I'm a Volt employee working at MSFT. I never got a Friday email from Volt about this. All I received from them was an email this morning asking me for what I thought was a test on the version of Microsoft Outlook that I was running. Volt has been rolling out new timecard tools, so I thought this was an attempt to collect information on software versions to prepare for a future update/rollout.
It wasn't until I checked/. this morning that I learned what was going on. Thank YOU!
See my response to Volt this morning:
From: [name wittheld] (Volt)
Sent: Monday, March 02, 2009 12:19 PM
To: 'AskVolt'; [] (Volt)
Subject: RE: Non-viewable Vote button
Importance: High
I thought the email below was simply a test to see if Volt employees were running the right version of Outlook for some future tool roll-out. However, I've since read from the web an article which implies that I should have received an email last Friday night. I never received such an email, nor since. I was never informed on what I was voting on. Now I know that this email is for Volt employees to vote to receive a 10% pay cut.
I take BACK my "Accept" vote. I do NOT accept that at this time.
Why? Because I don't know enough about it. I don't know if Volt, the company, is also reducing their profit margin to MSFT for my billing by 10%, and further, I don't know if the non-MSFT Volt employees and managers are also taking a 10% pay cut. Truly, if I hear that the answers to my questions are Yes, then I will be glad to join in and take a 10% reduction in pay; but not until then. If it's important enough for Volt staff to do it, then I'm willing to join in.
On the surface, this seems like a sneaky thing for Volt to do; but I'm sure it's just an oversight.
From: [] (Volt)
Sent: Monday, March 02, 2009 10:47 AM
To: 'AskVolt'
Subject: RE: Non-viewable Vote button
Accept
From: AskVolt
Sent: Friday, February 27, 2009 9:41 PM
To: AskVolt
Subject: Non-viewable Vote button
If your version of Outlook does not allow you to view the 'Vote' response option in the upper left hand corner, simply reply by stating "Accept."
Recently (in the past year) I took a personality test administered by an employment agency. I saw that 'honesty' was a consistent theme in the first few questions. I paused to recall what I learned in my college logic and psychology courses -- that (supposedly) dishonest people see dishonesty in others; and honest people see honesty in others. I proceeded with this as a guide.
Questions repeated over and over, though in different forms, were like this one:
"Aren't you frustrated that all your coworkers call in sick when they're not?"
Even though I believe it to be unfair *if* someone does that, I answered, "No". Then one like this came along:
"Sometimes my coworkers will call in sick when they're not."
This is tough, because I know cases when this has happened. How does this shed light on *my* honesty?
I work for a company that budgets a basket of days to each employee - vacation, holiday, sick time. You never need to say why you're out, only that you're taking time off. It eliminates the temptation to lie because of a strict company policy. I think that's a good approach.
I recently (in the past year) took a personality test administered by an employment agency. The concept of 'honesty' seemed to permeate everything in the first few questions, so as I sat there I paused to recall my college courses on logic and psychology and recalled that dishonest people see dishonesty in others; while (supposedly) honest people don't.
The questions repeated over and over in differing formats were like this one:
"Isn't it unfair that your coworkers will call in sick when they're really not?"
So, what did it say about me that I 'played' the test? In most cases, I answered honestly; but questions like this one really tested me:
"I know my coworkers occasionally call in sick when they're not."
Well, factually I know cases where that's true. How does that shine any light on my honesty?
In my career (management) I work for a company that gives employees a budget of days off every year - either vacation, sick time, etc. They don't ask you why -- you take a day for whatever reason and it's deducted from your yearly budget. I like that. It removes the temptation to lie. I like that approach.
Whether financial gain for the violator from a copyleft license, or stealing financial gain from the copyright holder. I see them two sides of the same coin.
I'm befuddled as to why anyone here would object to this ruling. This community more than most seems to understand the responsibility of a user of a work to a) know; and b) respect the creators' rights for the use of that work. This applies to the GPL copyleft license, where it requires that all derivative works maintain the original copyleft license; as well as to the concept behind the Creative Commons.
Similar to this case in question, if someone took GPL'd works and made a derivative and then attempted to restrict the use of that derivative in a way not allowed by the GPL, you'd expect that person to be subject to punative action.
If you're going to do something with work that someone else created, then you should know and respect the license for that work, whether that license specifies relative freedom or restriction.
Buyer (or borrower) beware.
What kind of company was she interviewing with? To work at a bank (or financial institution), each employee must be bonded in order for the institution to maintain their blanket bond for federal insurance. In fact, a financial institution cannot be bonded if a single employee has prior convictions for financial crimes. Each employee is bonded (fingerprinted) and their prints are sent to the American Bankers Association, and then ultimately to the FBI to check against the fingerprint DB.
Once you get to a certain stage in the interview process, it seems reasonable to process the bond on the employee-candidate.
I've been bonded. I worked at a bank. Now I work for a software company as a program manager. I was not bonded (fingerprinted) for any employee other than the bank.
"You catch more flies with honey..."
Actually, you catch more flies (customers) when you know what they want to buy, and how they shop or navigate your site. And you can only know that by watching what they do. This isn't new. When you go to someone else's property -- whether that be a grocery store, mall, bank, etc, there are cameras on you. Some for security. But some are to see how people shop, select, and buy. The same applies when you go to someone's server. This data isn't only useful for making money (serving up relevant ads, etc.), but for improving the customer's experience with that service/site. If you learn that a majority of your customers are clicking three levels to get to X, then you learn to move X up two levels.
I'm not offended by this practice, as long as it doesn't include Personally Identifiable Information and is completely
anonymous.
