[HN Gopher] Strengthening our workplace with neurodiverse talent ___________________________________________________________________ Strengthening our workplace with neurodiverse talent Author : ingve Score : 57 points Date : 2021-07-26 17:55 UTC (5 hours ago) (HTM) web link (cloud.google.com) (TXT) w3m dump (cloud.google.com) | randompwd wrote: | Anything about making their workplace less coder hostile? | | Open plan office - great for sales, HR, marketing and reassuring | insecure managers/leaders/CEOs they have worth - not so great for | people who need to concentrate hard to solve hard problems and | write good code. | TrinaryWorksToo wrote: | Autism isn't a bad word. We don't talk about LGBTQ+ people as "on | the spectrum". | mariodiana wrote: | This is an old article, but it came to mind when I saw this. A | software testing company discovered that high-functioning people | with autism make good testers. | | https://blogthinkbig.com/autistic-people-software-testers | wlesieutre wrote: | One weird trick to make readers blindly click through your | cookie consent popover: put it in a different language than the | page content! | | https://i.imgur.com/lMz297U.png | [deleted] | robotnikman wrote: | Glad to see them taking the initiative to make interviews more | accommodating for people on the spectrum. | | As someone on the spectrum myself, I always dreaded job | interviews. I would try to get as much information on what the | interview would entail as well as the atmosphere and other | specifics so I could mentally prepare myself beforehand and give | myself a better chance to show my best side. The example they | provided of performing an interview in text through a google doc | rather than over the phone really hits home for me, I feel like I | am much better able to communicate my ideas through written | mediums than verbally. | | I feel overall there is a lot of untapped talent in the | neurodiverse community that is passed over due to some of these | barriers in effective communication, so I'm always glad to see | companies take initiatives like this. | Aaargh20318 wrote: | > As someone on the spectrum myself, I always dreaded job | interviews. I would try to get as much information on what the | interview would entail as well as the atmosphere and other | specifics so I could mentally prepare myself beforehand and | give myself a better chance to show my best side | | I'm on the spectrum as well and interviews are a bit of a mixed | bag for me. I hate everything around it, going to a new, | unknown location, not knowing exactly where you end up, meeting | new people, etc. | | The interviews themselves, however, are fine. I basically get | to talk about my special interest with people who are | presumably equally knowledgable about the subject as I am. I | usually enjoy them. | masterof0 wrote: | As someone on the spectrum as well, I have a question, if you | don't like meeting new people, how are you supposed to | collaborate with others? At Google at least, we need to work | with people across teams all the time. Or you are hoping for | a forever-remote gig? | Aaargh20318 wrote: | I choose to work for small companies/startups. Preferably | around 10-15 people. | | As small companies tend to grow, the trick is to get out in | time. At a previous job the company grew to over 150 and | that wasn't healthy for me. I should have bailed at around | 75. | ndthrowaway wrote: | And somehow, this dissonance meshes fine with | allowing/encouraging their management chain to run roughshod over | [neuro and other]diverse employees. Eyeroll at best. | renewiltord wrote: | Fascinating. An interesting consequence of Google's search ads | business's rampant success is that they get to run experiments | like this at low risk to themselves. The advantage they have over | the government is that they have a vested interest in making it | succeed - access to an additional labour force - and a vested | interest in letting go if it fails - they are still subject to | fiduciary duty. | | If they open up this stuff, it'll be a win-win for Google and | sufficiently neurodivergent people. | | Reminds me of that old joke about Bill Gates deciding that the | best way to help humanity was to impose a corporate tax via MS | Office and then use that to build toilets in Africa. | endisneigh wrote: | This is great, but I don't see anything that's done specifically | for autism. What's described[1] would benefit everyone across the | neuro-spectrum, and that's great. My question would be why they | weren't already doing these things? Better late than never, they | say. | | [1] - coaching, ongoing support for them and teammates once | joining, offer extended time, provide questions in advance, | conduct interview in writing | | One thing people always forget is that these sort of | accommodations exist in the beginning for one group, but everyone | benefits and that's how we move forward. Perfect example of this | are ramps, which originally existed for those who were physically | handicapped. | Lapsa wrote: | read title. sounds stupid | PradeetPatel wrote: | Hopefully this will help to create a more diverse and inclusive | workforce. Neurodiversity is very underlooked in the tech | industry. | claudiulodro wrote: | I'd say I'm a solid developer (at least that's what my employers | have always said!), but I've always really bombed in-person/live | interviews. I think it was probably a personality thing, as