Microsoft CEO says women need not ask for raise, should trust system

http://www.foxbusiness.com/technology/2014/10/09/at-women-tech-event-microsoft-ceo-says-women-need-not-ask-for-raise-should/

by adventured • 12 years ago

106 91 12 years ago

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rdl• 12 years ago

Is he quoted out of context, or trolling? I'm confused, because most Microsoft people I know speak really highly of him, but the system is shitty for promoting even white guys in tech, let alone anyone else -- people get promoted by moving jobs every 12-24 months, not through being recognized and rewarded for contributions at companies.

"Karma" makes me think he's trolling, or was quoted out of context.

(The snarky response here is "he's clearly speaking from his extensive experience as a woman in technology...", but I'd rather take the high road.)

ryanburk• 12 years ago

http://readwrite.com/2014/10/09/nadella-women-dont-ask-for-r... has a better write up, in my opinion. this was at the annual grace hopper celebration of women in computing and was not out of context / said ironically.

dominotw• 12 years ago

> Twenty-nine percent of the general Microsoft workforce is female, and in the U.S., almost 61% is white.

Can someone give me an american perspective on why Americans find 61% white to be an unacceptable thing considering 60-70% of american population identifies as white and America still predominantly is a white country.

rokhinip• 12 years ago

It's true. I was at the conference when he said that and he has not been quoted out of context.

If he was trolling, he chose to do it at a bad location given that he's at a conference aimed at promoting women in the tech industry

istorical2• 12 years ago

I think the likeliest case is that he is a poor negotiator himself and has left potential raises on the table without realizing it due to a lack of initiative.

The personality types that are more common in the software field are often the personality types that would avoid risk and conflict - two fears that prevent labor from negotiating for better wages.

I really don't understand why this is being made into a gendered issue. My first instinct is to just assume that if he'd instead been asked "How should software developers ask their bosses for raises?" he would have had the same answer, an answer that reflects his own insecurity and fear of negotiating - not one that reveals some deep-seated prejudice.

jacalata6• 12 years ago

In the software field? Maybe. In the billion dollar software company CEO field? No, really not the case.

tdicola• 12 years ago

No its not out of context, a better article here has more details: http://readwrite.com/2014/10/09/nadella-women-dont-ask-for-r...

For what its worth he walked back the statement on twitter, "Was inarticulate re how women should ask for raise. Our industry must close gender pay gap so a raise is not needed because of a bias #GHC14"

clubhi2• 12 years ago

I don't think roles deserve certain salaries. Different people are worth different amounts for the same role. As a corollary, I don't think women should have salary expectations because of a role.

comrh2• 12 years ago

"Different people are worth different amounts for the same role."

But are not worth different amounts because of their sex.

clubhi2• 12 years ago

It's impossible to infer what a female is worth because you can't even infer what a male is worth.

kmonsen• 12 years ago

Not asking for raise is "good karma".

Why would anyone want to work for Microsoft at this point if they have options?

adamio• 12 years ago

Apparently he also said "That's good karma. It will come back," Nadella said. "That's the kind of person that I want to trust, that I want to give more responsibility to."

http://www.theverge.com/2014/10/9/6953697/microsoft-ceo-saty...

rjknight2• 12 years ago

This reminds me of David Graeber's bullshit jobs[1] thesis, that those doing more "real work" tend to get paid less because real work is enjoyable. It sounds awfully like Nadella is saying that "more responsibility" might be a substitute for better pay, and that people should be happy with that.

[1] http://strikemag.org/bullshit-jobs/

pacaro• 12 years ago

My experience at MS was that the only way to get promoted was to have a good relationship with your manager, and for them to have a good relationship with their manager, and so on (the higher level you are the more layers need to be persuaded).

So if you are in that position you don't need to ask. What to do to get your next promotion, and whether you are on track, is just something that gets discussed in 1:1s from time to time.

If you are not in that position, then no amount of asking is going to make any difference, coming into work with an offer from Google/Amazon/Facebook/etc. will maybe get you escorted from the building, maybe get you a counter offer.

