Google Groups no longer supports new Usenet posts or subscriptions. Historical content remains viewable.
Dismiss
Ethics Dunce, Life Competence and Workplace Division: Brittany Pietsch
27 views
Skip to first unread message
Michael Ejercito
Jan 18, 2024, 1:12:46 PM1/18/24
to
https://ethicsalarms.com/2024/01/17/ethics-dunce-life-competence-and-workplace-division-brittany-pietsch/
Ethics Dunce, Life Competence and Workplace Division: Brittany Pietsch
JANUARY 17, 2024 / JACK MARSHALL
My first reaction was to have sympathy for Brittany Pietsch, the
Cloudfare account executive who somehow thought recording her Zoomed
firing and posting it on social media would be a good idea. Then I
learned she was 27. That’s much too old to behave like she did, much
less to be self-righteous about it. Her experience ended up on every
social media platform and was covered by media outlets from the New York
Post to the The Wall Street Journal, and now she is the official “poster
girl” for deluded and entitled young workers who don’t get the
capitalist system and the competitive workplace.
You can see her nine-minute clip here. If you don’t wince through it,
you may need a refresher course in workplace ethics yourself. An at-will
employee, Brittany argues with the HR staff who were assigned to dismiss
her. Here’s a typical exchange:
PIETSCH: “I disagree that my performance hasn’t been– I haven’t met
performance expectations, when I certainly have, just because haven’t
closed anything officially.”
HR REP: “I hear you. Thank you.”
PIETSCH: “Also, why are you doing this and not my manager? We’ve never
met, so this seems a little odd… Yeah, I would love like an explanation
that makes sense…”
HR REP: “Just for clarification, you are not being singled out in this.
Your peers are also being collectively assessed on performance. This is
a collective calibration for Cloudfare…”
PIETSCH: “Well, yeah, no, can you explain for me why Brittany Pietsch if
getting let go?”
HR REP: “I won’t be able to go into specifics or numbers.”
PIETSCH: “Wait, why though? I just started. I’ve been working extremely
hard. Just because I haven’t closed anything, that has nothing to do
with my performance… And so I really need an answer and an explanation
as to why Brittany Pietsch is getting let go not why Cloudflare decided
to hire too many people then are now actually realizing that they can’t
afford this many people and they’re letting that go. If that’s the real
answer, I would rather just you tell me that instead of making up some
bullshit… It’s just very, very shocking. Very, very shocking. I have
like really given my whole energy and life over the last four months to
this job and to be like go for no reason is like a huge slap in the face
from a company that I really wanted to believe in…”
[Quick aside: One of my biases is against people who refer to themselves
in the third person.]
There is only one competent and responsible way to handle the experience
of being fired or laid off, as my father, who was fired almost as often
as I have been, taught me. Accept the news, tell your supervisor that
you enjoyed working for him or her, shake hands, wish them the best, and
leave with your head high. “You never know when you might have an
opportunity to work with the same people, and it is always wise to leave
a good impression as you leave,” Dad said. With the exception of my
first job, every other one before I started my own business ended with
me being told that it was time to go. After I exited the U.S. Chamber oc
Commerce and gave my farewell performance for the organization’s
president, my old boss called me and said, “Whatever it was you did, it
was brilliant. They wondered if they made a terrible mistake by letting
you go!” I always got glowing references from the organizations that
canned me, and that old boss hired me to do a project for him a few
years later.
Megyn Kelly, the ex-Fox News host and a lawyer, was brutal in her
assessment of Brittany’s confrontational exit interview. “You’re not
calling the shots here, Brittany,” she wrote. “You’re an employee. You
don’t get an answer because you’ve demanded it from HR. I am sick of
these young, entitled people trying to play the victim when something
happens to them. This has happened to all of us in the course of our
lives and we used to understand that it sucks, but I go on with my life.”
