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Comment by throwaway29303 | Hacker News Reader

This is awful. I'm sorry that happened to you. However,

  If Apple refuse to take actions, I will interview with major media outlets describing the experience in more details and I will release a list of all individuals involved from senior management to the HR director and all the evidence as public record.

You're wasting your time if you think they're going to do anything with this kind of approach. Get a lawyer first before thinking on doing any of that, though.

And let this be a reminder to everyone else that HR isn't there to help you - it's there to help the company.

In this kind of environment it almost feels like one needs to record everything that's happening in order to defend themselves. Cops use cameras, maybe it's time for employees to start wearing them too. Maybe.

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In NY (and, I think, California), that's illegal.

I found this out, because at the company at which I worked, managers kept making verbal commitments, then gaslighting me about them. I could never get them to commit in writing, and my own "reflection" emails (the standard advice about this) were worthless. I considered walking around with a little digital recorder in my pocket.

But many states have explicit laws against surreptitious audio recording. I suspect that comes from politicians being caught with wires (yeah, I'm a cynic).

That's why, if you get a surveillance camera that also records audio, they will usually have a card in there that tells you to post notices if you switch on the audio recorder.

It is not illegal in New York to record a conversation if the person recording is part of the conversation (one-party consent).

Huh. I did not know that. Thanks!

Here's a summary of NY law regarding one-party consent: https://recordinglaw.com/united-states-recording-laws/one-pa...

However, it is illegal in California, where the original author was located.

By reflection emails you mean where you summarize what was said and try to get the other person to confirm them?

I think those only work if you disregard any statements that don't get confirmed, and/or you twist the statements into action items that you don't prioritize until they confirm them.

The way that weasels (BTW: The Way of the Weasel, by Scott Adams, is downright prophetic about this kind of stuff) deal with it, is to not respond at all. Then, when you bring it up, they say “I never agreed to/said that!” If you then share the email, they say “I never got that. I would have corrected it, if I had.”

Their manager always has their back on these exchanges.

That's why my reflection email always includes at least one question about some detail of the statement I want to confirm.

"Per our conversation of this morning when you asked me to delete all our backups, do you want me to erase the disks or should I also roll over them with the company steamroller?"

How about, “I’ll get started on that as soon as you confirm.”

> But many states have explicit laws against surreptitious audio recording. I suspect that comes from politicians being caught with wires (yeah, I'm a cynic).

Voices can be easily faked, that's the reason. Same will happen to video as deepfake technologies keep improving.

Regardless of legality if you get found out you'll probably get walked out of the building by security (even if you're just using it as eg a substitute for taking notes among people with mutual trust.) I've heard stories about people who tried this and it's unlikely to end well.

OP is seemingly banking on being better at marketing than Apple is. I don't think it's a smart bet.

That's a very petty approach. Apple (or any company) could easily sue this guy for that threat.

Sue for a threat to expose? On what grounds?

Wouldn't this be protected as a whistleblower?

The author is... well, I don't think interviews are going to go the way he or she thinks.

To wit, reading part 1, the first paragraph boils down to "my manager was on vacation for my start date. I was provided with an onboarding buddy, who warned me that Apple is trigger happy firing folks." Para 2: manager made a likely inappropriate joke about last name. para 3: not really relevant? para 4: project was raw. para 5: onboarding buddy was not super helpful with onboarding. It may well have been the case that onboarding buddy was not an expert on the project, or that OP was hired because of his or her specific expertise on this project. etc.

For better or worse, I don't think going public with this story is going to be viewed as anything but a he said / she said mess. None of which means I think Apple treated him or her well, or that the team wasn't a mess, or anything else.

It may well, however, come up when googling the author's name for quite a long time. That's an additional factor to think through. It may be the best outcome for the author is to leave this behind, seek some therapy to help move on, and get a job at a company that doesn't treat him or her like this.

Agreed. This is really only interesting to journalists if they're building a story like the NYT/Amazon one a few years back.

> googling the author's name for quite a long time

Yup. Especially for someone with one year of experience and needing a visa, this isn't a good look.

I actually don't get what's the problem here. I manage a team and one time I booked a vacation and then we hired a guy.

He quit (he was the only person to ever quit that was working under me, company is treating employees good) and said in the review that this was horrible from my side. Am I not suppose to take a vacation ever?

I've seen this attitude quite often in juniors: The manager is always supposed to be available. Not immediately answering your email so you need to follow up with a phone call? Thanks, you just interrupted my talk with my boss and his boss about our department budget, and your colleague next door could also have solved your urgent problem.

More often the reverse complaint is uttered, and because of the power differential I think that direction is far prevalent.

But ideally, both sides should learn to see each other as human beings with limited lifetime, limited availability and patience and a life outside of work. As a manager, this is a little easier to accomplish: just scold your subordinates for answering emails off hours and remind them to take their vacations seriously. They'll learn quickly to do the same for you. Everybody wins.

You can take vacations whenever you want, but you can't hire new staff and just let them twist in the wind concurrently with you taking time off.

Holidays are planned ahead. Don't hire at the same time. Easy.

On the great hierarchy of potential conflicts that can be caused by taking your vacation on day X instead of Y, missing a new direct report's start date by a couple days is a very minor concern. Particularly at a larger company where a new hire will have to go through a bunch of onboarding busywork and has a buddy.

I can understand why this would be bad optics to someone who's insecure and junior, but it really shouldn't be a big deal.

It’s not about being insecure and junior, it’s about being a good manager and putting the right tools in place to help your employees succeed. No one — junior, senior, insecure, or secure — wants their time wasted doing nothing. It’s one thing to go on vacation, but it’s another to not put the proper support system in place for the new employee as to not keep them in the dark. That’s just one of the things that differentiate bad/average managers from the best.

Unfortunately this industry is just too polluted with managers like the one referenced in the blog post who end up contributing to bozo explosion

Reality: hiring takes an unknown amount of time. Candidates often prioritize prompt hiring, to do things like start health insurance, paychecks, etc. On growing teams with open reqs, this is equivalent to never being allowed to take a vacation.

> Holidays are planned ahead. Don't hire at the same time. Easy.

This is not realistic and quite frankly bad suggestion.

"Yeah, we would hire you next week, but since manager is on vacation we can hire you only in three weeks." Said no-one ever.

And what's the problem in taking those first two weeks to just slowly get to know the code and get to know your workmates? If I had a situation like that I would be thankful that I don't get shoved into work immediately and can take my time.

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