So, while I don't have an opinion on the karmic consequences of asking for a raise, I do believe that it will not achieve anything other than friction, either your boss knows you need a raise and is working with you to get it, or you should look for another job

matthewcford• 12 years ago

what a load of bullshit, if the women in MS found out that they are being underpaid and asked for a raise, then their wage bill would raise. Very self serving.

kirinan• 12 years ago

I think it is out of context and isn't what he means. I think he means to say that women should be able to trust the system to give them a raise if they have earned it, not that they can trust the current system or should trust the current system. I think he is talking about an ideal system and not the one we are currently in. I'm going to assume best intentions here.

gajeam• 12 years ago

Two things:

First of all, ironically this was at the Grace Hopper Celebration, named for one of the foremost pioneers of women in technology.

Second of all, he's already essentially retracted the statement on Twitter.

https://twitter.com/satyanadella/status/520311425726566400

yzzxy• 12 years ago

His response to the response:

"Was inarticulate re how women should ask for raise. Our industry must close gender pay gap so a raise is not needed because of a bias #GHC14"

https://twitter.com/satyanadella/status/520311425726566400

nickbauman3• 12 years ago

Which implies that the solution to the problem is to LOWER the pay of men to match the pay of women. I think the term "unintended consequences" can be writ large here by now.

anigbrowl3• 12 years ago

It implies no such thing.

higherpurpose• 12 years ago

I don't get what that's trying to say. It seems to me he wants to retract the answer because by now he realized how bad it sounds, but at the same time he's also trying not to get all women in the company to ask for raises tomorrow.

So the statement is like "Yeah, yeah we need equal pay for men and women and all that...but don't ask us for raises to actually make that happen".

zorpner• 12 years ago

The most charitable interpretation I can think of is that he went to a panel at a conference to give career advice to women (which has its own problems) and gave them advice for an ideal world instead of for the real world, which also happened to be anti-labor.

forrestthewoods3• 12 years ago

Protip: If you are a man you should reject any invitation to speak at a women's focused conference. At this conference in particular there was a bingo sheet for statements made by men. Any misstep will turn into a headline. It's crazy dangerous.

Attendees also questioned, perhaps fairly even, a particular panel session that all men. Why were they there? Because they were invited! The only rational response is to turn down such an invitation in the future.

andlarry• 12 years ago

Why were they there? Because they were invited! The only rational response is to turn down such an invitation in the future.

The Ada Initiative recommends[1] responding thusly:

* Respond saying that you'd be honored, but the panel seems awfully heavy on the men, and can they find a qualified woman to join the panel? Here are some suggestions.

* Respond saying that you have taken a pledge not to participate in all-male panels from now on, but you'd be happy to join if a qualified woman is added.

* If you can't accept, suggest a qualified woman to take your place.

[1] http://geekfeminism.wikia.com/wiki/Allies_training#Scenario:...

neilellis16• 12 years ago

"Our industry must close gender pay gap so a raise is not needed because of a bias"

Which is a much better statement :-)

ttronicm• 12 years ago

What a terrible human being! That's probably being too kind.

jnem2• 12 years ago

That's a very reactionary statement based on precious little information.

rjknight2• 12 years ago

Is this surprising? CEOs of 120,000-employee corporations are not exactly well-known for their belief that those employees all deserve a raise.

It might be stupid for Nadella to want to nickel-and-dime MS employees, especially female ones, but as someone who is judged by the short-term profitability of the company, he has some pretty strong incentives to do so.

comrh2• 12 years ago

This entire panel seemed out of touch. What were they trying to offer?

gojomo• 12 years ago

I haven't seen the full context, but I believe the statements may have been offered with an implicit, "in an ideal, properly functioning system".

That is, less "don't ask for a raise", more "you shouldn't have to ask, pick a place that does it automatically [my goal for Microsoft]".

Of course, there are still problems with that approach: the salary incentives are never fully aligned, and even if you achieved that harmony of salaries-and-value for a short while, it would drift out of alignment. Workers demanding raises or managers cutting the overpaid would then both be required.

But I can see why a large-company CEO like Nadella would hold out the ideal of smooth, regular, equitable, no-exceptional-requests salary adjustments. That's something big companies can systematize much more easily than little ones.

neilellis16• 12 years ago

The essential problem here is that we're still talking about men telling women what they need to do. Because, hey it's their problem.

