The one person that I would have never suspected is Dave McClure. Here's a guy who didn't fit the investment world and he was smart and hustled his way in.
He started 500 startups with a female co-founder and said he chose her because she was smarter. He saw an opening for himself and talked about playing Moneyball for venture capital. He spoke often in interviews about chasing investments among founders who didn't fit the profile but were eminently backable and that included women. He blogged publicly about his insecurities and campaigned for diversity.
Guess it proves you can't really know a person through their writings and interviews. He was someone that I admired and I'm more than a little disappointed.
Did he come up with "paid, laid, or made"? I've heard it from sales people and thought it predated McClure.
The kitten and "money shot" is absolutely unnecessary, but I get the coarse language for "paid, made, laid"- the idea is that compelling products and services target base desires.
I think the most compelling products deliver utility. Even if targeting base desires is your product design strategy doesn't mean it needs to be in a template for future founders to follow.
Your argument is similar to the argument for having swimsuit models in tabloid newspapers. NYT is a better product.
> I think the most compelling products deliver utility.
> Your argument is similar to the argument for having swimsuit models in tabloid newspapers. NYT is a better product.
The argument is right, because better (as in NYT vs. tabloids, or as in better in worse-is-better) products don't win on market. If you can target base desires, you'll beat products delivering utility.
Let's say we're talking about Chris Rock. There's a difference between him cracking jokes on a public stage and him directing these same sorts of jokes to a potential hire in a private conversation.
I haven't looked into McClure's offenses beyond what the article talks about, but those slides seem totally innocent to me (it's a joke targeted at VCs more than anything else), which just makes him seem less guilty in this context ('cause why not just use real evidence then?). No comment on his actual guilt.
This quote from the linked article (from Chris Sacca) seems apt:
Over the last week, I have spoken with friends, friends of friends, heard from people from my past including stories of how I’d behaved, and read incredibly thoughtful and courageous essays. I’ve learned that it’s often the less obvious, yet pervasive and questionable, everyday behaviors of men in our industry that collectively make it inhospitable for women.
There is definitely a pervasive issue here in software culture as it relates to women, and maybe singling out and punishing individuals is the only way to combat it—but my first inclination when making moral judgements is to consider intent. When I see those slides above, I see the work of someone whose 'filter' and sensitivity to not offending people is lower than average. I do not see immoral activity, however.
I will gladly look at more info. on McClure's offenses if anyone wants to share—and I'm perfectly aware he may not be an instance of what I'm about to mention here—but, we recognize there is a systemic issue with gender equality in software which needs to be fixed, but is there maybe a better strategy than punishing individuals who get caught displaying symptoms of the admitted, systemic issue? (or do we retract the claim that there's a systemic issue? —cause those things are at odds: is it the fault of the culture these people are a part of, or have they personally done something egregious? We could mistakenly go too far in either direction, but maybe our aim will be better if that part of the issue is at least considered...)
Obviously that slide deck was not the offense in question for Mr McClure. However, I'm surprised you think the slide deck is appropriate. Here's a good tip: sexual jokes and references are just not appropriate for a business context. And they become even more inappropriate the greater the gender imbalance is. When there's one or two women in a room of fifty men, and you give a presentation mentioning the supposed universal desire of getting laid, money shots, and showing a guy cuddling up with two adoring women, all of whom are partially undressed, that is creating an extraordinarily uncomfortable environment for those women. Combine that with near-constant "flirting" and come-ons those women experience from the men with more money and more power who surround them and can control their future in the industry and who often react very badly to any suggestion that they are being too aggressive or misinterpreting the women's behavior, and it feels like real menace, not harmless jokes.
That's a good point, and I agree that depending on the gender ratios present, it could be a very uncomfortable situation for minority female attendees. Also, the money shot and guy cuddling with two girls are pretty iffy.
At the same time, however, you are only addressing my first sentence, and my question remains about how to best deal with this: even granting the above, I'm still left with the impression that this guy is largely socially tone deaf and non-malicious, and a product of his culture: so is it possible to make corrections without 'treating the symptom' (i.e. punishing individuals who happen to display symptoms of a systemic issue)—or maybe that's the only way we can get at it?
I'll comment more on racism in the south, but in my opinion the best formulation of the problem is: "there are systemic, bad cultural norms".
If you look at it this way, then punishing every incidence is critical if you want to change attitude towards them (albeit in a contextually-adjusted severe manner, of course).
But for people just "following how things are done", the disincentive is chance_of_being_caught * punishment_for_being_caught.
If only the second term in that equation changes as a result of the current push, then I feel like it just creates more inequality and doesn't change the underlying problem as much.
So yes, punishment for all to some degree that's more than a wrist slap.
>I haven't looked into McClure's offenses beyond what the article talks about, but those slides seem totally innocent to me
Not in a puritan country. People have lost their jobs for making a "dongle -> dick" joke speaking to their friend at a conference because someone overheard...
