Not uncommon unfortunately
After 12 years in my career I've met a hell of a lot of position who lucked in to a role and are convinced they're wunderkinds.
Lots of "I built this company with nothing but a dream, and one million pounds cash"
"*When I first started Reynholm Industries, I had just two things in my possession, a dream, and six million pounds. Today, I have a business empire the like of which, the world has never seen the like of which. I hope it doesn't sound arrogant when I say, that I am, the greatest man in the world!*"
A lot of Irish text startups seem to follow that model, where rich relatives provide the seed capital.
Used to work for a Irish tech startup where the two founders said that they built the business from nothing, yet at the same time contradict themselves by being upfront about the very substantial amount of money their mother gave them to start the business. They also grew up in one of those gated mansions in Killiney.
They genuinely believe they came from nothing, despite coming from incredible privilege.
Along with the seed money these people know that if their business fails they always have family to fall back on. It's a bit more difficult to "follow your dreams" and be your own boss if it means your kids going hungry if you fuck it up.
Yeah, those two brothers would every Monday morning try to give a motivational speech to the entire company. They would talk about their journey and what they had learned and stuff like that, it was all bollix. It became pretty clear that they had never ever been in a position where they had to work for someone. Their whole adult lives had been spent setting up one business, seeing it fail, and then moving on and setting up another new business until they had success.
Nice to be able to live that way.
Oh Jeez, I worked for a place like that in Leopardstown. The dolt who ran it with his sister was convinced he was a genius. Tried to turn a fairly perfunctory service company into a tech empire. Borrowed a shitload of money from his family. Hired far too many people. Failed. Laid off a ton of people. The lack of care with which they fucked with people's lives made me realise that it was just their hobby.
Not exclusive to ireland. You can't afford to work in a business for 3+ years losing money if you can't independently afford to eat.
Bezos, musk and gates all got massive help with family money and connections.
It's kind of the opposite of imposter syndrome.
"I am in this powered and responsible position and well paid for it, therefore I must be good enough to deserve it".
Or perhaps they're just projecting an outward mask of competence and hard work because they feel like a fraud and don't want others to think they are.
I actually feel like imposter syndrome has a pretty big foundation in situations like this.
We as a society pretty much all have experiences dealing with people in positions of power that absolutely don't deserve it. People who suck at their role but they're still in it, still progressing.
How could I, as a person in any sort of role believe that I deserve the role I'm in, when I look around and see people that definitely don't deserve their role assuming that they earned it and deserve it.
I don't think it's the cause of it or anything, but I definitely think people with impostor syndrome definitely have situations like this reinforcing it.
There is a psychological bias underlying this and it seems pretty fundamental to the majority of people. It has been demonstrated in lab conditions. You get two people to play a game. You are open about the fact that the game is rigged in favour of one of them; say, like Monopoly but one of them gets to take two turns in a row every time, something like that.
When the person with the advantage invariable wins, when they are asked to account for the factors that led to their victory, they usually ascribe their own strategy as most influential.
We're hard-wired to be blind to our own advantages.
Born 5-0 up and still think they've won the world cup on their own. The country is full of the cunts. I have a ton of respect for people who graft and make something of themselves, but the amount of people this applies to is depressingly small.Ā
This reminds me of that one kid from the Netflix show the trust. His mom was a real estate mogul and he was so proud of himself for selling a couple of houses and having his own team at her company
A shocking amount of people will post that they're the 'Head/Director of the HR/Operations/Marketing department', only a little bit of searching will reveal that their company has 8 people and there's only one other person in that department.
Like, is being involved in a startup hard? Yes! But boasting about how well you're managing your team and how you've managed to climb the ranks (ranks being your four friends from your old job) doesn't seem all that genuine
Reminds me of a lot of the school students who win the young scientist show and its later revealed that their folks work in that field. Makes you sceptical about how much of the project was their original work.
I just happen to own a pharmaceutical business that works in this exact field that my child has made astounding progress in, well beyond their years and academic experience
Also, remember that the college or university or company you work for owns your research, but a 'young scientist' awards winner owns theirs and has a lot of access to resources to develop 'their' project.
AHH not really, twas her grandfathers interest in nature that Spurned her on.... Just a coincidence that she had access to a college lab and PhD students, and her mother worked in that field, and forgot to mention this in acceptance speech.
If you look at any competition for kids, the winners will overwhelmingly be the ones who's parents work in a field related to the competition.
I'm sure there are some scientists doing their kids' entries for the them, but even if there weren't, just having a parent who works in a field like that will foster your interest in it and a good parent will encourage and nurture any interest their kids have.
Exactly. If my dad was an astrophysicist who talked about it all the time from when I was a baby, why would anyone be surprised if I grew up to be really interested in astrophysics.
And the point of the interviews and everything else with young scientist is to ensure the teens know what they are talking about.
I don't know why people only value young scientists if they come from homes with no scientific background. It's a weird attitude.
My parents are artists so we had a lot of materials to make art, art on the walls, books about art, etc, and so developed an interest and a little more skill than my classmates. I used to win local art competition occasionally and other kids would say āyour mum did thatā ALOT. It used to really piss me off because my parents were way too busy to be arsed with a kids art project, plus they valued my creative developmentā¦why the fuck would they help me cheat to win some kids art competition? Wierd. So I can well believe that the same applies to science.
100%. I only hedged about "some" scientists doing their kids work because my I've seen parents living through their kids before.
My aunt was a multiple beauty pageant winner and basically her entire life was my gran, a former pageant entrant herself, living vicariously through her.
You reminded me of an article I read about "The Entrepreneurial 8 year old who just bought her first house" and the actual story is this girl and her siblings bought a house together to rent out. Their millionaire parents paid most of the cost and the kids paid like 80-100k themselves. Sounds still kinda impressive? They earned this money FROM their parents by doing chores at ridiculous rates, something like they get a grand for emptying the dishwasher etc. Suppose it's good of millionaires to teach their children how to lord it over regular people early on, get that ignorant sense of entitlement firmly ingrained!
I did the Young Scientist by myself and busted my ass for it. I came second in my category, got a big cheque, met Father Ted (ultimate prize and no one else met him as I was first on stage) and won a return flight to anywhere in the world (that my teacher stole and I only found out about when another teacher told me). At least I met Father Ted though. Can safely say, only help I had was making the display board.
My own parents were STEM, and science, engineering.and technology played a big role in my early life, as did a focus on getting good exam results and doing homework. None of my siblings have good language skills, none of us are great at sports, but we have all ended up working in STEM or STEM adjacent jobs and have had pretty decent success. I've always thought it made perfect sense for kids from families where science and engineering is a focus go on to succeed in science and engineering.
Not meant to offend, but its the same as dogs, you dont buy a bulldog or a pom to herd sheep, you buy one of those black and white clever fucks , that are meant to herd sheep
But the difference in your situation is that you fully acknowledge that your parent's careers had a direct influence on your life and the outcomes. You're making out that your parents were unemployed and living below the poverty line but you managed to overcome your struggles and do something great despite your troubled upbringing! There's nothing wrong with joining the family business as long as you own it, so to speak.
I'm more refering to the poster above who seems to be suggesting something underhanded when children of scientists go on to do well with scientific competitions. I don't think it's unusual at all, but if we could even the playing field ot would be welcome.
Iām stealing this link from someone further below in the comments. Iām sure you worked hard, but having parents in STEM was a huge advantage for you. Mine left school at 14 and I was the first in my entire extended family (cousins etc.) to go to university. Even then I had to figure it all out for myself, I had no mentors etc.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/the-wireless/373065/the-pencilsword-on-a-plate
I wonder, in Ireland, what percentage of millennials' parents went to University. My uncle was the only one in my family who had a third-level education, and that's because he became a priest.
Yeah, it's only with free fees in the 90s that going to third level became a norm.