Let's just get it clear, it is all about what we (men) need to do. Slavery wasn't an African person's fault. Xenophobia isn't a problem for foreigners to sort out.

There is nothing wrong with realising that we have a privilege over another group in society and making efforts to become aware of that and to work against it as best we can. What is wrong is assuming it's something that the people we have privilege over need to combat themselves.

One last analogy:

Hey poor person, work harder and then you can inherit money like I did.

PS: Can someone explain the downvote? (PPS: it would be nice for reasons to be given for downvotes, because as a frequent user, commenter and submitter it feels pretty rubbish being down-voted without knowing why)

neilellis16• 12 years ago

PPPS: Thanks for those who voted back up. Would be nice to know the reasons for down votes still. Wouldn't it be quite easy to prompt a down voter for a reason and display that reason. Thus encouraging responsible downvoting?

neilellis16• 12 years ago

And would you believe it, that comment was downvoted :-) oh the irony!

georgemcbay• 12 years ago

I kind of wish there were a link you could click on each post to see a list of the people who downvoted it.

I don't expect that to ever be added and I can imagine many ways in which it would backfire, but nothing annoys me more than silent downvotes (downvotes but no responses) to posts that are perfectly reasonable if maybe mildly controversial.

If you disagree with a post (that isn't just obviously a troll or otherwise clearly meant to be offensive) enough to downvote, respond with why, it is much more useful for everyone that way.

Dylan168073• 12 years ago

Okay, fine. I downvoted you because you seem to be blaming him for answering a direct question and also for saying it's women's problem when he said it was management's responsibility.

I can't tell for sure if you're actually blaming him or explaining yourself in a confusing way, but both of those are bad.

You make valid points, but the way you tied them into the conversation makes your point confusing and/or non-sequitur-insulting, so I think it's a bad comment.

patrickdavey• 12 years ago

Check out http://heforshe.org/ ... launched recently enough I believe "A solidarity movement for gender equality"

neilellis16• 12 years ago

I have and I think it's a bloomin' good idea. White people fought to end the injustice of black people, so surely it's also men's responsibility to fight for equality/respect for women.

forrestthewoods3• 12 years ago

That movement is organized by UN Women (United Nations). "UN Women is the UN organization dedicated to gender equality and the empowerment of women. A global champion for women and girls, UN Women was established to accelerate progress on meeting their needs worldwide".

I'm still waiting for a big movement that supports person equality and empowerment of people. A global champion for people and persons.

hawkice• 12 years ago

One possibility (as someone who did not downvote) that could lead well-meaning people to sincerely disagree with you:

Your framing of the problem of empowering professional women treats women as professional objects being acting upon by men, and not professional subjects of their own destiny. Many could see your proposal as perhaps self-defeating.

neilellis16• 12 years ago

That's totally fair enough, but I don't believe that down-voting should be done on opinion - as it can bury a point of view. Very happy with people disagree-ing with me that's their prerogative of course! But down-voting someone is like flagging them. You should upvote something because you think it's a good comment. But never downvote unless the comment is abusive, flamebait etc. anyway IMHO :-)

anigbrowl3• 12 years ago

I didn't downvote you, but he gave this advice in response to a direct question. True, he could and maybe should have been asked what he was going to do about it, but since there's one CEO and lots of individual employees wishing for raises, some of whom are women, the likelihood is that individual employees who get a raise will do so at the behest of their direct manager, regardless of gender.

neilellis16• 12 years ago

I want to make clear that I believe we all make mistakes and we all have prejudice - denying prejudice would be a foolish thing. I don't expect of him that he should be without prejudice, "he who is without sin" etc.

More I'm just re-iterating that what he said doesn't help in the battle for equality, it hinders. And within the setting he made the comment :-) it really doesn't help. Again not about blame, just that it doesn't help to put the emphasis on women to change their behaviour?

Certainly my focus is on the problem, not the person - because he may well be (and probably is) a much nicer person than me.

alukima• 12 years ago

Very well said. In general, I wish people would support each other more in tech. Too often people have a 'deal with it attitude'.

jnem2• 12 years ago

First, when you say, "slavery wasn't an African person's fault", I have to assume you are talking about Slavery in recent American history and not Slavery as a thing throughout history. Humankind is at fault there because almost every race and culture did it at some point.

