Thread regarding Wells Fargo & Co. layoffs

I hope K. Sand toes is impacted. That guy is completely in over his head.

Come on. We all know it’s true abt the fake interviews…..

@2krs, so? Can if I can't discriminate against old people, why can they? Or why can't I refuse to hire women who might get pregnant if it doesn't fit into my plan?
And it's too bad the executive branch didn't have that rule.

Imagine your own response to a policy that required at least one white person on your interview panel, and at least one white interviewee in every pool of finalists. Seem like a good idea? Alrighty then.

They don’t hire troopers over 35 due to retirement rules for law enforcement.

“ In general, law enforcement personnel are subject to mandatory retirement at age 57, or as soon as 20 years of service have been completed after age 57. The maximum age of entry, which is intended to ensure full retirement benefits upon reaching mandatory retirement age, is typically age 37.”

It's funny that the prosecutors or in New York where they won't hire troopers who are over 35. Do as I say, not as I do.

I know of an entire department in which legacy team members were “pushed out” and the whole new team consist of Bank of America people that used to work together. Internal team members applied for the management roles but were never considered bc these jobs were handed over to their buddies. Coincidence they all were hired based off of qualification or equal hiring opportunities? I think not. I will be reporting this to ethics line and maybe informing our new HR head since she claims she never heard of hiring bias before. Who else should I go to? Hoping there will be a class action lawsuit out there. This is just pure blatant.

'...This is a clear case of discrimination 'The practice was tied to Wells Fargo’s “diverse slate” policy, which stipulated that at least half the candidates interviewed for jobs paying $100,000 or more needed to be “diverse.” '. Requiring interviewees to fit a certain racial profile is by itself discrimination against the group that does not fit that profile. I know the supposed "woke" crowd doesn't agree, but that is because they are anything but "woke"...."

Agreed

So… it’s our fault? LOL

I think the response of, "I have never heard of this. We can't act on what employees don't tell us" with regard to the fake interviews is about as plausible as the same response to employee backlash to RTO. "No one told me that RTO is unfavorable and creating adverse consequences. We can't act on what employees don't tell us. We genuinely thought everyone loved RTO because that's what the Teamworks article with 2 pictures of 4 smiling employees said. I give directions and deny accountability, I purposely ignore things I don't want to see or hear, and people know they will face my wrath if they try to tell me, but it's not our fault we allegedly didn't know. The peons have failed us all again."

This is a clear case of discrimination 'The practice was tied to Wells Fargo’s “diverse slate” policy, which stipulated that at least half the candidates interviewed for jobs paying $100,000 or more needed to be “diverse.” '. Requiring interviewees to fit a certain racial profile is by itself discrimination against the group that does not fit that profile. I know the supposed "woke" crowd doesn't agree, but that is because they are anything but "woke".

Yeah Ms. Ling’s response here seems a bit weak to say the least…

Reporters will be digging further on this issue because of course its been happening. I love how Ms Ling says no one told her about fake interviews. Yeah, because that’s how it works right? You’re told by HR who to interview and of course you run to the head of HR and say something isn’t right. Yeah, of course. Lol

@nzv, all 20 had college degrees so they have to be d-mb.

I think folks are missing the goal here. Wells likely won’t see any punishments. The point is to give the accusations merit. Does anyone think it’s coincidence Charlie finally addressed the times report a couple days before news comes out that the feds are looking into it? If anything this is just another reason Charlie must go

@pgy+1h9gA0h5 Of all the Charlie Company hires, I think Daley takes the case. If he and Prince Charles aren't doing the wink wink nod nod like there is no tomorrow I would be shocked. Two people who are on the clock 40 hours per week and do about 2 hours of work combined! Not to mention that they have all of the power in the world at their hands.

Former manager here. Back in 2017 (before DE&I was all we talked about) I was required to interview a minimum of 3 people even though, in MANY cases, the perfect candidate was an internal candidate familiar with the work. I was forced to interview one external and one additional internal candidate. I always felt awful because I knew it was a waste of their time when we had the best candidate. I cannot imagine the pressures managers are under now, now that they have to check so many boxes. Hiring should be BLIND. The best candidate should be picked regardless of race or gender identity.

