Rejecting candidates unwilling to acknowledge female interviewers | Hacker News Reader

Rejecting candidates unwilling to acknowledge female interviewers

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35 pointsdrewg12353 comments

Of course, a candidate who doesn't want to communicate with women, or can't accept a female senior, no-one wants that. But "not making eye contact" is possibly not a good way to infer that. Some years ago there was a study as to why UK magistrates gave heavier sentences to black kids rather than white. One thing that came up was that black kids tended to look to the ground, to not make eye-contact, when being questioned: the magistrates saw this as "guilty looking" whereas it is just an Afro-Caribbean cultural thing, making eye contact with an elder is considered disrespectful to many in that community.

The indomitable Naomi Wu dug at exactly this point in the thread. She got OP to clarify that by typing "not making eye contact" he did not mean "not making eye contact" but meant "communicating with".

I'll leave the irony of this unstated.

He didn't, though, he clarified that he meant making eye contact with the man but not the woman.

Apparently when he said "Doesn't make eye contact with or communicate with" he meant "doesn't communicate with or communicate with"

“Doesn’t do X or Y” has colloquial meaning of “Does neither X nor Y”. In cases of X being subset of Y or otherwise lower degree it means “Doesn’t do Y, e.g. X”

You’ll see this in common speech “My husband doesn’t do the dishes or clean up at all”, “he doesn’t reply to emails or update anything in JIRA”, etc.

Pretty standard language structure in English. Odd that people are having trouble.

Except he didn't say "doesn't do X or Y" he said "is unwilling to X or Y", which breaks the colloquial defense and makes it questionable what he meant. (And I don't fully trust further explanations by someone under this kind of pressure)

Do you interpret "unwilling to X or Y" as "unwilling to X" or "unwilling to Y"? I interpret it as "unwilling to X" and "unwilling to Y".

For instance, "my husband is unwilling to take care of the twins or take the dog to day-care" means the husband is not going to either of those things, i.e. the speaker wishes for the husband to do one of these two things and the husband is doing neither.

Likewise, "unwilling to make eye contact or communicate" means "is not willing to either make eye contact" and "is not willing to communicate".

In fact, it feels very natural to me to take that interpretation. But I am completely open to the idea that this is not the case in other people's English. I don't know the OP guy, so there's no real skin in the game for me, but I really think he has the same meaning as me here.

My initial take was that "unwilling to make eye contact or acknowledge" meant either/or as opposed to neither/nor. But I think there's also a possibility that I'm wrong.

But can we know for sure? I feel that we have to try to interpret the first tweet as a standalone thing, because the followup explanations happened after he started getting called out for what is, in theory, illegal.

> My initial take was that "unwilling to make eye contact or acknowledge" meant either/or

What would that even mean in practice though. It’s like a pointless thing to write.

The indomitable frumiousirc is incredibly incorrect.

What you're discussing is tangibly different than what's described in the thread though. Refusing to look the lone woman present in the eye while giving interview answers -- even for a primary interviewer who is a woman -- while making good eye contact with others present isn't the same as looking down/away from a male judge or magistrate in a court setting.

This could be bias against those who are uncomfortable making eye contact with women. Is eye contact a requirement for communication? Certainly it helps but now with remote work, video meetings, and lots of async written artifacts, I find it much less so.

"Occasionally make eye contact with women" should probably be a reasonable expectation for professional employees, who should be expected to work well with diverse (not the identity politics meaning of that word) teams.

Does being shy around women make you a bad person? Does being uncomfortable around people who are different than you make you a bad person?

It's one thing if someone outright ignores an interviewer (that is hugely disrespectful). It's entirely another if someone is forcing their values on someone else over something as trivial as eye contact.

This whole thing sounds hand-wavy and virtue-signally to me. And in a bad way.

> Does being shy around women make you a bad person? Does being uncomfortable around people who are different than you make you a bad person?

It may not make you a bad person, but it would probably make you a bad hire.

> It's one thing if someone outright ignores an interviewer (that is hugely disrespectful).

If you read the entire twitter thread, you will see that this is exactly what is being discussed. And if you haven't seen this behaviour in person before, you haven't been paying attention.

> It may not make you a bad person, but it would probably make you a bad hire.

Ah yes, so the very people who champion "diversity" and "empathy" show their true colors by selecting against people with some kind of social anxiety or traumatic experience. So much for that!