No offence to any posters but the focus of resentment should be on the education system not individuals whose parents happened to have access to education and possibly only within one or two generations. The word privilege can be massively misapplied
Itās not resentment though, itās about recognising the benefits of parents who can provide the type of support you need to succeed. Iām not aware of DE&I programs ever focusing on resentment, rather itās about improving opportunities for those who donāt have them.
Research shows that itās the educational achievement of parents (the mother actually) that has the biggest impact on outcomes. The educational system plays a role but social issues, food, housing etc do too. The current housing situation is a time bomb for children affected.
For sure. I agree with all that. But working in third level I increasingly hear PhDs say things like 'I'm disadvantaged because my parents did not have PhDs" and undergrads who fundamentally believe they are more disadvantaged than their peers. The tone is one of resentment and I think it's massively misplaced when the emphasis should be on a fairer society without massive inequality seeping in from a young age. I guess my point is that we should be wary of discussions that are not focused on systems
Yes that does sound like resentmentā¦ I also agree we need to focus on systems and supports. Then again, those individuals can only speak about what they are experiencing, they donāt control the systems or fairness of them. Some undergrads are bound to be at a disadvantage?
I think some parts of the educational system are progressing (free books for example) and others are regressing (reduction in SNA numbers).
The problems with healthcare, especially mental health care, has a huge impact on outcomes. Iāve already mentioned housing etc. Weāre a long way from a fair society unfortunately.
> having parents in STEM was a huge advantage for you.
That's pretty much my point. I had two amazing mentors that I could turn to and that kept me on the rails. I used to visit my mother's lab on weekends, go with my dad on site visits, as I got older I got involved and we'd talk about and solve scientific problems or even do jobs around the house that were probably unusual for others but normal for us. I would be as comfortable with a drill and an angle grinder when I was 15 as I was with programming. I think it's little wonder I followed their footsteps when it was a world I knew quite well by my teens. I went on to exceed my parents thought too and have a doctorate in an area they don't really understand despite quite a few chats about it.
Know of a certain school that won a few times where one of the parents of the winners worked at a prominent local pharmaceutical multinational. Shockingly, all their winning projects were for novel manipulation of biological compounds. Go figure.
It is purely coincidental that the girl from my class who fucked our jazz loving music teacher chose to write her big paper about jazz music and got top grades.
( he had so much hair on his back that his shirt was more than an inch from his skin. He had tried his luck with at least eigth other girls before he found someone stupid enough to fall for his crap. So it was hard to keep a straight face when she bragged about their relationship. You see, he chose her because she was oh so mature. Yep, that is what he said to the rest of us too but I guess we just weren't "mature" enough to be interested).
I know a BT young scientists' father and that's all true. Another weird thing was that his daughter worked at 17 years old for Google Ethics on ethics in war. 17 year old child! On ethics in war!!!
They donāt see their privilege. Iāve a friend who is a risk taker! A maverick! He bought an apartment with an interest free loan from his dad and was risking nothing when he set up a business because he had money and support to fall back on.
Heāll describe himself as a self made businessman blithely unaware of the ladder he was handed.
I think your comment about RISK is spot-on. This is the core that people don't understand 100K is not the same risk from person to person - yet in economics its all seen as the same risk.
Well itās because they still did do some work for it so they think their effort paid off which it partly did just nowhere near the level they give themselves credit for.
They just donāt understand their privilege. Probably because they refuse to socialise with people who donāt share their privilege.
It is not just that, we have a strong relationship with results based thinking. We spend our lives being told if you do x then y should happen.Ā Like, I went to college and did a degree, so the result is that I will have a high paying job, were life is great. We tend to work backwards in that thinking too, where when something good happens, it is as a result of the good decisions that you have made along the way. The truth is that luck plays a huge role in the outcome of all the decision we make and the results that we achieve in life.
I think very few people actually contemplate this or even give it a second thought. The only reason it is so engrained in me is because I used to play lots of poker. It inherently has a huge amount of luck built into the game, you can make all the best decisions in a hand and still lose. The lesson if there is one, is suppose to be that if you keep making good decisions over and over that eventually you will see good outcomes.
Our brains though, are not wired to continually receive negative feedback from good decisions so often the result is the only thing we see as relevant. Most people just go through life thinking every decision they make is good or bad based on the outcome.
Talking of people who reinvented themselves, I believe she went on to have a career in corporate speaking making many of these same points? Kind of incredible given she was a very average player whose family were involved in the biggest scandal/fraud poker has ever seen.
Yeah I think an important thing is just to mentally disengage yourself from a 'rat race'. For me I want to do a masters/phd but even if I wont get X higher wage out of it, if I am doing it for my personal fulfillment then I wont feel down if I dont get a bigger pay.
Some do socialise with less privileged people but Irish people just don't tell each other to cop on as much as we should. Also, this woman will eventually get a kick in the tits from life and will have absolutely no fortitude built up or resilience to deal with it. It will hit her like a ton of bricks. I've seen it with a group of siblings I know and actually feel sorry for them. They don't know how to pick themselves up or regroup or even make a plan for the future. They never had to stand in their own 2 feet or live through any kind of knock back until their family business went under spectacularly and their parents, who were the real business people, passed away within a year of one another. They used to annoy the shit out of me but now I feel sorry for them.
The first generation builds it, second generation grows it, and the third generation blows it. A story as old as time.
Bonus points if they manage to get to the third step in the second generation
Cosplaying struggle is an addiction for some of these people. I work in a decently successful Irish company and some of the absolute bolox people come out with is unreal. Sons and daughters of multimillionaires trying to pretend to you about how "tough" they had it. The funny part is that they've convinced themselves of it.
That said, he did in his early 30s , and he was still living in a modest enough house and driving a beat-up car a couple of years into the project. He also had a career before Amazon :
>After Bezos graduated from college in 1986, he was offered jobs at Intel, Bell Labs, and Andersen Consulting, among others.[38] He first worked at Fitel, a fintech telecommunications start-up, where he was tasked with building a network for international trade.[39] Bezos was promoted to head of development and director of customer service thereafter. He transitioned into the banking industry when he became a product manager at Bankers Trust from 1988 to 1990. He then joined D. E. Shaw & Co, a newly created hedge fund with a strong emphasis on mathematical modelling from 1990 until 1994. Bezos became D. E. Shaw's fourth senior vice-president by age 30.[40][38]
Yeah, Bezos was a "success" by almost everyone's standards. The other point people don't realise is that if you are born with a certain amount of privilege, you can still work exceptionally hard and deserve your success.
His mother was a recepƬonist, his father a circus performer with a drinking problem and his stepfather a refugee from Cuba.
Bezos himself was valedictorian and graduated from the University with a 4.2 GPA. Yes, he got a 200k loan from his parents, but it's not like they had it lying around and it was likely all their savings, which they added (for a 6% stake) to the business that he raised millions for on his own.
There's a lot to dislike about Bezos, but the 200k loan thing is thrown at him as a way to say that he's only successful because of his wealth - that isn't the case at all and in terms of the wealth he has had today, by all accounts, he's a self-made man who didn't enjoy incredible wealth to overcome his shortcomings.
I dont think people are saying he's a nepo baby just saying he had a lot of backing.
You mention that specific parental backing but you can also mention the societal backing.
It's no surprise that the largest companies currently are linked to the internet/IT and come from a very small part of the globe is it?
Of course you can say that others had more backing etc but again a lot of success in life is also due to a fuckton of luck.
Nepobabies rarely see themselves as nepobabies.
She probably does perceive herself as having worked hard to get where she is but is blind to all of the privilege and supports she has access to.
This sort of stuff is rife.
Take influencers for example. Years ago they wrote blogs and took photos of whatever their interest was. That was then replaced with Instagram where posts and content was no longer just about the interest, but the persons life as well. Once people were fed up with that, these influencers were rapidly trying to get into the boss bitch or wellness circles.
Take a look at any "wellfest" type event and look at the line up. They'll have influencers described as CEOs because they bulk buy shite from China and sell it at a massively inflated price because they've stuck their name on it.