Second, if I understand it correctly, I think maybe people downvoted you (not me) because your statement implies (however unintended) that without men doing something about it, women cant close the pay gap on their own. Making the statement a bit leaner, it could be interpreted as, "Without men doing it for them, women cant close the gap". Which is all kinds of incorrect.

Anyway, I don't think you meant it that way, but as you can see from the "slavery" example, it's easy for us to be unaware of our own racial, cultural, historical, sexual, and sociological bias. Myself included.

neilellis16• 12 years ago

Fair comment, it's hard to communicate anything well :) Certainly not my intention, my emphasis is it is men's responsibility to help reduce gender inequality, not our privilege :-)

Though again I disagree with people using down votes to disagree with an opinion :-)

frostmatthew2• 12 years ago

Making the statement a bit leaner, it could be interpreted as, "Without men doing it for them, women cant close the gap". Which is all kinds of incorrect.

Comments like the last line there are what I [despite being a male who genuinely feels there should be more women in tech] find extremely frustrating.

If we [men] do nothing we're accused of not caring and/or defending the status quo. If we try and help we get accused of suggesting women are incapable of doing it themselves.

verroq2• 12 years ago

The downvotes are for your man-splaining. Your status as privileged group invalidates everything you say.

neilellis16• 12 years ago

When I wrote the comment below the question was to the effect of "How is there privilege for men in Tech", it has since been edited.

It's almost impossible to avoid it and I have certainly done my bit to make it worse when I was younger (and probably still do a little).
However, I would rather a female commenter answer this from her direct experience.

mrxd2• 12 years ago

Let's just get it clear, it is all about what we (men) need to do.

There's wide disagreement about whether men should be getting involved in feminist projects. The concern is that men will dominate those as well.

The overwhelming majority of men wouldn't want to participate anyway, because they benefit from the way things are now.

neilellis16• 12 years ago

To clarify: I'm saying it's our responsibility to change our behaviour. Inequality of any form is an imbalance of power, those who have been allocated or have taken greater power have I believe a moral imperative to re-balance the power as only they can return it without there being conflict.

For sure women can fight to take back their power, but it wouldn't be nicer for everyone if we (men) just gave it back?

frostmatthew2• 12 years ago

PS: Can someone explain the downvote?

I didn't downvote you, but since you made a PS, a PPS, and a PPPS about it I would suggest you read HN's Guidelines[1], specifically: "Resist complaining about being downmodded. It never does any good, and it makes boring reading."

Some people are going to disagree with what you say - it's really not worth worrying about.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

smokinjoe• 12 years ago

Personally speaking, I worked 2+ years at a company where I slowly realized that I was worth more than what I was being paid. I didn't push for a raise very hard, but the more responsibilities I acquired, the more products I built, the more customers I interacted with, I thought it would be more than fair to increase my compensation.

Every single request was met with a "we'll speak about this at a better time." I would just smile, nod and go back to work. It made me feel bad about myself from the standpoint that maybe I wasn't worth that. Then of course come the friends and family that ask whether I've gotten that raise yet (always a fun conversation..).

I learned that if you want something, you need to go out and get it. If you sit there waiting for a raise, you will never receive one.

So I left the company and found a new job with better pay.

It sucks because not everyone has that option (I'm a stupid, young, single person) and it shouldn't come down to that - but it is a reality of the business world. The fact that the CEO of Microsoft so naively believes that this is how things work is somewhat unsettling.

diogenescynic• 12 years ago

This thread, in about half a second, dropped from the 2nd post from the top to the 28th post. C'mon mods, quit suppressing discussion.

nickbauman3• 12 years ago

Answer the following question for yourself: Why do managers not want you sharing your compensation information with your co workers? The answer is the reason why CEO answered the way he did, especially the "good karma" comment.

zxcvvcxz2• 12 years ago

Isn't the problem that they don't ask for raises and negotiate as much or as hard as men do? I wonder what would help women with this. Everyone needs to look out for their own best interests in "the real world", no magic fairy is going to wave a wand and give people doing the same job the same money. There's no economic incentive to do so without pressure. And that pressure must come from the employees.

jacalata6• 12 years ago

Partly. The other problem is that when they do negotiate the way men do, they tend to get far more negative reactions (like having the job offer withdrawn). http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/cfawis/bowles.pdf

zxcvvcxz2• 12 years ago

Well there's a market solution for that too - keep looking for better work if you believe you're worth more. Eventually smart employers will see the ridiculousness of what's happening, and hire all the otherwise competent workers who are being discriminated against for no good reason.

blergh123• 12 years ago

I'm actually surprised at how many people in the comments want to immediately defend or explain away his comments. It's pretty clear he meant what he said, and is now on the back foot attempting to undo the damage he did.