I wonder how Pietsch got the crack-brained idea that trying to impugn
her former employer this way was a shrewd career move. I wouldn’t hire
her. She told the New York Post that although she hadn’t intended that
the video get the kind of attention it has, she doesn’t regret sharing
it. Yeah, we’ll see about that, kid. I think there is a substantial
likelihood that you will regret it, as Rick Blaine told Ilsa, “maybe not
today, maybe not tomorrow, but soon and for the rest of your life.”
She also told the Post that she has been inundated with messages from
other, out-of-work 20-somthings who wish they had done the same thing.
Yes, and that may explain why a lot of them are unemployed just like
Brittany.
Thanks to the bad publicity, Matthew Prince, the CEO of Cloudflare, felt
he had to comment on the video on Twitter/X. “We fired [about] 40 sales
people out of over 1,500 in our go-to-market org. That’s a normal
quarter,” he wrote in part. “When we’re doing performance management
right, we can often tell within [three] months or less of a sales hire,
even during the holidays, whether they’re going to be successful or not.
Sadly, we don’t hire perfectly. We try to fire perfectly.” He then
criticized his company for not having Pietsch’s supervisor involved in
the kiss-off meeting. Prince is right about that, but it doesn’t excuse
Brittany. Again, Kelly was brutal.”You’ve invited the company to
publicly humiliate you,” she wrote. “They could tell in your limited
time on the job that you weren’t up to it. You admitted you didn’t close
deals…Go find someplace else where they like you and work harder…Keep
your head down and your mouth shut.”
I’ve had to be the firer far more times than I’ve been the firee: once I
had to fire an entire staff made up substantially of single mothers. As
an artistic director, I’ve had to fire actors in the final week of
rehearsal; once I had to fire a 9-year-old girl. I’ll take getting fired
over being the one doing the firing any day. Once you’ve had that
experience, the Golden Rule should kick in. Most of the time, the person
firing you has no choice in that matter. Don’t make that person feel
worse by acting as if you have been destroyed. He or she usually feels
terrible already.
Come to think of it, that was one way Brittany’s conduct was less
destructive than it might have been. Mostly it hurt her. The HR staff
probably left the encounter thinking, “Boy, are we lucky to be rid of
that woman!”
***
WordPress’s bot suggests that I should tag this post, “France.” Oh!
“Brittany!” Now I get it…
Ethics Dunce, Life Competence and Workplace Division: Brittany Pietsch
JANUARY 17, 2024 / JACK MARSHALL
My first reaction was to have sympathy for Brittany Pietsch, the
Cloudfare account executive who somehow thought recording her Zoomed
firing and posting it on social media would be a good idea. Then I
learned she was 27. That’s much too old to behave like she did, much
less to be self-righteous about it. Her experience ended up on every
social media platform and was covered by media outlets from the New York
Post to the The Wall Street Journal, and now she is the official “poster
girl” for deluded and entitled young workers who don’t get the
capitalist system and the competitive workplace.
You can see her nine-minute clip here. If you don’t wince through it,
you may need a refresher course in workplace ethics yourself. An at-will
employee, Brittany argues with the HR staff who were assigned to dismiss
her. Here’s a typical exchange:
PIETSCH: “I disagree that my performance hasn’t been– I haven’t met
performance expectations, when I certainly have, just because haven’t
closed anything officially.”
HR REP: “I hear you. Thank you.”
PIETSCH: “Also, why are you doing this and not my manager? We’ve never
met, so this seems a little odd… Yeah, I would love like an explanation
that makes sense…”
HR REP: “Just for clarification, you are not being singled out in this.
Your peers are also being collectively assessed on performance. This is
a collective calibration for Cloudfare…”
PIETSCH: “Well, yeah, no, can you explain for me why Brittany Pietsch if
getting let go?”
HR REP: “I won’t be able to go into specifics or numbers.”