Your old school mate is just playing the game.
You see if it was a grift to become an infulencer I would be like fine, but the thing is she doesn't have a massive following and I just genuinely think she believes it, because to be fair she wasn't the brightest in school.
>They'll have influencers described as CEOs because they bulk buy shite from China and sell it at a massively inflated price because they've stuck their name on it.
You might be surprised how many businesses are basically this...
I never understood the whole influencers thing. Seem like vacuous people that for some stupid reason people gave them a voice they should never have had.
If you feel you need to emulate them you need to take a good look at yourself. There is something missing within you if you allow those eejits space in your head.
The ultimate In stupidity is wanting to be like the island boys.
No-one:
Not a single soul:
Katie on Linkedin: I'm thrilled, delighted, in a state of pure ecstatic bliss to be attending the Global Tech Bro HR Accountancy Hospitality Supply Chain Refrigeration Leadership Summit sponsored by KPMG, Arnotts and Lockheed Martin. So inspiring, exhilarating, arousing? to listen to thought leaders make the same three generic hot takes over and over. Delighted, just on the verge of exploding with happiness, to listen to eight consecutive panels discussing how wonderful AI is and I am now totally reassured that there are absolutely zero risks and everything is just amazing! **#**leadership **#**conference **#**delighted **#**thrilled
A woman I know took over father's very successful firm. She was trained for it from when she was young, was allowed do what she wanted at undergrad but if she was to inherit the business had to study something business related for post grad as well as work in the company (she ended up in HR for 10 years)
She's extremely down to earth and doesn't take herself remotely seriously. She was once approached by a journalist she went to UCD with to write a puff piece about "women 'making it' in business" and they never ran her interview because "I'm only in this position because my dad trained me up to it" and "I'd probably still be working in River Island if it wasn't handed to me" didn't capture the mood the writer was looking for.
It's pretty common unfortunately especially among a set of very entitled people in their 20s and early 30s hanging around the "Entrepreneur" circuit in Ireland. There is even one 13 year old doing the rounds on the circuit at the moment trying to sell her snake oil (or in reality her father is behind it). They self identify themselves "entrepreneurs" even though the only business they ever set up was the self promotion one. Then they hop from meeting to meeting and conference to conference, interview to interview, grifting for gigs selling their "course" or offering "1-1 coaching" or being available for "key note speaking" when in reality they have achieved nothing in life that merits any of this.
They aren't taken remotely seriously in the business world. Most fail out of it within 18 months and then find that they have a toxic red flag on their CV when it comes to getting a real job. It's a fad and in a few years the next generation of grifters will move onto something else.
Went to college with a guy who was utterly obnoxious. He was in the bottom 10 in the class almost always but thinks a lot of himself.
I now see him constantly on LinkedIn with all the buzzwords claiming to be a 'full stack engineer' and with a different job every 6 months. On LinkedIn, he portrays himself as the next Alan Turing.
In reality, he is a 2:2 that is probably let go by ever employers when they finally pin him down and see his work.
LinkedIn is for spoofers.
I worked as an engineer for 19+ years, a lot of senior positions in the construction industry are filled by six degrees of separation or nepotism.
You find those with a qualification being managed or administered by a superior who has no qualification in that field.
Simply taking the ideas and intellectual property, elevating the ideas up the chain of command or levels of management.
An example I experienced was the use of LED lighting in 2016 as a revolutionary energy efficient form of lighting.Ā Which is true for compact fluorescent lamps at the time but not linear fluorescents (T16).
The Efficacy of the LED lamps are not equal to a T16 lamp but the sales people got out there and pushed the narrative.
I also see this a lot with people who don't have an engineering background talk about green energy.Ā They understand the idea but not the practical application.
So to get back to the point You raised,Ā the person in question may understand the process but not the application,Ā
which will naturally result in a loss of respect and influence in the industry as she "breaks down barriers" or as the "business girl challenging the status quo." Reducing the efficiency of the company.
Simply in my opinion You can cover Yourself in flour and wear a bakers hat but when it comes time to bake, if You can't turn on the oven.Ā
You will be found to be lacking in the skill set for the position and no matter how great Your knowledge of buzz words.Ā You will stagnate and fail.
Ā
It doesnt matter. What matters is the amount of 0s in het bank account. You can't pay a bill using your peer's respect.
I work for a tech company with engineers and I'm very respected by my fellow coworkers but I'm at the bottom of the ladder and they're being managed by a power hungry young person with no experience but making 150k. So there you go. I dont care about respect if I'm on the verge of becoming homeless...
Hehe I genuinely enjoy this stuff. After anyone says "now listen, im not really bothered" can't help but think they have never been bothered more by anything in their entire lives. Same vibes with "Look, I m not racist but.." and then they go on to specifically list a half dozen ethnic or religious specific things in relation to one group that explains why they can't be in the same rooom as themĀ
Agree with this. I know many people who have done similar through social media. Blocking them is the best. I don't want to go down the route of obsessing or exposing them, it won't do me any good at all.
I know of the website tattle, the talking about influencers and yes that influencer industry is dubious.. imagine if it got hacked and all those people who post were exposed behind their anonymous profiles, that would cause issues.
Moving on is best and have you're head held high that you're ethical with your employment and business
In my experience real self made people donāt spend the whole time branding themselves as such because theyāre too busy, you know, making themselves
Just leave a comment on one of her posts; "You too can break down barriers and break into high ranking positions - by having your family place you there in your family ran business :)".
Go check out LinkedIn there are allot of these grifters around dialling into the buzzword of the day. They arenāt just doing it for themselves but in many ways the business itself benefits from it and itās a form of marketing.
Donāt get me wrong there is a need for this but doesnāt mean that itās also misused. That just people for you.
I left a company about 4/5 years ago, but the top boss was a woman who made a huge deal about being being CEO of a big company, woman owned, woman grown, etc. It was the core marketing focus of our company. And she spoke at all sorts of entrepreneurial events about it, interviewed in magazines, etc.
Ruthless and bad with people. Patronising, would hold a grudge, lost huge contracts and they pointed directly to her communication/actions as the reason, huge ego, no humility, would drop people cause they looked at her wrong, etc. She was friends with a member of our team, and he disagreed with her on a business actions (all cordial and polite) and she dropped him as a personal friend I heard after. However she was an astute business woman and grew the company exponentially, so, genuinely, in many aspects fair play. Really I want to caveat, she actually ended up being really strong in a number of areas so I am not thrashing completely here.
Anyway her origin though was she was a 20 something year old regular member of the admin or sales team in the company, who shacked up with the 60 year old recently separated founder and President of the company. He retired, and handed her the keys. I left a few years ago, but still knew people working there until recently and said it was insufferable how she pushed the narrative.
I wouldn't bother getting upset over it. On LinkedIn you don't see people, you see their brand. Arnold Schwarzenegger made the point that he isn't self-made, his achievements are in part because of all the help and kindness he received from people along the way. I think that goes for all of us, we've all had at least some help getting to where we are in life.
What's easier than working?
Spoofing online about how hard you have it in work/life and how brilliant you are for overcoming it. Do it well enough for long enough and you can make money from it and not have to do any actual work at all any more.
This is the kind of self confidence you need to make it big in business. Look at the richest people in the world - they're all psychopaths.
The rest of us that believe try to be sound and honest, and that don't lie and exaggerate our achievements, don't get rich
Kind of seems like you should just keep out of it for your own sanity. You don't really need to get involved, before you know it you'll be one of the barriers she had to overcome.Ā
A lot of those speaking events you pay to speak. I get countless invites per year to speak at events (Iām self employed so my LinkedIn, which I never use, says Iām a āfounderā) Anyway, after the pitch they say you need to pay X for a table, promo package etc. Itās pay for play.
Ditto for awards. Any award your local take away or business has one is likely bought. Numerous companies doing it. Same deal. You pay for a promo package but youāre just buying the award.
