Entitlement what can we do about it.

[D.P.]

You think it's appropriate for an absolute career starter to blindly questions? I consider it completely inappropriate.

It is absolutely appropriate and should be viewed positively. That is absolutely the kind of person you want on your team. The absolute worst performers are those that keep quiet and hope to go unnoticed with their head down. I want my views challenged, daily, so I can defend the decision I make, and implement changes based on the very people that I supervise so we can all improve .

 

[Orangeade]

What a bizarrely arrogant point of view.

I wonder if you’re one of those who balk at the temerity of employees wanting things like flexible working conditions, and paid holiday.

We offer very competitive holiday and strongly encourage it's usage. We have excellent maternity (Ok I'll admit paternity is a bit lacking). Not sure why you would think we would be stupid enough to train well and pay well and not look to retain???

We have a very happy workforce with a low turnover rate. Whatever we are doing works..

 

[D.P.]

Taking a year out or working part time should probably come with some negatives for your career if you are competing with someone else who doesn't have kids and puts more of their time and effort into their job.

Absolutely not. Raising your family is far more important than career, and a good employer should realise that. It is far more important to foster a bi-directional relationship, accommodate and support new parents and by doing so have them appreciate that you understand the true priorities.

time does not equal value, results mater more. And nothing should be determined over short time periods with external factors. Moreover, there is a limit to how much one can work and still provide high value. You dont wont employees having burnout or reduced capacity because they over worked for some arbitrary deadlines. Long term productivity and career progression is paramount.



The last thing you want is to turn a good performer away just because they became a parent. Employer churn is incredibly destructive.

 

[Orangeade]

Yes absolutely appropriate, because I wouldn’t want to interview anyone that can’t make an observation and ask a relatively open ended question.

I’m also not arrogant enough to think that just because I’m an industry veteran and have years of experience, a newly or soon to be qualified graduate can’t have valid questions or points of view. Wholly inappropriate?what a disgusting mindset.

Why shouldn’t a potential employee want to know about the sort of environment they’re potentially going to work in? Despite your arrogance it is t a privilege for them to work for you, and an employment contract is a two way thing.

It doesnt sound at all like you hire fairly, it sounds like you hire with a poorly framed and ill-conceived pre-determine bias and can’t think outside the narrowness of the box you’ve built for yourself. Of course you’ve not got a diverse workforce, you don’t understand diversity or benefits that it can bring.

If you are a fresh faced person that knows absolutely nothing, been surrounded by the latest and greatest tech, opportunity and really interesting (and diverse ) people with the ability to ask all and everything.....and the best you can muster up out of all of it is regarding some retarded soundbites they heard on reddit.....then yes I'd say you were an idiot.

Which I guess comes full circle of the original OP.....there is a sense of entitlement.

For the record most young people that come in (I speak like I'm old in my early thirties!) have a great mindset and thrive...

 

[Orangeade]

It is absolutely appropriate and should be viewed positively. That is absolutely the kind of person you want on your team. The absolute worst performers are those that keep quiet and hope to go unnoticed with their head down. I want my views challenged, daily, so I can defend the decision I make, and implement changes based on the very people that I supervise so we can all improve .

I think you missed the point where I said it was a challenging role....everything is up for their viewpoint being challenged including up and including the c-suite. I routinely have analysts/associates challenge the prevailing culture/idea...which is why they are well compensated and are head hunted.

A major difference than a blathering idiot talking about something not appropriate to them, their career or the company they are in.

 

[GordyR]

You think it's appropriate for an absolute career starter to blindly questions?

Not just appropriate but fairly impressive.

I consider it completely inappropriate.

There is no good reason to consider it inappropriate unless you think that the line of questioning was pursued purely as some kind of political statement and not out of business acumen.

And if so, why would you think that? Why would you make that assumption when diversity in a workforce is so well understood to result in higher performing teams?

Isn’t your immediate assumption potentially an example of you being political, rather than the candidate?

Large corporations don't actively consider and evaluate the level of diversity within their workforce for political reasons, they do so because increasing diversity in a workforce leads to significantly better results, which in turn translates into increased profitability.

To be clear, there are obvious exceptions or industries where you absolutely would expect to see a strong skew along gender or racial lines, either because one particular demographic is particularly suited to the industry in question, e.g. higher average muscularity being a direct benefit for whatever reason; or because from a social perspective far less of one demographic might be inclined to apply for roles in that industry, and that's fine.

But your immediate dismissal of any candidate who would ask such a question perhaps says more about you than them.

