
Star Performer Created a ‘Toxic Culture’ at Silicon Valley Community Foundation - SREinSF
https://www.philanthropy.com/article/A-Star-Performer-Created-a/243159
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kuro68k
Wow. Bullying, sexual harassment, all the usual stuff.

How are people still getting away with this for so long? Didn't they even
notice the high turnover and Glassdoor reviews?

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barrkel
As long as there was no actual expensive lawsuits and publicity wasn't too
bad, it sounds like she was a major net contributor. What was in it for the
foundation to get rid of her sooner?

~~~
xstartup
I am not sure why the above comment is getting downvotes but seems like a
valid question to ask.

Extraordinary people need extraordinary compensation. Maybe pissing off a few
people is part of compensation and company has no problem with that as she is
worth 100 such people she is gonna piss off.

~~~
zaphar
The reason this is problematic is that it downplays the risk associated with
the behavior. It's a form of short-term thinking that emphasizes the immediate
gains over the longer term losses.

This article may possibly impact the business longer-term and the hidden
opportunity costs they have already experienced are both harder to quantify
and also really costly.

It also assumes that you couldn't find someone just as effective with good
people management skills as well. I personally think it is a myth that someone
is irreplaceable unless you make them irreplaceable. If you do that then you
deserve the fallout for when that irreplaceable person becomes a liability.

This foundation is likely now opened up to lawsuites, a reputational hit, and
potential loss of business. Can they weather it? Probably. Did they have to
weather it? No.

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whatshisface
> _Former staff members say Loijens 's fundraising prowess allowed her to get
> away with treating people badly. Her value to the organization, they say,
> includes the deep knowledge she has developed over the years about how to
> value complex assets such as artwork, real estate, and especially stock in
> privately held companies that can bring significant tax benefits to donors
> when they give it away._

Why was she a manager? Without a power advantage she wouldn't have abused
anybody: obviously she wasn't screaming at her superiors, given that she
wasn't fired. Most absuers only unfold their unique traits when they're
surrounded by subordinates that have no chance of retaliating.

~~~
onion2k
_Why was she a manager?_

People don't just want more money. They want to be important and powerful as
well. If there's someone in your organisation that you want to keep, paying
them more to stop them leaving won't work. They leave anyway, but with a
higher salary to use as a bargaining chip for their next role. You _have_ to
give them more responsibility, and that usually means bringing people in under
them.

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whack
It's interesting to note that despite the "toxic culture", Mari was protected
because she was getting the job done, and done well. In her mind, she must
have thought that her harsh methods were necessary in order to achieve the
desired results.

This almost seems analogous to the armed forces, where recruits are subjected
to all forms of screaming, yelling and demeaning comments. I would never want
to be in such an environment, but clearly, they are doing it because they
believe that it works. Do we think that the Marines should be pressured into
not yelling at recruits? If not, shouldn't other organizations be given the
same latitude if they genuinely think it works best?

~~~
afarrell
1) I think that organizations whose normal mode of operations includes
physically dominating others and violating their bodily autonomy are a
different enough case that my intuition is that you'd probably not want to
apply the same reasoning. If we were having a conversation about the cultures
of police or prison guards, I think this would be a productive analogy to
start working from.

2) "They're doing it because they believe that it works" implies a certain
deliberateness and design. Having spoken with a few USMC recruiters back when
I was a teenager, I'm very inclined to believe that they've put a lot of
thought into this and that there is a fair amount written about how they use
these harsh methods to solve the problems like "How do we give people from a
wide range of social backgrounds the mental toughness to be able to do
trigonometry in their heads while mortars are going off near them?"

This is quite different from refusing to deal with one employee who has a
habit of randomly screaming at people about accounts receivable issues.

~~~
whack
1) This seems like a very arbitrary distinction. Is there any hard evidence
that yelling is only effective in training people to "physically dominate
others"? In the absence of such evidence, we should default towards
consistency

2) Your point here is that it's ok to engage in yelling if the decision was
made "deliberately" and "by design"? I don't think we as a society should be
micromanaging the internal working of a private organisation to that extent.
We should be regulating organizations by their behaviors and outcomes, not
their thought processes.

Lest anyone misunderstands me, I certainly do not advocate for yelling and
belittling behavior. I don't think it makes for a productive workplace, and I
would never want to work in one. But I do think there's an inconsistency wrt
the wide latitude we give the armed forces. To the extent that such
inconsistency is acceptable, I'm curious as to why.

Edit: Another example that just came to my mind, was many athletic coaches in
sports like soccer. Specifically, the "greatest football manager ever", Alex
Ferguson.

[https://www.givemesport.com/1251440-sir-alex-ferguson-
used-t...](https://www.givemesport.com/1251440-sir-alex-ferguson-used-to-
shout-at-rooney-when-he-really-wanted-to-shout-at-nani)

[https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2016/01/29/how-
cristian...](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2016/01/29/how-cristiano-
ronaldo-was-reduced-to-tears-by-sir-alex-ferguson/)

~~~
xtian
> But I do think there's an inconsistency wrt the wide latitude we give the
> armed forces. To the extent that such inconsistency is acceptable, I'm
> curious as to why.

The armed forces are specifically looking to replace any creative or
independent thinking with responsiveness to the chain of command and
willingness to commit acts of violence. Those are exceptional requirements
which are generally in direct conflict with the productive functioning of any
other organization.

I do think it’s worth inquiring into why we’ve created a society which
necessitates such broad-scale weaponization of human beings, however.

~~~
ModernMech
> responsiveness to the chain of command and willingness to commit acts of
> violence

There is even a term for it: Followership. Something I had never even heard of
until I looked into joining ROTC, and realized they weren't looking for future
leaders, but robots they could program.

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dominotw
I thought the guy in the picture was the main offender. Why did they put his
picture instead of Mari Ellen Loijenss'.

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dooglius
The title is missing "at". It sounded as though there was a community
foundation that tongue-in-cheek called itself "Toxic Culture".

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iopuy
Wow, as a silicon Valley outsider I had no idea an entity like a community
foundation would control 13.8 billion dollars!