Conflating two things here. Saying something exaggerated and offensive, specifically for effect and attention, is not the same thing as a power play for sex.
I think there are both 1) sleezeballs who intentionally take advantage of their position and 2) men who don't realized what they're doing and need to use better judgement.
Without knowing details, there are at least indications in both McClure's and Sacca's pasts that they may (hopefully) be in the latter group.
And hopefully this will help both groups get smaller.
"In 2014, Sarah Kunst, 31, an entrepreneur, said she discussed a potential job at 500 Startups, a start-up incubator in San Francisco. During the recruiting process, Mr. McClure, a founder of 500 Startups and an investor, sent her a Facebook message that read in part, “I was getting confused figuring out whether to hire you or hit on you.”"
That message was absolutely inappropriate. Women should be able to raise money without being hit on by investors.
My comment was in response to the idea that Dave was secretly different than his outward appearance. I don't know him, I don't know the situation. But I think otherwise good people can do things they should apologize for and stop.
A person who does this being "otherwise good" doesn't lessen the harm to women looking for jobs or investment. But it does go to the person's intent and overall desert of punishment.
Interesting point. However, perhaps the reason why you would just take it as a compliment, is because as a man, you haven't been in the position of being taken advantage of, or desired for purely sexual purposes by women in positions of power. I am making huge assumptions and generalizations of course, but as I understand, it is much more common for older men with power to "take advantage of" more vulnerable women, so women are instinctively taught (or learn) to be wary and incredibly careful in these situations to not give the wrong "signals". Whereas men, generally having no experiences with this dynamic, are more carefree.
Yes, they met as two professionals in the context of an open job position. Inappropriate move #1 was contacting the job applicant over FB, #2 was making a comment about whether or not to "hire" or "hit on" her. The fact that he places the chances of hiring her in relation to "hitting" on her is wildly inappropriate.
If he wanted a relationship, there are infinitely better and more appropriate ways to go about it, especially if he thought she might actually be interested.
Going via FB in the manner that he did is pure 100% creepy behavior.
Someone else here mentioned that Bill Gates met Melinda (his wife) while she was working at Microsoft. Wouldn't this mean their relationship shouldn't have happened/is wrong?
There are many public figures who have met, dated, and married their colleagues. One that comes to mind is Jimmy Kimmel and his wife (head writer for his show). I think as long as it doesn't affect hiring/promoting/professional decisions it's a different situation. This is also assuming, of course, that there is no form of harassment going on.
Well it definitely has an affect, the only difference is everybody is either ok with it or indifferent to it. If all of a sudden Jimmy's wife starts being an asshole and gets fired then what? You don't think it would be handled differently if the head writer wasn't his wife? Just like this Facebook message thing. If she had been receptive to it, everybody is cool. But since she wasn't all of a sudden we've got the pitchforks out. I'm not saying it isn't wrong per se, but it's a far cry from some sort of clear-cut breech of ethics when whether it's ok or not depends on somebody's reception to it, and we sit here and happily condone marriages in the workplace and pretend they don't have an effect.
I mean there's also a couple other things that differentiates McClure's situation. He's also married. He seems to have accelerated the harassment immediately. Obviously I don't know the details, but it doesn't seem like he was just asking her out on a date. And if he did then clearly she wasn't receptive and he should have stopped. I think it's pretty easy to see that there's a clear violation on McClure's side.
Sure I don't disagree. At the same time, I can see (and I'm sure it's happened) that if he had sent just one message, and had not been married, we may see a similar reaction. My larger point isn't that he didn't do anything wrong, but that these situations are common, we usually only hear about it when something bad happens, and the line between what is acceptable or not is highly variable.
Its not very hard to make your intentions clear outright. Like other siblings have pointed out, it was the way that he propositioned her that was creepy and unprofessional. He appears to be leveraging the financial power he has to get the lady to go out with him, whether he realized that or not. (Strictly personally, my opinion is that he was fully aware of what he did. He seems like a very smart and determined person and its hard to see him not realizing this).
A better way would have been to make it explicit. i.e. "Hey X, now that we are done with business, I was wondering if you would like to meet over coffee sometime later. This will certainly not affect our professional relationship either way, but I think you're an interesting person and would like to know you better."
Some relationships though are just really dicey, like the one above. Its like having a relationship with your direct manager, since the manager is evaluating you professionally, and that's why its generally considered a bad idea.
As the OP pointed out, one of the big differences is that Bill Gates never said "go out with me or I'll fire you", whereas McClure clearly indicated he was choosing between hiring and hitting on.
Who knows exactly what it was like for Bill ans Melinda. It isn't difficult to pick up on social cues of someone illustrating a mutual interest in you before you outwardly hit on them. It's also not difficult to respectfully ask them if they would like to get a drink, in a personal context. There's no evidence McClure did either.
I meant it in a different way (and was being somewhat sarcastic): that in a lot of cases, office flirting (even among equal peers) can seem OK if the woman likes the guy, and creepy if they don't (e.g. he is awkward, nerdy, out of shape, etc). In essence, a comment on how "jocks" get away with more of that kind of stuff.
