College is when you transition from the (hopefully) "happy place" you were as a kid to "the real world".
It sucks that Yale didn't help this person when she need it. But it certainly doesn't get any better in the real world.
If, one fine afternoon, your boss says "how are you?" and you say "I cut myself earlier today", then expect to be promptly escorted out of the building. Perhaps to a mental health facility, if you're lucky.
If, one fine afternoon, your boss says "how are you?" and you don't say "fine", be prepared to explain yourself in detail. You'd better have a way with words, because your job is definitely on the line. Especially at a startup.
You might say "that sucks". And it does suck. But that's just the way it is for 99% (wild made up number) of the jobs in the USA. Unlike grade school soccer games, your employer isn't going to hand out trophies just for participation.
True, but if it sucks, surely it's a good thing that people recount their experiences in articles like this so that the status quo can be unsucked?
There are places where it's not quite the way you describe. A few years back I had a colleague who had a mental breakdown. He voluntarily took some time off after discussing the situation with his boss and eventually came back. No problem, and no job on the line (both because he's legally protected and because of the company/country culture).
I like that, and I'd fight to make that a reality if it wasn't so.
Disagree†. High turnover is not desirable anywhere, but it is far less tolerable at a startup. People are far less interchangeable and systems are more often bound up in people's minds rather than in some employee handbook.
†Depending what phase of startup you are referring to, a somewhat tangential discussion.
For what it's worth, I had that almost exact conversation, as an engineer at a startup. The only difference from what I wrote and real life was that it wasn't my boss, it was my boss's boss, the VP of Engineering, doing something called "management by wandering around".
That was 30 years ago, but I doubt that today's managers are any different. I did keep my job, but alarm bells were definitely ringing in top management that day.
Successful startups (which ours turned out to be) are often as much about risk management as anything else. Having employees that aren't 100% "fine", for any reason, is a risk. Of course that risk must be weighted against the turnover of replacing that employee.
Having employees that aren't 100% "fine", for any reason, is a risk.
I doubt you have ever worked for a company where most (or any!) of the employees were 100% fine.
The choice is not whether to be fine. The choice is whether to deal with problems as they inevitably arise in all our lives, or to hide them under the rug ... until they erupt.
It sucks that Yale didn't help this person when she need it. But it certainly doesn't get any better in the real world.
If, one fine afternoon, your boss says "how are you?" and you say "I cut myself earlier today", then expect to be promptly escorted out of the building. Perhaps to a mental health facility, if you're lucky.
If, one fine afternoon, your boss says "how are you?" and you don't say "fine", be prepared to explain yourself in detail. You'd better have a way with words, because your job is definitely on the line. Especially at a startup.
You might say "that sucks". And it does suck. But that's just the way it is for 99% (wild made up number) of the jobs in the USA. Unlike grade school soccer games, your employer isn't going to hand out trophies just for participation.
All IMO of course.