ethiclub

And you wouldn't even know that another solution necessarily existed.

And you wouldn't necessarily know where to start.

And you would have the mental hurdles of "where do I start", "who do I listen to", etc.

Yes, for many (most?) non-technical folk.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curse_of_knowledge

Good move ...and the consolidations continue...

I notice that the power of these new behemoths are a risk to SMEs. Kaseya/Datto/ITGlue/CWM/Automate/Sophos/BG/Sell... These all used to be of a size that could communicate and deal with small business. Far more focus weighted towards enterprise now.

It seems a little strange that ITIL wasn't at all discussed (in article or comments) before redesigning the wheel

Feminism is the advocacy of women's rights on the ground of the equality of the sexes.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mumsnet

- PR and relationships with (governmental or other) organisations

- Intelligent positioning

- (Arguably good timing in the market)

- Community well targeted, needs catered for well.

- Appropriate (simple, fast) technology, little barrier to entry

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacker_News

- Two way beneficial relationship with YC

- Careful / Aggressive (depending on situation and feature) moderation

- General (although arguably slipping into Eternal September) maintenance of a niche community but with steady growth

- Appropriate (simple, fast) technology, little barrier to entry

ArXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/1611.08847

ISO 29148:2018: https://www.iso.org/standard/72089.html (Paper utilizes 2011 spec, now withdrawn)

Devil's advocate:

Common, successful marketing: If a brand is poisoned, distance yourself from the name & rebrand. At its extreme, it is used alongside phoenix company tactics.

It works, although a (likely minority) customer portion will keep their finger on the pulse.

Retool and the Retool team are absolutely superb.

In our experience, it's the current winner amongst the flourishing low code/db app/spreadsheet app space. It is one of few that to me, proves that this space should (and will) eat market share from excel/gsheets on one end, and expensive bespoke tools on the other. Also eager to see these offering more competition against small ERPs, CRMs and the like - Perhaps this will eventually even give behemoths such as ConnectWise, Salesforce et al a run for their money. Those companies need some competition on both innovation and price. For now though obviously, this is best used for business automation, small tools, and stitching data/processes together.

Not affiliated, just a very happy customer. Customer support is above and beyond. Trialed internally to great success, thus preparing to consider in client solutions.

If we grant partial personhood based on our knowledge of 'complexity or maturity of consciousness', we are setting ourselves up to a) see ourselves as qualified to do so, and even to 'act as god' in some circumstances, b) creating an expensive, difficult challenge for ourselves, and c) declaring that there is an appropriate hierarchy - arguably comparable of a caste system (Which is scary). Not granting any personhood/ rights at all (our current state) is a subset of this, and the most extreme example of heirarchical positioning based on 'right to be there'.

On the other hand, granting equal rights to all means treating a squirrel as reverently as a human, which society does not seem to agree with.

One of the biggest conversations for the 21st century.

Perhaps the former is a means to an end, and the answer is to slowly assimilate other species into coverage of legislation, with the end game of protecting all live equally. It feels as if future societies would look back and judge us for not immediately siding with the latter.

To clarify: Referring to peer reviewed papers on inter-species, rather than intra-species of course.

Thanks for fixing. Yes that was the intended question.

Any known ring species where (A + B cannot breed OR B + C cannot breed) AND A + B can breed? Assume not possible?

Brain size correlates to intelligence, but not aware of any causation that makes this worthwhile comparing. Any new literature worth reading?

A move to a more oligopoly-like market is a step forward though, no?

Coming from an emotional angle highlights the fact that teams are family style groups that spend most of their waking days together, which is nice in a way. Having said that - It feels that even after many of these conclusions in this article are made, a lot of the offboarding process is still tangled up with that emotion - Which isn't beneficial for any party.

Never take them back

I have examples of team members returning once or even twice and adding great value each time (both permanent and contract). Some examples of people returning and spending 4+ (and counting) years in a new or the same position. "You are welcome back any time" is uttered many times to departing team members. They are welcomed back with open arms. (re)Onboarding is a breeze. If neither party burns bridges and has a graceful transition, then the relationship can be picked up again later.

should respond to this unwelcome news

Perhaps it doesn't need to be viewed as 'unwelcome news', and instead viewed more pragmatically. It's all part of the Personnel lifecycle. Personal Life > Work Life... That employee shouldn't view your organization as their highest priority. A business owner has a responsibility to help someone transition out of the firm. If they're leaving, it's for a reason. Good luck to them. Perhaps there is something that the business can do to facilitate. That person has provided value over their tenure - And if not, then that's just data for the business to improve it's employment processes (role design, forecasting, responsibility assignment, recruitment, interviewing, contract finance).

