The Pinterest Paradox: Cupcakes and Toxicity

It's pretty demoralizing to see these kinds of stories come out so often at so many different companies.

I agree with the author that companies should start looking harder at retention; so much of the attention/effort right now is to spent on the beginning of the pipeline, but it's not effective if everyone quits in 10 years.

This is a well-written account of the author’s experience as COO. I hope her next bosses/colleagues don’t shortchange her like Pinterest did.

Even though I empathize Francoise Brougher's experience, I don't think this has much to do with gender bias. First, reading the article again, one can completely replace the gender points and the entire argument still holds. This is just typical company politics and employees vs founders vs senior leadership fights. I doubt the author may also know this but just use gender bias to catch eyes and align with the main stream discussion about gender inequality. Second, how do you know Ben and the other two executives are men? They could be LGBTQ. What if Ben and the other two men stood out and declared themselves as female? Did the author have gender bias?

I empathize so deeply. My selfish (and imperfect) solution has been to seek out pockets of equity and support and proactively leave toxic environments behind - but this also means forgoing opportunities (that I shouldn't have to give up).

Let's all pledge to speak up, so we can at least start creating visibility for systemic change!