Yelp didn't make her move, or make her take out high-interest loans, or promise any certain job stability based on performance. It isn't relevant to Yelp that she's a single mother. And on and on and on. So much of what is written here seems to be failure to take responsibility for questionable decisions and irrational expectations.
Isn't that attitude the issue at hand though? Large corporations (this one has north of 3k employees and is pulling in hundreds of millions in revenue) shouldn't be able to treat their employees like replaceable trash instead of human beings to save a few bucks.
Ironically, if I had a family tragedy and asked for leave at the small company I work for that makes very few profits, they'd give me the thumbs up instantly. You'd think the super rich corporations would have an easier time accommodating that, but some of them just refuse if it means a few bucks out of the pocket of John Q Millionaire.
This is precisely why our parents' generation had far more robust unions: they got paid higher wages, and got treated with a lot more dignity over it. Even if unions weren't perfect, they prevent a few millionaires at the top from stomping all over the little people.
> they got paid higher wages, and got treated with a lot more dignity over it
This. But I guess working conditions will need to go back to early 20th century ones for people to find out how low can things go without bargaining power.
Would she be offered such position if the company didn't "treat their employees like replaceable trash instead of human beings to save a few bucks"?
Performance-based sales in any industry (Internet ads, Yellow pages ads, timeshares, used cars) are known for high pace and high turnover. Companies are quick to hire, but also quick to fire.
If you told the company they were entering a long-term relationship with an employee, and it wouldn't be that easy to get rid of them, the employer would suddenly get very selective, and the candidate would probably have to show years of past sales experience, recommendations from previous employers, go through a few rounds of interviews, etc.
They are not treating employees like replaceable 'trash'. They are treating employees like replaceable workers.
And this relationship goes both ways. Employees can treat their employers as replaceable. Although I haven't seen an equivalent loaded word for 'trash' in this scenario.
And there is no reason to believe that the only reason she was fired was because she wanted days off. Based on her own testimony, which is the best version of the events for her, she had many times used leaves to care for her children and put her manager in a 'difficult position'. So she would have been marked as a bad employee.
As for the union. A union of sellers of anything is called a cartel and is illegal, but if it's a union of sellers of labour then it is suddenly the shining beacon of equality. The only real difference is that union of sellers have way more voting power.
> Large corporations (this one has north of 3k employees and is pulling in hundreds of millions in revenue)
The statistic 'revenue' is well chosen to support your point, because they also posted a net loss in 2015, and 2013, and 2012 and 2011, all in the order of tens of millions of dollars, so while they have a lot of receipts they don't actually have any spare cash.
Companies, big or small, have some quota of instances where they can engage in charity instead of business (that is, make decisions on the basis of their humanitarian value rather than how much they increase net revenue), sometimes they literally engage in charity outside of the company (sponsoring good causes) and sometimes they engage in charity inside the company.
However, if they exceed their quota, they go bankrupt, and then they are incapable of engaging in any future charity and also everyone who works for them gets fired. Companies who consistently lose money (like Yelp) have a lower quota for charity than companies who consistently post profits.
This sounds like manipulating the circumstances so it only benefits the organisation. When tech companies are having hard time, they expect employees to put extra hours because "you are a part of a team and you have to save the ship". When company is doing better, they expect employees do their job and their circumstances are not their responsibility.
This is the first time on HN I'm actually sad I don't have enough karma to downvote a post.
"It isn't relevant to Yelp that she's a single mother". There are so many things wrong with this statement that I can't even begin to answer. To quote something I found yesterday:
“The amount of energy necessary to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude bigger than to produce it.”
When my father died last year, I was immediately offered (without me even asking for) up to two weeks payed leave. And they didn't call me the next day to give me an ultimatum.
Of course the company didn't care that my father died. No one outside of my team even knew. But my immediate supervisor did. And he did everything he could to help me get through. Because he's a human, not a corporate drone.
However deep or shallow a company's hierarchy may be, at each level there are discreet human beings.
You lucked into working for a pretty great company, then. I couldn't imagine being offered unsolicited extra paid time off from any company I've ever worked for, regardless of reason. The mantra these days seems to be: companies exist to squeeze as much value out of employees as they can whilst paying as little as they possibly can. If, as a company, you're not doing this, you're going to get outcompeted by companies who are.
> I was immediately offered (without me even asking for) up to two weeks payed leave.
That was really good of them. My hope is that the author (and everyone) will choose to work for a company that would be as good to her as yours was to you.
But a job is just an offer. The employer can't ensure that the offer makes sense for any individual's situation. I personally think Yelp's offer totally sucks, but my situation is different from others', so I look for whether or not they were deceptive or failed to hold up their end of the deal. Were they? Right now I'm not seeing it.
> I look for whether or not they were deceptive or failed to hold up their end of the deal.
Does that even matter? The way her manager treated her was utter crap and that reflects badly upon the whole company. Her article is a subjective accounting of what happened, and I truly believe most of it is true. Having an accurate, objective picture of the situation is impossible.
> The way her manager treated her was utter crap and that reflects badly upon the whole company.
Was the way her manager treated her a violation of their agreement? If it was, we should condemn Yelp, or at least that manager. If on the other hand Yelp was acting in accordance with the agreement, why are you talking as if your values should be important in an agreement you aren't a party to?
I guess it comes down to, do you think adults should be able to make deals as they see fit? Or just ones you think are nice?
Companies are run by people and exist because they have value to people. Entitlement or not, it is extremely distressing to see people argue that the employees of companies are not worthy of a little bit of sympathy by their own coworkers.