The answer btw was because we hire fairly. Oh and typically for heavily quantitative roles (but also sales qualities) in a heavily competitive environment requiring long difficult hours.....we tend to get very few if any candidates who are women.

Then that would be you answer to their question, at which point you could have probed them further in order to understand their motivation. Why this immediate recoil?

We are a business focused environment, we exist to make money and solve difficult problems. People tend to either love the place....or wash out quickly. For the men and women that are here it's a very rewarding experience to prove themselves and be rewarded for it.

I have no doubt that all of that’s true, and I know nothing about your industry whatsoever. I therefore wouldn’t dream of telling you that you’re doing it wrong and I’m doing it right or anything like that; but perhaps it would serve you well to at least consider whether or not you may have missed some extremely fine candidates, purely because of your own prejudices or assumptions.

 

[Chuk_Chuk]

You are paid what it costs to replace you, and if the local / country-wide market cost for your skills is only £X, that's all you're typically going to get.

I realised in the 2000s that I needed to emigrate in order to find a much higher country-wide market value for my skills, which I found in the USA.

I agree with you but how did it get to this position in the first place. Where british people are payed less than their counterparts in other western countries?

The reason I am leaving for Canada is for employment, I also managed to meet a woman there too so will be settling.
CISCO.

Nice one, if the job doesn't work out there is always the illegal maple syrup trade

 

[spaggyboy]

Loving the Boomer attitude in this thread. Remember kids, wanting enough money to live on, to be able to study something you might be interested in, demanding decent work-place conditions or to be with a fair shout of being hired if you're not a white male, is sheer entitlement.

And all the nice things that the Boomers enjoyed like final salary pensions, dirt cheap houses, good wages and free university places are all things they really deserved and their grandchildren wanting the same is also pure entitlement.

El oh el

 

[fez]

Absolutely not. Raising your family is far more important than career, and a good employer should realise that. It is far more important to foster a bi-directional relationship, accommodate and support new parents and by doing so have them appreciate that you understand the true priorities.

time does not equal value, results mater more. And nothing should be determined over short time periods with external factors. Moreover, there is a limit to how much one can work and still provide high value. You dont wont employees having burnout or reduced capacity because they over worked for some arbitrary deadlines. Long term productivity and career progression is paramount.



The last thing you want is to turn a good performer away just because they became a parent. Employer churn is incredibly destructive.

Thats not what I am saying. My point is that you cannot expect to step back from your career in any serious capacity and keep pace with people who dedicate themselves to it far more. This is true in almost any pursuit.

Yes you will always have people who are more capable working 30 hours a week than someone else working 50 but if you have two similarly skilled people and one wants to work part time in a time demanding job that also requires flexibility and working late at the drop of a hat then the choice may become far more obvious.

For plenty of jobs it won't matter. For some jobs it will. It should not be a given that having children will not negative affect your career.

 

[bigmike20vt]

Absolutely not. Raising your family is far more important than career, and a good employer should realise that. It is far more important to foster a bi-directional relationship, accommodate and support new parents and by doing so have them appreciate that you understand the true priorities.

time does not equal value, results mater more. And nothing should be determined over short time periods with external factors. Moreover, there is a limit to how much one can work and still provide high value. You dont wont employees having burnout or reduced capacity because they over worked for some arbitrary deadlines. Long term productivity and career progression is paramount.



The last thing you want is to turn a good performer away just because they became a parent. Employer churn is incredibly destructive.

Either i did not write my point very well or you are missing the point that Fez was responding too...... I fully embrace a company supporting people with family life, but it is a statistical fact that on average someone who has only done (for arguments sake) 75% of the hrs doing their job as another person who has done 100%, all other things being equal, regardless of sex the person with less hrs will be less experienced and likely to have less skills.
That does not mean a super talented person who took time off for a family cant still shine, but surely it will have an effect when you look at the average rather than just the individual.
(and this is true regardless of if man or woman but its just that women tend to be the ones to take more time off)

**** for the record our family is a statistical outlier........ I only work 34hrs a week over 4 days (38 as i have to have lunch break but not paid for that) due to child care and my wife has gone from 32hrs back to full time. She does now earn more than me and i am ok with that (indeed its a bit of a segue but our way of working - even when my wife was part time at 32hrs) is a far more beneficial way to work for the employee.... rather than have 1 high earner and 1 low earner doing hardly any hours..... the tax savings alone is significant as we are both just under the higher tax bracket - or was until the wife was promoted - as opposed to one of us on say 70k and the other on 13k for instance).

edit should have read full thread before responding as Fez already covered exactly what i meant

 

[platypus]

The problem is that people want to pat themselves on the back right now. They want something that should take 20 years to take 2. They want "positive" discrimination to rebalance things. A gay friend of mine had no issue with it at all because he saw it as basically a payback. We've had it **** for years so if we need to make it **** for a different group to make my groups life better faster then so be it. Baffling attitude.



