That wasn't the point of the question. The question was a hypothetical to test if there was any possible response that would've satisfied the original poster.
They're not suggesting to assume good intentions about the parties forever. They're just asking for that assumption for the purposes of the question that was asked
There is no satisfying answer if your actions before are not satisfying. The question implies that the original poster cannot be satisfied, and thus shift the blame implicitly. The problem remain not what the answer is, or how it is worded. The answer only portrays the actions, which are by themselves unsatifsying.
Can and do are two vastly different things. The assumption that data privacy can only be accomplished by no one having any access to data is ridiculous.
Of all the companies that exist right now, apple does a fair bit of work regarding data anonymization and access restriction.
"At Shopify, all candidates begin the interview process with something called the Life Story, an interview in which the candidate sits down and discusses their work history, passions, and aspirations."
None of that sounds like the actual stories about childhood. It's totally appropriate to discuss past work experiences, aspirations and passions as a "Life Story".
Moreover the “Tell me a little about yourself” suggested interview opener is open-eded enough that the candidate can decide what they want to discuss and highlight. Majority of people do not answer that question with "my first memory was when father left when I was 3 years old..."
Off the top of my head, working in an emergency department of any major hospital is guaranteed to be filled with emotionally-difficult circumstances. Yet we don't ask doctors, nurses and technicians personally invasive questions to determine their ability to do their job.
For someone starting a job in an emergency department, having prior personal experiences with life or death situations is a very poor indicator of ability to handle that type of pressure in professional life. So why is that relevant to office jobs?
right, but for someones first job i would also not expect any experience how to handle work situations at all. regardless of how i would be able to find out it seems a bit much to ask.
that's exactly the point I am trying to make? it's ok to ask about past professional experiences, it's not ok to ask personal questions about the past.
I don't know about you or your story. I hope you're doing well.
I've learned that the majority of people just don't want to hear anything negative or anything that makes them feel sad. If I want to have social, casual friends, I have to wall off parts of my life story.
Thankfully, I have a couple of close friends and family who know the reality and that is enough for me.
that's why i don't care about casual friends. i mean i do have some, but that's because we have some hobby that we share. the people in that group however are all replaceable.
what's not replaceable is deep friendships with people that do care and are open to listen.
that's no country. you find these kind of people everywhere. my theory is that the people who don't want to hear those things have not yet dealt with their own traumas (which can take decades).
Thank you. I found the part where the author throws in "cared for a dying parent" particularly distasteful, it's like a benchmark for "palatable damage"
The author appears young. I would give them the benefit of the doubt. It has been my experience that people who have lived a fortunate, trauma free life cannot really understand the trauma experienced by others. They might appear to understand, say all the right words, and so on. Then a few days later or weeks later be confused or upset because of how you react to something. A good friend once said to me, "Wow, that is still upsetting you?" He wasn't being a jerk, he was just surprised.
That may be true, but it doesn't mean that I have to submit to an interview with people like this who are lacking empathy. It also wouldn't be great if these kinds of interviews proliferate.
Empathy comes from being able to put yourself in other people's shoes. Reading fiction has been shown to increase empathy. If so then these guys need to do more reading.
Not just trauma necessarily, but many of our defining moments include things like, leaving a religious community we grew up in, coming out as LGBTQ+, being too broke to pay bills and taking out a risky loan, experiencing racism/sexism/ageism.
Not things I'd be inclined to talk about when those things are ripe for opening myself up to discrimination.
At first I agreed with you, but then I remembered: Where is our sensitivity, empathy and tact for the person who said that, who may have their own trauma and own issues?
The reality, the beauty of human relationships is that they are between people with all these issues and dimensions, all the nuance and detail that make up human beings. In the wild, there's no laboratory people - no clean, perfect specimens in simple environments.
My rule is, I don't know what someone else has been through and is going through. Never, ever judge. If absolutely necessary (e.g., I need to decide to partner with them or not), make my best guess but don't judge.
Well said. In addition to that, I think a speaker's intended meaning is also important to consider.
imo, people often take what people say literally or default to a first-instinct interpretation, rather than trying to understand what the speaker is attempting to convey. I try to interpret what people say charitably (a few of my friends think much too charitably), but I really believe that the vast majority of people seldom intent any malice in their comments.
In the example, it might have been intended in an empathetic way - "Damn, sorry, I didn't realize you were still hurting. I would have extended a shoulder to you if I realized". Or a pragmatic way - "I think the situation isn't as bad as you think, want to talk about it?" It could have been bluntly honest (personally, I typically appreciate honesty over politeness) or a totally aloof statement made on reflex. It could also just have been someone being a jerk, but I suppose the point of my rambling is that there's a myriad of ways to interpret a comment, and it's largely based on both the speaker's experiences and how they communicate.
Those are essential points. I'd just adjust the first to say, I think people tend to choose the interpretation - literal, metaphorical, reading emotions, etc etc - that suits their own emotional drive.
I find that the person I'm talking to, if I treat them as if they are a*holes, act as if that was their intent the whole time. If I treat them as if they in good faith, they act that way.
