (eg Shona, Marissa, Joan, countless others had clout and could pack a whollop). I am stunned, saddened, and disgusted by the current state of things at company and sv more broadly. I do not mind difficult people or opposing views, but the intellectual fraud and naked aggression couched as 'progressive' 'activism is bullshit, totally unacceptable, and embarrassing for everyone involved. the Damore memo/episode, from the outside, was an alarming and very dark moment. though it will never happen, I think the company ought to recognize that was a mistake and invite him back, etc. for its own benefit and sake of every person working there. one of the best aspects of Google was meritocracy of ideas -- critical value -- best idea won no matter who/how/where. if an idea sucked (or was great) it was everyone's responsibility to recognize and argue with support of logic and data. whether you agree or not with memo, it played it straight and followed this code (value system). then got shit on by people threatened by (potential) inferiority of their own ideas. that is bad enough, but Sundar/company trying to compensate for the deficit by taking away job and forcing man out of company was huge fuck up. lost much respect in my view and ultimately no way to appease the self loathing insecurity of people raising hell. it is clear most critics lack conviction in their own anti memo views based on ubiquitous need to misrepresent its content. ie claiming that argument posed is that women are inferior re eng abilities. the 'media' reporting has been complicit but this is no surprise as one should consider where the 'progressive' agenda/narrative is sourced. it is sad and pathetic to fundamentally misrepresent a person's view (and truth) in effort to 'win' counter 'argument.' in case of media, early publication of memo even stripped out references to 'level' out unsupported counter 'arguments.' most of all, though, the man was trying to have a discussion, not prove/project his identity and certainly not attack any other person. the insecurity and self loathing was overpowering, though, and provoked response that was malicious, aggressive, and completely unacceptable. the goal was to eliminate his (apparently powerful) ideas by destroying his professional life and silencing him. that goes against letting the best idea win. shame on those involved and hope some will take responsibility at some point. now these same aggressors are making noise and threats about the rubin issue with more fraudulent "reasoning' and more demands to interfere with lives and professions of others without justification. .. while Sundar/team fall over each other to see who can apologize / appease the most. shitty, fraudulent journalism again center stage. let me explain it clearly: dude was paid for inventing and contributing android, a major pillar of the success you all bask in yet complain is insufficient and take for granted. keep the hundreds of thousands in comp coming but organize people to leave work and maybe not go back for day just to prove how fucking rough you got it (so so tough to read nyt on bus from luxury flat to gourmet breakfast) or to paraphrase 'not even basic dignity and respect' is provided for individual at Google. . just top of market comp, buses, gourmet food, every benefit under sun, learning opportunity, stimulating work, state of art tech, and limitless stream of apologetic coddling from ceo when nyt prints frowny article that triggers self loathing reflex. try being poor, try being fucked by justice system, try going without status, without health care, try having your kid taken or harmed while helpless to respond. stfu about how everyone ows you a little more ... say an unscheduled afternoon off with side of attention/validation. .. because it boosts (fleetingly) your self image and sense of worth. why go to work? solving critical YouTube marketing problems to make world better place? that would seem urgent and bound to responsibility to the work and to the team? but let's get real, it's all about 'doing you.' or if the values at Google are out of whack, how about showing respect to your colleagues, stfu and take massive talents elsewhere? no, everyone else should change instead. you want the respect, the comp, the perks, the status, the comfort, the afternoon off, the ceo apologies, with a bit of grandstanding on top with afternoon off. that will make real impact like trying to market YouTube a little more. here is the thing that is missing: someone needs to contribute YouTube in the first place. or android or search or ads etc. Rubin created a lot of opportunities for a lot of people. that, unlike bs walkout etc, is not trivial. all the comp (but still want more plus faster promo for the glorious chosen people more equal than all the rest yet perpetually victims), perks, etc ... that comes from contributions like android not protests about bullshit and poorly reasoned attention seeking. .. the nerve to talk about Sergey, Drummond, Rubin, et al in positions of power after 'sexual' (what is the word, 'stuff' .. concensual-but-still-evil-somehow). as if the gravy train will just keep on coming from heaven once all the bad men who built company are put away. you don't want these guys to fuck and don't want them to get paid ... jealous ass player hating. .. embarrassing and juvenile not virtuous or important in the least. you want the glory of Google yet begrudge the men that provide it to you. a bit of gratitude and recognition is in order, you are lucky to be in the company of these men (and others inc women). that does not mean not to speak mind, the opposite as discussed already. focus on what you contribute vs demand and recognize + respect your colleagues vs walk out on them ... or go do something else but just quietly vs impose more aggression in form of attention seeking. save the hysteria and kick the facts. dude was paid not for exit but in spite of it. he was paid for contributions, arguably underpaid. he was difficult to work with, so what. he had porn that people oddly know about, so what. he had concensual affair, so what. he asked gf to blow him when she came to hotel on night they broke up, so what. oh now that is harassment because she ended relationship afterward? she was expecting something non sexual from hotel visit with man she was in dom/sub relationship? so a year later she puts together narrative for hr to paint bad light, they investigate and find 'credible' bc it is bc it is as simple as just laid out. so he leaves company with -60m vs board grant. seems raw enough to me. oh and no one trumpets the now year old non story involving personal, consensual sex life of two adults. .. then three years later nyt runs garbage par-for-course 'piece' with all the buzzwords, trendy virtues, and outrage prepackaged for mass consumption/reaction. it's a shame to see this happening. the aggression needs to stop. and for fucks sake stop lying and just stand behind your argument. in this case, you demand attention, excessive control over others, and more favorable treatment/advantage. .. because two adults had concensual, non traditional sexual relationship that ended causing man to leave company but still take subset of comp rightfully owed him for massive contributions that you personally benefit from while elsewhere in the world actual suffering and hardship exist. raw raw, time is up (for this fraudulent, aggressive, antisocial behavior, god willing).
