Ex IBM Sales Manager, Fired After Battling Discrimination Against Subordinates, Wins $11 Million Lawsuit (theregister.com) 162
On Thursday, a federal jury in Seattle, Washington, found that former IBM sales manager Scott Kingston had been unlawfully fired by the company and denied sales commission after challenging the treatment of subordinates as racially biased. And it awarded him $11.1 million. The Register reports: The case dates back to 2017 when two IBM sales people within months of each other closed similarly large software sales deals that led to vastly different commission payments. Nick Donato, who is White, received more than $1m for a SAS Institute deal, while Jerome Beard, who is Black, was paid about $230,000 for closing a sale to HCL Technologies. Beard was paid about 15 per cent of what he should have received under his agreement with IBM, despite a company policy not to cap sales commissions.
Kingston, who managed the two salespeople through two lower-level managers, raised his concerns about racial discrimination with his superiors toward the end of 2017. Recalling his jury testimony, he said of his conversation with his managers, "They were telling me it wasn't about money; it was some other reason. I flat out said, 'You are leaving no possibility for anybody to conclude another reason than racial discrimination. You are foreclosing any other possible conclusion. You are going to get us sued.'" And that's what happened. Beard sued IBM in 2018. After a failed motion by IBM to dismiss the case in April, 2020, the company settled for an undisclosed sum several months later.
Kingston sued in 2019 [PDF], after IBM fired him in April, 2018, claiming he had erred in approving Donato's seven-figure commission. The company also fired two other IBM managers, Andre Temidis and Michael Lee, who raised similar objections to the allegedly discriminatory capping of commission due to an Arab-American salesperson. The Seattle jury found [PDF] IBM violated Washington State law against discrimination and policies against race discrimination and withholding wages. "We are disappointed by the jury's verdict," IBM said in a statement emailed to The Register. "IBM does not condone retaliation, race discrimination, or any other form of discrimination. The company will consider all of its options on appeal."
Kingston, who managed the two salespeople through two lower-level managers, raised his concerns about racial discrimination with his superiors toward the end of 2017. Recalling his jury testimony, he said of his conversation with his managers, "They were telling me it wasn't about money; it was some other reason. I flat out said, 'You are leaving no possibility for anybody to conclude another reason than racial discrimination. You are foreclosing any other possible conclusion. You are going to get us sued.'" And that's what happened. Beard sued IBM in 2018. After a failed motion by IBM to dismiss the case in April, 2020, the company settled for an undisclosed sum several months later.
Kingston sued in 2019 [PDF], after IBM fired him in April, 2018, claiming he had erred in approving Donato's seven-figure commission. The company also fired two other IBM managers, Andre Temidis and Michael Lee, who raised similar objections to the allegedly discriminatory capping of commission due to an Arab-American salesperson. The Seattle jury found [PDF] IBM violated Washington State law against discrimination and policies against race discrimination and withholding wages. "We are disappointed by the jury's verdict," IBM said in a statement emailed to The Register. "IBM does not condone retaliation, race discrimination, or any other form of discrimination. The company will consider all of its options on appeal."
Big Blue made a big boo-boo (Score:5, Insightful)
How is this crap still happening?
Re:Big Blue made a big boo-boo (Score:5, Insightful)
The reason it's still happening is a lot of people will more heaven and earth to deny discrimination exists, just read the comments here in any thread involving such. Though given that a court of law has found their actions racist, I suspect this thread may prove an exception.
I think the reason many people denyit is because many people have an incredibly unnuanced view off the world where everything and everyone is rigidly good or bad and there can be no shades of grey. Therefore if you did something a bit off then you are BAD and there is no escape, so the only safe thing to do is essentially deny anything bad every happens.
Ironically, given how much those same people rail against it, it's exactly the same mentality that leads to twitter hate mobs.
Re:Big Blue made a big boo-boo (Score:5, Insightful)
The reason it's still happening is a lot of people will more heaven and earth to deny discrimination exists, just read the comments here in any thread involving such.
This. I've been in IT/software for 26 years, and I've seen lots of it, disguised as microaggressions or whatever. Over time you start seeing patterns of promotion (or lack thereof), treatments or the types of jobs assigned, in ways that have no correlation to actual performance.