This is another thing they are trying to "fix" as well. I am all for both partners being equally responsible for childcare and raising kids...if they want to be. What I am completely against is bending over backwards to accommodate parents and act like someone isn't putting their career on the back burner. Taking a year out or working part time should probably come with some negatives for your career if you are competing with someone else who doesn't have kids and puts more of their time and effort into their job.

This is where all the gender paygap ******** comes into it. Women earn more than men up to I believe around 30 when, surprise, they start having kids and start dropping out of the full time workplace.

Women get paid less on average for men but they certainly don't for the same job. Thats illegal and has been for a long time.

Basically there are things we can do better as a society but god damn we are going about it the wrong way in a lot of areas.

This is a tough area and I don't disagree with your overall sentiment - we can do things better as a society - but take my situation as an example.

I was heavily discriminated against by my old employer and had to fight long and hard for my right to shared parental leave, and in the end was forced to take it unpaid, which ultimately we could afford so happy days. So this is one thing we do appallingly - I only bring this up because you mention that there are some that want to do this, and have to fight for it, quite the opposite of having anyone bend over backwards for me.

That aside, I took 8 months off with our second child and loved every single minute of it. Upon return to work, nothing had changed. No issues with my career progression, nothing on the back burner, no problems with my pay rise that year, etc etc etc. So I dropped out of the full time work place for two thirds of a year and had zero consequences to my job - my wifes story with our first however, entirely the opposite and she had to fight tooth and nail to get back to even parity before having left for mat leave.

 

[platypus]

Thats not what I am saying. My point is that you cannot expect to step back from your career in any serious capacity and keep pace with people who dedicate themselves to it far more. This is true in almost any pursuit.

Yes you will always have people who are more capable working 30 hours a week than someone else working 50 but if you have two similarly skilled people and one wants to work part time in a time demanding job that also requires flexibility and working late at the drop of a hat then the choice may become far more obvious.

For plenty of jobs it won't matter. For some jobs it will. It should not be a given that having children will not negative affect your career.

Posted my earlier comment before seeing this, but just to reinforce: my career break did absolutely nothing to harm my career. My wifes did, significantly.

It's simple discrimination, nothing else.

 

[platypus]

Loving the Boomer attitude in this thread. Remember kids, wanting enough money to live on, to be able to study something you might be interested in, demanding decent work-place conditions or to be with a fair shout of being hired if you're not a white male, is sheer entitlement.

And all the nice things that the Boomers enjoyed like final salary pensions, dirt cheap houses, good wages and free university places are all things they really deserved and their grandchildren wanting the same is also pure entitlement.

El oh el

If I was feeling particularly vindictive I might point out that its somewhat ironic that the current malaise in the financial markets is having its biggest hit on DB/final salary pension schemes, rather than the more modern and significantly less generous defined contribution schemes. Hitting the boomers/Tory voting base harder.. but I won't.

 

[bigmike20vt]

Posted my earlier comment before seeing this, but just to reinforce: my career break did absolutely nothing to harm my career. My wifes did, significantly.

It's simple discrimination, nothing else.

that is only true if it is the same company and the same job though isnt it?

perhaps your company is decent, and your wifes not so much........... IF it is the same company/job then that is absolutely outrageous - unless you got lucky and your wife unlucky (depending on if glass half full or half empty) and there was a policy change.

but so long as in your current team a woman would have been treated the same as you then i dont see discrimination just because company X has a better materntiy/paternity package and how they deal with returning to work than company Y

 

[platypus]

that is only true if it is the same company and the same job though isnt it?

Why? I don't think that it is.

It may not be discrimination within a company, but its a clear societal bias that exists. Man - nearly a year off, no issues. Woman, 9 months off, big issues. Pretty simple as I see it.

 

[bigmike20vt]

Why? I don't think that it is.

It may not be discrimination within a company, but its a clear societal bias that exists. Man - nearly a year off, no issues. Woman, 9 months off, big issues. Pretty simple as I see it.

