I’m sorry to be pushing on this when it seems like you are doing the right thing, but could you elaborate more on this sentence from the article?
After that leader arranged for her to be flown to the U.K. for a job interview, she recalls being surprised to discover that she was expected to stay in his home, not a hotel.
Why was she being put up in your house and not a hotel, if you weren’t affiliated with the group she was interviewing for? I think this is the part a lot of people were sketched out by, so more context would be helpful.
Sorry I’m mostly trying to take a day away from the forum, but someone let me know that it would be helpful to chime in here. Essentially what happened:
The org had arranged accommodation (not a hotel), but it didn’t cover the first night she’d be in the country
The people running the recruitment talked to me in a “this is your friend you recommended, could you help out?” way
We had a spare room so I offered that; they said yes so I communicated with her about that
This was all arranged on the day of her flight (before she flew)
(I’m eliding details to reduce risk of leaking information about the person’s identity.)
This is a lot worse than I was expecting. This makes it clear that the woman was in a situation where it was extremely hard to refuse Owen’s offer of accommodation.
Firstly, the organization screwed up majorly. You should not be arranging accommodation for someone on the same day they fly to a foreign country. I know I would have been fairly distressed if this had happened to me.
Secondly, we need to remember that this was an organization she was interviewing for, and Owen was the one that recommended her, and was presumably on good terms with the org. It wouldn’t be unreasonable to think that making a fuss about staying at Owen’s house could hurt her chances with the org.
Thirdly, the power imbalances in their friendship might make her concerned about what would happen to her position if refusing accommodation hurt said friendship.
Fourthly, it’s often very expensive to get a last minute hotel. Refusing to stay with Owen could have occurred a large financial penalty.
This was not a case of “hey do you want to crash at mine when you fly over next month?”. This is a case of “no better options”. It’s extremely inappropriate to push boundaries on someone who is in this situation. I’m very saddened at the extreme lack of empathy and judgement that was shown here. I’m relieved that Owen is no longer in leadership positions in EA, and I deeply hope he has sincerely reformed since this encounter.
(1) Owen should have pushed the organization to find other housing for the interviewee?
(2) If the organization would or could not do so, Owen should not have agreed to host the interviewee for an evening (leaving her to find an expensive last-minute hotel?)
One potential concern with a yes to (2) is that—assuming it would have been OK to offer lodging in this situation to an older male to whom Owen wasn’t attracted—this could be seen as imposing extra costs on the woman for being young, female, and attractive to Owen.
(Personally, I would never make the hosting offer to any candidate.)
The most important thing he needed to do was to not mention masturbation or anything else sexual. The situation makes it significantly harder to for her to push back against unwanted behavior. (I think this would also have been wrong if she had agreed in advance to stay there, but the fact that it was foisted on her on the day makes it worse).
I absolutely agree with 1), I definitely think the org should have paid for a hotel, given how badly they screwed up it’s the least they can do. I’m not too sure about 2), I think an offer of lodging could be okay if it was the absolute last resort and kept strictly professional.
From the article, it sounds like her flights to the UK were paid for by the org (although it’s a little ambiguous, could read it as Owen paying, although that wouldn’t really make sense to me). If they can pay for flights, it seems reasonable that a hotel room is not an excessive extra cost.
I’ve stayed at a (non-EA) professional contact’s house before when they’d invited me to give a talk and later very apologetically realized they didn’t have the budget for a hotel. They likely felt obliged to offer; I felt like it would be awkward to decline. We were both at pains to be extremely, exceedingly, painstakingly polite given the circumstances and turn the formality up a notch.
I agree the org should have paid for a hotel, I’m only mentioning this because if baseline formality is a 5, I would think it would be more normal to kick it up to a 10 under the circumstances. It makes this situation all the more bizarre.
[Edit: I’ll redact this comment once someone who knows more actually clarifies it. My intent was to help provide a way to connect the concern to OP’s piece as-written. If you don’t want that and want perfect clarity instead, just skip this thread]
(I’ll throw my hat in the ring that this doesn’t surprise me, now seeing that he was pretty sure that he had a friendship with this woman. Personally If I arranged for a friend to have an interview at an effective nonprofit in my city, I would definitely ask them if they wanted to stay in my spare bedroom. I’d always offer because (1) I personally greatly prefer to stay in a place with a kitchen and some opportunity for social interaction over a hotel room, and (2) hotel costs are counterfactual donations and trades of this flavor have been going on in EA for a decade now.
It’s bad if he didn’t clarify first and give her the option of hotel or not. And possibly, due to perceived power dynamics, it would even be bad anyway to offer his space… like maybe it’s important that he had been totally hands-off with her entire work-related visit since their friendship was not actually so cemented. But this whole housing dynamic seems qualitatively similar to the type of mistakes and misunderstandings of power dynamics that he made elsewhere, and is now working on improving and addressing proactively in future. So I personally do not continue to be worried about the housing aspect although it was not named in this apology piece.)