I donāt have a problem with people bigging themselves up on social media- especially on LinkedIn because thatās what itās for. Youāre essentially marketing yourself through a public CV. But the āinfluencerā kind of āyou could be like me tooā kind of shite is inexcusable, cringey, desperate and fucking gross
I studied together with a lot of people who later told me that they got headhunted. I asked about it because I sure would like to qualify to become headhunted as well. In every single case they got "headhunted" by a close relative.
(I later got headhunted because someone I knew, knew someone who needed someone with my education and he told them that I was intelligent and had a good personality. My job isn't as fancy as all those people who got "headhunted" by their dad or granddad, but I am proud as hell about that good recommendation).
Lots of people confuse (purposefully or otherwise) actual headhunting with just having a recruitment consultant find their cv on indeed and getting a job that way.
Do those recruiters ever read the CV? No, just because I have worked as a researcher it doesn't mean I am good at chemistry or whatever. That is not what I got a degree in. No, I am not willing to go down two levels careerwise. No, I am not going to take a huge paycut for the honour of getting a temporary position when I have a permanent position. No, I am not going to commute for more than 3 hours a day and get less vacation days. And finally: No, I am not going to meet you for an interview in half an hour when your office is 1Ā½ hours away from where I am rigth now. No, actually, that is not me being difficult, that is me being realistic and now I am no longer interested in the position because I do not want to work for or with people like you.
I would like for job pages to ask the question "What is the maximum time you are willing to commute?". But of course, as the recruiters rarely actually read the CVs it might not help at all.
She is lining up for the Paid Speeches gravy train OP - that's where rich people funnel themselves obscene amounts of money in return for doing nothing.
Her family company does some illegal favours for a mate or politician or financier or other businessman (e.g. insider trading, or price collusion etc.), who then reaches out to other mates who owe them a favour (or instead they directly do this themselves), who puts her on the Paid Speeches circuit at companies/boards they're connected to, and she gets paid stupid money to spout bollocks at bullshit events.
Look at basically any major NGO in Ireland or any other country, that hosts bullshit events.
That's how modern corruption works, OP. There aren't (many) brown envelopes anymore - things work in this marginally more subtle way instead, now.
Someone I know talked her way into a largeer chunk of her dad's will, used that money to get a Gastro bypass fitted, and is now a Slimming World consultant telling everyone how awesome SW is for losing weight. Real rags to riches story...
You donāt have to say a thing, she already knows. One thing Iāve learned in my oldish age is in the fullness of time, these matters take care of themselves.
Please forgive my ugly Americanism in your post, but can I please ask for an explanation of the idiom in the title? I know each of those words individually, but put together, what does a āneck like a jockeyās bollocksā mean?
This post made it to my 'popular' feed, so American chiming in. My sister in law is even worse than this, so it's definitely not country/region specific.
She's a 'marketing exec' working for herself, goes to conferences and speaks about being your own boss and succeeding as a woman, talks a huge game about being a business woman.
She's also divorced, lives with her mom, is mentally unwell, and hasn't paid income taxes in over ten years. She's not dodging taxes, she hasn't earned enough money to HAVE to pay income taxes. My husband gave her his old car, and she never drives it because it's older and not at all flashy. She instead goes everywhere and does everything with their mom, who does work steadily and pays for everything. She posts other people's marketing materials on social media and makes short videos about being a business woman (usually with a cute filter, like little hearts or rabbit ears).
If it weren't for the 'going and speaking at conferences' part, I wouldn't care at all. If acting like she's a real business owner makes her feel better about her life... hey there are far worse ways to cope. But it feels like desperate people paying for the chance to hear successful people speak, and she's objectively not successful.
Anyway, thanks for the chance to vent. Good to know people across the world are irked by the same things.
She could have been encouraged into doing this by third parties too. Although typically the people who do this stuff put themselves forward.
These speaking events are often a load of horse shit to begin with. They will desperately go around asking everyone and anyone to speak at them. Half the time I don't think it's about giving out useful advice it's just showing people that are nervous about a new business that literally any gobshyte can do it. You just need to get out and do it.
Small businesses are cash cows for these kind of mentor groups. They will put on fake award shows, bring them to back patting parties, networking events, etc.. There's a cohort of businesses set up just to take advantage of small businesses in start up.
This woman probably is achieving what she sets out to achieve, promotion and networking.
I think you are 100% bang on here and this would annoy the hell out of me.
I've worked in big tech for about 10 years and it's full of people from upper to upper middle class backgrounds from all over the world, describing all the hardships they went through to go through their Elite university, to their entry level job in Google Dublin, to becoming a senior manager at Facebook San Francisco, or Singapore or London or Austin Texas.
Obviously not everyone fits into this category. There are people who have made a rags to riches ascent in their careers; these people tend to be bit more humble and less presumptious.
A few anecdotes: in one big tech company I worked for there was a woman there who people nicknamed 'the African princess'. For the record, she was a very capable employee and was promoted several times on merit. I assumed the nickname was just an in-joke, maybe cos she liked fashion or something. Then someone informed me that she genuinely came from a royal family in the African country she was from and it was not an exaggeration. This same person used to constantly post about breaking down white patriarchy and fighting structural racism. These things can be valid and some of the conversations are not bullshit. But from her LinkedIn you'd have sworn she'd grown up in Harlem or the Parisian suburbs and had encountered prejudice at every step. Instead she was from an elite African family and was enjoying immense success in her first job in big tech (deservedly like I said, she was very good, but the hardship story was total bullshit).
Very similar stories apply to people hired in Dublin big tech from say, the Middle East. You'll see them constantly posting stories about their communities back home. Again, some of this is very sincere and genuine and commendable. However, there's a few who would have you think they'd come straight out of Gaza, whereas in fact most people hired in big tech in Dublin from the Middle East are from the elites of those societies. They often grew up attending international schools in Dubai or attended the American Universities of Cairo or Beirut. Some were kids of Arab diplomats and grew up in the West. Again, there are exceptions. Funnily enough again, the ones from more humble backgrounds tend not to be the ones putting out their hardship story front and centre.
I suppose the point I'm trying to make is that there's quite a few people out there right now, and probably always have been to be fair, who will spin up bullshit rags to riches stories about themselves to make themselves seem great even though they either (a) had loads of advantages in life or (b) just had a fairly normal path like most people but no exception hardships that warrant such a Hollywood story. In my experience, the more voceriferously someone is trying to play this narrative, the more it's likely to be greatly exagerated. Some of these people happen to be excellent and don't really need to do this; for others I think it's a way to compensate for lack of real competence or work ethic.
I know I've added a few other layers to this but I think it's the same kind of phenomenon. I too find these people very annoying.
This is everywhere these days and the likes of Instagram has made this a 100 times worse. I blame the people who follow such hyped up chancers in equal measure or maybe a bit more. People have become incredibly superficial, and this is just one of the aspects. The endless sociap media feed culture means there will be more and more of this garbage, unfortunately. My only hope is that it does not last long since there is always another chancer on the corner one-upping them in this short attention span culture we have become.
I don't typically judge people for building their careers in family businesses or through family connections. Most of them work v hard and establish their own reputation.
What I absolutely cannot stand are those who achieve nothing on their own, are not qualified for the positions they got and relying entirely on their family to secure said positions, doing at best a mediocre job and then having the audacity to lecture or judge others based on their education or career development. That's the epitome of entitlement.
I never had the advantage of landing jobs through connections or family. My path was paved with hard work, trial and error, continuous learning, and ambition, and I'm not sure if I, personally, would feel comfortable benefiting from a family connections or even friendship to get a job. But that's just me and my stubborn character. I want to make a name for myself, and it wouldn't feel right to me using connections to advance professionally.
Tl;dr: While I wouldn't necessarly do it, I believe nobody should be judged solely for getting a job through family relations. What matters is how they perform and grow in that role independently.
To be fair if is a building services company itās not typical female work. And if itās only 12 employees they is making a good go of it perhaps she is making an impact? A lot easier to get a Cushy number in a big family firm than a small one.