I'm | pretty all-over-the-place when speaking in person. In text | though, I can polish my thoughts before sending them! | | Automattic had (and still has) an interview process that was | fully text-based via a combination of Slack, p2, and GitHub, and | it _really_ worked well for me. I didn 't even speak to a person | (on video) until a couple weeks into starting the job! | | A completely text-based interview process works great for a | variety of people: neurodiverse, people with accents/ESL, fidgety | people, etc. Especially for remote companies where everyone | communicates using text 90%+ of the time! I'm glad it's catching | on, and I hope to see it expanded to more companies. | pyb wrote: | "We will offer candidates in this program reasonable | accommodations like extended interview time, providing questions | in advance, or conducting the interview in writing in a Google | Doc rather than verbally on a call." | | These would great practices for any job interview, whether the | interviewee is on the spectrum or not. | | Providing questions in advance (behavioral at least) would make | the interview process a lot better for everybody. | | The possibility to answer the more involved questions in writing | would also be a great plus overall. | [deleted] | kbelder wrote: | Aren't 'neurodiverse' people over-represented in IT/Computer | Science, compared to their fraction of the population? Is trying | to increase their share even further the correct way path to | take? | | If we're talking about the general workforce, instead of | specifically tech fields, that would make sense. | andai wrote: | Yes, they're already a large share, and they hate the existing | interviewing process, as well as most office environments (and | the politics that go along with it). | brighton36 wrote: | Over-representation assumes that there's an objective taxonomy | by which representation can be factored. I find it very amusing | that no one thinks of this, and/or can't bring this 'obvious' | fact to light. "Imagined Communities" is a good book on some of | this, if anyone cares to read more. I suspect that there's a | lot of civil religion at work, that causes these taxonomies to | not immediately appear assumptive. I would guess that we'll | lose these components of the civil religion, over time, as a | consequence to these initiatives. | tgsovlerkhgsel wrote: | A more reasonable metric to use seems to be whether a group is | over/underrepresented in a company _compared to the available | workforce_ (not overall population), and I 'm not sure whether | neurodiverse people are overrepresented by that metric. | | However, even more important would be to try to give everyone a | fair chance, as opposed to trying to meet some metrics which | can often lead to discrimination | (https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo- | way/2018/03/02/590346891...). | | Since neurodiversity isn't one of the "popular" | diversity/social justice topics, I suspect the main motivation | here is to avoid missing applicants that are technically | skilled and suitable, but may not do well in the interview | process due to their neurodiversity. | RivieraKid wrote: | Do they still force candidates to think out loud while solving a | problem? | dolni wrote: | There is a lot of this that seems poorly thought through. | | Asking for an employee's medical records is forbidden. Asking an | employee to undergo a medical exam is forbidden. Asking questions | about the employee's health or disabilities during the interview | process is forbidden. See https://www.eeoc.gov/pre-employment- | inquiries-and-medical-qu.... | | With all that said, what prevents anybody from saying "I don't | feel comfortable taking a phone call" or "I need extra time for | this" without actually being autistic? Then the disadvantage they | claim to be removing hasn't actually gone anywhere. | Causality1 wrote: | What's the problem with that? If someone has trouble with phone | interviews why should a diagnosis be a barrier to being able to | give the best performance they can? | TrinaryWorksToo wrote: | Also forcing people to use accommodations they don't want is | illegal. | donkeyd wrote: | Well, for one thing it's hiring people who may not be the | stereotypical "cultural fit". I've always been a massive | proponent of hiring based on "cultural fit", but have recently | started to realize it can get really toxic that way. | | Hiring people who are good at their jobs, but may be different | in a social setting can be a way of indirectly hiring people on | the spectrum. If you have many extroverted employees, hiring | more introverted people will inevitably lead to hiring people | on the spectrum. | | How do you judge this? Well, personality tests are pretty | common already, they can absolutely show traits that are more | common in people with autism. Also, an interview can tell you a | lot about a person. | jdgoesmarching wrote: | I've always thought "cultural fit" was an odd thing to | prioritize when we have research showing that (actual) | diversity is more helpful for avoiding groupthink. Especially | when this term is just begging for bias to creep in. | | One lesson that stuck with me was the Houston Rockets GM | putting some barriers around how emotional judgments were | allowed to influence decisions. Small rules like "don't give | players nicknames" or just giving less weight to personal | interviews were good experiments