Academia is no better (it can actually be worse, for I've seen racist actions that would get anyone fired in corporate America.)
As you said, it's just a matter of looking at the comments here to see why this still happens.
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Re:Big Blue made a big boo-boo (Score:4, Insightful)
Ageism, is the new discrimination.
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Ageism, is the new discrimination.
Yes, absolutely. It's not as common in IT, but it is in software engineering, in particular in the Valley.
Re:Big Blue made a big boo-boo (Score:5, Insightful)
In this case though it seems pretty indefensible what happened, so most likely they were just denying it because they knew that they had done a racism and rather than admit it and fix it were just hoping that it would go away. Unfortunately for them the guy decided to sue, but a lot of people wouldn't be willing to take that risk so they probably thought they could get away with it.
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You seem to be as intelligent as shoe leather.
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I disagree. People are just asking that we not jump to the conclusion that there was discrimination, until presented with evidence of such.* Yes it's hard to prove, but our entire criminal justice system is based on the principle of innocent until proven guilty. And that it's preferable to let 10 guilty people free rather than condemn one inn
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Perhaps that is part of the reason, but there are other explanations. Confirmation bias has a large influence. When something goes against your bias, you
Re: Big Blue made a big boo-boo (Score:2)
Al Capone was charged with Tax Evasion instead of racketeering. Sometimes the guilty cannot escape guilt by hiding under the guise of a quasi right
Re:Big Blue made a big boo-boo (Score:4, Informative)
Cases like this are really simple. Black person was paid 15% of what a white person got for doing the same work. IBM had an opportunity to explain how that disparity was unrelated to race, showing the other factors that influenced their decision. The jury was then able to decide if those other factors were believable (i.e. not made up to justify the racism) and if they did in fact merit the reward only being 15% of what the other guy got.
In this case they decided that IBM could not justify the disparity, and that the most likely reason for it was racism of some form.
Re: Big Blue made a big boo-boo (Score:5, Informative)
From your link:
"Lawyers for the men contend IBM reduced the payments not for its stated reasons, but because upper-level managers had set up and were enforcing an informal, hidden budget for commission payouts. Under it, the salesmen faced cuts simply because they otherwise stood to make too much money."
That doesn't stop them from being racists and making much deeper cuts to darker skinned sales people.
"Also it seems cheaper to me to not hire black guys in the first place if I was racist. But what do I know?"
Seems obvious to me it's not the same people doing the hiring. Why would that not be the case?
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There are probably a few reasons. The one I can think of is IBM is a US Govt approved contractor, and as such they have to do certain things, some of which deal with mandatory diversity and non-discrimination requirements. If they want to keep selling billions of $ of nonfunctional AI and business management applications to US Govt, they must report back periodically on metrics showing they meet these requirements.
Not sure if the regulation covers all of a company or just their Government Services sector
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"There are probably a few reasons. The one I can think of is IBM is a US Govt approved contractor, and as such they have to do certain things ... "
Exactly, human resources at IBM are definitely trying their best to reflect diversity in their hiring practices, it's an easy data point for outsiders to monitor. The IBM managers who decide how much of a commission salesmen get, not so easy to keep tabs on.
Breach of contract? (Score:2)
If a salesman was paid less commission than their contract, that would be a breach of contract, not a racial issue.
If the contract was vague, then why was the other salesman paid more?
It could be racism. But I strongly suspect other issues. Like one salesman was a better negotiator. Or had a crap manager.
But whatever the reason, cheating salesmen out of their commissions for any reason when they hit the jackpot is a really bad move. Salesmen live for commissions, they talk to each other, and the good o
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"but it happens because the black community in America has given up on fathers in the home"
Ever wonder *why* that might be? Did they get together and cast a vote?
Many men behave badly, black, white, yellow what have you and there were no shortage of single parent homes when fathers, most of them white, were abandoning homes & families during famines, war & economic downturns.