I disagree for it to be bias or discrimination the company would have to treat different staff differently. To me it just shows that your company is a better one to work for than your wifes if you plan on having a family. (as it stands my wifes company - which is where i used to work - is awesome........... My current company is...... .average in that department - but very good in other ways)

if anything who i work for discriminates against men as if we had another child (god help me if it happened) i get 10 days full pay paternity but a mother in my position gets paid 3 months full pay

 

[fez]

This is a tough area and I don't disagree with your overall sentiment - we can do things better as a society - but take my situation as an example.

I was heavily discriminated against by my old employer and had to fight long and hard for my right to shared parental leave, and in the end was forced to take it unpaid, which ultimately we could afford so happy days. So this is one thing we do appallingly - I only bring this up because you mention that there are some that want to do this, and have to fight for it, quite the opposite of having anyone bend over backwards for me.

That aside, I took 8 months off with our second child and loved every single minute of it. Upon return to work, nothing had changed. No issues with my career progression, nothing on the back burner, no problems with my pay rise that year, etc etc etc. So I dropped out of the full time work place for two thirds of a year and had zero consequences to my job - my wifes story with our first however, entirely the opposite and she had to fight tooth and nail to get back to even parity before having left for mat leave.

You cannot be sure at all. Your company might be good for that, you might be very valuable to them vs your partner etc. There are a host of reasons that could be effecting this outside of gender. The other fundamental issue is that once women start having children, there is an assumption that they will have more and with a few children are less likely to return to the workplace in full capacity in the future.

"Fewer than one-in-five of all new mothers, and 29 per cent of first-time mothers, return to full-time work in the first three years after maternity leave. This falls to 15 per cent after five years."

This is the fundamental issue. Companies generally don't care about their employees beyond their usefulness to the company. With the above statistics its clear why companies are concerned that women won't be coming back full time.

My partner works in the NHS and the number of people who will have 2 or more kids and basically work for the bare minimum amount of time required to gain full maternity pay before doing it again is amazing. They can have 3 kids and work for about a year out of 3. Many of them don't come back at the end and some come back part time and others come back years later. That could be disastrous for a small company or completely fine.

Thats the problem. We always want a simple answer to a really complex question. Its always a complex interplay of factors and I don't doubt that sometimes its plain sexism. Most companies won't spite themselves but they will try to look after themselves.

I think its very hard to make rules that protect workers rights to maternity/paternity whilst also protecting companies. If either side has the power then there will be plenty will to abuse it.

 

[MikeTheNative]

Loving the Boomer attitude in this thread. Remember kids, wanting enough money to live on, to be able to study something you might be interested in, demanding decent work-place conditions or to be with a fair shout of being hired if you're not a white male, is sheer entitlement.

And all the nice things that the Boomers enjoyed like final salary pensions, dirt cheap houses, good wages and free university places are all things they really deserved and their grandchildren wanting the same is also pure entitlement.

El oh el

Entitlement is the current group of retirees who didn't pay enough tax/pensions when working to be able to actually afford their pension and now ask for current crop of workers to foot the bill of their unsustainable pension.

 

[bigmike20vt]

@fez I agree again... I dated (in the loosest possible sense, it was a rebound after 1st wife ) a sister on a ward at local hospital. (edit I deleted the hospital.... am sure there are lots of sisters there but just in case its too close to outing someone)

despite her being 28 and without a child herself (and so fully admitting she was being biased against herself) she was utterly fed up at employing women nurses of a certain age as they were losing a huge amount of staff to maternity. She properly went off on one - to me not her staff - when her maternity cover nurse announced she was pregnant , and was adamant that that was it, she was going to positively descriminate on any men or women past the age of wanting kids should they apply.

not sure what happened as we parted ways after a short time.

I do see it from the side of the parents (after all i am one myself) but equally can see how much of a PITA it is for companies where a significant proportion of staff (exact amounts will depend on the job) are constantly leaving despite still getting full pay, and only coming back part time afterwards.

tricky one for sure.

 

[bigmike20vt]

Entitlement is the current group of retirees who didn't pay enough tax/pensions when working to be able to actually afford their pension and now ask for current crop of workers to foot the bill of their unsustainable pension.

Not saying I agree with this or not - after all they are only asking for what they ARE entitled...

but my grandad who died a few years back at....i think he was 94 but its close enough...... He retired at 52 on a golden handshake pension from ICI. (they made him redundant at 50 before realising they made a mistake so took him back on some sweet deal for a few years of which the pension was part of the deal)

by the time he died we worked out he had spent more of his life retired than he had working. Throughout my whole childhood i only ever knew him retired.

not a bad deal at all if you can get it!.... not many will now i imagine.