From the San Francisco Chronicle
Tech’s concept of 'culture fit’ and the Ellen Pao trial
By Kristen V. Brown
From the first day in court, it was evident that venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers was not the only party on trial in the gender discrimination suit against it.
Ellen Pao, the former junior partner suing the firm, was also on trial. Whether her personality “fit” with the Kleiner Perkin’s culture was a question debated with as much relevance as the culture at the firm itself....
But culture fit can also function as a thinly veiled cover for bias....
“Culture fit suffers from the same delusions as 'pattern matching,’” said Geoffrey Nunberg, a linguist at UC Berkeley’s School of Information, referencing another loaded Silicon Valley buzzword. “You tell yourself you’re being objective as you wind up reproducing your own tribe.”...
“For some people, culture fit is just a way of saying 'no —holes,’” said Nunberg. “But it’s also become a way of reproducing one’s own cultural group, a pretext for leaving others out.”