Favoritism in the workplace

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Federal agency. Slightly attractive women get special treatment.

This is something I've heard about. I would go even further, though, and say that slightly attractive women who indulge flirting get special treatment. I know someone who was in a situation where she could've gotten special treatment. She was attractive, but she shut down the flirting, and it impacted her in a negative way. Another person didn't shut it down, and that person definitely got special treatment (as in certain male managers fell all over themselves to help her career).

This is one area that I think is tricky for women. And you would think it's just an issue for women who aren't conventionally attractive (as in they get slighted), but it's also an issue for women who are average or above average attractive but don't like a certain kind of attention from male superiors and send a clear message that it is unwelcome.

I don't really see how to change it. It's a difficult thing to prove. And most often, the attention skirts the edge of harassment. So it doesn't rise to the level of making any kind of official complaint. It's more subtle than that. At least that's the situation the person I know confronted.

I think that the sad reality is that managers -- of both sexes -- tend to treat more favorably the people who make them feel good. So even some female managers will advance and promote the people who tend to flatter them the most or make them feel liked.

I'd love to hear some positive stories about how someone effectively dealt with this sort of thing and was able to strike a balance.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Some of the worst environments for favoritism are huge old companies and organizations. I've read that a ridiculously high percentage of generals/admirals are blood relatives of former generals/admirals. And I work for a big company (not a family company by any means) where the same is true about company executives.

I think this is because old companies and organizations tend to promote from within. So people rise up in a certain culture and then just perpetuate that culture. They don't get new approaches to management because the people who become managers have been kind of indoctrinated into that way of managing. People get used to the friends and family plan, the idea that you help the people with whom you are friendly and have a comfort level. Someone who just happened to like you helped you out, so you get in a position of power, and your first instinct is to help your friends down the line. You figure as long as the people are competent, it isn't an issue. But you fail to realize that it is an issue because you've essentially removed the competitive aspect of promotions and perhaps ignored promising employees for no other reason than you just don't know them well on a personal level.

Organizations and companies that frequently hire external candidates are constantly getting fresh blood, so to say, in. The external candidates hired have no established network of friends to whom they feel allegiance so they tend to make decisions that are based more on the needs of the organization and the work product.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Federal agency. Slightly attractive women get special treatment.

This is something I've heard about. I would go even further, though, and say that slightly attractive women who indulge flirting get special treatment. I know someone who was in a situation where she could've gotten special treatment. She was attractive, but she shut down the flirting, and it impacted her in a negative way. Another person didn't shut it down, and that person definitely got special treatment (as in certain male managers fell all over themselves to help her career).

This is one area that I think is tricky for women. And you would think it's just an issue for women who aren't conventionally attractive (as in they get slighted), but it's also an issue for women who are average or above average attractive but don't like a certain kind of attention from male superiors and send a clear message that it is unwelcome.

I don't really see how to change it. It's a difficult thing to prove. And most often, the attention skirts the edge of harassment. So it doesn't rise to the level of making any kind of official complaint. It's more subtle than that. At least that's the situation the person I know confronted.

I think that the sad reality is that managers -- of both sexes -- tend to treat more favorably the people who make them feel good. So even some female managers will advance and promote the people who tend to flatter them the most or make them feel liked.

I'd love to hear some positive stories about how someone effectively dealt with this sort of thing and was able to strike a balance.

I'm in a federal agency and when I was younger I was treated borderline EEO badly. I could have filed but wanted to keep my job. I've now waited those sucker out. I'm in a position of authority.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Federal agency. Slightly attractive women get special treatment.

This is something I've heard about. I would go even further, though, and say that slightly attractive women who indulge flirting get special treatment. I know someone who was in a situation where she could've gotten special treatment. She was attractive, but she shut down the flirting, and it impacted her in a negative way. Another person didn't shut it down, and that person definitely got special treatment (as in certain male managers fell all over themselves to help her career).