> If he wanted a relationship, there are infinitely better and more appropriate ways to go about it, especially if he thought she might actually be interested.
McClure aside, in general situation when during recruitment precess you meet someone you would like to date is there really a way to go about it that doesn't end badly? Message during recruitment is plain creepy. Asking them out after they are hired is bad for obvious reasons like you being the superior and him/her having the impression that this is the real reason they've been hired. There was at least one story on HN that I remember when someone wasn't hired and soon after was asked for a date and it also ended badly, even if that person waited some time to be "safe" that still could be counted as stalking and using information summited during the interview for personal reasons is bad.
But you can't even ask about their phone number anyway! It doesn't matter if your intentions are honest and you two could be a good couple if you met at different occasion. Once the recruitment process starts he/she is pretty much removed form your dating pool. Even if you ask nicely without any inappropriate signals - any move you make can be seen by him/her as you taking advantage of the situation. Even innocent question about phone number can have really scary implications from his/her point of view.
Sure it can end in nice date or maybe an awkward silence and you explaining yourself and apologizing or it can give them a true nightmare... Are you going to risk it?
> in general situation when during recruitment precess you meet someone you would like to date is there really a way to go about it that doesn't end badly?
(a) No, not one where you have any control whether it goes bad or not
(b) Your day job is not a dating service
(c) If you can't figure out a and b on your own, you're not mature enough for a position of power
This isn't actually that complicated. There are seven billion people in the world, you choose one of the ones that you aren't professionally compromised with to date. Period.
Life is full of situations where you have to choose between two competing positive values. It's part of being an adult.
Yes, you are right about there being a choice. This is the core of the problem here. Many I feel look at it and wonder why pass a good opportunity to meet someone, we could both have a chance at something great (unending source of unwanted advances)... The advice about not trying it in professional settings is seen as taking away their freedom to date people, as being rejected without even ability to ask and by it being fundamentally unjust. What they fail to consider is how it look from the other side and how the very same innocent question from their point of view can be seen as some sort of "deal" and part of nightmarish recruitment process.
If you steal bread, get caught, and are shown mercy by the baker, did you still not commit a crime? Just because you aren't punished doesn't mean you didn't do something wrong.
And before you say "there's no victim if she was okay with it", there was a victim: the company and investors he represented. His actions show that he was not acting with proper ethics, putting them all at risk of lawsuits, criminal action, etc.
The fact of the matter is, when you are a hiring manager, you are in a position of power and that power comes with certain ethical obligations and responsibilities. Not just to those applying for a job or funding, but to your company and it's shareholders.
And the argument about whether she might like it or not doesn't change the fact that it's inappropriate and creepy.
It's sexual harassment. As a male, I would be incredibly uncomfortable if I were in this situation with the genders reversed. Picture: you're interviewing for a job you're wildly enthusiastic about. The hiring decision lies with an older woman who you are not at all attracted to, and she fires off that line at you. Who would feel comfortable in that situation?
It happened to me multiple times, because I am an attractive male. Having conversations with a female boss like "oh, my shoe is too tight, let's go to my hotel room together to change it" etc. Sometimes I think medieval-style gender separation is the best thing for business...
I wouldnt have any issues with that honestly. We are humans not machines. We say things sometimes that get interpreted as something its not. The comment Mclure made was stupid. But calling it sexism or herrasment as if its some systemic thing seems a tad extreme too.
it's pretty unambiguous what he said. Unless he pulls a Clinton (be skeptical about the definition of "is") there is no way for this to "get interpreted as something its not".
A professional can keep their personal feelings separate from their professional responsibilities. If you feel that the former is compromising the latter, remove yourself from the situation and defer the hiring responsibilities to a colleague.
You can also ask someone else in a non-creepy way, especially by not relating the prospect of getting hired to their response to your sexual overtones (the "I don't know if I should hire you or hit on you" bit).
This isn't rocket science, its common sense and common decency, not to mention being a "professional". McClure's actions in this particularly instance are shady and creepy to the extreme.
A more apt analogy would be if you were a young hetero male not attracted to older females (cougars, in parlance) and she were a loan officer at the bank you want to procure a loan from and she hit on you like that.
It's something you'd likely report to the bank management but it's not workplace sexual harassment (she's not harassing another lower echelon staffer).
Still uncouth and uncalled for and any respectable organization would take corrective action.
[edit] Seeing that that was during staff recruiting process, I can't even imagine how someone would even entertain such a puerile idea in their heads, no less mention it in communication.
There are some people (maybe many) who when they have some power seemingly lose all sense of decency. It's discouraging and boggling.
I know we are way past civics and other classes in school which tried to steer kids into a more "moral" frame of mind, but I think the advent of fraternity culture permeating into daily life beyond secondary education and educational institutions in the educated indicates that something's amiss in our culture.
