Facebook did not hire Black employees because they were not a culture fit

No, it is absolutely not fine.

One's livelihood should not be determined by an ability to fit into some monocultural clique based on one hiring manager's subjective view of a culture they are not familiar with. I thought companies were trying to accomplish certain business goals, and not build cultural/ideological echo chambers (unless they build that as a product, which I guess Facebook does).

> Determining they're not a cultural fit because they're black, is most definitely not.

Yes, and culture is most certainly intertwined with ethnicity, or at the very least - by location. Should companies be allowed to screen candidates from, say...Vermont, or Louisiana just because it's not a protected discriminatory attribute. Sorry, people of Vermont. You're just not a great culture fit for us.

I'm honestly struggling with trying to come up for any good reason to hold this opinion in the first place.

> Yes, cultural fit is subjective - but so are interviews.

This isn't a reason to throw out one with the other. Just because interviews are flawed is no excuse to discriminate based on culture. Not to mention there at least exist frameworks for testing skills and ability (no matter how flawed they are). There are no frameworks for testing "cultural fit", and, at least as of now, 99% of hiring managers would not be equipped to be a good judge of culture.

While proof of violation may in some cases be difficult, because its very hard to measure the impact of one among several subjective criteria, I find it difficult to believe that there are actual “culture fit” decisions that are not disparate-impact discrimination. To wit, I do not believe that it is ever the case that “culture fit” decisions either:

(1) fail to have a substantial adverse impact on one or another protected class, or

(2) have such an impact but, in fact, effectively measure the minimum qualifications for successful performance of the job in question, so as to fall within the “business necessity” defense.

In fact, I think the predominant purpose of “culture fit” is to provide a cover for arbitrary discrimination by hiring decisionmakers with which unlawful discrimination can be masked in a way which makes it more difficult to litigate, as a liability risk mitigation technique.

In the abstract, it sounds really good: "We're hiring you because you're different and we want that over another person who brings more of the same." In practice, it sounds like an opportunity to have managers add "s/Culture Fit/Culture Add/" to an outgoing message filter.

You'll know it's real when managers start pushing back: "I don't want that person because they sound like a real jackass". That's what "culture fit" was supposed to mean. That's where the rubber really meets the road: teaching people to distinguish between the discomfort they feel because somebody is a jerk versus the discomfort they feel because they're attuned to people like them and everybody else introduces a tiny, almost subconscious air of uncertainty.

It's really hard to do, because a lot of people don't want to think of themselves as racist/sexist/homophobic, but the cumulative effect of those tiny nudges causes a lot of harm.

If your company is a bowl of 999 blue M&Ms and somebody asks you to find a new M&M that will Fit That Bowl I know what I'd be reaching for (feels like question #1 on an IQ test)

I still think I dislike the 'Culture' word though. The company has a culture & minority staff have a culture - but these are not the same things. The actual company culture isn't even the same thing as individual summation of individuals in it.

Back to the M&M bowl. Each person that added the previous 999 M&Ms didn't hate the other colours - they just fitted that +1 Blue that fit what they found.

Then edict comes down that the big-blue bowl looks really unappetizing, and doesn't actually look like M&Ms. This bowl is not representative of M&Ms! Oh I'll stop now..

..I just had mental picture of an experiment. Send people into a room with an unopened M&M packet and instructions to fit or add to the bowl. Then maybe vary the bowl contents (number in it, skew the colours). Then further fiddle with the ratio in their 'sealed' packet... OK, I said I'd stop..

No, it doesn’t. An actually strong culture at a company is something that that will be adopted by new employees regardless of whether they completely fit preconceived notions or not. Over emphasis on culture fit during the screening process generally leads to mono cultures that only appear to be strong, but are actually quite weak because they are never challenged.

Those times you remember not listening to your gut and regretting it are susceptible to confirmation bias.

Personally, I've had great gut feelings about people that turned out to be terrible hires. I've had bad feelings about people who turned out great. I've had direct work experience with folks that were amazing, and then at a future job they performed quite poorly.

There's no removing subjectivity from interviews probably, but I highly recommend you turn down your gut feelings if you have an interest in unbiased or at least less biased hiring decisions.

I eventually changed to an industry where I was a better cultural fit and it was like night and day. I enjoyed the work more, my career picked up, and I just generally liked my coworkers better. It was still a job, so things weren't and aren't perfect, but everything does improve when you're in a place that's a good fit for you.

Those companies that we rejecting me as "Not a good cultural fit", were right, and I would have been less happy in the long term had they ignored the cultural fit issues and hired me anyway. Like a lot of young people, I didn't know myself well at the time.

Sometimes people aren't a good fit for an industry or a company, and nobody wants to hire someone who they think is ultimately going to be unhappy in the role. That doesn't do anyone any good.

Notice how companies like Google, FB, etc that advocate “diversity and inclusion” tend to have highly skewed politics, such as harassing and firing conservative employees.

The calls for “diversity” are the exact opposite — a call for cultural hegemony by far left views and racistly color-coordinating the population, so we have “balance” in the view of avowed racists.

The purpose is to bully anyone who opposes their racist ideology by labeling them as “against diversity” — a standard language game from fascists.

You are being gaslit.

But group cultural distinctives/values are very different from corporate culture. Corporate culture goes to how decisions are made, forgiveness vs. permission, what behavior is rewarded, etc. I don't think you can get that from a job interview. I don't believe you can interview for "corporate culture fit" and I don't think it correlates to people-group.