It's hard to resist the flow of conversation, to not go along with the way it's framed. I think that's why people act how you treat them; I think that's why people even confess falsely to crimes - the interrogator talks to the suspect as if they did it. Other sophsticated communicators also use that intentionally.
This interview style seems bound to create a psychologically enmeshed workplace with no healthy boundaries. Or a workplace full of people with charming, easily-shared backstories and nuclear families but no yucky problems. Would not want to work here, personally.
Any competent HR department would have a fit if they knew these kinds of questions were being asked. It's way too easy to wander into illegal discrimination when you're making hiring decisions based on people's backgrounds like this.
You'd think this was true, but I've seen some crazy shit in interviews, even at companies that were big enough and had a robust enough legal team, where you'd think they'd have their shit together.
I once interviewed at a medium sized, name brand Silicon Valley darling everyone on HN has heard of, where an interviewer outright asked me if I was married and if I had kids! Like, holy shit, just read your interview training manual! The very first sentence is probably "Do not ask any questions where the answer would even imply information about things that would get us in trouble discrimination-wise." Yet this person overtly asked! Here I was in the stairwell walking down to the second floor and she hits me up with one of the few totally forbidden questions! I thought about saying "What would HR think of that question?" but the asker was the HR manager! Totally bonkers.
The way I understand it, you can legally ask the questions, you just can't consider protected status for hiring purposes. The interview guidelines prohibit asking because "we didn't ask" is a stronger defense than "our interviewers have mental firewalls".
This case is strictly worse because the questions are explicitly being asked to evaluate eligibility for hiring.
It's still a major blunder by an HR manager but maybe there's a chance that they had already decided to hire the person but hadn't made an official offer and it was a mistimed getting-to-know-you chat? I don't know, it seems insane to even ask.
My wife was asked that question ("are you married, do you have kids?") in an interview with a tiny company 30 years ago. She attributed it to ignorance and replied "That's not a legal question to ask". The interviewer apologized profusely and he hired her. He turned out to be a really nice person who was unaware of what was out-of-bounds to ask in an interview. But that was 30 years ago, people should know better now.
>a workplace full of people with charming, easily-shared backstories and nuclear families but no yucky problems
Are you suggesting that this is bad? What do you hope to gain by seeking out obnoxious people with traumatic backstories and broken families with yuck problems? Misery loves company?
Why should someone’s present self be defined by things entirely out of their control (e.g. childhood trauma)? You seem to assume that “obnoxious people” and “traumatic backstories” go hand-in-hand; on the contrary, some of the most obnoxious people are those who have never faced anything in their lives other than minor and routine inconveniences. Neither person is inherently superior to the other, I’m just saying that I’d personally rather not work at a place that selects exclusively for “perfect” people along a metric unrelated to their job performance.
You were the one to make the link between "charming people", good childhoods and lack of "yucky problems". And, while I would agree that there is a strong correlation, it's true that it's not perfect.
Obviously performance is also a critical factor but your comment gave me the impression that you don't see any value (or even harm) in targeting charming people without yucky problems. They do indeed sound like "perfect" colleagues to me!
There isn’t a correlation. I am charming and would like to think generally pleasant to be around. But if you’re going to interrogate me about the entire life story of mine, you aren’t going to think that anymore.
Screening for people with life stories that you/anyone deems acceptable is extremely problematic, because realistically you will never have access to deeply personal information about 90% of your coworkers. As in, you should not be forcing Janet from accounting to disclose to you that she was abused by her stepfather, because if she is a well-adjusted adult it would have absolutely no bearing on your interactions with her at a workplace
You're one of those people who can only deal in absolutes, huh?
All else being equal, a person who enjoyed an idyllic childhood is typically going to be a more well-adjusted adult than someone who experienced the most depraved, violent, extreme child abuse imaginable.
I don't even have any interest in discussing the finer points with someone who completely denies the long-term effects of adverse childhood experiences.
We are talking about specifically work-related scenarios, that usually have pretty straightforward boundaries and surface-level interactions. "All else being equal, a person who enjoyed an idyllic childhood is typically going to be a more well-adjusted adult" - not necessarily in this specific context, people that didn't experience trauma are not immune to being awkward, immature, neurotic, anxious and various other things that makes working with them difficult.
That is not to say that people who have experienced childhood abuse can't have issues with basic human functioning. The point is, neither are necessarily are better or worse to work with just based on their trauma or lack of thereof.
It is irrelevant that people with normal childhoods are statistically more likely to be well-adjusted in most aspects of their lives, because we are only considering workplace interactions.
I was told that asking about resume gaps is a very biased question and a no-no, especially if it is a single gap, as opposed to a pattern.
Usually the answer to a single resume gap is something personal and none of my business as an interviewer, it's not my place to pry if you were raising children, caring for dying relatives or battling severe depression
That whole line of questioning is a HR nightmare and I don't think they'd get away with it in any large company. You are _not_ supposed to ask open ended questions that could reveal a candidate as a member of a protected group. They tell you that their parents kicked them out because they were gay, they don't get hired, and they file a lawsuit saying that there were forced to reveal their sexual orientation and they were discriminated against because of it.
This scenario is unlikely to be an _easy_ win in court, but presents enough headache and just the risk of the company losing in court would most likely result in a settlement offer.