Why does this kind of behavior need to be excused as 'out of context' or 'trolling'?

adventured• 12 years ago

Best guess here, is that it's because a lot of people like Satya and have been optimistic about what he might do at Microsoft.

If a bigger jerk said the same thing, you wouldn't see as many people seeking to explain it away. I think people naturally prefer to give a much greater benefit of the doubt to someone they think is nice.

Also, as a new CEO in a very difficult job with high levels of 24/7 scrutiny, there's likely to be an inclination to not light the guy on fire over his first misstep or three (even if it's offensive).

neilellis16• 12 years ago

That sounds reasonable, the problem is as ever that we human's have a problem separating the comment/action/thought from the person.

It's why we can't understand that Hitler was a vegetarian or Thomas Jefferson had slaves.

In reality we're a massively complex mismash of conflicting thoughts and emotions. Just like any country.

Yet we expect a consistency from the aggregate!

Personally speaking I can believe that he's a pretty decent person (probably more than I) and that he may well for all I know be trying to do his level best for gender equality. I only disagree with the statement, not the person. But the statement is very important when it comes from the head of one of the world's largest companies.

ChristopherM2• 12 years ago

This is horrible advice, men and women both must push for a raise, companies will absolutely under no circumstances just give away raises because "it's the right thing to do".

Case in point, I am a white male. When I started working at a company over a decade ago I also started at the same time as another white male. I started at $55k, he started at $52k I negotiated for an additional $3k from the start. The first year I assumed they would give me a good raise since I was hired at entry level wages, I got a $2k raise. I was livid. The next year I made a huge deal about the tiny raise, I ended up getting $5k, now up to $62k. Year after $3k, again not happy. During that year there was a "salary freeze", I told my boss that was unacceptable, if I didn't get a promotion I would be leaving. So I got another $5k during the salary freeze. The next year still not happy, I made the same ultimatum, This time $10k. Up to $80k, I ended up leaving a couple of months later for a management position.

In contrast that other software engineer? He got $2k per year, except for the salary freeze year, they made it up the year after. He left after 5 years making $62k

Me -> $55k, $57k, $62k, $65k, $70k, $80k

Him -> $52k, $54k, $56k, $58k, $58k, $62k

So, apparently by being the squeaky wheel I ended up making an additional $18k a year by the time we both left. Plus all the additional money I made the preceding years.

Lesson here? Make yourself very valuable to the company, and then make them pay. They won't do it of their own free will. Look at it from their perspective, if you don't say anything why would they do anything? Obviously you are happy if you are not complaining.

The problem for women is that, in general, they don't speak up, they don't negotiate for salary increases they just accept what is offered. What we really need to do is to teach women how to understand what they are really worth, and to negotiate from a position of strength.

rescendent• 12 years ago

It was a snippet from a very long interview where almost all of what he said was good.

However, in this answer, I can see why the CEO of a 120k employee company is not going to say "get pushy with your salary" else he's have a pay rise revolt with people's justification being "your boss', boss', boss' boss told me to"

waterhouse2• 12 years ago

I'm curious what you think of Ben Horowitz's "How to Minimize Politics in Your Company"[1]. He gives the specific example of an employee asking for a raise; he argues that responding by giving them a raise, even if it's reasonable, rewards behavior that has little to do with their job performance, which has undesirable secondary consequences. He says that the right way to deal with it is to have a good, regular, and standard process for evaluating employees and adjusting their compensation accordingly.

To a person who works at a company that doesn't have such a process, I'm sure your lesson applies. But I wonder what you think about what the company should do. Take the company you worked at as an example: should they have had some process by which they would have measured your performance and come to you (and perhaps your co-worker) with a raise? (More regular and performance-dependant than "+$2k/yr each year if you haven't been fired".)