> If you read the entire twitter thread, you will see that this is exactly what is being discussed.

Well it definitely wasn't described that way from the outset, which is an indicator of the Gergely Orosz's biases. Perhaps he should apologize and undergo some bias training.

> And if you haven't seen this behaviour in person before, you haven't been paying attention.

Or it could be that the field that I work in is largely a male presence and I haven't been on the interviewer side of the table with a woman.

The social justice types are funny to me. They issue proclamations about *ism from their ivory tower, all the while assuming the worst intent from anybody who doesn't act like they do. It's actually laughable. The moral puritanism needs a rest.

If your social anxiety or trauma prevents you from interacting with men and women in an equitable way, then it's absolutely fair for your interviewer to reflect on how it impacts the workplace and proceed accordingly. "Treat men and women equally" is a perfectly valid professional expectation.

I'm going to assume the equitable treatment you're talking about is eye contact, because I previously already addressed ignoring someone as disrespectful.

Policing eye contact, absent any other context, sounds like a massively negative impact on the workplace to me. And if someone does have some legitimate circumstances that make that a subconscious (or even consciously difficult) behavior then it sounds like your otherwise "equitable" workplace stops being equitable the moment someone is different than you in a way you don't agree with. It's "equitable for me, but not for thee."

We already know that interviews are nervewracking for some people. Add some other crap on top of that and I could see how someone well-meaning makes a minor blunder like failing to make eye contact with a woman. Where is the empathy that the equity types are clamoring for?

There is no need to discuss this “absent any other context”, since the context is provided. I do not think you’re engaging with this material in good faith.

It is not moral puritanism to say that when I am interviewing candidates, it is a hard requirement that they be willing and able to communicate with their coworkers - yes, even the women.

This isn't a good faith interpretation of what I said.

Intentionally ignoring was already covered off on. Yes, policing someone's eye contact during a potentially high-stress situation (like an interview) is moral puritanism.

FWIW, later he clarified:

> Spelling it out for the few people in replies wanting to misunderstand what I am saying:

> We rejected candidates who refused to communicate w female interviewers when they asked questions or tried to communicate. They’d only respond to the guy, who did not initiate the comms!

and

> When I wrote "did not make eye contact" I meant "only made eye contact with the man, refused to do so with the woman" reflecting on how the woman was ignored. Not just about eye contact: was about refusing to communicate in any way with the woman: but not the man.

I'd have been toast. Not because I'm an evil chauvinist, but because I'm a typical geek who took half a lifetime to get comfortable with making eye contact with, actually pretty much anyone, but particularly women.

But technically competent. Luckily I did get hired for that.

it's selecting for a specific "culture" and personality type

https://genius.com/18702731/Pink-floyd-dogs/And-after-a-whil...

It seems like a good idea to avoid hiring people who won’t talk with women. But it seems so unbelievable that this was a common problem as this is something I’ve never witnessed in probably hundreds of interviews that included women interviewers.

I once worked for a company that had a Japanese client and the client wouldn’t interact with women leadership. This was back in the days when software was delivered on cd and they wouldn’t accept the cd from a woman. It really skeeved me out and I refused to be part of the ceremony.

> this is something I’ve never witnessed

Ask the women in your life if they have.

Good suggestion, I should have been more thorough and said “this is something I’ve never witnessed and all of the women in my life I’ve talked with have not witnessed.”

I’ll also add that it’s pretty easy to tell if someone is making eye contact or not.

What I have witnessed, and been reported to me by women colleagues, is people being dismissive and redirecting to males. But they still looked them on the eye as they then directed the conversation away from women to men.

It’s the eye contact thing that stood out to me as being odd.

Really? Because I am a woman tech interviewer at a large tech company and this happens to me a lot.

Really, I confirm my earlier observation.

It’s interesting how people can have such different experiences but that’s part of what makes the world so wonderful.

I’m sorry you’ve experienced this and wish you worked in the companies I did as I guess we were just lucky with our applicants. Or you were unlucky with yours.

I’ve had that happen to me in the C-Suite of my own companies, with vendors, partners, advisors

Not exactly easy to screen them out, because you want their business! Annoying but I just remember “that’s what I hired this white guy with the ivy league pedigree for, atmosphere modeling” so the vendors have someone to make eye contact with

It works, I do the same in every country. I’m not spending a single minute of time on “representation and diversity trends in South Korea” I just do the thing that most likely makes money, I don't treat the US differently. Save the causes for after you’re done trying to make money.