Music, movies, games, etc., take a pretty jocular view of appropriate behavior --it's not to say there were not predators or other unsavory behavior by people toward others before mass media, but at least in some classes of people it was at least frowned upon whereas now it's openly celebrated with few exceptions.
I think this is a cop-out excuse. Even the frattiest of frat boys have moms, sisters, and girlfriends/wives.
This isn't that complicated, it's simply "treat others how you wish to be treated."
Before you proposition job applicants over Facebook DM just ask yourself: would I be okay with this if someone treated my mom/sister/girlfriend in this manner?
I'm not sure having sisters/wives/moms/brothers/fathers has much effect on people who are reared and imbued in a culture where entertainment (liberally defined) celebrates fraternity culture.
You just have to examine the "shaving cream on mouth and dicks painted on friends faces" attitude to know people do things to others that they _do not_ particularly want done to themselves.
To use a car analogy these are the kinds of people who would be happy to cut someone off while driving but would get enraged if someone did that to them. Of course, it's simple, drive defensively and don't do stupid things when driving --do people follow?
The comment is like in the dictionary next to "sexual harassment." Hell, you can tell how bad the statement is even without any other context. "I was getting confused figuring out whether to hire you or hit on you." The implication is that this woman might have lost out on a job opportunity because the man interviewing her found her attractive.
I think this is much more serious that you are making it sound if I'm reading your post correctly. As a potential investor you are in a position of power. Depending how things are going it might be a very serious power imbalance. The person seeking funding might feel very compelled to in essence prostitute themselves.
Absolutely. I'm not saying nothing happened. I'm not defending him at all. I'm just saying the word "sexual" is counter productive.
Harassment is harassment. It is not the fact that something is sexual in nature that bothers me. It is the fact that someone abused their position of authority.
I mean if we're going to debate labels: In my opinion it is completely inappropriate when your position of power, in a person setting, while referencing the professional setting, to discuss this. Maybe we could use the labels "abusive" or "predatory" or "toxic" if you'd prefer? Personally, I'm fine with "sexually harassive".
I would much rather that because this had nothing to do with sex and everything to do with ego and power trips.
I don't think it is OK what he did but sexual harassment this is not. It is an advise of power, pure and simple.
We talk about the middle east being sexually repressed but look at ourselves in the us: why is everything a sex crime? Come on folks. We can do better.
Personally, I'd feel better with the sexually part removed. Who cares of the harassment is sexual? Harassment is harassment.
No, this is clear sexual harassment, and would be if the genders were reversed, or the same, or entirely unknown. It's a sexual proposition from someone with power over another person in a professional relationship.
This is the "I can't be racist because my best friend is black" defense.
It's hard for me to see where all the McClure defenders are coming from. Is it that hard to see his actions in this specific instance as being (wildly) inappropriate? This is basically textbook sexual harassment. Just distill it to the basic facts:
1) Job applicants comes to interview for a job
2) After the interview, McClure contacts her over FaceBook and not-so-subtly propositions her in relation to her goal of getting hired
How is this at all defensible? EVEN if the job applicant was overtly flirty, how is messaging a job applicant over FACEBOOK and saying what McClure said at all appropriate?
At the very least, McClure is, as he would say a "fucking" dumbass, at worst, a sexual harasser.
I 100% bet he's done a lot worse and knowing other partners at 500 Startups, it frankly doesn't surprise me at the least.
I interpreted the original comment and direct parent as not defending McClure, but being shocked and surprised that his private behavior was so contrary to his public persona.
Thanks for the link. The way women are portrayed on that page is very objectifying. It seems to be saying, "your sexuality is the most important thing to us"
A lot of that stuff is just virtue signalling. You don't actually have to believe in any of it to become its champion. That's what's wrong with a lot of stuff in the world, there are lots of champions of stuff that don't really practice what they preach, it's an easy way to claim leadership.
I agree, but I think that even the most feminist men are raised and inculcated in a misogynist society. You likely do have a good idea of who McClure is. But it's a numbers game - given a position of power and a systemic gendered inequity, there are a lot more opportunities for a man to fuck up. That's why we, and I speak as a (cisgendered/heterosexual) man myself, have to be constantly vigilant about our actions and introspective about our thoughts and where they come from.
You are making a statement of surprise that someone who "didn't fit the investment world", who was "smart" and a "hustler" would not make such a mistake while navigating the interface between his personal life and his business/career. I say "personal life" given these advances indicate an IMPROPER blurring of personal need, including a physical attraction response, which was then carried over into day-to-day business. It is this response that creates a double bind for the women who are involved in situation. Double binds are bad news, whether they are intentional, such as those used by Trump, or unintentional, such as those created by those who do not manage their personal lives well.
Why is it that we EVER may assume, by someone's external behaviors including their writings, videos and interviews, that we may "know" an individual? Why would we ever assume a level of trust in how they conduct themselves in their personal lives by their outward actions? Why would we assume someone who did "fit" the investment world would be more likely to act in a similar improper manner? How is it that we actually fail to acknowledge that each of us has a line that, when it is crossed, we are capable of making horrible mistakes? Why is it that Western culture has formed a view of mistakes as something to be avoided at all cost, as opposed to an opportunity for great learning?