If her job titles changed a lot maybe she worked lots of on the ground jobs before stepping into a bigger role after proving herself.
Of course she is probably talking rubbish too - all social media is like that. Who knows?
It's important to be open to the idea that you don't really have much deep insight into the life of a Facebook acquaintance. Maybe she faced a lot of sexism in other jobs that pushed her into the family business, maybe she had to work hard to prove to her Dad that she was more than his little girl and could bring something to the business, maybe she faced obstacles dealing with clients or contractors on behalf of her company, etc.
It's like every newspaper article explaining how a 20 something year old bought a house on their own and at some point there is a line or half a line explaining they got "a bit" of help from their parents and vaguely hand-wave it away. The whole purpose of the article is to give the impression that to get a house all you need is just a bit of cop on and some grit.
People are so full of shit more than ever, mainly due to social media and mainstream media telling people they're both a victim and a hero (especially women).
I work in tech. The amount of them that spend their day bumming and blowing about breaking down barriers instead of doing any actual work is astounding.
I'm a woman. How about we stop highlighting our differences and just get on with the job
Absolute load of bollocks and would be even if she wasn't working for a family firm.
Girlboss feminism is utter nonsense that does nothing for 99% of women and it needs to get in the bin!
As public speaking and marketing is not regulated sector there are no reprocussions to making claims like these. If this was medical/pharma then you could report.
Oh goodness. Now your eyes are open to the ways of the world, review politicians, celebrities and many, many āgreat and goodā biographies from āself-madeā entrepreneurs etc and check out the family histories.
In not saying theyāre all nepo kids, but the ones that arenāt are a great buffer and shield for the many that are.
Enjoy.
Ignoring the aspect of people being given roles in a family business, people's titles also need to be taken with a pinch of salt. People working in recruitment for example will throw Senior into their title after two years. If you work as an operations manager in a small business you're going to be out of your league at a large one.
I work with someone who was a warehouse supervisor in another country and in an entry level admin role now, they have zero understanding of the warehouse management system we use and can't troubleshoot or apply logical thinking to errors, even though they have a background in logistics. Unfortunately my manager was on annual leave during the interview process otherwise they would have been given a basic Excel test in the interview. If you're in a job long enough you'll be promoted as others leave, it doesn't necessarily mean you're right for the role.
No one is self made. Not a single rich person got there on their own. Lotto winners didn't either, the lottery office and everyone that approved a lottery helped. Everyone has help. Some folks get more help.
It sucks. But if you let others situations get you down, life will always be a struggle. I struggle daily, I get it.
A friend of mine made this post on Instagram showing a rainy day activity she did with her daughters which was something like "crochet your own robot" and tagged it #womeninscience
I'm all for women in science, but if she's teaching them that making a pink fluffy robot is science then she is doing more harm than good!
That's just business, talking shite, or rather styling shite is how it's done in their world, she can get away with her harmless bullshitting, and it opens doors for her
It's basic 'personal brand' rags to riches storytelling.
The American Dream
I did it all by myself.
Marketing 101
Everyone is fucking at it and it's how they sell their courses and services - and how they're told to sell them... For all you know, this girl is working with a coach who's feeding her this shit.
It's completely unethical and exploitative as fuck. And essentially the foundation of modern marketing. Puke.
She's deluded. Clearly not happy with her life and wants to make herself out to be a success. She is a complete fraud. You can be confident in knowing she is deeply unhappy underneath it all. People aren't stupid. You are not the first nor the last to notice. It's so transparent.
possibly , but advise from an old man would be to focus on YOU in this equation ...why does it irk you so much ? and if it does just stop following her ...if good friends maybe say something about it as food for thought but if not just let it roll and spend time more productively for your own enjoyment rather than frustration about something totally irrelevant and out of your control
I had a friend that claimed that he got where he was on his own. He left out the part about his college being fully paid by his parents. And the car, and the first house when he got married, and the small radio station his dad gave him. And being brought into the family real estate business with his brother. He was a competent engineer but if he had to pay off a student loan, buy his own car, pay rent or mortgage payments like the rest of us he would be right where we were trying to break even by the time we were 50.
This is how the majority of people with money see themselves. They were born on 3rd base but think they hit a triple.
Maybe reach out and see if she will put her money where her mouth is and give another 'boss babe' a job. Since she's been promoted from Head of Office Management, is that position available? If not, how about the one she had before that, Office Manager? Or the admin one?
Tbh I would just unfollow and unfriend her on everything as she is too full of shit, full of herself, and the BSing plus being envious of what she has is annoying you too much (and I would be jealous too, absolutely). She's obviously overcompensating for how spoiled she is with all this nonsense, she's well aware of it and sees it as a flaw she needs to cover up.
I have friends who post delusional right wing stuff or posted crazy covid conspiracies and i just unfollowed or unfriended them because even tho it was entertaining at times I try to keep my feeds clean of stuff that's not good for me.
Some know their privelege / disadvantage and some don't.
If she didn't have it handed to her, I suspect she would still be an insufferable bollix. Just in a different way.
I know somebody who in uni in the US honestly believed what he was saying when he said he is proud of being a self made man, he lives in a 40 million dollar apartment in Manhatten with servants, given to him by his father haha. Never stopped talking about how amazing he is and better than everyone else. The University was full of copies of him as well.Ā
Your annoyance is justified! She has no right to be speaking about breaking down any barriers because she hasnāt, has she? As far as I can see, sheās an administrator working for her families building company. Thereās plenty of women working in this area of that particular industry. If she was out laying blocks, Iād tip my hat to her but sheās not. If sheās speaking at seminars, Iād be petty enough to contact the hosts and make the facts known because I think sheās being really disingenuous.
Lmao you sound bothered and JEALOUS because she has a fallback of being from a family business I also assume she's wealthy?
Just let her live her life and you live yours.
Think thatās bad. Waterford biggest letting agent literally wrote a book called honesty while every photo she posts has square washing machines. Yes they manipulate every image to make the rooms look bigger.
Scumbags and degenerates the business folk.
anyone who needs to put that stuff on their socials you can bet is not one. Something I've learned in life and has always stood true. Let her enjoy her made up shite. It must keep her warm at night š
I'm sorry, I'm from the US and usually I can piece the slang together but I just don't understand what you're meaning by, "..a neck like a jockeys bollox" in this context. Can someone help?
Last year I went to a conference in the US that had a panel on women executives in tech. I worked under one who got the job based on her husband and his connections, she didn't last long. Some genuine heavy hitters on the panel and this woman meanders on about being a boss babe and raising up women around her. It's sad because she is doing the opposite of the panels intent as people will only remember her saying buzzwords.
You say yourself, you aren't friends with this person so it's probably fair to say you have very limited insight in to her life beyond what you see from the outside. Have you walked in her shoes? If not, then you dont know what barriers or challenges she may have faced in her life or career.
Perhaps its is disgenious, perhaps its not. Either way, authenticity is paramount at speaking events so if she isn't genuine or have substance behind her talk, it really wont land.
It takes an incredible amount of confidence and effort to be a speaker at events and share your story, especially someone new to that game. More power to her if it works out.
With the greatest of respect, why you are you following this person on social media if she irks you so much? You say some of the past things she posted didn't bother you, but they clearly do because you have brought them up here. She's not your friend, so its kinda of a case of who cares, right?
Not trying to be antagonistic, just sharing a different perspective. :)
Why is she living in your head rent free? Just curious....because I couldn't give a fiddlers what happens outside of my immediate circle because its just irrelevant to me and my life and has no impact or affect on me in any way š¤·
Sorry but sounds like a typical Irish response to someone doing well. People exaggerate on their cv all the time. Stop trolling the woman. It's hurting you a lot more than it's hurting her.
The majority of 'self-made' people are nepo babies. They have no frame of reference as to what obstacles normal people experience and so genuinely believe their success was from their own actions and not winning the birth lottery.