"Do an exit interview...If your company has a dedicated HR team, they will have this baked into their process

I think this touches on the best takeaway - The process should be codified (not just the exit interview). An employee shouldn't have to drive this, and it shouldn't be made difficult for them. They shouldn't have to ask for pay slips, final payments, references etc. - The business should ideally have done this all proactively. This is all part of employee welfare, and even if the employee is leaving they are still owed that welfare.

When a team member triggers a transition (inter or intra organization) by handing in their notice or request for transfer, a templated job should immediately be created in the business's system with tasks for

- handovers

- exit interview

- contract end procedures

- recruitment / forecasting triggers

- A prompt, nice, diplomatic email to the business (or business unit) that says 'J Smith is leaving' (without giving away personal information), and 'thanks for what they have done' (a genuine message of thanks).

It's not taking the heart away from the team/process by automating this, it's just ensuring that a proactive checklist is generated for due diligence in offboarding and replacing the team member. And it's about abstracting this away from emotion and ad hoc reaction, and doing right by people.

If the news catches you unaware, it may indicate that there is room for improving team communication (depending on the reason for leaving). In plenty of close-knit organizations, team members feel comfortable discussing their discontent with their line managers (whether it's salary related or otherwise). And those line managers then help the employee to resolve them (often by changing role in the team/org, or helping them adjust their employee roadmap/development path), or help them transition away (with more notice in which to recruit). On occassion, businesses have actually lined up the employee's next job for them.

Severe performance issues at scale, unable to recommend as a solution to most clients. As yet insufficient evidence of long term solutions. Rebuttals to this comment from bubble.is staff are welcome.

the company shifted to a four-day week, with Fridays off. At first, Nagele says, it went smoothly, since summers are slower. By the fall, they realized they needed to make some adjustments; some members of the support team now work on Fridays but have Mondays off, and vice versa, so that there’s consistent coverage throughout the week

(Treating flex-hours & 3-day weekend models as a dichotomy) We posit that flex-hours and working week caps are more feasible and beneficial than fixed or rotating 3 day weekends.

- If the company takes Friday off, it is essentially asking a favor from its partners and customers. Those parties are now obligated to wait an extra 24 hrs for service. Flex-time offers better coverage for external parties, and it is easier to operate Incident Management / Customer Support functions.

- (Rotating or fixed) 3 day weekends make individual staff unavailable for >72 hrs. Especially for those staff members that have 'workaholic' traits, this can make it difficult to truly relax/unwind on the weekend. 'Flex-time' workers anecdotally are perceived as more 'available' than 4-day-weekers.

- Fixed/rotating 3 day weekends appear to require similar levels of forecasting/rostering as flex-time models do. Flex-time offers more value to staff.

- A single flex-time model is perceived as fairer, and results in fewer caveats (for parents, carers and those with other obligations).

- A flex-time model + a working week cap has a neater roadmap than 4 day weeks. A graceful reduction in hours over time allows staff and operations to adjust. Further, the gradual reduction arguably allows the same productivity-output to be 'fit into the same hours' more easily than jarring steps toward a 4 day week do.

- A flex-time model is arguably more compatible with weekend & overnight coverage initiatives.

- 3 day weekends don't aid (relative to flex-models): Commuter time, city traffic, life>work priority, improved customer support, life emergencies, inter-time-zone communications.

Hi Chris,

Out of interest, may we ask - How do you reconcile your carbon emission research against other ecological considerations? Does your group use a preexisting model to map externalities / run simulations?

Many thanks (Apologies for taking the conversation out of scope slightly)

Wealthy consumers are a fraction of the problem

Agreed. It's still a model that provides an entrance point to wide distribution being possible. (Legislatively, economically, general awareness).

It's not suitable as a single solution to go all-in on - As long as this isn't treated as a false-dilemma and solely relied upon, it has value.

The original poster did not necessarily mean to force such products on the entire world population.

Wealthy consumers are able to fund technologies. Wealthy consumers are also able to be more discerning with purchases.

In the same manner as many nations skipped industrialization and computing stages, we can do the same with eco-friendly products. When Africa was ready, it procured mobile phones, not desktop computers.