in how to keep screenings | more objective. We don't have the granularity or | measurability of new hire data as NBA offices do, but I think | these concepts are still useful. | bitwize wrote: | > I've always thought "cultural fit" was an odd thing to | prioritize when we have research showing that (actual) | diversity is more helpful for avoiding groupthink. | | Astronaut 1: You mean... our work culture is conducive to | groupthink? | | Astronaut 2: * points gun * Always has been... | dolni wrote: | You raise good points and I am of the mind that this is a | difficult problem without silver bullets. | | I don't believe there is any way to create and vet a "100% | bias-free guaranteed" interview process. | | That said, our industry does have a reputation for being | especially unwelcoming to women. It would be a shame if a | candidate raised red flags and those flags went undetected or | ignored in an attempt to be "inclusive". | jawns wrote: | The new trend is hiring for "culture add" rather than | "culture fit." In other words, not trying to determine | whether a person fits in with everybody else, but trying to | determine whether what they bring to the table is something | new and beneficial. | | My own engineering team still uses the term "culture fit," | but I recently helped refine our interviewing guidelines to | make it more clear what we mean: | | "We are assessing the _candidate 's_ comfort level with our | processes, priorities, frequency of change, etc. Assessments | should never reflect an _interviewer 's_ comfort level with | any candidate's culture, personal attributes, etc." | hunter2_ wrote: | Regardless of what you aim for regarding culture, culture | itself seems like the sort of thing that people can't | readily change about themselves (just like you can't expect | people to change their religion, even though technically | they're free to do so in many cases), and for that reason, | culture seems like it should be among the protected classes | that shouldn't be used for hiring decisions. Sticking to | whether they can get the job done, as cold as that sounds, | seems most equal-opportunity IMHO. | enkid wrote: | I mean, why make people do a phone call if it doesn't actually | help with the interview process? | dolni wrote: | It does help with the interview process. A lot of | communication lies in body language and tone of voice. Taking | that out of the equation, absent a good reason, is going to | eliminate useful information. | | Some people might exhibit behaviors that are problematic in a | professional environment. To go into a hiring decision | without that information would be a mistake, in my opinion. | enkid wrote: | I would need to see some sort of evidence that a phone call | can identify problematic behaviour in a systematic way | before I would by into this. | dolni wrote: | It's well established that tone of voice conveys a lot of | information when communicating. | | If a candidate says something during a phone call that | makes the interviewer uncomfortable or have reservations, | that's absolutely a legitimate reason not to hire | someone. | enkid wrote: | Yes, tone provides a lot of information, but can someone | accurately ascertain whether that tone will lead to | problematic behaviour? I don't know. I would want to see | some sort of research before accepting that this does | what you say it does. | | Certainly, if someone were to say something sexist or | racist in an interview, that would be a red flag. But I | doubt most people would do that. So maybe you are able to | weed some people out, but probably not very effectively, | and you will likely still have to have other mitigations | in place. In additions, you will have "false positives" | in the form of people being misread. For example, they | could be saying something genuinely and the interviewer | thinks they are lying or being sarcastic. Are the false | positives worth the true positives? I don't know. That's | why I would want to see actual evidence. | dolni wrote: | I think the most useful context for tone would be to weed | out people who display anger, irritation, or snark. | Especially when the situation doesn't call for it. | | > In additions, you will have "false positives" in the | form of people being misread. For example, they could be | saying something genuinely and the interviewer thinks | they are lying or being sarcastic. | | Text alone makes this far more ambiguous. You're going to | have _way_ more trouble gauging someone's actual intent | via words alone than vs words + tone of voice. | | That's the point I was making. Tone of voice is a ton of | information. Don't take my word for it, feel free to | Google it and you will find pages and pages outlining | just how important it is. | wadefletch wrote: | I think that's very true in the context of sales jobs, or | more generally anything that requires the same action of | frequent, mission-critical person-to-person communication. | | I'm not so sure it applies in the context of a remote SWE. | dolni wrote: | That's kind of a tone-deaf thing to say, _especially_ | given the recent allegations surrounding Activison- | Blizzard | (https://www.npr.org/2021/07/22/1019293032/activision- | blizzar...). | | It absolutely applies and is important. | tgsovlerkhgsel wrote: | I suspect that you may need to actively request these as an | accommodation, and I suspect a lot of these restrictions go out | the window then. [1] says "When an applicant asks for an | accommodation for the job interview, the employer can require | medical documentation." | | That also means that depending on how this is implemented, | people who aren't aware of it, too shy, undiagnosed, or don't | want their diagnosis on the record everywhere may not benefit | from this at all. OTOH, some of the training may improve the | situation in general, even when no accommodation has been | requested. | | [1] https://askjan.org/articles/Job-Application-Interview- | Stage-... | TrinaryWorksToo wrote: | The employer can require medical documentation, but the | documentation forbids disclosing a diagnosis. | dsr_ wrote: | One of the best things about accomodations is that they benefit | nearly everyone. | | Ramps instead of stairs? Necessary for wheelchairs, but good | for elderly knees and people temporarily on crutches or roller | scooters. | | Keyboard of your choice? Necessary if you have low motor | control, still good for preventing people from getting RSIs. | | Interview in writing instead of via voice? Guess what: benefits | Deaf people, those who are hard of hearing, and people who have | difficulty speaking. | [deleted] | andai wrote: | Also plain old social anxiety and performance anxiety! | H8crilA wrote: | Interviews via Docs will have an even higher cheating rate | than the phone calls, can't wait to hear stories about that, | lol. | avianlyric wrote: | That why you have multiple stages. | | It's stupid to rule out accommodations because people might | cheat. You shouldn't punish the innocent majority for the | transgressions of the guilty minority. | dolni wrote: | > You shouldn't punish the innocent majority for the | transgressions of the guilty minority. | | Have you stopped to think about just how much stuff we | have to do and put up with as a society because a small | number of people are dishonest? | | We have to have IDs, because people might lie about who | they are. | | We have to have an entire (very expensive) criminal | justice system because people might commit crimes. | | We have to have locks on the doors to our homes and | vehicles, because people might trespass. | | We have to have cashiers and overly-complicated automated | registers (with someone watching) because people might | not want to pay for everything that they are taking out | of a store. | | You show up at a closing for a new home, they want a | cashier's check, not your personal one. Why? You might | not actually be good for the money. Plus they do all the | title work. | | Every bank has a giant safe. Every country has some | weapons of war. | | It's very idealistic to say "well only a few people will | cheat so it's fine." It isn't, and it never has been. | vharuck wrote: | >We have to have locks on the doors to our homes and | vehicles, because people might trespass. | | But most of us don't have metal bars over our homes' | windows. There's a middle ground of making bad behavior | mildly inconvenient. | | Also, all of your examples are precautions born from | experience. There have been burglars and shoplifters for | centuries, so it makes sense to have some preventions. | When deciding whether to try something new, it can be | counterproductive to focus a lot on preventing cheating. | I'd suggest seeing if it ever becomes a problem worth | addressing. | dolni wrote: | People have been cheating on tests for as long as tests | have been around. That is born from experience. | | You haven't made any compelling argument to support why a | job interview would be different in that regard. | dolni wrote: | Sure, they do benefit everyone, but you missed the point I | was making. The point is that they claim it is to level a | playing field, but they're not actually doing that if those | accommodations are open to everybody. | | Your comparison also comes off a bit disingenuous. They're | talking about interview accommodations like "providing | questions in advance" and "extended interview time". | tshaddox wrote: | But again, who is harmed by extending these accommodations | to everyone? | dolni wrote: | Well, for one thing, if you have "normal" employees who | can conduct a regular interview process, they might raise | some red flags in how they conduct themselves in person | that wouldn't be apparent in a remote setting. | | One example could be that an interviewee inappropriately | stares at a woman or makes an inappropriate remark while | on-campus. You wouldn't see that if the entire interview | were conducted only via Google Docs. | avianlyric wrote: | Your making the assumption that the accommodations are | meant to provide some sort of "advantage" to compensate for | some other "disadvantage". Like dealing with disabilities | is some sort of arithmetic problem. | | Accommodations just provide optionality, and let's people | choose the approach that suites them best. Rather than | assuming that you can fairly apply some rigid standardised | test on people, and expect it to accurately measure | individuals. There's plenty of data, and some pretty basic | stats, which show this doesn't work. | | Proving extra time provides almost no advantage to anyone. | Either you can answer the questions well, or you can't. The | amount of time it takes to do isn't very relevant, so | taking more time isn't an advantage. | | Providing questions in advance also isn't an advantage. | Again you can either answer them well or not. If you're | worried