This is one area that I think is tricky for women. And you would think it's just an issue for women who aren't conventionally attractive (as in they get slighted), but it's also an issue for women who are average or above average attractive but don't like a certain kind of attention from male superiors and send a clear message that it is unwelcome.

I don't really see how to change it. It's a difficult thing to prove. And most often, the attention skirts the edge of harassment. So it doesn't rise to the level of making any kind of official complaint. It's more subtle than that. At least that's the situation the person I know confronted.

I think that the sad reality is that managers -- of both sexes -- tend to treat more favorably the people who make them feel good. So even some female managers will advance and promote the people who tend to flatter them the most or make them feel liked.

I'd love to hear some positive stories about how someone effectively dealt with this sort of thing and was able to strike a balance.

I'm in a federal agency and when I was younger I was treated borderline EEO badly. I could have filed but wanted to keep my job. I've now waited those sucker out. I'm in a position of authority.

How did you deal with the people treating you badly? The kind of thing mentioned above isn't a situation where the woman filed a complaint. It's a situation where she didn't indulge the flirting. And even that hurt her.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm interested in hearing stories where people have encountered unmerited favoritism in the workplace, situations where one employee clearly is favored by a manager, even though that employee doesn't necessarily contribute more or go above and beyond. I'm interested in hearing how this impacted the office as a whole and if/how it was ever mitigated.

TIA.

Why do you ask?

One of the worst ones I encountered was a company that hired new people for a specific long-term project. As with many projects, this one had multiple issues during the week of the deadline. Boss and a few pets decided to take off a few days that week, up to and including the day the project was due, leaving the rest of us to deal with the fallout. I was one of the new employees, and after that I decided not to become an old one.

[Anonymous]

I work at a large financial company that only hires Indian H1Bs for Unix admins. Indians only hire other Indians. The bias is embedded in the culture.

Suppose there was a large, U.S. government-operated program that permitted U.S. employers to hire nothing but White Anglo Saxon Protestant (WASP) college-graduate men between the ages of 22 and 30.

The sad truth is, if you change a few words, that is exactly what the H-1B program permits; but instead of WASP males, the favored population is male Indian college graduates, perhaps largely from the south and west of India (and certainly not men from other parts of Colonial India, such as Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Myanmar (Burma), and very, very few women from the Subcontinent).

http://cis.org/north/h-1b-program-facilitates-blatant-racial-discrimination

Company ---------------------- Percent Indian
Cognizant Tech Solutions ---- 99.6%
Infosys ------------------------- 98.1%
Tata Consultancy Services --- 99.7%

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I work at a large financial company that only hires Indian H1Bs for Unix admins. Indians only hire other Indians. The bias is embedded in the culture.

Suppose there was a large, U.S. government-operated program that permitted U.S. employers to hire nothing but White Anglo Saxon Protestant (WASP) college-graduate men between the ages of 22 and 30.

The sad truth is, if you change a few words, that is exactly what the H-1B program permits; but instead of WASP males, the favored population is male Indian college graduates, perhaps largely from the south and west of India (and certainly not men from other parts of Colonial India, such as Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Myanmar (Burma), and very, very few women from the Subcontinent).

http://cis.org/north/h-1b-program-facilitates-blatant-racial-discrimination

Company ---------------------- Percent Indian
Cognizant Tech Solutions ---- 99.6%
Infosys ------------------------- 98.1%
Tata Consultancy Services --- 99.7%

OP here. I think what you are talking about is something different than favoritism and probably more appropriate for another thread. You are talking about race in hiring practices, not necessarily a situation where a manager has a favorite based on personal relationship and gives that person advantages that other employees don't get.

I'm not necessarily saying that the issue you raise isn't an issue or isn't worth a discussion, but I think it's different than the topic of the thread.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I work at a large financial company that only hires Indian H1Bs for Unix admins. Indians only hire other Indians. The bias is embedded in the culture.

Suppose there was a large, U.S. government-operated program that permitted U.S. employers to hire nothing but White Anglo Saxon Protestant (WASP) college-graduate men between the ages of 22 and 30.

