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Search - "canada day"
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continued…
I'm In Canada. A woke HR lady hires an African guy despite him plagiarizing code and lying through an interview. First day he surfs soccer websites so I confront it and HR lady basically calls me a racist and to watch my back.
A second African new-hire comes into the office today and he seems quite capable in an area of specialization for our team. So I ask if we can have him on our team because he has skills. The exec decides to look at the costing for him and goes, "HOLY SHIT WHY ARE WE PAYING ANYONE THAT MUCH?" She looks at the résumé of the new guy and finds out that he is only at intermediate level in his specialization. So I say, "It could be worse. The other guy flat out lied through his interview and he got hired anyway." I forward the emails where I recommended against hiring the other guy and why.
My exec, who is a company stakeholder, opens the pricing list for recent hires. It is obvious that if you are not not white you get paid way above market value for your skill level. Exec is pissed off on a level I never knew was possible.
We make a call from the board room only to find out that the head of HR (also an executive) is driving this. My exec tells me to give her the room. The yelling was so loud everyone could hear what was said from outside the boardroom. At one point the HR lady says, "Just because we could get them cheaper doesn't mean that we should… We pay that much because it is 'the right thing to do'." My executive goes completely silent for a few seconds then in a super aggressive way says.
"…I am going to have your FUCKING head for this. Then I will make sure that you NEVER get a job in HR again for the rest of my natural life. ONLY ONE of us will survive this. YOU are the one pissing away profit. So get ready because I'm going to drown you and your team like a bag full of unwanted puppies." Then she hung up the Polycom. She came out about a minute later and kicked the office manager out of his office and sat there all day making calls and sending emails.
https://devrant.com/rants/2337768/...33 -
First rant.
Managing an app in Canada, came back home to Thailand to visit my parents.
No deployments while you're gone, just bug fixes, boss said.
Landed at 3am, "hey I know we only support desktop but we got new customers only on iPad, make it responsive in a day and deploy." Wtf.
Haven't even seen my parents. In Starbucks.15 -
> In office for first time in awhile
> Run into group of 4 people I don’t recognize in far cubicle corning laughing in hushed voices eating of an impressive spread of food
> See me and immediately look at each other with panicked expressions
> Confused, I put my hands up to indicate I come in peace
> They relax a little and say they thought I was from HR since they didn’t recognize me
> Ask why HR seeing them would be such a big deal
> They say their potluck is not “sanctioned”
> …?
So apparently HR just could resist ruining one of the only good things about coming into the office and one of the coolest things about the company’s culture. At least once a month there would be a giant potluck where everyone would bring some home cooked dish and share it. I can’t tell you how amazing these are in Canada, 50+ plates of authentic food from all over the world.
Unfortunately HR didn’t agree as 1. They didn’t cook so felt bad taking food. 2. Nobody asked them permission to put on these events they just happened organically. 3. Some people were bringing in food that they felt was culturally inappropriate (ie. caucasian guy bringing in homemade sushi).
HR recently banned all “unsanctioned” potlucks and all future potlucks needed to be approved through them with the following stipulations. 1. You could participate without bringing something by donating to HR $10 2. If you brought something you still had to give HR $10. 3. Things you brought in had to be approved by HR
Naturally the first and only potluck under these rules only 4 people brought something in as many couldn’t get their dishes approved because HR didn’t like what they were planning to bring (started out as being because culture and turned into HR just being picky), most just brought $10 so there wasn’t enough food to go around and so after HR took a giant group photo to post on the company’s social media accounts to show off how good the company’s culture is most everyone had to go out for lunch. HR sent out an email later that day exclaiming what a huge success for charity and the company brand the potluck was and they can’t wait for the next one. (I have the HR communications email marked as spam so I never saw the email). Nobody ever organized a sanctioned potluck after that.
However people still missed cooking and sharing their favourite recipes with one another so potlucks still occur but they are now very small, secret, invite-only, hush-hush affairs.
…What in the ever loving fuck22 -
Im gunna get a lot of flak for this but just hear me out:
People keep asking me what it's like working in a male dominated industry. They have conferences for women in tech empowerment and I get forced to go to them because I'm the only female in the office.
The thing is. I don't feel oppressed. I get that we "need" more women in tech but from my experience and from talking to various women at my old university, the reason women are avoiding the tech industry isn't because it's male dominated and they feel out of place. It's because a) it doesn't interest them or b) they never thought of it as an option (like myself).