Re:Big Blue made a big boo-boo (Score:5, Insightful)
"but it happens because the black community in America has given up on fathers in the home"
Actually you are both wrong. The reason lies closer to home. To get into public housing, candidates are ranked. If you are a single mother, you get priority. So social workers will advise young unmarried couples to not get married so the mother can get into public housing. Now, when the father stays over, it risks getting the entire family thrown out of their housing. So a seemingly innocent policy of giving priority to single mothers ends up with the unintended consequence causing black fathers to leave/be forced to live without their family. Its not everybody, but its effect is enough to show up in the statistics. This is why politics are bad, we've had this policy in most places in the US for over a half century. We've known its bad side effects for decades and yet we still won't change it.
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Ignore my above post. Apparently I can’t read. They actually did find that IBM was discriminatory. Shame on me for not checking better before spouting off incorrect info.
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Well done and well said.
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Re: Big Blue made a big boo-boo (Score:3)
Do you have an actual response to the valid point that was raised? Or are you just going to wave your hands and pretend that there's nothing wrong?
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That's a very good question.
Speaking as a racially and sexually biased white male (yes, I admit it and no I'm not planning on changing it either because I have good reasons to be biased), this shit still happens because people keep hiring idiots but it seems in middle and upper management, they are very reluctant to fire them once the truth comes out.
I can't comment on whether this payment discrepancy was really race related. It seems to be too stupid of a move to be this simple. However the man was right:
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If it really was racially motivated, hell, what can I tell you... call me elitist but the number of people who live their lives by facts and figures rather than gut feeling seems to be in the ballpark of all aspergers plus 10%,
More people should do this.
Re: Big Blue made a big boo-boo (Score:2)
What? Cite facts and figures alongside evidence denying racism?
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Cite facts and figures alongside evidence denying racism?
If such evidence exists, it should be cited.
Re: Big Blue made a big boo-boo (Score:2)
Using the words "facts and figures" is not the same as actually citing facts and figures.
Re:Big Blue made a big boo-boo (Score:4, Informative)
If the two lower-level managers can't provide clear evidence or explanation of why this person was paid less than he should have been, then indeed the default assumption is that it was due to discrimination. There are reasons for keeping metrics and details on any decisions that diverge from the norm, since otherwise it will be presumed, rightly or wrongly, that ill intent was applied.
When making human resource decisions, they always need to be done with the consideration of how they will perceived. This is why the paper trail is so important, otherwise people will decide for themselves the motives.
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If the discrimination was for other than racism, it's really stupid to broadcast your bigotry in such an obvious manner. As if people don't notice they didn't get paid a million dollars they were entitled to.
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Interestingly, I was trying to be objective and got labeled a troll. :)
I guess the SJW army is always watching
At any rate... I'm not debating the stupidity of the whole thing, it's indeed typical for a large company to behave in idiotic ways, especially when money is involved. As a matter of fact, I found this particular behavior so idiotic, I'm subjectively inclined to believe the compensation difference was determined by something other than racism, namely plain stupidity.
Whatever it was, it should be pun
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"I can't comment on whether this payment discrepancy was really race related. It seems to be too stupid of a move to be this simple. However the man was right: There was NO WAY for anyone to come to any other conclusion than he was paid less because he's black. Wrong or right conclusion doesn't even matter."
Since there's not a "me too" button, here I am answering you with an "exactly that".
Maybe because I'm not American, I have trouble to even understand racism (people is people, right?) which, of course, d
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"Your comment makes no sense. It tries to denigrate the victim and is a rambling word salad that Trump would be proud of."
No, it doesn't. What I'm saying is that *even* if that were the case, that the black guy fully deserved the lower comission, it still wouldn't make any sense trying to stand on such an obviously losing position, so much moreso if, as it's more possible, that wasn't the case.
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Speaking as a racially and sexually biased white male (yes, I admit it and no I'm not planning on changing it either because I have good reasons to be biased),
There are *no* good reasons. They are your reasons, reasons you chose to harbor, cultivate and ferment. That doesn't make them good, for you or in general.
Embrace them if you will, just don't pretend they are good.