Fake interviews have always been the norm. In my mind, I knew that at least 1/2 of positions I interviewed for had someone already picked. You can easily tell by the amount of engagement by the interviewer. Also, No matter how hard Charlie tries to appease the Dems, they already decided to make Wells an example. They will not stop until the Bank is broken up.

Bye bye K.S.

"I applied for 20 jobs in as many months. In all cases, the people hired were half as qualified as me but somehow has worked with the hiring manager elsewhere ."

Yeah, all 20 were not as qualified huh? and you have intimagte knowledge of this how?

Get over yourself.

@pyk+1h9gA0h5 - when I go in front of the judge, you will be my exhibit number one. You will spend one year in prison but that will teach you a good lesson that a fake interview is. It networking . It is called a fraud .

I will say sham interviews at Wells Fargo happen. And it is directly caused by setting ridiculous interview requirements.

When a manager identifies a talented employee the manager wants to hire for a role, HR forces the manager to conduct additional interviews anyway.

It is a manager's job to identify and hire the right talent for the position. But HR interferes in the process.

Cut out the BS HR processes and "sham" interviews go away.

@pyk+1h9gA0h5

That still isn't discrimination. If a manager has directly worked with someone in the past, they have real world experience with that person, know their capabilities and work ethic.

It is called NETWORKING. And it is a valuable skill to learn. Perhaps you should try it.

Federal prosecutors in New York have opened a criminal investigation into whether Wells Fargo violated federal laws by conducting sham interviews of nonwhite and female job candidates, according to two people with knowledge of the inquiry.

The investigation is being conducted by members of a newly created civil rights unit inside the criminal division of the Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office, the people said. They requested anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly.

The investigation, which is in its early stages, was spurred by a May 19 report in The New York Times that centered on a whistle blower, Joe Bruno. Mr. Bruno, a former Wells Fargo employee, and others said that bank managers were interviewing job applicants whom the bank deemed “diverse” — a catchall term for racial minorities, women and members of other disadvantaged groups — for roles that had already been promised to other people.

These sham interviews were the result of the bank’s quest to increase diversity — a noble goal that became twisted in practice, because some employees said it was more about recording the bank’s efforts to hire more minorities than actually hiring them.

The practice was tied to Wells Fargo’s “diverse slate” policy, which stipulated that at least half the candidates interviewed for jobs paying $100,000 or more needed to be “diverse.” The rule was put in place in mid-2020. However, the practice of conducting fake interviews existed long before then, because Wells Fargo had a similar, unwritten policy in place.

A Wells Fargo spokeswoman declined to comment on the investigation.

It is not clear what, if any, charges could result from the investigation. But it shows a new willingness by federal authorities to pursue criminal prosecutions of civil rights violations at a time when hate crimes are on the rise — especially because the criminal code is seldom applied to the treatment of workers or customers by corporations.

The civil rights unit handling the Wells Fargo inquiry was created in November by Damian Williams, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York.

Under federal law, for instance, it is a crime to interfere with “an applicant for private employment” in a way motivated by the applicant’s “race, color, religion, or national origin.”

Federal authorities typically cite civil anti-discrimination laws when bringing cases against companies for hiring discrimination. Also, customers who find themselves mistreated because of their race rely mostly on state anti-discrimination laws to get justice.

In creating the civil rights unit, Mr. Williams said that federal authorities needed to reconsider how the justice system treated issues of discrimination. Pursuing criminal cases, he said, would make efforts to get justice for victims of discrimination “more effective.”

At Wells Fargo, one of the nation’s largest banks with nearly 250,000 employees, sham interviews occurred across multiple business lines, including in its mortgage servicing, home lending and retail banking operations. The Times report last month focused on the bank’s wealth management business.

Since then, another 10 current and former employees have shared stories about how they were subject to fake interviews, or conducted them, or saw paperwork documenting the practice. The people spoke on the condition of anonymity because they feared retaliation from Wells Fargo or their current employers.