about people cheating by passing the questions | around, then only provide them an hour or two in advanced, | or only once they're onsite. | | If you're interview process can be fooled by giving people | more time, or advanced notice, then quite frankly it's not | a very good interview process. | spfzero wrote: | Why would time not be highly relevant to job performance? | Productivity is defined as an amount of work output | (whatever that is for the job in question), divided by | time. So time is in fact central, and a team member who | can do more in a unit of time should be more desirable, | no? | maininformer wrote: | Not that simple. Time is usually a quarter not an hour. | The amount of work is intermingled with value, perceived | or actual. | dolni wrote: | Of course it is that simple. A quarter is made up of a | bunch of hours. | | Nobody is asking an interviewee to have a full product | prototype ready for demo inside an hour. What they do is | present some problem to you and ask you to reason through | it. | | Being able to work out pitfalls in a design early, rather | than several weeks in, saves a lot of time and money. | | So in short, yes. It is that simple. | Twisol wrote: | > A quarter is made up of a bunch of hours. | | And a sandpile is made up of a bunch of grains of sand. | [0] It's identically disingenuous to suggest that such a | difference in quantity does _not_ manifest a difference | in quality. | | I don't think your point is necessarily a bad one, but | you're leaving a lot of opportunity for people to dismis | it. | | [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sorites_paradox | projectazorian wrote: | Might be relevant if the person's job is to answer | interview questions all day, but in practice this is | hardly ever the case. | hunter2_ wrote: | All else being equal, productivity might drop. But by | hiring some less productive people as well, there are | likely some non-productivity-related benefits to be | enjoyed, such as broader brainstorming about how to make | the product/service work well for a more diverse set of | customers, and whatever value might be created by the | morale boost (people generally like to do good) along the | way. | Jabbles wrote: | Do you have an example of a question or interview process | that you think fits your description? I think a standard | tech-company interview has a lot of time pressure, and | providing more time would help many candidates | considerably. | a1369209993 wrote: | > I think a standard tech-company interview has a lot of | time pressure, and providing more time would help many | candidates considerably. | | ... and? A office that's accessable only by ladder has a | lot of leg pressure, and providing wheelchair ramps would | help many employees considerably too, regardless of | whether they're wheelchair-bound. | dolni wrote: | That's a ridiculous comparison. | | Time pressure is directly tied to performance. | | Sometimes, stuff breaks and wouldn't it be great if it | got fixed in half an hour instead of four hours? | | Projects sometimes have deadlines. | | You are not talking about an accommodation made for | something unrelated to the job, here. This is some gold- | level mental gymnastics. | endisneigh wrote: | > With all that said, what prevents anybody from saying "I | don't feel comfortable taking a phone call" or "I need extra | time for this" without actually being autistic? Then the | disadvantage they claim to be removing hasn't actually gone | anywhere. | | Nothing. A small minority of people gaming the system shouldn't | necessarily mean you get rid of accommodations. | dolni wrote: | It doesn't mean you have to get rid of them, but you should | probably think about what the pitfalls are and how best to | address them. I have written about those elsewhere in this | thread, so I won't repeat them here. | sircastor wrote: | Part of accommodating people who have a disability is | introducing equity and equality into the process, and making it | possible for all candidates to use those options. There might | be a perception that one route is easier than another, and if | that's the case, it's a failure on the part of the interview | process. | | Options provided for equality and equity are not supposed to | ease requirements for a subset of people, but ensure that their | evaluation doesn't punish or discount them. | dolni wrote: | Do the accommodations as stated not make you think that | cheating an interview will become very easy? | | "I need extra time for my interview" and "I'm uncomfortable | with a phone call" sounds like a very easy way to get third | party help without anybody being the wiser. | | And again, that flies in the face of their attempt to | actually level the playing field. | phreeza wrote: | I am not an expert on the American legal system, but it seems | like that would be fraud and thus a criminal matter. Companies | could report suspected cases to the authorities. This here | seems to be a case from the educational system where similar | issues can arise: https://www.vox.com/first- | person/2019/3/14/18265874/college-... | dreyfan wrote: | Seriously? The charges in the admissions scandal had to do | with mail fraud and bribery. Do you really think the American | judicial system is going to get involved because some Google | employees skipped a meeting by claiming they were Autistic? ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2021-07-26 23:00 UTC)