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Because of lack of self-awareness. People are unaware that their *beliefs* (the propositions they hold to be true) aren't the same as their *feelings*. And that's important because most peoples' actions are dictated by their feelings; their beliefs come into play after the fact, to rationalize those actions. That's why religious people *think* they're morally better than non-religious people, but they aren't really any more likely to particularly good than anyone else.
So it's quite possible for someone to
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It's the same argument against the ACAB claim"why aren't the so-called "good cops" fighting back against the 'bad apples'?"
Because they'll lose their income and get attacked,that's why.
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Why "still"? It is the same "Homo Fuckup" 1.0 at work. Unless and until that gets fixed (fat chance), this crap is going to continue.
Disguising various forms of discrimination (Score:2)
Really? That weak half-a-something comment was moderated "Insightful"? Not really FP abuse, but at least haff-a-something moderation.
But I'll take it seriously enough to answer the trivial question in a more serious way than it deserves. I can even draw upon many firsthand experiences in the formerly happy Big Blue family, though it's hard for me to distinguish between the forms of discrimination seen, supported, and experienced. But the main form of discrimination I saw close up were age- and gender-relat
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So I'm guessing you are not black, yes?
Because that ... would invalidate his logic?
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His "logic" proves him to be the most stupid thing ever called a human.
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Not only is he not black, he's barely human. No human could possibly be that dumb. Right? RIGHT?!
IBM does condone. (Score:4, Insightful)
IBM does not condone retaliation, race discrimination, or any other form of discrimination. The company will consider all of its options on appeal.
If you don't condone racial discrimination, then why are you appealing it? Why are you disappointed in the ruling?
Re:IBM does condone. (Score:5, Informative)
They clearly aren't saying "We accept we are racist, but we just don't want to pay" (even if its true or not). They are saying "we don't agree that the issue was caused by race, we would never be racist and are disappointed the ruling said we are ".
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Ya, and simply whacking the CEO and other suits pay packages would easily pay for their bias in this case. IBM certainly cannot plead poverty.
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IBM's president knew the holocaust was occurring when IBM was building holocaust management systems and printing jew disposition punch cards. He was apparently happy about it.
To see that IBM still has racist management is approximately the least surprising thing ever.
It's much like how policing as we know it in the USA evolved from governmentally empowered slave catching posses, and now people are surprised that there's a lot of white supremacism in police forces. Well, no fucking shit. And by the way, did
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IBM's president knew the holocaust was occurring
That's a strong claim and you've provided zero evidence to support it.
People inside fucking Germany didn't know about the holocaust, it's a bit stupid expecting some bloke in America to be aware.
Not to mention of course that Auschwitz was built two years before the Wannsee Conference; in other words before German policy was mass murder.
Shit, your linked article at the Guardian explicitly mentions "a senior IBM representative from New York travelled to Berlin". So that would have been prior to 11th December
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"That's a strong claim and you've provided zero evidence to support it."
Let us know when you learn to internet, noob. Google can give you more citations than you can eat, if you ain't skeered. The support is not at all hard to find if you actually want it.
If you search for it and genuinely can't find it, say so and I will demonstrate how a web search works. But this is not something hard to find. Every major.news outlet knows and has covered it.
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Let us know when you learn to internet, noob.
What sort of cunt uses the word 'noob'?
Let me know when you have any actual fucking evidence.
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What sort of cunt uses the word 'noob'?
What sort of total incompetent cannot google "ibm president knew holocaust was occurring"?
Let me know when you have any actual fucking evidence.
You mean like this [theguardian.com]? You fucking numpty. How the fuck did someone as stupid as you make it this far?
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Well, I made it this far by being able to read and understand what I'm reading.
What you're claiming: "ibm president knew holocaust was occurring"
What you've linked: Nothing to support that claim.
Don't piss on me and tell me it's fucking raining you lying shit. I asked for evidence and you've failed to provide it. Twice.
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Re:IBM does condone. (Score:4, Insightful)
Ya, and simply whacking the CEO and other suits pay packages would easily pay for their bias in this case.
The current CEO of IBM is named Arvind Krishna and is Indian. He has spoken publicly about IBM's policy of no racism. However, the events described here were before his watch at the helm, which started in 2020.