In an interview on Monday, Bei Ling, Wells Fargo’s head of human resources, said that she did not believe the fake interview practice was “a systematic issue.” Employees had not complained about it, she said.

“During these past eight months I can tell you I have never heard such a thing from the recruiting community,” Ms. Ling said. “I have never even heard the words ‘fake interview.’”

She added that there was no way for the bank to understand the scope of the problem unless employees spoke up. “We can’t act on things that we don’t know,” she said.

In some instances, there were written records of the practice of conducting fake interviews. In late 2020, just days after Wells Fargo offered a job to a person who counted as “diverse” by the bank’s standards, a human resources employee asked that person to apply for a different job at the bank, according to an email reviewed by The Times.

The first offer was still on the table, the Wells Fargo employee explained, but the bank also wanted to show that it had “qualified candidates” for both roles. “Simply book keeping for us,” the employee wrote in the email.

When asked about the human resources employee’s message, Ms. Ling said: “We’re reviewing the communications.”

On Monday, Wells Fargo’s chief executive officer, Charles W. Scharf, announced the bank would temporarily pause its “diverse slate” rule to study its implementation and make changes to prevent more fake interviews from being conducted.

The bank had already been experimenting with ways to streamline its hiring process. In February, Wells Fargo began a pilot program that did away with job postings and the “diverse slate” interview requirement in cases where internal candidates had been identified. The goal was to make it easier for employees to move to new roles within the bank. Until then, every job had to be posted and “diverse” candidates interviewed in keeping with the policy, unless managers specifically applied for an exemption requiring approval from high-level executives.

Ms. Ling said the pilot program had nothing to do with problems arising from the “diverse slate” rule.

Wells Fargo has been working its way through an organization-wide cleanup of its business practices for the past five years. Beginning in 2016, it was publicly revealed that the bank had been opening fake accounts in customers’ names without their knowledge, charging some of them bogus fees on mortgage loans and forcing others to buy unnecessary auto insurance. The scandals have cost the bank more than $4.5 billion in fines.

In early 2018, the Federal Reserve imposed an asset cap on Wells Fargo, restricting it from growing until regulators were satisfied that its risk management practices and its treatment of customers had stabilized. The bank’s leadership has turned over since then, and Mr. Scharf took over in the fall of 2019. Regulators have still not given Wells Fargo the all-clear.

Its woes have continued.

A group of Black homeowners recently sued the bank for stalling on refinancing their home loans. The Securities and Exchange Commission fined Wells Fargo $7 million for failing to properly follow anti-money laundering laws. And Rohit Chopra, the director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, put Wells Fargo atop a list of “repeat offenders” that he proposed should be stripped of their operating licenses because they were violating too many financial regulations.

The post Federal Prosecutors Open Criminal Inquiry of Wells Fargo’s Hiring Practices appeared first on New York Times.

Finally, wells can no longer pull wool over our (minority) eyes. We all knew that the hiring here was farcical. It is about time Wells paid a heavy price for taking many of us for a wild ride. I applied for 20 jobs in as many months. In all cases, the people hired were half as qualified as me but somehow has worked with the hiring manager elsewhere . I will happily testify in the USA vs Wells Fargo case.

if an interview actually happened can it be called fake

Just means more compliance training for the innocent. Bonuses and advancement for the guilty. Not shocked by this... been here 20 years and have seen all kinds of bad hiring. Lots of unqualified friends of managers. Saw one manager get hired in tech that spelled byte as bite. No kidding here. Still lot of toxicity to uncover. Not enough time in the day.

Lol!

“During these past eight months I can tell you I have never heard such a thing from the recruiting community,” Ms. Ling said. “I have never even heard the words ‘fake interview.’”

She should just review records of all the manager training sessions where people were indoctrinated over a Skype meeting with no documentation provided to support the directions given in those meetings.

Meetings like that send the message from upper management to do what they say and shut up about it.

It happened to white men as well

Is it criminal though? A PR disaster, but not illegal.