Computer programming should be in grade schools and highschool's just like math and science to help educated not only women but people in general that it's an option. That's what's going to help more women get in the tech industry. Not these bullshit conferences and women's rights in tech movements, and hiring women over men (even if she's worse than him in skill level) just because she's a woman.
Frankly I think it's downright shameful that companies that are male dominated feel the need to hire women over men just because of gender. If I'm applying somewhere and there's a better male candidate, hire him! I'd much rather your company have a good team then a "balanced" team. Great tech teams are what will bring along new and better technologies, not balanced ones.
Keep in mind I'm talking about Western Civilization here, I get that a lot of countries are still struggling with the balance of women's rights at all but this is Canada.
I also get that there are probably some women who want to join tech but won't because it's too male dominated but frankly that's a shit poor excuse. If you really wanted to join tech then being surrounded by make co-workers wouldn't deter you from living your life the way you want to. If you feel so uncomfortable around men that you won't go into an industry you love because it's male dominated then I'm sorry for you and you should probably see a councillor to get that worked out.
I feel more oppressed by having to put aside my programming and being forced to go to these conferences than I do in the every day workplace. My boss is literally more offended that I don't feel offended about being a woman "minority". He spent a week pestering me about how I would feel about this, that and the other thing if it happened to me.
I'm not saying nobody ever says anything even remotely sexist to me but frankly I could give two shits- I'm here. I'm coding. I'm good at what I do and I'm comfortable enough with myself that I can just blow off the comment (which probably wasn't even meant to offend me) and continue working. But you're going to get that wherever you go, this isn't a flaw of the tech industry. This is a flaw of the world and it goes both ways (men get flak too).26 -
Tooday
Movie sucks
Games sucks
Most programmers sucks
Buying a house sucks
Try to get a grocery under 200$ for nothing sucks
Have child with no future other then capitalisme sucks
Friends that don't take any news in 8 years sucks
Have a girlfriend that don't sucks sucks
Buying pricey shit and thinking i will survive at least 10 years and broke after 3 years with warranty sucks
All social platforms sucks ( other then devrant)
Working for a shit salairy and doing everyone jobs sucks
Lossing mind about idiots in our world sucks
My english sucks
You sucks
My water heater sucks
My landlord sucks
My budget sucks
My old 16 years old bike i use to go work sucks
Government sucks
House builder sucks at 80%
Bank fuck you everytime sucks
Taxes for any service sucks
Medical system in canada sucks
Educational system in canada sucks
Goes on each day i realize something sucks...12 -
Be a fellow who's distracted af. You just had a presentation in another city. You're driving home and a light lits up saying you need gas. You stop at the petrol station, pour in some gas, grab a cop of joe while you're at it, pay and leave. You're 15minutes away from the gas stop already and an unknown number is calling you. You pick it up. A male voice says
Voice: "hello, this is police. Did you just leave a gas stop 15 minutes ago?"
You: *wtf, what the fuck did I do now!* "yes, I sure did."
Voice: "you forgot to pay for the fuel"
you: *oh shit, he's right! I remember now - I only paid for the coffee! Shit! I'm in trouble now. *
"oh.. Right, you're right, I forgot... I'll turn around and come back to pay
Voice: "wait, don't rush, I may be able to help you. I'll call you back, keep your phone close" *hangs up*
5 minutes later phone rings again.
Voice: "can you pull over, please? Here's a phone number of that gas stop. Give them a call, I'm sure you'll sort it our. Have a nice day!" *hangs up*
you call that number. A woman picks up.
You: "hello, I forgot to pay you for the gas, gimme a few minutes - I'll turn around and get back to you"
Operator: "do not worry, I think I can help you! You can pay for it at your home town if you like, but I'm afraid they might not be working today. But they will tomorrow! Would that be OK for you?"
you: "umm, yeah, of course! It's my fault - anything is OK for me!"
operator: "ooorrr.. I could pay for you now and you would pay me back. Would that work? Here's my bank account, I'll pay for you when you send me those 50 something €"
a fantasy story? Made up story? Bed time stories? Dysney movie plot? Phishing? Canada?
No. This is Lithuania :) believe it or not, this is a true story, and there are more like this one.
Respect to the police!12 -
A tale of silos, pivots, and mismanagement.
Background: Our consultancy has been working with this client for over a year now. It started with some of our back-end devs working on the API.
We are in Canada. The client is located in the US. There are two other teams in Canada. The client has an overseas company contracted to do the front-end of the app. And at the time we started, there was a 'UX consultancy' also in the US.
I joined the project several months in to replace the then-defunct UX company. I was the only UX consultant on the project at that time. I was also to build out a functional front-end 'prototype' (Vue/Scss) ahead of the other teams so that we could begin tying the fractured arms of the product together.