Slashdot Mirror
I'm a Volt employee working at MSFT. I never got a Friday email from Volt about this. All I received from them was an email this morning asking me for what I thought was a test on the version of Microsoft Outlook that I was running. Volt has been rolling out new timecard tools, so I thought this was an attempt to collect information on software versions to prepare for a future update/rollout. It wasn't until I checked /. this morning that I learned what was going on. Thank YOU!
See my response to Volt this morning:
From: [name wittheld] (Volt)
Sent: Monday, March 02, 2009 12:19 PM
To: 'AskVolt'; [] (Volt)
Subject: RE: Non-viewable Vote button
Importance: High
I thought the email below was simply a test to see if Volt employees were running the right version of Outlook for some future tool roll-out. However, I've since read from the web an article which implies that I should have received an email last Friday night. I never received such an email, nor since. I was never informed on what I was voting on. Now I know that this email is for Volt employees to vote to receive a 10% pay cut.
I take BACK my "Accept" vote. I do NOT accept that at this time.
Why? Because I don't know enough about it. I don't know if Volt, the company, is also reducing their profit margin to MSFT for my billing by 10%, and further, I don't know if the non-MSFT Volt employees and managers are also taking a 10% pay cut. Truly, if I hear that the answers to my questions are Yes, then I will be glad to join in and take a 10% reduction in pay; but not until then. If it's important enough for Volt staff to do it, then I'm willing to join in.
On the surface, this seems like a sneaky thing for Volt to do; but I'm sure it's just an oversight.
From: [] (Volt)
Sent: Monday, March 02, 2009 10:47 AM
To: 'AskVolt'
Subject: RE: Non-viewable Vote button
Accept
From: AskVolt
Sent: Friday, February 27, 2009 9:41 PM
To: AskVolt
Subject: Non-viewable Vote button
If your version of Outlook does not allow you to view the 'Vote' response option in the upper left hand corner, simply reply by stating "Accept."
Recently (in the past year) I took a personality test administered by an employment agency. I saw that 'honesty' was a consistent theme in the first few questions. I paused to recall what I learned in my college logic and psychology courses -- that (supposedly) dishonest people see dishonesty in others; and honest people see honesty in others. I proceeded with this as a guide. Questions repeated over and over, though in different forms, were like this one: "Aren't you frustrated that all your coworkers call in sick when they're not?" Even though I believe it to be unfair *if* someone does that, I answered, "No". Then one like this came along: "Sometimes my coworkers will call in sick when they're not." This is tough, because I know cases when this has happened. How does this shed light on *my* honesty? I work for a company that budgets a basket of days to each employee - vacation, holiday, sick time. You never need to say why you're out, only that you're taking time off. It eliminates the temptation to lie because of a strict company policy. I think that's a good approach.
I recently (in the past year) took a personality test administered by an employment agency. The concept of 'honesty' seemed to permeate everything in the first few questions, so as I sat there I paused to recall my college courses on logic and psychology and recalled that dishonest people see dishonesty in others; while (supposedly) honest people don't. The questions repeated over and over in differing formats were like this one: "Isn't it unfair that your coworkers will call in sick when they're really not?" So, what did it say about me that I 'played' the test? In most cases, I answered honestly; but questions like this one really tested me: "I know my coworkers occasionally call in sick when they're not." Well, factually I know cases where that's true. How does that shine any light on my honesty? In my career (management) I work for a company that gives employees a budget of days off every year - either vacation, sick time, etc. They don't ask you why -- you take a day for whatever reason and it's deducted from your yearly budget. I like that. It removes the temptation to lie. I like that approach.
Whether financial gain for the violator from a copyleft license, or stealing financial gain from the copyright holder. I see them two sides of the same coin.
I'm befuddled as to why anyone here would object to this ruling. This community more than most seems to understand the responsibility of a user of a work to a) know; and b) respect the creators' rights for the use of that work. This applies to the GPL copyleft license, where it requires that all derivative works maintain the original copyleft license; as well as to the concept behind the Creative Commons. Similar to this case in question, if someone took GPL'd works and made a derivative and then attempted to restrict the use of that derivative in a way not allowed by the GPL, you'd expect that person to be subject to punative action. If you're going to do something with work that someone else created, then you should know and respect the license for that work, whether that license specifies relative freedom or restriction. Buyer (or borrower) beware.
What kind of company was she interviewing with? To work at a bank (or financial institution), each employee must be bonded in order for the institution to maintain their blanket bond for federal insurance. In fact, a financial institution cannot be bonded if a single employee has prior convictions for financial crimes. Each employee is bonded (fingerprinted) and their prints are sent to the American Bankers Association, and then ultimately to the FBI to check against the fingerprint DB. Once you get to a certain stage in the interview process, it seems reasonable to process the bond on the employee-candidate. I've been bonded. I worked at a bank. Now I work for a software company as a program manager. I was not bonded (fingerprinted) for any employee other than the bank.
"You catch more flies with honey..." Actually, you catch more flies (customers) when you know what they want to buy, and how they shop or navigate your site. And you can only know that by watching what they do. This isn't new. When you go to someone else's property -- whether that be a grocery store, mall, bank, etc, there are cameras on you. Some for security. But some are to see how people shop, select, and buy. The same applies when you go to someone's server. This data isn't only useful for making money (serving up relevant ads, etc.), but for improving the customer's experience with that service/site. If you learn that a majority of your customers are clicking three levels to get to X, then you learn to move X up two levels. I'm not offended by this practice, as long as it doesn't include Personally Identifiable Information and is completely anonymous.