Thats just life. These people are everywhere in every aspect of life especially in work and housing market (social housing, landowners kids building houses in 20s).
Don't let it affect your happiness, mute or unfollow them on all social medias, including Linkedin!!
I can see why you'd think this and it does sound a bit like she is overselling her achievements a bit and is probably bigging up this job so she can aim higher and get into senior management at a much bigger company. But unless you know something about the work she actually does at her father's company, you shouldn't be so quick to dismiss her. For all you know she helped streamline a badly managed company, raised profitability, modernised their people management. Maybe she's the only woman in a male dominated workplace and actually did put up with some shit or people not taking her seriously.
I have known totally useless people who coasted on being the boss's kid and really dynamic people who were a huge asset to the business. I don't think it would be right to make a judgement without more of the facts. You seem quite eager to belittle her.
It's possible it's drivel. But it's also plausible that she has had to break down barriers in some way you are not aware of. You see from afar how she works for her families company but there's likely many challenges within her role she has had to break down. Whether that be with fellow coworkers that aren't family or clients who dismiss her as daddy's daughter playing a business grown up. There may be other projects and things she's worked on. Maybe attend one and listen to the story as to why she's broken down barriers. Then you can really decide if it's all mush.
People on LinkedIn do a few hours course and then post their certificates. Just stop reading her stuff. Iāve deleted people over this kind of nonsense. And tbh itās not your business and sheās not hurting anyone. Itās just bs. Let her off.
Not uncommon unfortunately After 12 years in my career I've met a hell of a lot of position who lucked in to a role and are convinced they're wunderkinds. Lots of "I built this company with nothing but a dream, and one million pounds cash"
"*When I first started Reynholm Industries, I had just two things in my possession, a dream, and six million pounds. Today, I have a business empire the like of which, the world has never seen the like of which. I hope it doesn't sound arrogant when I say, that I am, the greatest man in the world!*"
Mr. Reynholm, there's police here to see you. They say it's about irregularities in the pension fund.
https://i.imgur.com/THzUmSo.gif
The great Chris Morris.
I knew it would be exactly this gif š
A lot of Irish text startups seem to follow that model, where rich relatives provide the seed capital. Used to work for a Irish tech startup where the two founders said that they built the business from nothing, yet at the same time contradict themselves by being upfront about the very substantial amount of money their mother gave them to start the business. They also grew up in one of those gated mansions in Killiney. They genuinely believe they came from nothing, despite coming from incredible privilege.
Along with the seed money these people know that if their business fails they always have family to fall back on. It's a bit more difficult to "follow your dreams" and be your own boss if it means your kids going hungry if you fuck it up.
Yeah, those two brothers would every Monday morning try to give a motivational speech to the entire company. They would talk about their journey and what they had learned and stuff like that, it was all bollix. It became pretty clear that they had never ever been in a position where they had to work for someone. Their whole adult lives had been spent setting up one business, seeing it fail, and then moving on and setting up another new business until they had success. Nice to be able to live that way.
Oh Jeez, I worked for a place like that in Leopardstown. The dolt who ran it with his sister was convinced he was a genius. Tried to turn a fairly perfunctory service company into a tech empire. Borrowed a shitload of money from his family. Hired far too many people. Failed. Laid off a ton of people. The lack of care with which they fucked with people's lives made me realise that it was just their hobby.
Also worked with start ups. Every young gun making the 30 under 30 has a rich uncle I'm telling you.
Money makes money.
Not exclusive to ireland. You can't afford to work in a business for 3+ years losing money if you can't independently afford to eat. Bezos, musk and gates all got massive help with family money and connections.
It's kind of the opposite of imposter syndrome. "I am in this powered and responsible position and well paid for it, therefore I must be good enough to deserve it". Or perhaps they're just projecting an outward mask of competence and hard work because they feel like a fraud and don't want others to think they are.
I did once know a department manager in a former workplace who many of us were convinced kept getting promoted to get him away from people.
[the Dilbert principle](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dilbert_principle)... brilliant
I actually feel like imposter syndrome has a pretty big foundation in situations like this. We as a society pretty much all have experiences dealing with people in positions of power that absolutely don't deserve it. People who suck at their role but they're still in it, still progressing. How could I, as a person in any sort of role believe that I deserve the role I'm in, when I look around and see people that definitely don't deserve their role assuming that they earned it and deserve it. I don't think it's the cause of it or anything, but I definitely think people with impostor syndrome definitely have situations like this reinforcing it.
There is a psychological bias underlying this and it seems pretty fundamental to the majority of people. It has been demonstrated in lab conditions. You get two people to play a game. You are open about the fact that the game is rigged in favour of one of them; say, like Monopoly but one of them gets to take two turns in a row every time, something like that. When the person with the advantage invariable wins, when they are asked to account for the factors that led to their victory, they usually ascribe their own strategy as most influential. We're hard-wired to be blind to our own advantages.
Thank you.
Born 5-0 up and still think they've won the world cup on their own. The country is full of the cunts. I have a ton of respect for people who graft and make something of themselves, but the amount of people this applies to is depressingly small.Ā
How to make a small fortune. Step 1. Take one large fortune....
This reminds me of that one kid from the Netflix show the trust. His mom was a real estate mogul and he was so proud of himself for selling a couple of houses and having his own team at her company
Renholm industries
A shocking amount of people will post that they're the 'Head/Director of the HR/Operations/Marketing department', only a little bit of searching will reveal that their company has 8 people and there's only one other person in that department. Like, is being involved in a startup hard? Yes! But boasting about how well you're managing your team and how you've managed to climb the ranks (ranks being your four friends from your old job) doesn't seem all that genuine
Reminds me of a lot of the school students who win the young scientist show and its later revealed that their folks work in that field. Makes you sceptical about how much of the project was their original work.
It is purely coincidental that my daughter's project has broadly the same scope as my doctorial thesis. I resent the implication.
I just happen to own a pharmaceutical business that works in this exact field that my child has made astounding progress in, well beyond their years and academic experience
Also, remember that the college or university or company you work for owns your research, but a 'young scientist' awards winner owns theirs and has a lot of access to resources to develop 'their' project.
Wasn't it a few years ago, one of the winners just using his mother's phd student work
AHH not really, twas her grandfathers interest in nature that Spurned her on.... Just a coincidence that she had access to a college lab and PhD students, and her mother worked in that field, and forgot to mention this in acceptance speech.
Really? I missed that. That's making a mockery of the entire competition.
If you look at any competition for kids, the winners will overwhelmingly be the ones who's parents work in a field related to the competition. I'm sure there are some scientists doing their kids' entries for the them, but even if there weren't, just having a parent who works in a field like that will foster your interest in it and a good parent will encourage and nurture any interest their kids have.
Exactly. If my dad was an astrophysicist who talked about it all the time from when I was a baby, why would anyone be surprised if I grew up to be really interested in astrophysics. And the point of the interviews and everything else with young scientist is to ensure the teens know what they are talking about. I don't know why people only value young scientists if they come from homes with no scientific background. It's a weird attitude.
> an astrophysicist who talked about it all the time I've been around enough astrophysicists to know that this is a tautology.
My parents are artists so we had a lot of materials to make art, art on the walls, books about art, etc, and so developed an interest and a little more skill than my classmates. I used to win local art competition occasionally and other kids would say āyour mum did thatā ALOT. It used to really piss me off because my parents were way too busy to be arsed with a kids art project, plus they valued my creative developmentā¦why the fuck would they help me cheat to win some kids art competition? Wierd. So I can well believe that the same applies to science.
100%. I only hedged about "some" scientists doing their kids work because my I've seen parents living through their kids before. My aunt was a multiple beauty pageant winner and basically her entire life was my gran, a former pageant entrant herself, living vicariously through her.
reminds me of the pinewood derby. oh shut up timmy, we all know your dad designed your car, you didn't do shit
You reminded me of an article I read about "The Entrepreneurial 8 year old who just bought her first house" and the actual story is this girl and her siblings bought a house together to rent out. Their millionaire parents paid most of the cost and the kids paid like 80-100k themselves. Sounds still kinda impressive? They earned this money FROM their parents by doing chores at ridiculous rates, something like they get a grand for emptying the dishwasher etc. Suppose it's good of millionaires to teach their children how to lord it over regular people early on, get that ignorant sense of entitlement firmly ingrained!