Now, this is pure speculation, but I could only fathom one reason for the difference in compensation.
In my company, we have customer accounts that are considered "easy", which all sales folks want . . . and ones that are considered "difficult", which nobody wants. For "easy" accounts you just need to show up one time at the customer and the deal is signed. For "difficult" accounts, you need to have days of meetings and fight to win over the customer.
Our greener sales folks are assigned to "easy" accounts to help build their confidence. Our more experienced sales folks get assigned the "difficult" accounts.
If you look at the IBM customers in this case, they are SAS Institute and HCL. Maybe IBM considered SAS Institute a "difficult" account but HCL an "easy" account. The sales managers might have adjusted the compensation to reflect the difficulty in closing the deals?
Like I said, pure speculation. And if this was so . . . why didn't IBM mention this in the court case . . . ? Maybe they didn't want to reveal to HCL that they are an "easy" account . . . ?
If I was HCL, I would push for a better deal with IBM on my next contract with them.
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Interesting point, however whether an account is "easy" or "difficult" should not matter when bonuses are paid.
Contract A brings $10M, contract B brings $10M, bonus payouts should be equal because they are a fixed percentage of the contract value.
"Easy" and "difficult" are subjective terms, "5% of contract value" is not.
Re: IBM does condone. (Score:2)
Being white is a qualification (Score:5, Interesting)
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Thank you for the most informative post in this entire discussion.
$230,000 is a lot of money. I'm sure IBM can find tons of people who'd do all sorts of shady shit for $230k. I'd been wondering how a company like IBM could possibly let racism outweigh greed. There's a song in Avenue Q "Everyone's a little bit racist", but paying somebody $1.1 million when you can get someone else to do the same job for $230k is just nuts. I can't believe that IBM is so loose with their money that they toss somebody three qu
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SAS is a white dominated European firm. They would never give a contract if the IBM salesman was not part of the old boys club.
Your two sentences are entirely fucking disconnected from each other.
So yeah the white guy got paid more because the only way to get that sale was to be a white guy. I have been in sales and despite being brown myself for certain accounts I always send the white guy from my sales team
And if you're selling to an Indian company you send your team's Brahmin.
We know which of our clients are racist
My experience tells me that nobody gives a fuck but I'm not working in the US or mainland Europe so maybe you really do work with cunts.
When I'm procuring software, hardware or services, I look at viability, match to requirements, cost, time to deliver, likelihood of success and other factors that will impact my company's ability to meet its objectives.
Who the other co
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And if you're selling to an Indian company you send your team's Brahmin.
You tried to make a dig about the caste system but your ignorance shines through.
If I really believed in the caste system for a business deal I would send the "baniya" not the "brahmin".
Indian caste system is Brahmins for academia, Kshatriyas for military, Baniyas for business and Shudras for everything else. Untouchables are folks outside the system which would include non Hindus btw. Obviously such a system doesnt work when most of your best clients are Christian which in theory would make them unt
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Oh, I'm sorry. I only know about the Indian caste system not the US one.
I've seen the reaction by Indian people to an Indian Brahmin. I've also been treated as very fucking far from untouchable by Indian friends, colleagues and other Indians that don't even know me.
Obviously such a system doesnt work when most of your best clients are Christian
Nonetheless, pretending that in-group bias or an 'old boys club' is purely limited to a single fucking skin colour is racist in itself. Racism is bad, don't be racist.
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So yeah the white guy got paid more because the only way to get that sale was to be a white guy.
The white guy got paid 4 times more just for being white? There are so many racist clients that, in order to attract enough white salespeople, IBM pays them 4 times the commission of black salespeople?
Wow. I can't imagine why minorities never shut up about white privilege and systemic racism.
Re: IBM does condone. (Score:2)
I'm pretty sure a good way to avoid being sued for discrimination might be to NOT arbitrarily say after the fact someone's work was "easy" and they will be paid less than expected. Then you won't have to explain how you're only bullying an employee and not illegally discriminating.
