The present day composer refuses to die - Edgard Varese
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Microsoft paid 'more than a million' to silence a female executive
SOFTWARE DEVELOPER Microsoft paid "more than one million" to silence a woman executive who was overlooked for heading up the UK arm of the company.
According to the Telegraph, Natalie Ayres, a married mother, missed out on the job in the summer of 2006 despite being thought the likely candidate for the role.
The job was instead given to Gordon Frazer, a general manager at Microsoft South Africa, allegedly before Ayres had even finished the interview process.
Microsoft employees thought that she had been treated unfairly and raised questions about a "glass ceiling" for women rising through the company's ranks.
Ayres, who had worked at Microsoft for 15 years, left at the end of the year with a 'compromise agreement' that ran into seven figures, Microsoft sources told Daily Telegraph.
"It's a boys' club," said one. "The only way to progress beyond a certain point is to become a male in female clothing."
"They do not follow procedure enough and if your face doesn't fit, you suffer," he explained.
This is not the first time that Microsoft has fallen into disrepute. At the start of this month it became clear Microsoft has a rather wild UK office, by all accounts, as it emerged that the company's staff were grossly misbehaving at booze fuelled parties.
That case centres around Simon Negus, who was dismissed by the firm last year after he was accused of kissing a colleague.
Papers filed in court suggest that a Microsoft sales conference was full of drunken people, high on vodka and Jagermeister and indulging in "outrageous misbehaviour". In one instance a man was so drunk that he followed a female manager into a toilet and another was "so p***** he could not remember a thing", the newspaper added. µ
Tags: Microsoft
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I'm a white male that didn't get promoted in a Fortune 100 company because of sex discrimination from my white female boss. Of course, it had nothing to do with her being incompetent and my own common-sense competence making her look bad. No sir, she made sure to tell everybody who would listen that she was somehow the victim of sex discrimination and that I was another bad male employee. I finally had enough and left the company. After my departure, personnel from several other departments (VPs, directors, managers) made it clear that I was the only one from that department who actually knew anything. (Of course, they were all males so their opinion was biased and thus easily dismissed.)
In the end this stellar example of female competence did me a favor because I swore that I would never work for a corporation again. 10 years later I'm working in my own company and don't dread going to work each day.
Oh, and this great example of female competence was terminated about 2 years after I left. The company knew she would claim discrimination so they simply gave her a promotion, kept close tabs, and terminated her for incompetence. Oh, the irony!
Well Kate, can't get ahead on your own merits? Cry discrimination. I wonder if there are ever any white males that never get promoted?
"Followed a female manager into the toilet", "high on Vodka and Jaegermeister" - amateurs. Wanan see how a real company throws a party: http://www.businessinsider.com/munich-re-ceo-everyone-remembers-prostitute-party-differently-2011-5?utm_source=Triggermail&utm_medium=email&utm_term=Clusterstock%20Select&utm_campaign=Clusterstock_Select_052411
It's a bit harsh to judge any organization by behaviour at a sales meeting. While we are all descended from creatures quite similar to chimps, the resemblance can be far more marked in the sales fraternity (and I use that last word advisedly).
At one DEC sales meeting the UK sales manager had an actual punch-up with his deputy - nobody thought less of them, as long as the bucks kept rolling in.
Human males evolved to be tribal and territorial, possessive of females rather than respectful of them as equals.
In corporations where reason, realism and thus competence are at a low ebb the politics of power often follow this pattern instead as it is instinctive, but not well tuned to modern reality.
This kind of BS is a fairly good predictor for future border skirmishes with wandering bands of management consultants.
That kind of behavioural mode is encouraged by the highest management structure of MS where the boss is the boss because they are boss rather than because they are the right person for the job, like that conch hogging Ballmer for example.
No wonder, i routinely got BSOD. That must be the equivalent of OS Kernel got "drunks" in bits..
This is a company that has been convicted on three continents for unending violations of anti-trust laws. Do you really think that these folks have any scruples?
MY UNCLE WINED SO MUCH TO HIS LANDLORD THAT HE GOT SEVERAL MONTHS FREE RENT. SO HE ASKED TO GET HIS LEASE EXTENDED TO 10 YEARS. BUT THE LANDLORD TOLD HIM THE STIPULATION OF THE FREE RENT IS THAT THE LEASE WILL BE TERMINATED WHEN IT EXPIRES SOON.
THATS CUZ HE WINED TOO MUCH!
(EXECUTIVES SHARE IN COMMON THAT THEY ARE A GREAT BIG GROUP OF WINERS SO MS SHOUDNT OF BEEN SURPRISED)
Her being married with children is important in conjunction with the insider comment that;
"It's a boys' club," said one. "The only way to progress beyond a certain point is to become a male in female clothing."
No link, Kate?
A question: why did you include the info that she is a 'married mother'? Is that info an important factor in this story?
Oh Yeah!!
I wanna work for Microsoft sign me up! :D