Equal Opportunity Employer?

[sharktale1212]

Well as some of you might know I recently resigned from my job. I worked in the IT arm of one of the largest bank in the world. Currently I am going to join Infosys.

Before I got my offer from Infy I was also appearing for a company called Mahindra Satyam. They made me go through a "IT check" interview lasting 25 mins. Then asked me to come down to their office for another round. When I turned up, they had another "IT check" round from the same person for 15 mins. Then there was a manager round asking me about issues I faced etc for 25 mins again.

Then the HR told me I'll be getting another technical round. That lasted around 25 mins again. I passed through that round. I was told a "very senior" guy from Satyam was going to talk to me. That guy couldnt be reached so I had to go through another technical round. That too I passed.

/*I was so pissed that I forgot to include this
At this juncture HR tells me (his exact words): Your profile has been shortlisted. I'll confirm your selection in a few. I am waiting for Competency team to release an offer.

Now here I assume I was through the whole thing and was getting hired.

Then he makes me wait for over a week (I can only assume to look at other candidates). Then he tells me a "senior guy" needs to talk to me before he can finalise me. And that too its a discussion, not an interview.
A complete ruse to kick me out of the whole process.
/*

So after passing 5 rounds, the senior guy calls me up. He chats with me for 2-3 minutes and disconnects the call. And then I was judged by this "very senior" guy in less than 5 minutes.

After going through 6 rounds HR tells me my profile is on hold. I am technically competent but they cant take me. The reason is: I stutter. Its nothing major but still they see problem. They are not ready to have a word with the client (its their prerogative I know). They rather insist that I work on an internal project. I would be "slowly" introduced to the client so that he can adjust to me. Considering none of their projects (for my tech) are offshore they are unwilling to take me. Reason is all client facing positions and they dont want me on a stake (their words not mine). The way I see it they are rather worried about their reputation.
To rub salt to wound, they want me to hold for 2-3 weeks. Basically for them to look for replacements and if there are none they might consider me.

It was a rather insulting conversation.

Frankly I have been appearing for interviews for over 3mths now. I have always had a sneaking suspicion that something like this was happening to me. I never paid attention cause no one had wasted my time so much. Most of the time I was out in the first round. So no harm done. But this time made me go through 6 rounds only to say this.

I never thought my stuttering as a disability. This is the first time someone made me feel so. And the question is: If its a disability, what does the company talk about when they say "we are an equal opportunity employer"? And is it correct for companies to say we will release an offer and then go back on their words?

 

[Being.smart]

What does stuttering have to do with any IT position :unsure:

 

[greenhorn]

Ignorant HR was a bit too honest. Most of them are clueless anyway. If you want to fight, it's your word against theirs. Companies claim they are equal opportunity employers to avoid potential litigation. Usually some other excuse is made to cover up such rejections. You just got lucky this time to find out the truth.

 

[sharktale1212]

@greenhorn - I dont really want to fight. Just had a WTF moment . I always had suspicion of this happening. It happens and cant be helped. Normally I keep getting kicked out during the first round. But these guys took 6 rounds over a period of 1 month only to give me this bullshit. That too after a 2-3 minute conversation.

 

[booo]

The HR of the "big mncs" give you the worst excuses. you can actually see their mood change within a fraction of time. from demanding to begging.

 

[Sei]

Well as some of you might know I recently resigned from my job. I worked in the IT arm of one of the largest bank in the world. Currently I am going to join Infosys.

Before I got my offer from Infy I was also appearing for a company called Mahindra Satyam. They made me go through a "IT check" interview lasting 25 mins. Then asked me to come down to their office for another round. When I turned up, they had another "IT check" round from the same person for 15 mins. Then there was a manager round asking me about issues I faced etc for 25 mins again.

Then the HR told me I'll be getting another technical round. That lasted around 25 mins again. I passed through that round. I was told a "very senior" guy from Satyam was going to talk to me. That guy couldnt be reached so I had to go through another technical round. That too I passed.
So after passing 5 rounds, the senior guy calls me up. He chats with me for 2-3 minutes and disconnects the call. And then I was judged by this "very senior" guy in less than 5 minutes.

After going through 6 rounds HR tells me my profile is on hold. I am technically competent but they cant take me. The reason is: I stutter. Its nothing major but still they see problem. They are not ready to have a word with the client (its their prerogative I know). They rather insist that I work on an internal project. I would be "slowly" introduced to the client so that he can adjust to me. Considering none of their projects (for my tech) are offshore they are unwilling to take me. Reason is all client facing positions and they dont want me on a stake (their words not mine). The way I see it they are rather worried about their reputation.
To rub salt to wound, they want me to hold for 2-3 weeks. Basically for them to look for replacements and if there are none they might consider me.