I came out of my self-imposed exile here to post this because I think it's important to draw a line and indicate a social community such as HN (or Twitter) are woefully inadequate to deal with these types of issues in a meaningful way and to do so without a highly divisive conversation forming. (This is not to say the message should not be delivered strongly to anyone listening, however.) All that comes of these discussions is blame and division. Evidence of that is show here, now, in the polarized comments.
The only people who can judge Dave honestly here now are the victims, his co-workers and himself. I do have empathy for those involved, but my emotional contributions here are pointless, given the scale and reach of this news.
You make an incredibly important point, and the fact that HN is resistant to it shows that most people are lucky enough not to have been betrayed by someone that everyone respects. I've had that experience, and it was shocking to realize that someone could be so different internally vs how everyone perceives them.
It's entirely possible he is being set up. Anyone who doesn't see this angle is foolish, and honestly shouldn't say anything publicly about it due to their naïveté.
What is particularly telling for me that instead of trying to explain himself he just ran away.
Sometimes if you rally around someone reflexively you're empowering a predator. Justin Calbeck got at least two passes we know about previous to his current troubles.
At my alma mater there's a doctor who had people covering for him for fifteen years until a brave woman accused him publicly of sexually assaulting her during an exam. At last count 125 women have come forward with a similar complaint against him.
A few years back my attitude might have been different but you're shaped by your experiences.
That's a general problem with people's tendency to pass judgment on things where they have no first-hand experience. There are lots of people who have been accused of crimes, have later been exonerated, but in the process the court of public opinion has already crucified them. At that point it's too late: the public will never admit it was wrong.
I'm not sure what we do about that. People who actually do bad things should be held accountable for them. Our "innocent until proven guilty" system is nice in theory, but the end result in the eyes of the public usually ends up being "guilty until proven innocent, but still guilty".
I agree with your sentiment (could've been worded better). Without clarification it seems like people are assuming the worst. Given Dave's reputation that doesn't seem fair. Hopefully the community will get some clarification so that those who work(ed) with Dave can make an informed judgement call for themselves about how to proceed with their relationship.
Women reported it, right? The Times article describes it. Women seeking jobs were propositioned and then denied jobs after rebuffing, sexist comments were made while they were fund raising and suggestive texts were sent. It doesn't seem like rape level stuff but it's still bad and unacceptable.
It's never a good idea to approach someone romantically if there is some kind of superior/subordinate relationship. it just seems really messy with some sort of VC type relationship too, maybe almost a worst case scenarios.
Just to be real clear, I don't think that's the bar. I think it's sick what happened. One of the parents was asking about the details and asked if it was rape or whatever and I tried to answer.
I'm not in any way, shape, or form condoning or down playing what has happened here
I'm not sure what McClure actually did, but in the current hypersensitive, politically correct environment, simply asking a woman out that you happen to meet while both of you are involved with a startup seems to be considered "harassment" worthy of destroying careers and businesses. Some of the stories that have surfaced recently clearly step over the line, but many others are vague and lack any clear intent on the part of the accused to make the woman uncomfortable, let alone harass or assault them.
Intent matters. Men who use positions of power to intimidate women into doing things they don't want to do should absolutely be punished. Men who happen to be attracted to women that they work with/around who decide to politely ask them out shouldn't be.
The problem is that men who happen to be attracted to women that they work with/around sometimes end up using positions of power to intimidate women into doing things they don't want to do, simply by deciding to politely ask them out.
Yes, intent matters, and we should take it into account when morally judging someone; but if you are in the position to severely damage someone's career, you have to realize that any simple request can put them under a lot of pressure. Even if they don't want to comply, they might feel obligated to do so, unless you somehow manage to make very clear that there won't be any repercussions whichever way they decide.
If you are in a position of power and start feeling attracted to a report, you should keep it to yourself. If you really can't bear to stay silent, you should quit your job, or at least move to a different department. When they can no longer feel threatened by you, then you can try to make your advance. Everything else might devolve into harassment without any intent to do so.
> Even if they don't want to comply, they might feel obligated to do so, unless you somehow manage to make very clear that there won't be any repercussions whichever way they decide.
Even if you "make very clear there won't be any repercussions" it's wrong. Why the hell should the other person trust that you'll be able to keep your feelings separate from your professional judgment when you've had the bad sense to make things awkward in the first place? It's pissing in the pool. It's antisocial and unnecessary.
Yes, you can never be sure that you have successfully made yourself clear unless the other person explicitly acknowledges it. (E.g. by saying "I feel like you are trying to tell me something, but don't think it's quite appropriate. Go right ahead, I think I can handle whatever it is.")
Needless to say, getting to that point would be very difficult without accidentally putting them under pressure, which is what you should avoid in the first place. Better to not even try.