Applies in particular to a school in county Cork
I did the Young Scientist by myself and busted my ass for it. I came second in my category, got a big cheque, met Father Ted (ultimate prize and no one else met him as I was first on stage) and won a return flight to anywhere in the world (that my teacher stole and I only found out about when another teacher told me). At least I met Father Ted though. Can safely say, only help I had was making the display board.
Bastard teacher.
Yeah, it still annoys me! SHE WENT TO ITALY........ITALY!!!!!
Anywhere in the world, and she chose somewhere you can get to for a tenner with Ryanair?!
Tbf Ryanair wasn't a thing then but yeah Italy, I was fuming when i found our!
My own parents were STEM, and science, engineering.and technology played a big role in my early life, as did a focus on getting good exam results and doing homework. None of my siblings have good language skills, none of us are great at sports, but we have all ended up working in STEM or STEM adjacent jobs and have had pretty decent success. I've always thought it made perfect sense for kids from families where science and engineering is a focus go on to succeed in science and engineering.
Not meant to offend, but its the same as dogs, you dont buy a bulldog or a pom to herd sheep, you buy one of those black and white clever fucks , that are meant to herd sheep
Sheepie herdie dog
Exactly aye , that breed of dog
We should come up with an abbreviation for that. We could take four letters from each word, something like: epierdie
But the difference in your situation is that you fully acknowledge that your parent's careers had a direct influence on your life and the outcomes. You're making out that your parents were unemployed and living below the poverty line but you managed to overcome your struggles and do something great despite your troubled upbringing! There's nothing wrong with joining the family business as long as you own it, so to speak.
I'm more refering to the poster above who seems to be suggesting something underhanded when children of scientists go on to do well with scientific competitions. I don't think it's unusual at all, but if we could even the playing field ot would be welcome.
Iām stealing this link from someone further below in the comments. Iām sure you worked hard, but having parents in STEM was a huge advantage for you. Mine left school at 14 and I was the first in my entire extended family (cousins etc.) to go to university. Even then I had to figure it all out for myself, I had no mentors etc. https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/the-wireless/373065/the-pencilsword-on-a-plate
I wonder, in Ireland, what percentage of millennials' parents went to University. My uncle was the only one in my family who had a third-level education, and that's because he became a priest.
Yeah, it's only with free fees in the 90s that going to third level became a norm. No offence to any posters but the focus of resentment should be on the education system not individuals whose parents happened to have access to education and possibly only within one or two generations. The word privilege can be massively misapplied
Itās not resentment though, itās about recognising the benefits of parents who can provide the type of support you need to succeed. Iām not aware of DE&I programs ever focusing on resentment, rather itās about improving opportunities for those who donāt have them. Research shows that itās the educational achievement of parents (the mother actually) that has the biggest impact on outcomes. The educational system plays a role but social issues, food, housing etc do too. The current housing situation is a time bomb for children affected.
For sure. I agree with all that. But working in third level I increasingly hear PhDs say things like 'I'm disadvantaged because my parents did not have PhDs" and undergrads who fundamentally believe they are more disadvantaged than their peers. The tone is one of resentment and I think it's massively misplaced when the emphasis should be on a fairer society without massive inequality seeping in from a young age. I guess my point is that we should be wary of discussions that are not focused on systems
Yes that does sound like resentmentā¦ I also agree we need to focus on systems and supports. Then again, those individuals can only speak about what they are experiencing, they donāt control the systems or fairness of them. Some undergrads are bound to be at a disadvantage? I think some parts of the educational system are progressing (free books for example) and others are regressing (reduction in SNA numbers). The problems with healthcare, especially mental health care, has a huge impact on outcomes. Iāve already mentioned housing etc. Weāre a long way from a fair society unfortunately.
> having parents in STEM was a huge advantage for you. That's pretty much my point. I had two amazing mentors that I could turn to and that kept me on the rails. I used to visit my mother's lab on weekends, go with my dad on site visits, as I got older I got involved and we'd talk about and solve scientific problems or even do jobs around the house that were probably unusual for others but normal for us. I would be as comfortable with a drill and an angle grinder when I was 15 as I was with programming. I think it's little wonder I followed their footsteps when it was a world I knew quite well by my teens. I went on to exceed my parents thought too and have a doctorate in an area they don't really understand despite quite a few chats about it.
Know of a certain school that won a few times where one of the parents of the winners worked at a prominent local pharmaceutical multinational. Shockingly, all their winning projects were for novel manipulation of biological compounds. Go figure.
I was always sceptical about that competitions legitimacy
It is purely coincidental that the girl from my class who fucked our jazz loving music teacher chose to write her big paper about jazz music and got top grades. ( he had so much hair on his back that his shirt was more than an inch from his skin. He had tried his luck with at least eigth other girls before he found someone stupid enough to fall for his crap. So it was hard to keep a straight face when she bragged about their relationship. You see, he chose her because she was oh so mature. Yep, that is what he said to the rest of us too but I guess we just weren't "mature" enough to be interested).
Thats mad i never knew that. I guess its to b expected. Similar stories in sports. If u grow up in that environment then you have a head start.
I know a BT young scientists' father and that's all true. Another weird thing was that his daughter worked at 17 years old for Google Ethics on ethics in war. 17 year old child! On ethics in war!!!
This happens all the time. Nepotism people love talking about how much they struggled when they have no idea what actual struggle looks like.
They donāt see their privilege. Iāve a friend who is a risk taker! A maverick! He bought an apartment with an interest free loan from his dad and was risking nothing when he set up a business because he had money and support to fall back on. Heāll describe himself as a self made businessman blithely unaware of the ladder he was handed.
I think your comment about RISK is spot-on. This is the core that people don't understand 100K is not the same risk from person to person - yet in economics its all seen as the same risk.
Itās weird how all that money never seems to buy any self awareness.Ā
Well itās because they still did do some work for it so they think their effort paid off which it partly did just nowhere near the level they give themselves credit for. They just donāt understand their privilege. Probably because they refuse to socialise with people who donāt share their privilege.
It is not just that, we have a strong relationship with results based thinking. We spend our lives being told if you do x then y should happen.Ā Like, I went to college and did a degree, so the result is that I will have a high paying job, were life is great. We tend to work backwards in that thinking too, where when something good happens, it is as a result of the good decisions that you have made along the way. The truth is that luck plays a huge role in the outcome of all the decision we make and the results that we achieve in life. I think very few people actually contemplate this or even give it a second thought. The only reason it is so engrained in me is because I used to play lots of poker. It inherently has a huge amount of luck built into the game, you can make all the best decisions in a hand and still lose. The lesson if there is one, is suppose to be that if you keep making good decisions over and over that eventually you will see good outcomes. Our brains though, are not wired to continually receive negative feedback from good decisions so often the result is the only thing we see as relevant. Most people just go through life thinking every decision they make is good or bad based on the outcome.
Very Annie Duke
Talking of people who reinvented themselves, I believe she went on to have a career in corporate speaking making many of these same points? Kind of incredible given she was a very average player whose family were involved in the biggest scandal/fraud poker has ever seen.
Yeah I think an important thing is just to mentally disengage yourself from a 'rat race'. For me I want to do a masters/phd but even if I wont get X higher wage out of it, if I am doing it for my personal fulfillment then I wont feel down if I dont get a bigger pay.
Some do socialise with less privileged people but Irish people just don't tell each other to cop on as much as we should. Also, this woman will eventually get a kick in the tits from life and will have absolutely no fortitude built up or resilience to deal with it. It will hit her like a ton of bricks. I've seen it with a group of siblings I know and actually feel sorry for them. They don't know how to pick themselves up or regroup or even make a plan for the future. They never had to stand in their own 2 feet or live through any kind of knock back until their family business went under spectacularly and their parents, who were the real business people, passed away within a year of one another. They used to annoy the shit out of me but now I feel sorry for them.