Precisely as per the Tesla business model, it is sensible to target 'rich' discerning consumers to drive legislation and production in order to scale & mature it for future consumers.

As such, the solution to reducing emissions might be to set up an environmental "beth din" which certifies whether a product is "environmentally kosher" or not. If an intransigent minority only consumes products that are certified environmentally kosher, the passive majority will fall in line

Further:

A. Organizations being held accountable by external audit will be far more likely to engage in ethical behavior than those with internal audits (internal boards are more subject to bias and likely have less access to expertise).

B. This could reduce 'greenwashing' and other exploitative claims over time.

C. The 'intransigent minority' (being willing to invest in such products) fund the initial growth of products, allowing them to gain economies of scale over time. Prices can then lower, and more consumers are then willing to purchase said products.

Another recent poll shows that only 42 percent of millennials support capitalism.

This statistic means something very different in context. The same poll showed 33% of people supported Socialism.

There are major noise factors here, including disillusionment and the fact that 'Capitalism' and 'Socialism' carry much cultural baggage and mean very different things to different people. Further, the statistics would arguably be very different if the poll sample was meritocratic rather than democratic.

Presumably, the cross-over (people that reject both Socialism & Capitalism) support a charity based or non-profit economy.

A prediction: Capitalism will 'prevail', and non-profits will remain 'niche'. Claim: 'Capitalism has a more survivable structure'. Consumer demand will mature over time, forcing for-profit organizations to respond by addressing all externalities, being self-accountable & transparent, and being externally audited. Wage spread will decrease. Shareholder dividends will dwindle. Socialism will not grow significantly beyond Scandinavian style investment (shared infra, healthcare etc.). Government will continue to 'lag behind' in legislation and action. Capitalism will continue to force Government to innovate and legislate. Government will not be able to provide the services that capitalism does, to the same cost-effectiveness and quality standard.

Arguably in an ideal world, government would 'take over' mature industry, if there were appropriate internal controls and no future innovation was necessary.

It appears the manager did not comprehensively 'arrange' this for the employee. Part of this job would have been ensuring that this information was transparent, and the decision fair.

If employees are complaining, it is presumably a mix of a) company culture issues and b) a lack of information that meant they perceived it as unfair.

It could/should be argued that it already has a place in the Physiological level. It's still human survival, just extended (life expectancy) and improved upon (physiological QOL)

This piece appears to be biased (and presumably was paid for by Hubspot). As a contrasting opinion, here is a personal perception of Hubspot (having worked with them as a client employee and a consumer of their output). As usual, this is opinion/perception from the writer only (not the opinion of an organization, and not making any claims).

"HubSpot’s HEART values: humility, empathy, adaptability, remarkability, and transparency."

- Hubspot arguably engage in (and recommend) dark UX patterns. Hubspot arguably encourages SPAM, misleading wording and coercion. This is in relation to current industry opinion on ethical UX, let alone future opinion.

- Much of their blog content promotes manipulative marketing and sales, with little consideration of the consumer's actual needs (see https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/emotions-in-advertising-e... for an article on consumer emotions that ironically concentrates on conversion & manipulation of said emotion).

- Hubspot arguably sells to anyone - The culture appears to be 'traditional aggressive salesmanship'. I.e. they do not consider whether the client can afford or gain value from the product, they just push through the sale. This opinion contrasts with their ethics code (https://s2.q4cdn.com/235752014/files/doc_governance/Code-of-...).

- While Hubspot arguably may not have a moral obligation to prevent it: They appear to be encouraging (or at least facilitating) low-quality content being churned out in the interests of clicks. The platform and mentality does not appear to be conducive to the creation of actual valuable content, nor the maturation of marketing/sales in an ethical direction.

- Hubspot arguably uses the word 'ethics' as a marketing tool, and there is little to show that real ethical considerations have been regularly employed. This is analogous to greenwashing and could be seen as detrimental to real ethical-capitalism.

Personal opinion: Hubspot's existence is detrimental to society.

In the interests of fairness and general industry progression, Hubspot's opinion/response to this is extremely welcome, and further discussion involving them could be very beneficial to many stakeholders.

Here is another angle (which none of the above opinion was influenced by) - http://fortune.com/disrupted-excerpt-hubspot-startup-dan-lyo...

Does anyone have any good devil's advocate information on Facebook?

