Saturday, February 28, 2015

Of pens and the company ink

One of the pleasures of becoming a man of relative wealth and power is the discovery that many of the more attractive women who ostensibly want to be "mentored" by you actually want to achieve their career objectives by rather more straightforward and horizontal means. Don't fall for it. The most easily-plucked apple is seldom the most sweet. Or the most wisely-plucked:
Clougherty and Lonsdale had been dating over the previous couple of weeks, while he was her assigned mentor for an undergraduate course at Stanford called Technology Entrepreneurship, Engineering 145. The limited-enrollment class offered a combination of academics, business skills and access to Silicon Valley that has made Stanford the most-sought-after university in the country, with the most competitive undergraduate admissions and among the highest donations. More than any other school, Stanford is the gateway to the tech world, and computer science is the most popular major. Each year, new young multimillionaires are minted, some just months after graduation.

Lonsdale, who also went to Stanford, made much of his fortune by helping to start Palantir Technologies, a major data-mining company. He was among the “top entrepreneurs and venture capitalists,” according to the course description, many of them alumni, who came to campus as mentors for E145. “Students will learn how to tell the difference between a good idea in the dorm and a great scalable business opportunity,” the E145 handbook for mentors says. “Guide them and challenge them.” Stanford students are well aware of how valuable these contacts are. Around the time Clougherty took E145, another student’s project, a virtual-payment app, attracted an investment from a Google board member who was a guest speaker in the course. It became the start-up Clinkle, with initial financing of $25 million.

After sightseeing in Rome, Lonsdale and Clougherty were together in the hotel room they were sharing when she started dressing for evening Mass. Lonsdale came up behind her and kissed her, touching her neck and hair and telling her she was beautiful. She had told him she was a virgin. Both agree they had sex. But what actually went on between them that night, and throughout their yearlong relationship, would become highly contested. After the relationship ended, Clougherty accused Lonsdale of sexual assault. Stanford investigated whether he broke the university’s rule against “consensual sexual and romantic relationships” between students and their mentors and, later, whether he raped her. The findings from the investigations have sparked a war of allegations and interpretations, culminating last month with dueling lawsuits, filled with damaging accusations.
When I was a young man working at my father's very successful technology company, every secretary, cleaning girl, and marketing assistant made their interest in me clear. But I never did more than take one of them to lunch once - a risk worth taking because she was even prettier than her best friend, who was the reigning Miss Minnesota at the time - because I knew a) there were plenty of girls on the girl tree who didn't work for Daddy, and, b) the moment something didn't happen to go a girl's way, there was probably some sort of sexual harassment shakedown waiting to happen.

(There was never a second date because the girl ate like a freaking HORSE. I mean, she put away about four times what I ate, and I was lifting weights and doing heavy martial arts at the time. I correctly anticipated that she would blow up, which she did within 18 months. Damned shame. She was genuinely beautiful.)

Work can be a great place to meet women. An Adobe executive once gave me an amount of stick for treating one department there like a candy store. There are hot girls just out of college in practically every big corporation's marketing department. But don't date the women who work for the same company you do and especially don't get involved with any woman over whom you have any sort of authority, or for whom you have any sort of responsibility.

Note that even the smartest, best-educated women exhibit this sort of hypergamy. And why not? It's easier than actually working.

16 comments:

Unknown said...

Looks like the story of a whirlwind romance between two control freaks.

Laguna Beach Fogey said...

Excellent advice. Especially the part about not dating women where you work. Awkward. Creates all sorts of problems. It might be fun to start banging the new girl in marketing, but when it ends--as these things inevitably do--she will be out for blood. Still, I've met plenty of married couples who met at work.

After sightseeing in Rome, Lonsdale and Clougherty were together in the hotel room they were sharing when she started dressing for evening Mass. Lonsdale came up behind her and kissed her, touching her neck and hair and telling her she was beautiful. She had told him she was a virgin. Both agree they had sex

Because Christian girls. The image of two computer geeks getting it on is not one I want to entertain..

SarahsDaughter said...

Looks like the story of a whirlwind romance between two control freaks.

Sure, because it couldn't possibly be the nature of women, right?

One of the first female 2LT's in Field Artillery was assigned to my husband's unit. He was assigned to be her mentor and I got to be assigned (by my husband) to be her driver. The first time was when she had her wisdom teeth taken out and didn't arrange to have someone go get her and drive her home. There was no way he was going to put any of his guys in a situation where she's drugged up and they are driving her POV to her home.

She did have several affairs with married enlisted men. Told me all about it when I was, once again, driving her somewhere. The latest one rejected her causing her to have a severe breakdown in my truck. She was punching the dash and screaming. When the next deployment came around, she was unable to go - she was locked up in Mental Health...