Good points. While less common, it's probably important to highlight that this applies to all gender combinations and orientations. If you're in a position of power over someone, it's not ok to express or act on interest.
I was careful not to use any gendered expressions after the first paragraph, which I collaged from downandout's comment. It was probably too subtle, so thank you for making it explicit.
Melinda Gates worked at Microsoft when she met Bill. Should he be publicly tarred and feathered like this? By your logic, he abused his authority and he should not have dated or married his wife because he held power over her -
he could have immediately fired her if she had rejected his advances.
So where do we draw the line, and why isn't Bill on the firing line in the same way these others are?
That was still a risky move. The key (literally, one of the elements of sexual harassment) is whether the advance is welcome. I'm guessing that Bill used a lower-risk way of finding that out than sending a text message after a job interview.
You are right, the line is whether the other party welcomed the advance. A lot of very smart people are not socially mature enough to even guess what will happen. Something worked once so they repeat it, over and over again.
Companies should prohibit all internal fraternizing and fire anyone who is caught breaking the rules.
VCs and anyone involved in hiring should have even stricter guidelines. If you are an investor, relationships with anyone who owns another company should be off limits. If you are involved in the hiring process in any way, once the company you work for is disclosed, any potential relationships with that party should be off limits.
Tech has been singled out due to the current news cycle narrative. Many other industries are extremely hostile; expect to see plenty more stories in the future. The biases may not all be gender, but could be things such as seniority, ethnicity. Nepotism and general corruption is rampant in other areas. This is not a US problem, this is a global.
>Companies should prohibit all internal fraternizing and fire anyone who is caught breaking the rules.
If you did that, you would have a difficult time hiring people. There are reasons that most large tech companies don't place an outright ban on it. People don't like being told what to do, and people that spend lots of time working with one another sometimes fall for each other. Tech employees aren't (yet) robots.
I for one don't know any details about what happened between Bill and Melinda. Do you? Maybe they slowly became friends over time and just got closer and closer after they adjust had developed a trusting, non-sexual relationship. If we however would learn that Bill made some remark about feeling sexualy attracted to her the first day they meet then that's a different story and we should be appalled. But we don't know. It certainly is a delicate problem.
There is a reason Captain Picard never plays poker with the rest of the crew.
> There is a reason Captain Picard never plays poker with the rest of the crew.
That's more likely because Captain Picard shares a romantic relationship with Dr. Crusher [1] -- despite him being Dr. Crusher's boss, and Picard's involvement on the death of her husband.
Life is complicated.
ps: to their defense, this happened over many years, so very different than Dave McClure's situation.
That's still a questionable situation. If a subordinate asks out a superior, how does the superior know if they're actually interested, or are just hoping for preferential treatment? And even beyond that, peers of the subordinate, once they find out about the relationship (and of course, they will find out), may be uncomfortable with a peer of theirs having the ability -- whether real or perceived -- to bend the boss' ear to that degree.
> Intent matters. Men who use positions of power to intimidate women into doing things they don't want to do should absolutely be punished. Men who happen to be attracted to women that they work with/around who decide to politely ask them out shouldn't be.
I agree with your statement that intent matters. But also what matters is your sensibility in propositioning others for more personal purposes. Any person in a position of power has to realize this and learn how to communicate more clearly. So its both intent and appropriate action. Men/Women attracted to people they work with should realize that propositioning women at work is NOT the same as doing the same in a bar, and MUST tailor their approaches accordingly.
I think there was some research that said that 30% of people meet their spouses/ better half at the workplace. So lots of people do ask out coworkers, but most seem to know how to do it better.
"both involved in a startup" ... nope. she was applying for a job.
If you read only what he said and nothing else, that would still be obvious. ("i don't know whether to hire you or hit on you"). So perhaps you didn't read even that much of the topic we are discussing?
Without defending anyone, My honest takeout by the whole sexual harassment threshold in the bay area or the US in general is that you could never end up together or even married with a colleague in that paranoid atmosphere.
Which is exactly what I did where I live in Italy. Happily married and yes, after saying things to a colleague of mine that would have made me accused in the bay area.
There's a difference between being involved with a peer or with someone outside your reporting structure on the org chart, and being involved with someone who is inside your reporting structure. It's the differential in power when combined with sexual advances that creates problems, not the sexual advances alone.
Of course, unwanted sexual advances are a problem regardless of the relationship of the two parties, but unwanted or wanted advances between two people with a superior/subordinate relationship is where we get into trouble.
At all companies I've worked for in the US, there's never been a ban or stigma against colleagues dating, as long as there's no power differential between the two people. We still of course always expect people to behave professionally within a professional setting, but after-hours is your business.
If relationships between people with a power differential are commonplace in Italy, that's... unfortunate.
Men are more likely to create more barriers to protect themselves and prevent bad optics rather than walk on egg shells around women. This in turn limits opportunities for women (aka glass ceiling).