PIETSCH: “Wait, why though? I just started. I’ve been working extremely
hard. Just because I haven’t closed anything, that has nothing to do
with my performance… And so I really need an answer and an explanation
as to why Brittany Pietsch is getting let go not why Cloudflare decided
to hire too many people then are now actually realizing that they can’t
afford this many people and they’re letting that go. If that’s the real
answer, I would rather just you tell me that instead of making up some
bullshit… It’s just very, very shocking. Very, very shocking. I have
like really given my whole energy and life over the last four months to
this job and to be like go for no reason is like a huge slap in the face
from a company that I really wanted to believe in…”
[Quick aside: One of my biases is against people who refer to themselves
in the third person.]
There is only one competent and responsible way to handle the experience
of being fired or laid off, as my father, who was fired almost as often
as I have been, taught me. Accept the news, tell your supervisor that
you enjoyed working for him or her, shake hands, wish them the best, and
leave with your head high. “You never know when you might have an
opportunity to work with the same people, and it is always wise to leave
a good impression as you leave,” Dad said. With the exception of my
first job, every other one before I started my own business ended with
me being told that it was time to go. After I exited the U.S. Chamber oc
Commerce and gave my farewell performance for the organization’s
president, my old boss called me and said, “Whatever it was you did, it
was brilliant. They wondered if they made a terrible mistake by letting
you go!” I always got glowing references from the organizations that
canned me, and that old boss hired me to do a project for him a few
years later.
Megyn Kelly, the ex-Fox News host and a lawyer, was brutal in her
assessment of Brittany’s confrontational exit interview. “You’re not
calling the shots here, Brittany,” she wrote. “You’re an employee. You
don’t get an answer because you’ve demanded it from HR. I am sick of
these young, entitled people trying to play the victim when something
happens to them. This has happened to all of us in the course of our
lives and we used to understand that it sucks, but I go on with my life.”
I wonder how Pietsch got the crack-brained idea that trying to impugn
her former employer this way was a shrewd career move. I wouldn’t hire
her. She told the New York Post that although she hadn’t intended that
the video get the kind of attention it has, she doesn’t regret sharing
it. Yeah, we’ll see about that, kid. I think there is a substantial
likelihood that you will regret it, as Rick Blaine told Ilsa, “maybe not
today, maybe not tomorrow, but soon and for the rest of your life.”
She also told the Post that she has been inundated with messages from
other, out-of-work 20-somthings who wish they had done the same thing.
Yes, and that may explain why a lot of them are unemployed just like
Brittany.
Thanks to the bad publicity, Matthew Prince, the CEO of Cloudflare, felt
he had to comment on the video on Twitter/X. “We fired [about] 40 sales
people out of over 1,500 in our go-to-market org. That’s a normal
quarter,” he wrote in part. “When we’re doing performance management
right, we can often tell within [three] months or less of a sales hire,
even during the holidays, whether they’re going to be successful or not.
Sadly, we don’t hire perfectly. We try to fire perfectly.” He then
criticized his company for not having Pietsch’s supervisor involved in
the kiss-off meeting. Prince is right about that, but it doesn’t excuse
Brittany. Again, Kelly was brutal.”You’ve invited the company to
publicly humiliate you,” she wrote. “They could tell in your limited
time on the job that you weren’t up to it. You admitted you didn’t close
deals…Go find someplace else where they like you and work harder…Keep
your head down and your mouth shut.”
I’ve had to be the firer far more times than I’ve been the firee: once I
had to fire an entire staff made up substantially of single mothers. As
an artistic director, I’ve had to fire actors in the final week of
rehearsal; once I had to fire a 9-year-old girl. I’ll take getting fired
over being the one doing the firing any day. Once you’ve had that
experience, the Golden Rule should kick in. Most of the time, the person
firing you has no choice in that matter. Don’t make that person feel
worse by acting as if you have been destroyed. He or she usually feels
terrible already.
Come to think of it, that was one way Brittany’s conduct was less
destructive than it might have been. Mostly it hurt her. The HR staff
probably left the encounter thinking, “Boy, are we lucky to be rid of
that woman!”
***
WordPress’s bot suggests that I should tag this post, “France.” Oh!
“Brittany!” Now I get it…
0 new messages