This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.
Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.
We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:
-
Shaming.
-
Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.
-
Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.
-
Recruiting for a cause.
-
Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.
In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:
-
Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.
-
Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.
-
Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.
-
Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.
On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
I had a very different experience working the India portion of tech company a few years back. Our company was considered an outlier though, and many other companies were often asking us "how do you get the India office to work so well for you".
From what I know, the secrets of success were actually very straightforward, but doing them is difficult.
The history:
The company started with a standard "outsourcing" by hiring a company in India to provide them with support workers. They quickly ran into quality issues. Anytime they found a good worker or support staff through this company, that worker would then go on to get a better job elsewhere. And the intermediary company often just made it difficult to keep using the same support staff.
The company decided this wasn't sustainable and didn't make sense. They opened up their own office in India, sent over a trusted Indian executive, and tasked that exec with building a functioning India office. A decade later those efforts seemed clearly successful. Their own stated reasons for success:
They have a world-class support team at that company. American customers would call in and ask to speak to the India support team members sometimes. They had talented developers that managed to get visas through us and then go on to work at a FAANG company. They had quality engineers in India that were respected bloggers and thought leaders on quality engineering.
I feel like I'm selling an ad about the company. They talked this stuff up while I was there, but it was my first job and I just thought 'whatever, gotta talk yourself up, right?'. But no, it took me some more life experience to realize they were actually impressive and unique.
Its possible to have a good company in India, but I think there is going to be a real problem if you are just doing it as a random cost saving measure and not putting much thought into how it should be done.
I love to see a success story here. I'm always frustrated with the difficulties around getting great offshore help, because statistically there's no way there aren't great people available in India, even if they're very tough to find.
I wish my company had the ability to have a high-quality offshore presence, though now it's "too late" in that we've built our brand around being 100% US-based.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link