What are the chances that this would happen with one of the very first (unofficial) female officers in Combat Arms? Wouldn't you expect the Lt Col who orchestrated this little experiment (looking for his star) would have vetted her? This was a couple years before the official announcement of females in Combat Arms, before S1 could track their personnel records because "female" was not an option in the system. Certainly her success was very important to his agenda.

Yes, she was vetted. And surprise surprise, she was, in the end, still...a woman.

Zorro said...

Men who date coworkers deserve the misery they usually get. Never s**t where you eat.

Unknown said...

'Sure, because it couldn't possibly be the nature of women, right?'

It's human nature. From what the article presented they both had their share of issues. Besides I did read the part where she shared a hotel room in Rome with him and had to put on extra clothing over her immodest clothing she was wearing on the trip. Just because he is a mentor doesn't make him her husband.

Tommy Hass said...

"Men who date coworkers deserve the misery they usually get. Never s**t where you eat."

That is such a faggoty proverb.

The reason why it exists is because a bunch of despicable government busibodies decided that every instance of a male fucking a coworker or subordinate is rape. It isn't something that is wrong in an organic, intrinsic fashion. It is harmful because the men with guns have decreed so.

Hammerli 280 said...

Business dating has a long list of risks...but it's often a decent source of dates just because of the time you spend there. You can make it work in an organization large enough that you don't need to interact daily with the person you just dumped. Someone you see frequently is a far worse risk...and you NEVER date subordinates. That's a recipe for massive problems.

LP2021 Bank of LP Work in Progress said...

Hypergamic traits are well alive even in the subconscious of women.

My new skype profile pic is a hypocritical unintended pic. Nothing noteworthy but after 2 months my contradiction occurred to me its a evening gown showing my 5'5 frame and how the dress lays out. the only problem is how I didn't realize I was in a 3 way mirror on the steps, like a pedestal. No more pedestals!

Daniel said...

In-company dating is lazy and short-sighted. Seriously, you've got business to do. Even if there weren't all the stupid regulations, you still have to be lazy and careless to do it. In most cases, there is another company one office suite or building over. Go troll those waters occasionally if you are that hard up. I worked for a company that shared a jogging lake with four other companies. Easier than the secretary pool, and nothing to entangle your business. Even if it went bad, no one was ever going to get written up.

But making a girl a part of your daily, long-term business transactions? There's a word for that: unwise.

John Williams said...

Don't get your meat where you get your bread!

Unknown said...

'In-company dating is lazy and short-sighted.'

True...and a man shouldn't take the lazy and short-sighted route in matters like that.

Anonymous said...

(There was never a second date because the girl ate like a freaking HORSE. I mean, she put away about four times what I ate, and I was lifting weights and doing heavy martial arts at the time. I correctly anticipated that she would blow up, which she did within 18 months. Damned shame. She was genuinely beautiful.)

Speaking of short-sighted... I still cannot understand why some girls do that. Lack of discipline from her parents is my guess.

Work can be a great place to meet women. An Adobe executive once gave me an amount of stick for treating one department there like a candy store. There are hot girls just out of college in practically every big corporation's marketing department.

"Candy store"... that's precisely what they're there for, if you think about. Or why any young woman works in public, for that matter.

Tommy Hass said...

"you still have to be lazy and careless to do it. In most cases, there is another company one office suite or building over. Go troll those waters occasionally if you are that hard up. I worked for a company that shared a jogging lake with four other companies. Easier than the secretary pool, and nothing to entangle your business. Even if it went bad, no one was ever going to get written up.

But making a girl a part of your daily, long-term business transactions? There's a word for that: unwise."

I am not ignorant of the potential complications regarding this, but I severely doubt that it would be a "don't shit where you eat" type of nono if it wasn't for the law/government.

It's probably suboptimal and less than perfectly professional. It's not flirting with disaster. (absent regulations)

What exactly is gonna happen? You have a fight and this leads to awkward moments at work? Wow... Date a subordinate and fuel rumors that she gets off easy (pun not intended) because she's fucking you? Meh.

Actually, it is far more unwise for the SUBORDINATE to date a superior, because a jilted ex who is also your boss is a bad thing.

I'd welcome those more experienced than I to explain to me, how this kind of tomfoolery is dangerous even without the law breathing down your neck.

Marissa said...

He's not her husband but she was travelling on Hus dime and he has every right not to have his partner dressed like a hooker. That's not control freakish at all.

Marissa said...

He's not her husband but she was travelling on Hus dime and he has every right not to have his partner dressed like a hooker. That's not control freakish at all.

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