The sad truth is, if you change a few words, that is exactly what the H-1B program permits; but instead of WASP males, the favored population is male Indian college graduates, perhaps largely from the south and west of India (and certainly not men from other parts of Colonial India, such as Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Myanmar (Burma), and very, very few women from the Subcontinent).

http://cis.org/north/h-1b-program-facilitates-blatant-racial-discrimination

Company ---------------------- Percent Indian
Cognizant Tech Solutions ---- 99.6%
Infosys ------------------------- 98.1%
Tata Consultancy Services --- 99.7%

OP here. I think what you are talking about is something different than favoritism and probably more appropriate for another thread. You are talking about race in hiring practices, not necessarily a situation where a manager has a favorite based on personal relationship and gives that person advantages that other employees don't get.

I'm not necessarily saying that the issue you raise isn't an issue or isn't worth a discussion, but I think it's different than the topic of the thread.

the point was that I am in a group in which the Indian managers favor other Indians. favoritism in the workplace. based on personal relationships from outside activities. activities that I will never be included in. since I can't list the statistics from my company, I added statistics for the managed service providers that provide the cheap labor. because not only is it happening in my company but also happening in the H1B body shops that feed into these large corporations.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My current boss plays favorites hard. When I first joined the team, she hated me. After a few months, I became the favorite. For the last year, the favorite is someone else and I'm not back to being hated but definitely no longer adored.

When I was the favorite, I knew it wasn't a fair dynamic to the rest of the team and that I didn't deserve it but I was just so glad to no longer be hated that I just went with it. Now that someone else is the favorite, I can appreciate just how much it sucks for the non-favorites on the team.

Why are so many women terrible managers?

[Anonymous]

Major brokerage firm in the 80s- the boss only talked to the men. There were no women - his quote was "honey , be thankful any of you have a job."

[Anonymous]

Every job I've had, management has had their favorites who get whatever shift they want, work whatever days they want, get away with pretty much anything, if anyone complains about the favorite, the complainer gets treated worse, selected for promotions, etc.

It sucks but it is what it is. It happens everywhere in every industry.

[Anonymous]

Attorney in government. I was in a division where the female boss clearly favored the only male lawyer to almost an embarrassing degree. I was convinced she had a crush on him. She let him wear jeans on non fridays and let him work from home when other people couldn't. (This was before telecommuting.) I always thought she was setting herself up for a sexual discrimination claim. I asked for a division transfer and never looked back.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My current boss plays favorites hard. When I first joined the team, she hated me. After a few months, I became the favorite. For the last year, the favorite is someone else and I'm not back to being hated but definitely no longer adored.

When I was the favorite, I knew it wasn't a fair dynamic to the rest of the team and that I didn't deserve it but I was just so glad to no longer be hated that I just went with it. Now that someone else is the favorite, I can appreciate just how much it sucks for the non-favorites on the team.

Why are so many women terrible managers?

OMG...I had that exact same boss...it was terrible. It was like being in an abusive relationship. You never knew if she was going to love you or hate you an any given day.

[Anonymous]

Had a co-worker that wasn't very bright and actually plagiarized my work. I could figure out how she kept getting plum assignments and why everyone else gushed over how great she was. Then I found out she was sleeping with the (married) boss.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My current boss plays favorites hard. When I first joined the team, she hated me. After a few months, I became the favorite. For the last year, the favorite is someone else and I'm not back to being hated but definitely no longer adored.

When I was the favorite, I knew it wasn't a fair dynamic to the rest of the team and that I didn't deserve it but I was just so glad to no longer be hated that I just went with it. Now that someone else is the favorite, I can appreciate just how much it sucks for the non-favorites on the team.

Why are so many women terrible managers?

OMG...I had that exact same boss...it was terrible. It was like being in an abusive relationship. You never knew if she was going to love you or hate you an any given day.

Same! Awful awful awful experience.