If it wound up being an unexpectedly easy large sale, tough nuts. If it was known in advance that commission would be capped for that deal then they wouldn't be in this position, and they wouldn't need to explain why it was myst
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I wonder at what point this isn't even about racial discrimination and just becomes about IBM corporate management authority and the individual vindictiveness of specific IBM managers. It's like some inter-party struggle in a communist party to purge cadre tainted by the scandal, with those on the fringes of the scandal pursuing the purge the most aggressively to demonstrate their loyalty to organization authority.
That's a bad look IBM (Score:2)
Re: That's a bad look IBM (Score:2)
What you're saying is, Every once in a while, you have to press CTL-ALT-DEL, emphasis on the DEL
IBM: We're not racist. Just look at our Thinkpad line
"Shuddup, Fred. We're going to appeal, is what my associate is trying to say."
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It doesn't even matter his race... (Score:5, Insightful)
... or if it was racially motivated. If he was paid less for the same deal and had the same contract with IBM as the other sales person, they deserve to be sued and he deserves to be paid what he was owed.
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Well, yeah, but IBM claims they fired the manager because he approved what the other person (the higher amount) got. IBM is saying neither of them was supposed to get the high amount. Given that they had to settle with the person who got the lower amount and this jury also ruled against them, I doubt they are right, but that's what they are saying and don't admit to discrimination.
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... or if it was racially motivated. If he was paid less for the same deal and had the same contract with IBM as the other sales person, they deserve to be sued and he deserves to be paid what he was owed.
If his compensation was really set solely by a contract, and if they were really identical, sure. One suspects it was possibly slightly more complex than that.
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The evidence of two court cases and his own manager aside, you've decided to die on the hill that "it was possibly more complex than that."
But no, you're not defending racism by claiming that this wasn't it.
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The evidence of two court cases and his own manager aside, you've decided to die on the hill that "it was possibly more complex than that."
But no, you're not defending racism by claiming that this wasn't it.
The burden of proof is on the accuser. If there's any direct evidence of racism, the article didn't bother to present it.
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The accuser presented his evidence to his manager, who agreed. The accuser presented his evidence to a judge, who refused to dismiss, whereupon IBM settled. The accuser's manager presented his evidence to a jury, who agreed and awarded a $11.1 million conclusion. Each have seen the contract.
You, however, have not seen the contract. You are, of course entitled to an opinion, but you are
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The accuser presented his evidence to his manager, who agreed. The accuser presented his evidence to a judge, who refused to dismiss, whereupon IBM settled. The accuser's manager presented his evidence to a jury, who agreed and awarded a $11.1 million conclusion. Each have seen the contract.
You, however, have not seen the contract. You are, of course entitled to an opinion, but you are neither entitled to declare facts nor declare your unfounded opinion to be worth a damn. Nothing of your opinion can undo a conclusion by 12 people with actual evidence in hand. Nothing of your opinion can compel me to weight it more highly than that jury's conclusion.
You are not the self-appointed arbiter of what happened here. You are, in fact, the accuser in this instance. And if there's any direct evidence that there was not racism, you certainly haven't bothered to present it. We're not relitigating this from first principles for your convenience and amusement. A judgment has been rendered, and it is your burden to show why it was erroneous, not the article's to justify it.
Again, if it is so cut and dried and irrefutable, then it should be easy to actually mention some evidence to the public. Nobody has bothered to do so, so I guess I'm free to doubt whatever I want to doubt. And even to express my doubts! Scary.
That's nice that you believe that court cases are never wrongly decided. If that's a principle for the left now, I guess I had missed that.
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Nope. Nobody cares what some random member of the public thinks. The manager got his judgment and his compensation. IBM lost its trial. Unless you're an appellate judge, you're irrelevant.
Funny, I thought that the right was all "law and order." Or
Hate to tell ya, but: (Score:2)
These things don't happen because you are black. Or a woman. Or whatever.
They happen to everyone of us!
You think we're not probably earning a lot less than some of our colleagues for no rational reason? E.g. because they were more confident and better at faking it than you, because they have no conscience. Maybe it just doesn't sit right with you, to be a dick...