It was a rather insulting conversation.

Frankly I have been appearing for interviews for over 3mths now. I have always had a sneaking suspicion that something like this was happening to me. I never paid attention cause no one had wasted my time so much. Most of the time I was out in the first round. So no harm done. But this time made me go through 6 rounds only to say this.

I never thought my stuttering as a disability. This is the first time someone made me feel so. And the question is: If its a disability, what does the company talk about when they say "we are an equal opportunity employer"?

I got increasingly angry as I read each line and was absolutely furious when I reached the end.

It pains me to say this but time and again these Indian MNCs have lowered my faith in them. I'm working in an international MNC and from my recent experiences with clients across North America (provided support to 20+ clients), Australia and UK, all of them have been extremely courteous and patient. I am a 100% sure that they would have no issues with you. They respect people who are technically competent and are extremely professional. It's only us Indians who take people on face value. (You don't want me to elaborate on the English speaking skills of some of my colleagues. I would rather stutter than speak the gibberish that they do)

To sum up -

Firstly, it is not a fcking disability. Don't even think that way because of this stupid experience. You are skilled enough to clear all tech rounds of Infy and Mahindra Satyam. You were previously working in the IT arm of one of the largest banks in the world. You are good at what you do and this one aspect doesn't detract any of that.

Secondly, you should be happy you came to know about the double standards before you joined and would have been forced into internal work positions and kept away from client facing ones. It would have been terribly depressing and frustrating.

Thirdly, erase whatever you experience was (and the consequent thoughts as a result of that) and go ahead with the enthusiasm you had before. Keep your chin up!

Best of luck for your future endeavours!

 

[blkrb0t]

This is interesting indeed. A technical job doesn't depend on a person's ability to talk fluently, but they still discriminate based on such factors. Wonder what other factors they discriminate on, as I've seen myself how the candidates get placed in our college.

Googled this just now: Stuttering as a Disability under the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990

Scientific studies have shown that 85 percent of employers agreed that stuttering decreases a person's employability and opportunities for promotion. Hurst, M.I. & Cooper, E.B., Employer attitudes toward stuttering, Journal of Fluency Disorders, 8, 1-12 (1983). Vocational rehabilitation counselors who were surveyed reported that stuttering was indeed vocationally handicapping. Hurst, M.I. & Cooper, E.B., Vocational rehabilitation counselors' attitudes toward stuttering, Journal of Fluency Disorders, 8, 13-27 (1983). Surveys of people who stutter have reported high rates of unemployment, discrimination in attaining employment, and denial of promotions because of stuttering. Opp, K.L., Hayden, P.A., & Cottrell, G.T., Stuttering and employment: A survey report, Annual Convention of the American Speech, Language, and Hearing Association, Boston, MA (1997).

 

[m-jeri]

I disagree with what said above. Talking properly is a very important requirement, especially if u are talking with clients. Anywhere. Europe, US or Asia. Kinda common sense.

That being said, i personally know someone from client side that stutters. . He like a 25+ year field expert with double doctorate & couple of patents thrown in and English is not his first language and he lives in US.
He knows his flaws, so he takes extra care so that we understand properly what he says. And he is spot on the first time always though.

If your stuttering is not a obstacle to clear interviews, then clearly its the HR procrastinating over things. Just ignore them.

 

[sharktale1212]

I got increasingly angry as I read each line and was absolutely furious when I reached the end.

It pains me to say this but time and again these Indian MNCs have lowered my faith in them. I'm working in an international MNC and from my recent experiences with clients across North America (provided support to 20+ clients), Australia and UK, all of them have been extremely courteous and patient. I am a 100% sure that they would have no issues with you. They respect people who are technically competent and are extremely professional. It's only us Indians who take people on face value. (You don't want me to elaborate on the English speaking skills of some of my colleagues. I would rather stutter than speak the gibberish that they do)

To sum up -

Firstly, it is not a fcking disability. Don't even think that way because of this stupid experience. You are skilled enough to clear all tech rounds of Infy and Mahindra Satyam. You were previously working in the IT arm of one of the largest banks in the world. You are good at what you do and this one aspect doesn't detract any of that.