“she recalls being surprised to discover that she was expected to stay in his home” seems to preclude the notion that Cotton-Barratt asked her first, so I’m not sure why you’re writing as if we’re not clear whether they discussed it beforehand.
Sorry I’m on mobile and it’s hard for me to see exactly how my comment comes off in the scheme of larger discussion. I agree it sounds like he didn’t ask her first. My main intention with my comment was to say that his treatment of that situation seems qualitatively related to the idea that he needs to address power dynamics and find clarity more proactively.
[[Edit: That said I can come up with an exchange where he would consider himself to have asked. I don’t really want to theorize this as likely to have happened, but maybe it can illustrate why I try to speak hesitantly about the actions people might or might not have taken. Example dialogue:
Owen: So normally in this situation I’d just host the interviewee at my place rather than having people faff around with a hotel. Is that cool here?
Woman: (thinking: damn that’s expected huh? Im surprised) um I guess so
My second paragraph appears to go off on a tangent but I was actually thinking in response to a potential exchange like this and trying to get ahead of anyone who might think that asking would always be good enough. I’m not necessarily ensorsing asking as a singular plan though I’d probably do it myself in some situations. The only sure solution is the solution that Owen appears to be taking, more proactivity and avoid these dynamics when possible anyway]]
Yes, that is one possible explanation for the sentence. There are also other, more problematic possible explanations, such as if the org itself told her they had a place for her and then sprung the surprise that it was at Owen’s house.
I tried to avoid speculation like this with my original comment because we can just ask what happened. We don’t need to make up stories, we can just find out what actually happened from the OP and the woman and put the matter to rest.
Yes I agree and I do hope someone who knows chimes in. I waited hours to comment here hoping someone else would, but in the hours I waited the original comment got over 60 more upvotes. It seemed like a growing and urgent concern for people, and I was becoming less confident that Owen or the woman would chime in in a timely manner.
I commented in parentheses to try to imply I was just dropping in, but now I really regret not writing something like: “I’ll delete this comment once someone who knows more actually clarifies it”
Just letting you know that Owen has chimed in to give more context, see the reply above. I think the added context is much worse than speculated here, a key point being that this was only sprung on her one day in advance.
I’m sorry to be pushing on this when it seems like you are doing the right thing, but could you elaborate more on this sentence from the article?
Why was she being put up in your house and not a hotel, if you weren’t affiliated with the group she was interviewing for? I think this is the part a lot of people were sketched out by, so more context would be helpful.
Sorry I’m mostly trying to take a day away from the forum, but someone let me know that it would be helpful to chime in here. Essentially what happened:
The org had arranged accommodation (not a hotel), but it didn’t cover the first night she’d be in the country
The people running the recruitment talked to me in a “this is your friend you recommended, could you help out?” way
We had a spare room so I offered that; they said yes so I communicated with her about that
This was all arranged on the day of her flight (before she flew)
(I’m eliding details to reduce risk of leaking information about the person’s identity.)
This is a lot worse than I was expecting. This makes it clear that the woman was in a situation where it was extremely hard to refuse Owen’s offer of accommodation.
Firstly, the organization screwed up majorly. You should not be arranging accommodation for someone on the same day they fly to a foreign country. I know I would have been fairly distressed if this had happened to me.
Secondly, we need to remember that this was an organization she was interviewing for, and Owen was the one that recommended her, and was presumably on good terms with the org. It wouldn’t be unreasonable to think that making a fuss about staying at Owen’s house could hurt her chances with the org.
Thirdly, the power imbalances in their friendship might make her concerned about what would happen to her position if refusing accommodation hurt said friendship.
Fourthly, it’s often very expensive to get a last minute hotel. Refusing to stay with Owen could have occurred a large financial penalty.
This was not a case of “hey do you want to crash at mine when you fly over next month?”. This is a case of “no better options”. It’s extremely inappropriate to push boundaries on someone who is in this situation. I’m very saddened at the extreme lack of empathy and judgement that was shown here. I’m relieved that Owen is no longer in leadership positions in EA, and I deeply hope he has sincerely reformed since this encounter.
To clarify, do you think:
(1) Owen should have pushed the organization to find other housing for the interviewee?
(2) If the organization would or could not do so, Owen should not have agreed to host the interviewee for an evening (leaving her to find an expensive last-minute hotel?)
One potential concern with a yes to (2) is that—assuming it would have been OK to offer lodging in this situation to an older male to whom Owen wasn’t attracted—this could be seen as imposing extra costs on the woman for being young, female, and attractive to Owen.
(Personally, I would never make the hosting offer to any candidate.)