If men feel the need to "walk on eggshells" to avoid offending women, then they're already in a bad place. Most men don't actually feel this way. If your first instinct in dealing with a woman at work is to make a sexual joke, or comment on your colleague's attractiveness, or to scheme about how you could convince her to date you, then _you_ are the problem, and you have problems, and you should do something about it. That is not normal or excusable behavior.
As for "women generally date up", that is a near tautology given the imbalance in power generally between men and women. By the mere fact that men overwhelmingly hold positions of power, women will typically "date up". There is no way around that. So it's not a useful statistic and certainly isn't evidence of anything.
It's not a paranoid atmosphere. This harrassment is real. If the comments are come-ons are among peers and welcome, then that's one thing. If the come-ons are coming from someone you are asking for investment from, that's inappropriate. If the person is rebuffed but continues making comments or propositions, that's harassment. I'm hoping you didn't browbeat your spouse into an abusive relationship. Presumably your come-ons were welcome. The problem happens when they aren't, and when a rejection results in continued repetition of the behavior or worse, retaliation.
I saw him speak at a fireside chat here in Berlin, and was struck by his overall juvenile attitude and idiocy. Given that that was his "shtick" I guess he was just hiding in plain sight. But I'm surprised that his poor judgement is such a shock to people when it's evident from his performances in public.
Yeah, that's the thing I don't get. I'm certainly no stranger to foul language (2 minutes with me in a social setting and that's obvious), but his shtick always seemed to me to be about shock value and getting a reaction, and a certain amount of braggadocio around being an "outsider", which has always turned me off.
Not gonna defend any harassment but this one's just nitpicking. He made a joke. I see him as the real life version of Erlich Bachman or Russ Hanneman from Silicon Valley. He is inappropriate, which is what makes him more likable (to some people).
You could argue that its unprofessional, but then so is wearing t-shirt and shorts to work. Tech culture quite proudly does not care much about appearances.
Slightly OT: Everyone wants to become a CEO or VC. But the truth is you don't want to. You'll miss the times when you were a naive intern who could mess around with just everyone you met both on a private and professional level. Once you juggle millions it's over. The slightest advance is treated--with good reason--as sexual harassment.
That's only true strictly in the context of dating within the professional pool. I would argue that having more money and power is good in general, but NOT for dating subordinates and coworkers.
Yes, you are right, but it's not that easy. Also the private environment has its pitfalls.
Without noticing you become quickly a public face the more powerful you get. Then, even in a private context you have to be careful who you approach, how you approach and how many. Often private and professional environments are not clearly separated as well.
Let's take again the intern example: There's nothing wrong with a cocky intern approaching and kiss-closing dozens of women on a night out. There's nothing wrong doing this every Friday and Saturday. But some CEOs or VCs would face immediate trouble if such behaviour even in a private context would become public.
The only way the CEOs or VCs would get in professional trouble for that behavior is if the women who they were slobbering on were women who they have power over in their business relationships. Rich men can (and do) slobber on as many women they want to who they have no professional relationship with, and nobody has a problem with that. It's fine, as long as you don't bring that behavior into the workplace.
It's not rocket science. You can fool around with as many women as you want, as long as those women aren't subordinate to you in their professional roles. It's when you insist on mixing your business with your pleasure that you get yourself into trouble.
I legitimately cannot understand why so many men have so much trouble understanding this.
Very disappointing. As a 500 alum I would never have expected this, as the environment was very professional and there were a lot of powerful women in leadership positions. In fact if memory serves, at least at mountain view, the women were more numerous than the men.
Kudos to Christine for being transparent, as expected.
Proactively: Be overt about your policies and values. Even though everyone will shift uncomfortably and roll their eyes, have occasional training sessions. Make a discussion of "what is not ok to say" part of your onboarding process. Have 1 on 1s. Collect anonymized feedback.
Reactively: When offensive behavior occurs, it has to be nipped in the bud ASAP. A quick chat with a junior employee (and maybe perhaps handing over a pamphlet on sexual harassment) may be all it takes. Egregious and/or repeat offenders should be fired.
It's very easy. Be polite and considerate. To be considerate: to consider the feelings of another person. Have empathy.
Be always ready to call out bad behavior, even if it hurts. It is so much easier to start when problems are small.
Even when I've worked in teams of all guys, I've called out the sort of "locker room" talk that would be an HR nightmare of women were around. For two reasons: practice makes perfect, and it's still sexual harassment if those sorts of comments are making one of the other men uncomfortable. You don't know their intimate lives. They could be gay. They could be devoutly religious. Jerk, they could just be not a fratboy pig that needs to make comments during lunch about every woman that passes by.
This is a good question, and perhaps the best thing to do is to have a clear policy in place on whats OK and whats not. Beyond that, of course its completely upto the person. You can never know how someone will behave in every circumstance, so you can only do so much.
> "The change I want to see is a startup environment where everyone, regardless of gender and background feels welcome and safe."