- The company does not seem to have an appropriate ethics board (for the size of company). There is some mention of an 'ethics AI board' but no real governance over Ethical conduct and compliance. If there are internal review boards (https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/jun/17/facebook-...), then it appears that they are thoroughly compromised, and not providing a level of accountability or serious thought that anyone will take seriously.

- There seems to be no intention or effort in achieving ISO standards (apart from a single ISO:27001 certification for FB Workplace, which was arguably to provide a 'feature' for the application rather than any ethical move). Granted, the value of standards and frameworks will always be in dispute, but these exist for a reason and are a neat 'package' that organizations use to ensure they are not reinventing the wheel and acknowledging a list of considerations.

- Facebook do not seem to maintain an ethics page.

- They do not seem to have an ethical voice - Nor do they appear to have anyone even pretending to have an ethical voice. PR from facebook (usually) manifests as 'We do what we do, and it's fine' rather than 'we will be introspective about this'. It seems strange that there isn't even any posturing here.

- The two types of FB employee that seem to voice insight on public forums are either a) discontent and being ignored by management or b) drinking the koolaid and refusing to admit that their practice is unethical.

Ignoring Occam's razor for a moment - Surely there is something to cling on to here, to provide the principle of charity for Facebook. FB sure are making it hard for consumers to paint them in any reasonable light.

Without paywall: https://outline.com/PUAZEj

Much of this can be summarized as "Modern business must acknowledge the nuance of modern demand."

The traditional phrasing 'maximise profit' is still valid - It's people's perception of what 'profit' means that needs to change, or even just perception on how to most effectively gain that profit.

This is a good thing. Consumers are starting to demand that products cater for all stakeholders - Not just themselves. Externalities are being offset. Organizations that purely look at the bottom line (tangible $) are missing the point (and by extension alienating a new and growing type of consumer) - There are hidden costs & benefits to consider. Saving $1 in costs could cost $2 in brand perception.

A more discerning worldwide customer base over time (through education, technology, availability of information) will force capitalism to shift. The premium tier is already transitioning over to more 'holistic' capitalism, where companies will identify and address all externalities. The wedge at the bottom is the issue - The mass produced, 'use once' plastic widgets. Consumers without $ can't afford to look at higher tiers of Maslow's hierarchy, so demand is closer to a simple, traditional model (function + price).

This is an inevitable and arguably sensible way to transition to more ethical capitalism anyway - As Tesla have correctly applied (target premium tier, then work downwards). Discerning customers are the ones with disposable $ - They can afford to shoulder some of the offsets, and they can afford to care about such things and start to demand them.

The question still exists though - Will the 'cheap' end of markets resolve themselves by adopting proven technology from above? (Once premium tiers have introduced maturity and economies of scale for ethical operations, then it is viable for lower quality products). And will all consumers become discerning and conscious enough about externalities to help swing this shift? The cynical answer is no, which moves us to the argument that legislative state intervention is absolutely necessary to prevent future costs* (e.g. mass migration from climate change).

*Comprehensive costs, not just $ costs - Including negative emotion, lost productivity, general wellbeing of the world populace, reduction of poverty, population health, life expectancy and mobility, and opportunity costs

One thing not mentioned in the article is the omission of natural light.

We have forced staff into dark, cramped spaces - Then introduced artificial light (knowing very little about the brain, light, vitamin D, SAD etc.).

Our office space planning has painted us into a corner. It is now hard to reintroduce natural light back into the workplace.

For devil's advocate testing of this, apply standard addiction/depression comparisons.

- "As an outsider I find the fuzz around heroin amazing....If you don't like heroin just leave and don't be so dramatic about it."

- "As an outsider I find the fuzz around depression amazing....If you feel depressed just get some exercise and don't be so dramatic about it."

- "As an outsider I find the fuzz around sex addiction amazing....If you are addicted just stop having sex and don't be so dramatic about it."

The world is becoming more empathetic to addiction and mental strength - And is, in general, transitioning away from 'stiff upper lip' / policing policy towards nurturing / healthcare.

It's worth considering 'FOMO' (fear of missing out), social anxieties, desperation to belong in society etc... There are many factors like these (genuine mental patterns that people experience) that give credibility to the current narrative of 'social media is addictive and we should help people'.

It therefore seems that one's default stance should be 'I assume there is a genuine problem here that people need help with' rather than 'they must be pathetic, why don't they just quit'.