tskelly@ccvax.ucd.ie (03/30/91)
Posters,
I would like to present a little teaser to you. All answers
will be examined carefully, be they serious or not, and regardless of
sex, colour, age, sexual preference, cultural or religious background
(have I covered everything?! :-) ).
The year is 2500. There is a planet - Flurb, with which Earth has been
in regular and close contact for the last 300 years. The peoples of
the two planets are well intermingled! Unfortunately, discrimation is
not uncommon from both sides.
As a member of the personnel staff you are responsible for filling a
position in your company. There are two candidates - a human and a
flurban. The two candidates are equally qualified and experienced but
neither is prepared to job share (they both need the full salary or
something!) One of the candidates, on the forms and in the
interviews, has made a point of reminding you that discrimination
exists and they would be very displeased if they felt that it would
taint this selection process. The other mentions nothing of the sort,
preferring to rely entirely on their qualifications, experience,
acheviements etc.
The final choice is yours. It must be one of these two! Which is it
to be!????
I have deliberately left some of the details fuzzy because I want all
possible positions to be examined.
1A. The company is a large bi-planetal (?) anxious to be fair.
B. The company is small but well organized with a good reputation.
2A. The position is at the managerial level - with a lot of responsibility.
B. The position is at the domestic level - with very little responsibility.
3A. You are human.
B. You are flurban.
4A. The person concerned with equal rights is human.
B. The person concerned with equal rights is flurban.
5A. The job is on Earth.
B. The job is on Flurb.
Any takers,
E-Mail or post is fine.
TSKELLY@CCVAX.UCD.IEpedersen@cartan.berkeley.edu (Sharon L. Pedersen) (04/04/91)
In article <1991Mar25.103043.48040@ccvax.ucd.ie> tskelly@ccvax.ucd.ie writes: > One of the candidates, on the forms and in the >interviews, has made a point of reminding you that discrimination >exists and they would be very displeased if they felt that it would >taint this selection process. The other mentions nothing of the sort, >preferring to rely entirely on their qualifications, experience, >acheviements etc. > >The final choice is yours. It must be one of these two! Which is it >to be!???? I see. We should all be careful not ever to talk about discrimination, because it's quite understandable when employers don't want to hire potential troublemakers. (sarcasm off) I'm not interested in hypothesizing about some nonexistant future world, but will comment on present-day reality: in my search for academic jobs this year, I have not been shy to ask departments about how many (if any) women are on their faculty, or among their graduate students. It is important to me not to be in a job where I am isolated. The campus interview is the place for _both_ sides to find out about the other. People's answers can be astonishingly instructive: the meant-to-be-reassuring comment "Oh, yes, we really do need one woman on our (currently all-male) faculty" says more than the speaker thinks. I'd love to know that I could rely entirely on my qualifications, experience, achievements, etc., in doing my job; it's unfortunate that one of the necessary qualifications is being able to work in an alien culture. --Sharon Pedersen pedersen@cartan.berkeley.edu OR ucbvax!cartan!pedersen