Secondly, you should be happy you came to know about the double standards before you joined and would have been forced into internal work positions and kept away from client facing ones. It would have been terribly depressing and frustrating.

Thirdly, erase whatever you experience was (and the consequent thoughts as a result of that) and go ahead with the enthusiasm you had before. Keep your chin up!

Best of luck for your future endeavours!

Sei, I had similar experience when joining my current job too. The interviewer said you have a "communication problem". Only thing I could tell him was - "I dont have a communication problem, you can understand what I am saying without going ah? what? Pardon me? etc. I am perfectly clear to you. If yes, then I dont see any communication problem. It could be said I stutter yes but not "communication problem". " The interviewer listened to me, was impressed and lobbied for me to get the job. In the current scenario neither this senior guy nor HR were ready to listen what I had to say. This is what made me feel odd. How come such morons get hired. Well in the end had to give the HR an earful, thats all I could do.

This is interesting indeed. A technical job doesn't depend on a person's ability to talk fluently, but they still discriminate based on such factors. Wonder what other factors they discriminate on, as I've seen myself how the candidates get placed in our college.

Googled this just now: Stuttering as a Disability under the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990

Any of those 85% employer agreeing to it publicly can be sued for all their worth. Still I have worked with some Americans and they have lobbied in my favor when promotion time came in. It was only the Indian managers who had problems. We are more biased as a community. A bipolar is easily called mental and dark skinned is called kaalu. So this is not really interesting rather disgusting.

- - - Updated - - -

I disagree with what said above. Talking properly is a very important requirement, especially if u are talking with clients. Anywhere. Europe, US or Asia. Kinda common sense.

That being said, i personally know someone from client side that stutters. . He like a 25+ year field expert with double doctorate & couple of patents thrown in and English is not his first language and he lives in US.
He knows his flaws, so he takes extra care so that we understand properly what he says. And he is spot on the first time always though.

If your stuttering is not a obstacle to clear interviews, then clearly its the HR procrastinating over things. Just ignore them.

Not sure which post you referring to but I dont believe speaking to be an important requirement. What you said would mean a dumb genius will never get to work in a team or will require another set of such people (I know I am just paraphrasing).

Not everyone needs to talk , things can be discussed over chat/mail too. You just need good writing skills. I worked with clients from Singapore and boy they were shy of speaking English. They became supremely agitated when we called them for any work. Most of us dealt with them over chat/mails.
That aside, do you work in IT? If yes, you would have seen what @Sei was referring too. People in position with some real gibberish as their language. And the subtlety of the language is always lost to them. We even had a big discussion on what "kicked the bucket" (an expression used by client) meant. Many were stumped why it was the bucket being kicked.

HR was aware of it the whole time. He had brought it up during my initial "are you looking for a change" talk. And thats what is been pissing me off.

 

[m-jeri]

I work in IT. Product development always. With Asian, European and now US clients. OffShore and Onsite.

If you think always chat and mail does the work, then i am sorry no point in blaming the HR. If you are good at writing, then this is the wrong profession for you. Don't take it as personal, you need to change your attitude of how people actually work and how u want them to work.

I cant continue more without being hurtful and discouraging for you. So i will stop.

 

[booo]

^I work in Product Development Company. There are two Linux driver guys in my team who stutter (haklana in hindi). No one gives a ****! they communicate over mail, they attend calls with oracle team(who licensed our product for their SAN arrays). again, no one gives a f.u.c.k.

 

[m-jeri]

Continuing this conversation with real world examples is only hurtful to the @OP. So whatever makes everyone feel good.

 

[Sei]

I work in IT. Product development always. With Asian, European and now US clients. OffShore and Onsite.

If you think always chat and mail does the work, then i am sorry no point in blaming the HR. If you are good at writing, then this is the wrong profession for you. Don't take it as personal, you need to change your attitude of how people actually work and how u want them to work.

I cant continue more without being hurtful and discouraging for you. So i will stop.

I, for one, feel it is the culture of the organisation rather than the people that matters. Discrimination of any kind sucks b@ll$, especially when frigging morons get hired and promoted everyday.

