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Comment by xivzgrev | Hacker News Reader

Being a jerk extends all around.

As a manager I’ve had two employees tell HR that I was racist. The evidence? One I fired for performance, the other I had on a performance improvement plan. Mind you I had other minorities on my team in parallel that had no performance issues and strangely enough did not say I was a racist.

Also one time the HR guy (who also doubled as office manager) ran a large scheme where he claimed employees were expensing things, he did it on their behalf and got reimbursed. I found this out after the fact where I was asked if I ever asked him to order laptops or ran up huge Uber bills.

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It does indeed extend all around, and I'm sorry you had to go though that. But you have to keep in mind that there is an extreme power imbalance between an employee and a manager who can have them fired, which means the jerk-factor is very much slanted heavily in one direction. For regular employees having those above you abuse their power over you in various ways is often a daily occurrence.

No idea why you're being down voted. I've had the very same experience once. Employee just sucked, after some nudges that went either ignored or just unnoticed I gave a very clear speech on where they're standing. Three months later I got him fired. He went to HR and claimed I was racist, and threatened with a lawyer. This really stressed me out for a good while, this was dragging along for weeks, with ugly mails and calls.

The details really matter here.

I won’t assume you or GP were racially motivated but “just sucks” can easily be code for “wrong race/culture”.

“Some nudges” is a red flag to me, regardless of race. You think you communicated a message but aren’t sure if it was understood. That’s your responsibility as the messenger, not theirs as the unknowing recipient.

> “Some nudges” is a red flag to me, regardless of race. You think you communicated a message but aren’t sure if it was understood.

Hence the "gave a very clear speech" part. If you don't get it at that point then I don't care if you're just stupid or it's cultural differences, at some point you have to adapt to the environment you work in. And no, there were no language barriers involved.

Yeah but the “very clear speech” came later, after the decision was made. After redemption was possible. At that point you’re just reinforcing your perceptions. Your job as a manager is to manage that expectation. If you fire someone for it that’s your failure.

> Yeah but the “very clear speech” came later, after the decision was made.

Huh? I clearly stated they had another three months at that point. Nothing changed, so they got the boot three months later. What the heck do you expect? Another two years? At this point I have to assume malice from your side. I guess you're just one of these people yourself. Blame everyone and everything but yourself.

> I clearly stated they had another three months at that point. Nothing changed, so they got the boot three months later.

Yes, and I clearly stated your mind was already made up so that didn’t matter. It was impossible for them to change your mind.

> What the heck do you expect? Another two years?

Your job as a manager is to address these issues before they become fireable. You know, to manage.

> At this point I have to assume malice from your side.

This is an internet forum, relax. What does it even mean to be malicious in an internet comment? I’m not taking away your livelihood.

> I guess you're just one of these people yourself.

“These people”? Is this still a thread about you not being racist?

> Blame everyone and everything but yourself.

Go look in a mirror.

Much like a blameless root cause analysis I believe a firing is a failure of the organization. How did this person get hired in the first place? How did you fail to coach them? What did the organization learn to avoid a repeat?

In my experience “performance” is code for “I don’t like you”. I have never seen a performance metric that isn’t arbitrary and inconsistent. Not just between peers but day to day for an individual.

PIPs are just CYA for HR.

I can’t speak to these specific situations because I wasn’t there but when managers speak about “performance” they’re using a euphemism for their perception. This can easily feel like racism because it comes from a place of discrimination.

“I have friends who are x” is a common refrain of racists so isn’t a defense, especially in an asymmetric power structure. Maybe you aren’t, or maybe your employees feel you are but they tolerate it to keep their jobs.

In your experience what are legitimate grounds to fire someone?

Theft and fraud.

If you’re bad enough at your job to get fired you basically are a fraud.

Is it your assertion that power asymmetry, discrimination, and retaliation do not exist?

> If you’re bad enough at your job to get fired you basically are a fraud.

Depends on who thinks you are bad enough and how they came to the conclusion.

If your boss thinks you are bad enough - the question is why do they think so? Is it laziness, incompetence, or merely small nonsense that the boss couldn't accept retroactively? Is this all via stack rank or fake BS quotas? What is it?

Even without stack ranking, if you lead a team large enough, you get people who are struggling more than others. Sometimes it’s clearly situational: they are more junior and are still learning the ropes, the project is going through a rough patch and it’s hard to deliver, they are going through a rough patch and it’s hard to deliver and sometimes it’s just that their skillset is mismatched with what they have to do. In this case, you have to decide if it’s a case where training will solve the issue or if having someone else there would be better for everyone. And yes, not constantly being in conflict with everyone is also a professional skill.

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