It’s no secret that the legal industry—and Silicon Valley and the greater technology arena—have dismal records for hiring, promoting and inspiring women.

Some of issues that face women (and men) in tech-related workplaces are front and center this week, due to Sunday’s The New York Times cover story focused on Amazon (which “recently surpassed Walmart as the most valuable retailer in the county.”)  “Inside Amazon: Wrestling Big Ideas in a Bruising Workplace,” by Jodi Kantor and David Streitfeld, discusses how “the company is conducting an experiement in how far it can push white-collar workers to get them to achieve its ever-expanding ambitions.” Amazon’s tactics have been dubbed “purposeful darwinism,” they said.

The report covers a wide range of issues regarding Amazon’s culture and workplace, where everyone is expected to “tear apart one  another’s ideas in meetings, toil long and late … and held to standards that the company boasts are ‘unreasonably high.’”

One section of the story is chilling for women: “Motherhood can also be a liability. Michelle Williamson, a 41-year-old parent of three who helped build Amazon’s restaurant supply business, said her boss, Shahrul Ladue, had told her that raising children would most likely prevent her from success at a higher level because of the long hours required. Mr. Ladue, who confirmed her account, said that Ms. Williamson had been directly competing with younger colleagues with fewer commitments, so he suggested she find a less demanding job at Amazon. (Both he and Ms. Williamson left the company.)”

The reporters also cited incidents where women who faced traumatic health issues were given low performance ratings and/or were put on a performance improvement plan when returning, including a woman who with thyroid cancer, another with breast cancer and a woman who had delivered a stillborn child. Another woman left for a business trip the day after she miscarried twins, the reporters noted. “Their accounts echoed others from workers who had suffered health crises and felt they had also been judged harshly instead of being given time to recover,” the story said.

“The mother of the stillborn child soon left Amazon. ‘I had just experienced the most devastating event in my life,’ the woman recalled via email, only to be told her performance would be monitored ‘to make sure my focus stayed on my job,’” the article stated. Amazon does not offer maternity or paternity leaves.

Monday Reaction

Monday, the Times provided a followup: “Jeff Bezos and Amazon Employees Join Debate Over Its Culture.”  In that followup, the reporters quoted a letter to employees from Jeff Bezos founder and chief executive, who declined to be interviewed for the original story):

“Mr. Bezos said Amazon would not tolerate the ‘shockingly callous management practices’ described in the article. He urged any employees who knew of ‘stories like those reported’ to contact him directly. ‘Even if it’s rare or isolated, our tolerance for any such lack of empathy needs to be zero,’ Mr. Bezos said.”

Also on Monday, Kantor appeared on CBS This Morning, and discussed the positive and negative aspects of Amazon.  On the show, Jay Carney (former White House press secretary and now the company’s chief spokesperson) contested some of The Times’ assertions and raised the point that 80 percent of technology companies do not offer any kind of maternity leave benefits. (There are a growing number of companies that now offer a year of paid parental leave—Netflix, Microsoft Corp. and Adobe are among the companies upgrading their policies).

Looking Forward

Let’s hope that The New York Times report and reactions trigger a candid dialogue to help all of us in the technology-related community to push for workplace environments that are productive, innovative, humane and gender/color neutral. (And yes, workplaces and people vary when it comes to recipes for successful organizations. )

Bios
• Jodi Kantor writes about gender, politics and other topics.
• David Streitfeld covers technology for The New York Times, and is a contributor to “BITS” the Business of Technology.)

More Reaction
• CBS News
• Politico
• Forbes/Tech
• Slate
• NPR
• USA Today

Monica Bay is a CodeX Fellow and freelance reporter for Bloomberg BNA Big Law Business. She is a member of the California bar. Email: mbay@codex.stanford.edu. Twitter: @MonicaBay.