The most important thing he needed to do was to not mention masturbation or anything else sexual. The situation makes it significantly harder to for her to push back against unwanted behavior. (I think this would also have been wrong if she had agreed in advance to stay there, but the fact that it was foisted on her on the day makes it worse).
I absolutely agree with 1), I definitely think the org should have paid for a hotel, given how badly they screwed up it’s the least they can do. I’m not too sure about 2), I think an offer of lodging could be okay if it was the absolute last resort and kept strictly professional.
From the article, it sounds like her flights to the UK were paid for by the org (although it’s a little ambiguous, could read it as Owen paying, although that wouldn’t really make sense to me). If they can pay for flights, it seems reasonable that a hotel room is not an excessive extra cost.
I’ve stayed at a (non-EA) professional contact’s house before when they’d invited me to give a talk and later very apologetically realized they didn’t have the budget for a hotel. They likely felt obliged to offer; I felt like it would be awkward to decline. We were both at pains to be extremely, exceedingly, painstakingly polite given the circumstances and turn the formality up a notch.
I agree the org should have paid for a hotel, I’m only mentioning this because if baseline formality is a 5, I would think it would be more normal to kick it up to a 10 under the circumstances. It makes this situation all the more bizarre.
Thanks. I got (and agree) that the context makes the masturbation comment worse. Wasn’t sure on the other points, thanks for clarifying.
Owen should have told the org this situation is unacceptable and that they should arrange accommodation at their own expense.
[Edit: I’ll redact this comment once someone who knows more actually clarifies it. My intent was to help provide a way to connect the concern to OP’s piece as-written. If you don’t want that and want perfect clarity instead, just skip this thread]
(I’ll throw my hat in the ring that this doesn’t surprise me, now seeing that he was pretty sure that he had a friendship with this woman. Personally If I arranged for a friend to have an interview at an effective nonprofit in my city, I would definitely ask them if they wanted to stay in my spare bedroom. I’d always offer because (1) I personally greatly prefer to stay in a place with a kitchen and some opportunity for social interaction over a hotel room, and (2) hotel costs are counterfactual donations and trades of this flavor have been going on in EA for a decade now.
It’s bad if he didn’t clarify first and give her the option of hotel or not. And possibly, due to perceived power dynamics, it would even be bad anyway to offer his space… like maybe it’s important that he had been totally hands-off with her entire work-related visit since their friendship was not actually so cemented. But this whole housing dynamic seems qualitatively similar to the type of mistakes and misunderstandings of power dynamics that he made elsewhere, and is now working on improving and addressing proactively in future. So I personally do not continue to be worried about the housing aspect although it was not named in this apology piece.)
“she recalls being surprised to discover that she was expected to stay in his home” seems to preclude the notion that Cotton-Barratt asked her first, so I’m not sure why you’re writing as if we’re not clear whether they discussed it beforehand.
Sorry I’m on mobile and it’s hard for me to see exactly how my comment comes off in the scheme of larger discussion. I agree it sounds like he didn’t ask her first. My main intention with my comment was to say that his treatment of that situation seems qualitatively related to the idea that he needs to address power dynamics and find clarity more proactively.
[[Edit: That said I can come up with an exchange where he would consider himself to have asked. I don’t really want to theorize this as likely to have happened, but maybe it can illustrate why I try to speak hesitantly about the actions people might or might not have taken. Example dialogue:
Owen: So normally in this situation I’d just host the interviewee at my place rather than having people faff around with a hotel. Is that cool here?
Woman: (thinking: damn that’s expected huh? Im surprised) um I guess so
My second paragraph appears to go off on a tangent but I was actually thinking in response to a potential exchange like this and trying to get ahead of anyone who might think that asking would always be good enough. I’m not necessarily ensorsing asking as a singular plan though I’d probably do it myself in some situations. The only sure solution is the solution that Owen appears to be taking, more proactivity and avoid these dynamics when possible anyway]]
Yes, that is one possible explanation for the sentence. There are also other, more problematic possible explanations, such as if the org itself told her they had a place for her and then sprung the surprise that it was at Owen’s house.
I tried to avoid speculation like this with my original comment because we can just ask what happened. We don’t need to make up stories, we can just find out what actually happened from the OP and the woman and put the matter to rest.
Yes I agree and I do hope someone who knows chimes in. I waited hours to comment here hoping someone else would, but in the hours I waited the original comment got over 60 more upvotes. It seemed like a growing and urgent concern for people, and I was becoming less confident that Owen or the woman would chime in in a timely manner.
I commented in parentheses to try to imply I was just dropping in, but now I really regret not writing something like: “I’ll delete this comment once someone who knows more actually clarifies it”
Just letting you know that Owen has chimed in to give more context, see the reply above. I think the added context is much worse than speculated here, a key point being that this was only sprung on her one day in advance.
Ah, thanks! I’ve retracted my first 2 comments here.