At this point there was a partial spec for the back-end, a somewhat architected API, a loose idea of a basic front-end, and a smattering of ideas, concepts, sketches, and horrific wireframes scattered about various places online.
At this point we had:
One back-end
One front-end
One functional prototype
One back-end Jira board
One front-end Jira board
No task-management for UX
You might get where this is going...
None of the teams had shared meetings. None of the team leads spoke to each other. Each team had their own terms, their own trajectory, and their own goals.
Just as our team started pushing for more alignment, and we began having shared meetings, the client decided to pivot the product in another direction.
Now we had:
One back-end
One original front-end
One first-pivot front-end
Two functional prototypes
One front-end Jira board
One back-end Jira board
No worries. We're professionals. We do this all the time. We rolled with it and we shifted focus to a new direction, with the same goals in mind internally to keep things aligned and moving along.
Slowly, the client hired managers to start leading everything in the same direction. Things started to look up. The back-end team and the product and UX teams started aligning goals and working toward the same objectives.
Then the client shifted directions again. This time bigger. More 'verticals'. I was to leave the previous 'prototypes' behind, and feature-freeze them to work on the new direction.
One back-end
One conceptual 'new' back-end
One original front-end
One first-pivot front-end
One 'all verticals' front-end
One functional prototype
One back-end Jira board
One front-end Jira board
One product Jira board
One UX Jira board
Meanwhile, the back-end team, the front-end team overseas, all kept moving in the previously agreed-upon direction.
At this stage, probably 6 months in, the 'prototypes' were much less proper 'prototypes' but actually just full apps (with a stubbed back-end since I was never given permission or support to access the actual back-end).
The state of things today:
Back to one back-end
One original front-end
One first-pivot front-end
One 'all verticals' front-end
One 'working' front-end
One 'QA' front-end
One 'demo' front-end
One functional prototype
One back-end Jira board
Two front-end Jira boards
One current product Jira board
One future product Jira board
One current UX Jira board
One future UX Jira board
One QA Jira board
I report to approximately 4 people remotely (depending on the task or the week).
There are three representatives from 'product' who dictate features and priorities (they often do not align).
I still maintain the 'prototype' to this day. The front-end team does not have access to the code of this 'prototype' (the clients' request). The client's QA team does not test against the 'prototype'.
The demos of the front-end version of the product include peanut-gallery design-by-committee 'bug call-outs', feature requests, and scope creep by attendees in the dozens from all manner of teams and directors.4 -
!rant
So, today's the day.
I'm moving to Canada! Super excited, but kind tired of all the moving around I did throughout the years...
Wish me luck 😊
Also, how many of you have moved countries at some point, as with our profession it seems quite easy?6 -
I don't think ranters here from first world countries (US/UK/Canada etc) realize what a big deal it is when companies from these countries hire South Asian companies (like India, Pakistan, Bangladesh) for their out-sourcing work.
I have seen some career building centers with people giving testimonials like "My mother tongue is Hindi and I was always afraid to talk to US/UK clients. But now that I took a course here, I can talk to them with confidence.".
People here throw themselves at these companies' feet begging for a contract. Gotta get that currency converted bag am I right?
I worked at a company and one day someone from London hired us for work and the boss threw a small party cuz "Someone from LONDON is hiring us omg".
Makes me wonder, this is why third world countries like us have such a good IT infrastructure.1 -
What's your company's vacation accrual and yearly carry over, and where is your company located?
I've got a deal of 5 days carryover per year and 1.25 day accumulated per month, in canada.3 -
!rant
So, at this day I have two jobs as software engineer (I'm self thought). The first one with a friend from high school, a billing platform. The engineer he had flew to Canada and leave him with nothing, so I made one from scratch, I couldn't deliver on time and most of the clients he had moved to another services so the benefits of the deal I made with him ended being less than expected (there was a deadline set by our government as these clients are merchants and the Costa Rican IRS equivalent is moving everybody to electronic billing to mitigate tax evasion). The backend was done using Go, the front-end with React and MobX.
Then, the second job. I'm being staffed to a big outsourcing company for a North American business. The engineer team is small compared to the other departments and the people are really nice. Their stack is Python and React, I'm the only guy allowed to use a different editor than Neovim (Emacs in my case).
between the two I work 11 hours per day, and I'm satisfied with this.
This is way better than my old CS job at Amazon Spain where I couldn't use Emacs to have a decent text editing experience.
Thanks, Lord.2