 

[agantuk]

You should talk / write (whatever you feel more comfortable with) to the HR and let him know in very clear words that their criteria for putting on hold is anything but legal. To be honest, you do have the opportunity to sue them, but let's not get into that. IMO stuttering is not a disability, though I have to admit since I am impatient I tend not to hear out people who speak slow or beat around the bush a lot. As most already pointed out, it is appalling to see how so many people (primarily of Indian origin) who know shit about English are working in the US in commanding positions. Not only do they speak BAD, their grammar is terrible. If it had been India, these guys would probably have remained unemployed forever. However most of the cases I have noticed these people are very good at what they do, and all said, that's what should really matter - not the color of the skin or personal preferences

 

[soggy316]

^I'm with agantuk, be batman, rattle some cages (even if you don't really go through with suing them)

 

[sharktale1212]

I work in IT. Product development always. With Asian, European and now US clients. OffShore and Onsite.

If you think always chat and mail does the work, then i am sorry no point in blaming the HR. If you are good at writing, then this is the wrong profession for you. Don't take it as personal, you need to change your attitude of how people actually work and how u want them to work.

I cant continue more without being hurtful and discouraging for you. So i will stop.

Edited this as I dint think it was worth it.
But now that we are gone down to the level to advice on career options, should I say you are one of the guys who will take a gibberish spouting over a stuttering person?

 

[asingh]

You were discriminated against due to the way you render speech, and sadly you cannot do much about it, being in India. The Indian corporate culture is pseudo - Americanized. In the sense, we like to ape the work culture and best practices of the mother-company, but the innate operational style and hiring blinders are still there. Sorry to say, you were rejected for this candidature in a similar manner as if the HR were looking for a groom for his/her daughter. Or probably the senior personnel who took your last round took the "call". Do remember, that HR in India is purely rote and administrative. They hardly have power of consensus or veto. They just search for candidates and try to get less pay + best skills. That is it. At the same time I find a lot of HR personnel (specially the women); to be extremely proud and haughty and assume they are more knowledgeable than actually shop-floor front line. They inject bureaucratic latency in administrative cycles, intervene in subject matter they absolutely have no knowledge about, are scared/apprehensive to raise flags when incorrect practices are implemented by managers, are quite adept at veiling and masking decisions or implementations. Basically "shrug shoulder" attitude. It is due to these ailments or you can say characteristics you will encounter: hires which are totally misfits (higher the position, the more prevalent this is), employees of all cadres getting away with incompetent performance or even getting promoted, misuse of office resources/policy, biased leverages and entitlements, display of empathy but lack of tangibility in action. Basically HR can be seen like the NATO of US. LOL. If you get what I mean.

The basic attitude of off-shore client : India back office set ups is, once a contract is inked no matter what, the renewal has to happen. There is nothing wrong with this. But if the company or account managers have confidence in themselves, they really do not need to negate deltas. The Sr. Manager saw you as a delta, and the client might get fed up or irritated (he felt). Which is extremely irksome as an attitude and thought process for the person. Maybe Mahindra Satyam is not like this globally but that one manager probably is. People in such positions usually think they are royalty and all their decisions are correct and non - judgmental -since- that is all they do all day. I have worked with a ton of people from all over the world, in all languages. Frankly speaking, it is quite difficult to communicate with people from SEA and Franco-phones...! But there is always a work around, if English is being used. The conversation can be managed slowly, and one is not being rude if they say "beg your pardon". Indian's will not understand this. They see, requesting for something >1x is a sign of begging and low hierarchy. The last interviewer (from Satyam) does not want his clients to go through this figment scenario. Or thought so. Frankly, I remember working with an American who also stuttered. First time I went on a call with him, he himself said.."by the way I stutter, so just prompt me if you do not understand something". Would a "prideful"; Indian do this/expect this. Nopes. Never. The last interviewer did not expect this from you, or would accept it. Thus: Nor can his client. Therefore: Candidature cancelled. HR cares 2 flying f****; that you were sieved through 6-7 rounds. As per them "you need the job"; they do not need a resource....!

Write down, Satyam Mahindra, as not a place to work for or entertain further calls from. I have.

 

[hareshr29]

I had also had long conversations with vendors from UK, every time i felt like ****ed up as i wont be able to understand their slang and they too knew that. But they were very much patient and co operative.
At the end of the day what everyone needs to get the work done

 

[greenhorn]

even if you call and complain, nothing will change. They will just make sure that the HR's will give legal excuses when dismissing someone.

 

[sid_donnydarko]

You haven't mentioned if you did stutter terribly during the 1st round. You also haven't mentioned if the position you applied for clearly stated "Excellent Communication and Interpersonal skills" under requirements. Judging by the total number of rounds you were put through, seems to me that they might've been giving you a lot of attempts hoping that you'd eventually improve. And trust me, i'm pretty sure this is what they'll say if you confront them.