I too like âa few good manâ.
TLDR?
TLDR; White males should just kill them selves and get it over with
This post crashed my phone.
You started with an explanation of why you historical hired women (âsoft skillsâ i.e. ârelationship buildingâ) and thatâs where I stopped reading. There wouldnât be a push for women in tech if that mindset didnât still exist
in future, perhaps consider the idea(s) that are offered, in full (vs look for first opportunity for confirmation bias override) ... assuming you care to explore merits of competing ideas in first place. in your haste, you missed the preface (technical skills) and substance of point -- gender not explicit consideration, I hired people with different personalities and skills vs self (eg better ability to manage and collaborate with others). sometimes men but quite often women. so diversity not 'diversity' ... from simple rationality. further, I comment only on own experience. do you doubt I hired better collaborators vs self and better managers vs self? do you doubt that in many cases these hires were women? so limited data/experience but I do not see how my mindset and actions -- hiring and promoting women -- is an obstacle to 'women in tech' that needs to be pushed somehow. is your point that we should only hire people exactly like ourselves to achieve diversity and inclusion? or that soft skills are derogatory or unimportant (at senior level they are certainly critical). I hired and promoted women and men that surpassed me (my goal as manager). you seem to blame me for some problem(s) -- what problem
This is a great read. Everything is spot on and is very well written. The only part I disagree with is that you fail to realise we don't live in a world where objective truth matters. We live in a world where public relations is very important to a companies success because people are very irrational. Senior leadership have to pretend and come up with narratives for public opinion, shareholders etc. The minute your thought merit and objective truth mattered is where you failed, and realising that all we should ever focus on is manipulation of people. Managers, colleagues, customers, governments, it's all about psychology and perception, not technology.
true indeed. hopefully there can be some balance / room for objective truth. I am guilty of wishful thinking far too often though.
I think most people would agree that James damore made a great memo with some productive conversation, but because there is too many stupid people in the world, you have to shut it down and get rid of the problem.
We are at a true breaking point in society. Case in point is the lawsuit against Harvard by Asian American students. No longer is it minority vs White, but it is victim vs more of a victim. At Google they claim that we need more âdiversityâ and pull up charts showing distribution by race. These distributions clearly show they we are over represented by Asians, under represented by Whites by population. They should be more transparent and just say we have too many Asians and not enough blacks. In their eyes there will never be true diversity until the white number is ZERO.
How did you pas the google hiring bar
Wondering the same thing salesforce...
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I was with you basically until you claimed the people angry were just jealous
fair criticism. I went too far to make the point. it was intended tongue-in-cheek vs matter-of-fact. the underlying motivations, emotions, etc are varied and complex. jealous does not really capture/explain dynamics here, I agree.
Damore seemed to actually care about the company, itâs a shame they had to fire him, this would not have happened 2013 or priorâjust my opinion but I believe gamergate pretty much ruined the perception the public had of women in tech and their treatment. My manager in 2013 was a women, a minority women at that. We never gave it a second thoughtâshe led a 10 man team at a fintech and was respected. People will see what they want to see, and in the valley theyâll Lynch you for it if you donât agreeâby lynching I meant what they did to damore*
r u upset
lol yeah a bit but think I got it all out now. rant over. funny too though, no? the absurdity of this all?
(hint: "Bonds" did not read your post.)