Nice to know others have that experience.

I've unknowingly been that guy before. Ended up giving that employer the finger on my way out. Good riddance.

It works, but you're just pandering to dinosaurs.

Which guy. The one not making eye contact?

The atmosphere model?

The person not getting eye contact?

Atmosphere model, thanks def needed to clarify that one.

Yeah, good for you sticking up for yourself, my guy didn’t have other marketable skills and was also adequately tied to the value of their stake. Definitely true on how this behavior in my case was correlated to old people. The one about women being ignored probably has broader distribution.

Why did the guy post this on twitter, doesn't he know the kind of reaction it will generate.

Anyway, i think it's fair game to filter out people who ignore the person asking questions, that's pretty abnormal behaviour regardless of gender. No need to for a twitter shitstorm to make that point.

I felt the same way, what a weird thing to tweet about. In all my years interviewing I have never seen anyone that wouldn't talk (or look at the eyes) of my female coworker when interviewing or elsewhere. I had female managers, directors and CTOs, and I don't recall an instance where the gender of the person were a problem. Looking at the person's twitter profile, he matches the type of those who think that having worked at FAANG or FAANG-like companies gives them some sort of extra credibility or something. I work and have worked at FAANGs and feel like if I have to write a short Bio for myself, the company I work for wouldn't make it there.

If you want my anecdote, I've seen it a lot. I'd suggest asking your managers, directors, CEOs if they've experienced it themselves -- I bet they have and that it happens all the time.

Dismissing this as mere signaling (as others here have) is ironically almost as bad.

Because everyone has experienced being ignored in various settings before. Its a thing that happens regardless of sex or age or color. It doesn’t necessarily mean it was due to some *ism.

`DoneWithAllThat ` said it all. I'm not dismissing anyone's experience, I'm just making an assessment taking into consideration OP and the type of content he publishes, I'm sure there is women that have had that experience, the same way people of color and other minorities have, maybe even white males when the interviewers are all from a certain group. That type of tweet was crafted for attention and virtue signaling as he himself is not a woman(judging by his profile, if he(she) is , my bad), he didn't show an specific case of that happening or denounce it, so is not really anything besides a story(that could be truth or not) where he(and his team) were the good guys.

What sort of specific case evidence could the tweeter provide that would satisfy you? Video with eye tracking?

I can assure you that it's easy to tell when this happens, even with my manly eyes. And yes, of course it happens to everyone, but it happens more to women than to men.

I'm serious, ask your friends and family and coworkers. It'll be eye opening for you.

I have, the interview ended fast.

he thought it would be good social signalling?

I have trouble maintaining eye contact with anyone. Though I agree that our industry has a bad track record of gender equality and needs to improve.

The point is that these candidates were only looking at (and talking to) the man in the room. Not making eye contact at all is very different from only making eye contact with men and ignoring women

Actively filtering out sexists (, racists, etc.) from your hiring process is a practical necessity for any company. If your company will hire programmers who refuse to acknowledge that women can be technically skilled, imagine what the salespeople hired through this process are saying to female customers. It's only bad options, and one of the worst ones is "nothing".

To properly judge a candidate, don't assume, don't hide requirements; If you're willing to filter them out on it, tell them up front what you're judging them on. If they still can't or won't comply, your filter might be reasonable, otherwise it's unfair.

To be honest I wouldn't be hyped about someone who needs "treat men and women equally" explicitly spelled out for them.

I get your point, but as long as someone can act the way you demand, why does it matter whether they would have acted that way on their own. The public interface is what matters, not private thoughts, not cultural or personal influences. You're interviewing for a professional job, not a personal relationship.

If you wish to test this out in real life, men, tag along with a woman who is shopping for a new car. I guarantee that the vast majority of salesmen will talk to you, not her. Doesn’t matter that she initiated the interaction with the salesman while you hung out in the background, doesn’t matter that she has said that it will be her car that she is paying for. As long as you are in conversational range, almost all the car salesmen will talk to you, not her. Source: been there, done that, repeatedly.

I cannot imagine interviews and candidates ever being in the same room again. Even in a hybrid company, what are the odds that the whole panel came in on the same day? This seems pretty pot-stirring for academic history.

Just did one this week on site .

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