There's bunch of red flags right from the beginning:
> When Cindy Warner joined Amazon Web Services in February 2020, she saw it as an opportunity to increase diversity and reshape the company’s strategy. ... Warner, ... said she had faced pay discrimination and an underlying culture of sexism and homophobia. She sued the cloud computing company alleging that male executives at AWS treated her with “open contempt, insults, and hostility” and upheld a “white boys’ club” – and claims she was fired shortly after.
It sounds like _she_ was the most toxic person there and was yeeted from the team for a reason.
> She recalls how AWS “aggressively” recruited her, offering a quick path to higher-level roles and better pay
That is sexism on Amazons part by definition. It also directly contradicts her discrimination assessment.
At this point I have what some would call prejudice against people wanting to reshape me for inclusion and diversity. I would call that experience though.
Of course you will have difficulties if they plant a diversity hire in a high position just because she is a women. That reaction isn't sexism of course and the hate should ideally be directed at those promoting "positive discrimination" instead of her, but it isn't surprising.
I accepted my culture as terrible by now. Sue me please.
> particularly women and people of color
If she wants to syphon sympathy of unrelated groups for personal career, firing her was a good decision. This is no management quality.
“… and according to the lawsuit she was hired at a lower tier than she felt she qualified for.”
I can’t speak to her personal experiences, but down-leveling is pretty common at every tech company and something someone with 30YOE should have fleshed out during the hiring negotiations.
Also since demoting people almost never works taking it slow seems in the best interest of both parties.
Now obviously they shouldn't keep you there. So if you are really up for it they should promote you and not leave you hanging. But by itself it doesn't seem like a overly weird thing to do.
I haven’t formalized my thinking around this so it could be an incomplete and terrible take, but I’m not sure its a problem that some companies have a “terrible” culture. Obviously, there are protected classes and laws, etc. High Level though, this is an executive position. Just get a new job. Its not like I am yelling at a mcdonalds employee that if they don’t like fast food they can quit and starve to death. Suing a company kind of seems like a money grab. It sounds like she was treated terribly but as a highly compensated and experienced exec, like why didn’t she just walk away. Why bother going through a year of torture and then sue them to point out how bad they treated her. I really hate litigation culture in America.
Totally prepared for alternate views and am not married to this PoV. These stories always rub me the wrong way though
Edit: By “I’m not sure its a problem to let companies have terrible cultures” I just mean there is room in the market for people to have different approaches. If a culture truly is so bad that people won’t work there, then they won’t attract talent and put out good products and slowly die.
Just ignoring bad or illegal things in the hope that the "Free market" solves it does not work most of the time, see the article that was on main page all day today about click to subscribe and call to unsuibscribe, Free market did not solve the issue, companies or individuals that cause harm need to be stopped.
First of all, sex and gender identities are protected in the US and her complaints are about sexism. High level means there should be lots of opportunities, but on the other hand, where does an Amazon exec go if they want to leave? Facebook? As a good faith argument, maybe she saw a personal growth opportunity in the position and also a good-for-the-company growth opportunity to use her experience tap into more talent and/or more of the market. It's easy to stay for a while, even years, if you think you might make things better for yourself and others.
As an outsider, when I got to the part about Ellen Pao I had to think a bit broader. When she was CEO of reddit, in 2014-2015, reddit was practically turning into Ron Paul supporters club. Many users backlashed against her and her decisions (main being banning harassment and revenge porn) and she stepped down. Looking back from 2021, those decisions sure seem good.
I appreciate that you said "Totally prepared for alternate views and am not married to this PoV." It's the main reason I responded after reading the article.
> I’m not sure its a problem that some companies have a “terrible” culture. Obviously, there are protected classes and laws, etc. High Level though, this is an executive position. Just get a new job.
Culture trickles down.
> If a culture truly is so bad that people won’t work there, then they won’t attract talent and put out good products and slowly die.
Or they'll attract only toxic employees, who are still capable of putting out a product, but will harm other employees who don't have the sort of economic mobility you're talking about.
On the contrary, prescriptive culture kills any other subculture. Corporate culture is a compromise, certainly nothing to strive for.
There is often also a giant divide in culture between departments and that is also true for management and developers.
You don't have to wonder why you are not well liked by colleagues when you are a diversity/inclusion hire that directly gets into a high position for external presentation reasons of the company.
I guarantee you that she was in any case far better treated than the common warehouse worker.
> “As more people whistleblow, they are seeing how these issues are interconnected in many ways,” Dubal said.
Meaning they see the lucrative settlements because companies want it out of the press, which supports these allegations. Don't let yourself be played for a fool.
> When Cindy Warner joined Amazon Web Services in February 2020, she saw it as an opportunity to increase diversity and reshape the company’s strategy. ... Warner, ... said she had faced pay discrimination and an underlying culture of sexism and homophobia. She sued the cloud computing company alleging that male executives at AWS treated her with “open contempt, insults, and hostility” and upheld a “white boys’ club” – and claims she was fired shortly after.
It sounds like _she_ was the most toxic person there and was yeeted from the team for a reason.