So basically her message is "it's ok to be inappropriate and stay as partner in our firm. Our investors' money is more important than sexual misbehaving".
Sounds like she doesn't really deliver on her change.
something I've never understood. These guys (Kalanick, McClure) are multi millionaires, and could probably get any number of women to take interest in them on that basis alone. Why risk career suicide?
Why would they need to hit on women at their workplaces? Why isn't the normal dating game (where they have a massive edge via being loaded) sufficient? I don't get it (at all).
What am I missing? These guys seem to be (borderline) insane and incapable of rational thought.
At the workplace do the work! Leave the political/religious/mating etc games outside.
I don't think that's fair to lump Travis Kalanick into the same boat as Dave McClure. Kalanick didn't sexually harass anyone personally, his subordinates did. There isn't really any evidence that Travis Kalanick tried to cover anything up either. If you read that Susan Fowler blog post regarding sexual harassment at Uber, it sounds like she was sexually harassed by one person, and the HR department wouldn't do anything about it. To me that sounds like the harasser and the HR department are the guilty parties, not Travis Kalanick.
I concede the point (and it is a good one, Thank You).
I don't follow this stuff in any great detail and those are just the first names I thought of. Erroneously, as it turned out, and as you correctly point out.
Fwiw, I am not really interested in "social justice" issues and I use this forum mainly to get insight into purely technical issues, and I really should keep out of such politically/ideologically charged threads. Note to self.
You could flip it around and ask why people have this career at all. Maybe they like to have this kind of power over people. Everyone has a mix of motivations, some of which are not particularly becoming. Managers have to be aware of that and work around their more instinctive feelings.
Its called abusing power. And a lot of people who find a lot of overnight success unfortunately don't realize the responsibilities that come with having more money and power.
Are you implying that tremendously rich men (barring mental illnesses / crippling social anxiety) are disadvantaged with respect to dating? Or even that being tremendously rich is not a factor at all? If so, I'll have some of what you are smoking.
The people under discussion are men(if you are objecting to the use of 'men' vs 'people'. I specifically used Kalanick and McClure as examples).
This also applies to rich vs poor women. It also applies irrespective of whether you are hetero, homo, bi, or * sexual.
Being tremendously rich makes success in all kinds of apparently unrelated fields easier. Yes, you'll probably attract a good number of gold diggers, but excluding those explicitly targeting your money, in every society in the world, being rich(/powerful/famous) makes you more desirable in the mating game.
Perhaps in an ideal world, it shouldn't work like that, but that is a different point.
Being a billionaire definitely helps, but it's not really a massive advantage to be a multimillionaire. I have a few wealthy friends (single digit millionaires) who still struggle with dating.
You seem to be a little naive when it comes to dating. Money by itself doesn't guarantee good partnership. There's also: personality, physical attractiveness, compatibility etc.
When these reports about sexual harassment are so vague about what actually happened it does a disservice to everyone. How is anyone supposed to know where the line is between hitting on someone and sexual harassment? Many women like to play hard to get. Many men out there are just plain dumb when it comes to how they show their interest in a woman, not malicious. With more specifics they'd be able to learn what's right and what's not.
I assume you actually realise why they are vague, but in case you don't: it's polite. Many victims find it humiliating to talk about, and adding details often adds to this humiliation.
In this case many details were published elsewhere already, in enough detail to offer little excuse.
Was the victim(s) identified? If not, then we should be free to talk about the specifics without making any identifications. Again, there's no details to go on here.
Yeah, I immediately thought of that video when I was considering the massive power imbalance at play here.
You can re-word most of Dennis' dialogue to fit the situation, too. "The implication that [she won't get an investment] if she refuses to sleep with me."
The last part of that clip is especially applicable. The other commenter sees this as a compliment. "She's attractive; of course she'd get hit on!" But it's a "compliment" with an asterisk attached to it, and the subtext is a massive power imbalance.
If you happen to work in California, you should study the law better before you consider a supervisory position. This style of advance is black-letter sexual harassment in California, if done by a supervisor to an employee in their organization. (This wasn't the precise case here, but it was very close, and your wording seems to take in cases beyond this particular scenario.) If these advances continued, it is easy grounds for a lawsuit.
Perhaps by first developing some level of intimacy & emotional connection in a platonic context, being a supportive whole human being with well-defined/practiced/communicated boundaries, and occasionally having a meta discussion about the relationship to get on the same page?
I don't need specifics since hitting on someone is a suboptimal strategy for connection. If you're just looking to get laid, try it out and let me know how it works for that.
He started 500 startups with a female co-founder and said he chose her because she was smarter. He saw an opening for himself and talked about playing Moneyball for venture capital. He spoke often in interviews about chasing investments among founders who didn't fit the profile but were eminently backable and that included women. He blogged publicly about his insecurities and campaigned for diversity.
https://500hats.com/commitment-to-diversity-d8a4ac8b1c12
Guess it proves you can't really know a person through their writings and interviews. He was someone that I admired and I'm more than a little disappointed.