Or because you were young, even though the older guys were so clueless they considered using functions in program code "too hard"! Because your bos
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I stand corrected! It seems there are some people who will not accept racism occurs even if found by a court of law. If suspect therefore there is no evidence that could ever convince you that racism ever happens.
Why are you so invested in the idea?
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It is not possible for a U.S. business to insert in contracts or agreements a power to racially discriminate. It is illegal, period. Saying "we can cap commissions at our discretion" does not grant them an arbitrary, unreviewable power (unreviewable even by the courts) to use that "discretion" to racially discriminate.
As luis_a_espinal says in one of the first posts on this thread "it's just a matter of looking at the comments here to see why this still happens". wosehi6883 here (and his 'Look how brave and
What moron at IBM (Score:5, Interesting)
There was a time when IBM Legal were known as "the Nazgúl" for being persistent and basically unbeatable. How the mighty have fallen.
Nick Donato, who is White, received more than $1m for a SAS Institute deal, while Jerome Beard, who is Black, was paid about $230,000 for closing a sale to HCL Technologies. Beard was paid about 15 per cent of what he should have received under his agreement with IBM, despite a company policy not to cap sales commissions.
Finally, a reasonably clear-cut case of racially-based discrimination that can be challenged in a courtroom.
So they underpay the black guy, are warned about how this makes them look, get sued (as predicted), lose (as expected), and they then fire the guy who warned them? That's some big-brained strategising right there.
And when the guy who got fired, sues (who could possibly have foreseen this?!?), they go "hey, you know that racial discrimination case we lost? How about we drag all that up again in a new courtcase we're bound to lose?"
But really, we shouldn't jump to conclusions based on this one (extremely damning) case. Because look:
"IBM does not condone retaliation, race discrimination, or any other form of discrimination."
Phew, you really had me worried there for a moment!
But wait, that is this?
The company also fired two other IBM managers, Andre Temidis and Michael Lee, who raised similar objections to the allegedly discriminatory capping of commission due to an Arab-American salesperson.
Oh.
Re: What moron at IBM (Score:2)
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Just in the “maybe” department, SAS is European and HCL Indian. Do the margins align for the two regions, and is commission calculated on gross sale or net margin? Likewise, was there a opportunity for greater supplemental revenue from one over the other?
There could very well be differences we are not privy to, although on the surface is apparent that IBM screwed up badly.
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There could very well be differences we are not privy to, although on the surface is apparent that IBM screwed up badly.
Wouldn't IBM have raised these differences in court? Clearly the jury was not convinced and they were definitely privy to these.
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That wasn’t the case at hand. The case at hand was wrongful dismissal. The matter of the other settlement is likely confidential.
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So they underpay the black guy, are warned about how this makes them look, get sued (as predicted), lose (as expected), and they then fire the guy who warned them? That's some big-brained strategising right there.
The manager was fired for warning in writing and leaving behind a paper trail. He was expected to call the bosses, meet them in some country club, on a golf outing, out of ear shot explain, the sticky situation, find way to stop the black/brown/yellow guy, or girl learning about it, adjust contracts and guidelines with wiggle room and provide plausible deniability. He was fired for this dereliction of duty.
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...thought it would be a great idea to air all this dirty laundry in court?
What moron would believe that IBM management would in this day and age simply pay black employees less for being black?
The story provides literally no evidence of racial motivations. So I'm left to believe either A. that some cigar chomping racist at IBM high up in management gave the order - "pay the darkies less!" - OR - B. to believe that this little todo is all part of the mass hysteria going on right now, with as much reality behind it as the "noose" in the NASCAR garage.
Hmm, which one to believe, l
I really object to it when... (Score:2)
It was flatly denied that it was racially motivated. Why should that have not then been the end of things in the absence of any proof beyond the initial allegation that it was?
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Lots of criminals flatly deny committing crimes. This is why we have courts and juries, to determine if the person was lying. The whole concept of mens rea in criminal law is about a guilty mind, I.e. What the person was thinking. If we can manage it for criminal law, we can manage it for civil cases too.
Anyway since you didn't quote anything about the case it's clear you have no idea what the evidence was or the legal arguments. You're just reflexively denying racism because it seems you have a vested inte
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Why should that have not then been the end of things in the absence of any proof beyond the initial allegation that it was?