Regarding the main topic of this thread: Perhaps Satya Nadella believes that Microsoft has such a process, and believes that no one should ask for a raise, and gave his advice as though all companies were like Microsoft. (Or perhaps someone has information contradicting this hypothesis.) pacaro's comment below suggests that, whatever else you might say about Microsoft's process, it doesn't reward asking for raises.

[1] http://www.bhorowitz.com/how_to_minimize_politics_in_your_co...

ChristopherM2• 12 years ago

The company I spoke of did have a yearly review process, I also waited for that yearly review to come up before I objected to the pathetic raises which barely tracked inflation. When one starts out at entry level, one should quickly gain significant raises commensurate with ones skills and abilities. This company clearly tried to get away with doing as little as possible, I also happened to know that senior software engineers at that company in Colorado were making $120k+. Had I kept my mouth shut, sure, in a decade or two I also would have been making $120k+ but in 2020's dollars not 2000's dollars. The actual salary doesn't matter as much as what those dollars can buy.

As for Microsoft, I have no idea how their process works or if they even reward ambition and results. I did work for a larger company later, 6 months in they gave me a $13k raise and 6 months after that another $20k raise when they made me a manager. I never once brought up my salary, what I did do was point out what I thought was being done wrong and then proposed how to fix it. In this case I went to the CTO as my manager really wasn't managing the product at all, I thanked him for hiring me but told him I didn't think I was going to stay. He asked why and I described what it was we were doing and all the problems it was causing. I then followed it up with a solution of how to manage the product. I did not expect, nor even go in there with thoughts of taking over my manager's job. It was just an honest assessment of how to fix and drastically improve the efficiency of the group. One week later the CTO came to see me, privately. He told me they were very impressed with the work I was doing and they wanted to give me the opportunity to manage the product and the engineers working on that project. The first 6 months were probationary, after that I would be made full manager and get a salary increase. At that company, I never needed to negotiate my salary. They were always generous, they listened and were very proactive in keeping their employees happy.

In general though, my experience has been more like the first job. The companies, while having a yearly review process are very stingy. When it's time to hire a manager they bring in someone from the outside as they don't want to hire another engineer and retrain them.

As for Ben Horowitz's article, I would have quickly left any company that followed his advice. Telling me to wait, the company policies etc. I would see them for what they are, a stalling tactic. I would recognize that I was being "handled". With me I voice my opinion, I lay out the facts. If they are ignored, I don't complain, I don't bring it up again. I just quietly look for a new job, and any counter-offers after that point are immediately turned down. As things have gone according to plan, I don't even have to deal with this anymore, because now I have my own company, products and clients.

zaccus• 12 years ago

I wonder what you think about what the company should do

Very simple: give the raise that was asked for, or get ready to find someone else for the position. It's the same decision to make, whether they have some kind of process to do that automatically or not.

general_failure• 12 years ago

Is there a complete transcript somewhere? Why are we all jumping to conclusions with no data? All this discussion seems pointless without enough information.

jacalata6• 12 years ago

Because some of us watched it? There is a full video here [0] and a transcript of the specific question and answer here [1]

[0] http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/10/09/microsofts-nadella-... and

[1] http://techcrunch.com/2014/10/09/microsoft-ceo-opens-mouth-i...

amaks• 12 years ago

Quartz: Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, here’s the real definition of karma. http://google.com/newsstand/s/CBIwh9iU1ho

neilellis16• 12 years ago

Fantastic, indeed Karma (or Kamma in the Pali) just means action.

The fruit of any action is of the same quality as the action itself. So indeed this infers that asking to have the same pay as a male colleague, or any colleague is in itself greed and that the fruit born from it would be of a similar type.

The Buddha I believe recommended that you never talk about the Kamma of another as it is usually just a way to hide a value judgement of someone else. Instead we should focus on what Kamma we take and therefore the type of fruits we'll experience in the future.

If this interests anybody - this is an excellent book on the subject: https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web...

Mikeb85• 12 years ago

Dear god, everyone should ask for a raise. You can't trust that your employer will give you one out of kindness or something...

Microsoft CEO says women need not ask for raise, should trust system

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