From the article: "Beard was paid about 15 per cent of what he should have received under his agreement with IBM, despite a company policy not to cap sales commissions."
There's an old saying: “When you have eliminated all which is impossible, then whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.” To relate this to the situation at hand, it wasn't a contractual issue regarding pay or commission, it wasn't for any other valid reason (or presumably that reason would have been made explicit)
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Obviously.
But what the truth may not necessariily be included in the information that you have available, and worse, you may not be aware that you do not have this information, or may disbelieve that there could be additional information. To conclude such a thing, you must have enough information about the matter such that it must be provably impossible for there to be any factors other than th
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It may very well be a personal matter, one that they aren't eager to discuss or disclose, but that doesn't mean it was necessarily racism.
I completely agree with your last point but, given the situation i.e. senior professional managers discussing an employee's performance, a 'reluctance' to discuss other potential factors is, to say the least, hard to understand.
In this particular case, I have no additional information. To flip the question, however, what are you seemingly reluctant to consider that it was some other reason, as he said?
As I said, I'm not party to any additional information either. However I thought it was pretty clear that I had considered the possibility of there being another reason, but discounted it because they were reportedly unable or unwilling to state what that reason was. The judgement of
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That's a pretty far far from the position of "when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever is remaining must be the truth", however.
Isn't that on you, or the court? The logical extension of this kind of reasoning is that any accused person, regardless of crime, must be assumed to
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"I swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help me God"
... they were reportedly unable or unwilling to state what that reason was.
Isn't that on you, or the court?
I kind of assumed the court did consider the question, and were 'unsatisfied' by the answers, or lack thereof, they received.
The logical extension of this kind of reasoning is that any accused person, regardless of crime, must be assumed to be guilty by their peers and the courts until evidence has surfaced that can reasonable vindicate them by creating sufficient doubt about their guilt.
Fortunately all cases are considered on their individual merits, in respect of the relevant legislation. I'm generally uncomfortable with overarching 'legal precedence' for precisely this reason, especially as some, historically, seem to run completely counter to the actual law. Courts are not, and
Maybe it wasn't about race (Score:3)
What do us people do who don't have the advantage of calling it racist when we disadvantaged?
Re: Maybe it wasn't about race (Score:2)
So should IBM. Implement stupid policies, get stupid results. What exactly did they think was going to happen?
Criminal (Score:4, Insightful)
What's really criminal is the high prices charged for large commercial software licenses, and now we know why. $1M for commission? Wtf.
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What's really criminal is the high prices charged for large commercial software licenses, and now we know why. $1M for commission? Wtf.
You have it entirely backwards. The price isn't high because of the $1M commission. The commission was $1M because the price was high to begin with and the salesperson gets a percentage. If he were selling carpet instead of multi-million dollar service contracts he would have gotten $50.
IBM does not want US people no they want H1B's (Score:2)
IBM does not want US people no they want H1B's But in this they they fucked up and fired the black guy. If they did this to an white guy then IBM may of been able to win the court case.
Scapegoats, form a line to the right (Score:4, Funny)
"IBM does not condone getting caught engaging in retaliation, race discrimination, or any other form of discrimination. The company will consider all of its options on appeal."
Hey, IBM...fixed that for you. You're welcome.
This is rediculous . . . (Score:2)
. . . Firstly, I find it hard to believe that all salesman's contract read the same regarding commission. Surely this is down to the individual to negotiate with IBM.
We don't see the value of either contract, which might help to understand the payoff.
I've seen plenty of commission scales which operate like a graduated income tax, so it's quite possible there's some really unusual shit going on.
500k - 1M -> 1% commission
1M+ - 5M -> 2% commission
5M+ - 25M -> 2% commission plus 100k for contrac
hmm (Score:2)
Compensation at that level is mostly related to negotiation skills, that kind of thing. (If you could get the same plumbing for 1/4 of the cost just by shopping around, wouldn't you?)
Is there any actual evidence that there were racial motives at work? Or is the concept of evidence and proof just some old dusty concept us old white guys use to oppress?