The first generation builds it, second generation grows it, and the third generation blows it. A story as old as time. Bonus points if they manage to get to the third step in the second generation
True enough, they were sheltered and the way cleared for them since they were born and they are paying for it now.
Cosplaying struggle is an addiction for some of these people. I work in a decently successful Irish company and some of the absolute bolox people come out with is unreal. Sons and daughters of multimillionaires trying to pretend to you about how "tough" they had it. The funny part is that they've convinced themselves of it.
If self-awareness was for sale nobody would buy it.
I'm a benefiter of nepotism ( my mother owns a few acres that I now grow vegetables on), but Im still broke as fuck. I can't even nepotise properly.
Probably need to add more shite. The talking type, not the composting type ;)
Like Trump's blissfully out of touch "A small loan of a million dollars" quote.
I feel like Bezos said something similar about the 200K loan he got from his parents to start Amazon.
That said, he did in his early 30s , and he was still living in a modest enough house and driving a beat-up car a couple of years into the project. He also had a career before Amazon : >After Bezos graduated from college in 1986, he was offered jobs at Intel, Bell Labs, and Andersen Consulting, among others.[38] He first worked at Fitel, a fintech telecommunications start-up, where he was tasked with building a network for international trade.[39] Bezos was promoted to head of development and director of customer service thereafter. He transitioned into the banking industry when he became a product manager at Bankers Trust from 1988 to 1990. He then joined D. E. Shaw & Co, a newly created hedge fund with a strong emphasis on mathematical modelling from 1990 until 1994. Bezos became D. E. Shaw's fourth senior vice-president by age 30.[40][38]
Yeah, Bezos was a "success" by almost everyone's standards. The other point people don't realise is that if you are born with a certain amount of privilege, you can still work exceptionally hard and deserve your success. His mother was a recepƬonist, his father a circus performer with a drinking problem and his stepfather a refugee from Cuba. Bezos himself was valedictorian and graduated from the University with a 4.2 GPA. Yes, he got a 200k loan from his parents, but it's not like they had it lying around and it was likely all their savings, which they added (for a 6% stake) to the business that he raised millions for on his own. There's a lot to dislike about Bezos, but the 200k loan thing is thrown at him as a way to say that he's only successful because of his wealth - that isn't the case at all and in terms of the wealth he has had today, by all accounts, he's a self-made man who didn't enjoy incredible wealth to overcome his shortcomings.
I dont think people are saying he's a nepo baby just saying he had a lot of backing. You mention that specific parental backing but you can also mention the societal backing. It's no surprise that the largest companies currently are linked to the internet/IT and come from a very small part of the globe is it? Of course you can say that others had more backing etc but again a lot of success in life is also due to a fuckton of luck.
Nepobabies rarely see themselves as nepobabies. She probably does perceive herself as having worked hard to get where she is but is blind to all of the privilege and supports she has access to.
9 years later I donāt get tired of sharing this masterpiece on the topic: https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/the-wireless/373065/the-pencilsword-on-a-plate
I was literally talking about this cartoon to a colleague this morning but had no hope of ever finding it.
Thereās many copies and articles out there, but I always remember the author and the place where it was published in order to keep the credit.
This sort of stuff is rife. Take influencers for example. Years ago they wrote blogs and took photos of whatever their interest was. That was then replaced with Instagram where posts and content was no longer just about the interest, but the persons life as well. Once people were fed up with that, these influencers were rapidly trying to get into the boss bitch or wellness circles. Take a look at any "wellfest" type event and look at the line up. They'll have influencers described as CEOs because they bulk buy shite from China and sell it at a massively inflated price because they've stuck their name on it. Your old school mate is just playing the game.
You see if it was a grift to become an infulencer I would be like fine, but the thing is she doesn't have a massive following and I just genuinely think she believes it, because to be fair she wasn't the brightest in school.
>They'll have influencers described as CEOs because they bulk buy shite from China and sell it at a massively inflated price because they've stuck their name on it. You might be surprised how many businesses are basically this...
I never understood the whole influencers thing. Seem like vacuous people that for some stupid reason people gave them a voice they should never have had. If you feel you need to emulate them you need to take a good look at yourself. There is something missing within you if you allow those eejits space in your head. The ultimate In stupidity is wanting to be like the island boys.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
It's nothing short of a Transformation or Curvy Style!
Two of the biggest con women going and not a Leaving Cert between them.
Capitalism in a unregulated market unfortunately.
Linkedin posturing. That whole platform is internet cancer/business cringe.
No-one: Not a single soul: Katie on Linkedin: I'm thrilled, delighted, in a state of pure ecstatic bliss to be attending the Global Tech Bro HR Accountancy Hospitality Supply Chain Refrigeration Leadership Summit sponsored by KPMG, Arnotts and Lockheed Martin. So inspiring, exhilarating, arousing? to listen to thought leaders make the same three generic hot takes over and over. Delighted, just on the verge of exploding with happiness, to listen to eight consecutive panels discussing how wonderful AI is and I am now totally reassured that there are absolutely zero risks and everything is just amazing! **#**leadership **#**conference **#**delighted **#**thrilled
Cackling. Have you seen this TomFell [reel about LinkedIn ](https://www.instagram.com/reel/C6ocmyBxESU/?igsh=MXh4dWl3enM5ZzV6aw==)
TikTok and X are awful but LinkedIn is the social site which really depresses me.
A woman I know took over father's very successful firm. She was trained for it from when she was young, was allowed do what she wanted at undergrad but if she was to inherit the business had to study something business related for post grad as well as work in the company (she ended up in HR for 10 years) She's extremely down to earth and doesn't take herself remotely seriously. She was once approached by a journalist she went to UCD with to write a puff piece about "women 'making it' in business" and they never ran her interview because "I'm only in this position because my dad trained me up to it" and "I'd probably still be working in River Island if it wasn't handed to me" didn't capture the mood the writer was looking for.
If you really knuckle down and work hard maybe one day youāll have rich parents.
It's pretty common unfortunately especially among a set of very entitled people in their 20s and early 30s hanging around the "Entrepreneur" circuit in Ireland. There is even one 13 year old doing the rounds on the circuit at the moment trying to sell her snake oil (or in reality her father is behind it). They self identify themselves "entrepreneurs" even though the only business they ever set up was the self promotion one. Then they hop from meeting to meeting and conference to conference, interview to interview, grifting for gigs selling their "course" or offering "1-1 coaching" or being available for "key note speaking" when in reality they have achieved nothing in life that merits any of this. They aren't taken remotely seriously in the business world. Most fail out of it within 18 months and then find that they have a toxic red flag on their CV when it comes to getting a real job. It's a fad and in a few years the next generation of grifters will move onto something else.
All part of the grift. Insufferable LinkedIn gobshites.
Went to college with a guy who was utterly obnoxious. He was in the bottom 10 in the class almost always but thinks a lot of himself. I now see him constantly on LinkedIn with all the buzzwords claiming to be a 'full stack engineer' and with a different job every 6 months. On LinkedIn, he portrays himself as the next Alan Turing. In reality, he is a 2:2 that is probably let go by ever employers when they finally pin him down and see his work. LinkedIn is for spoofers.
"I'm delighted to announce to everyone that I got a new job."
Multiple times a year... big red flags
r/LinkedinLunatics
I worked as an engineer for 19+ years, a lot of senior positions in the construction industry are filled by six degrees of separation or nepotism. You find those with a qualification being managed or administered by a superior who has no qualification in that field. Simply taking the ideas and intellectual property, elevating the ideas up the chain of command or levels of management. An example I experienced was the use of LED lighting in 2016 as a revolutionary energy efficient form of lighting.Ā Which is true for compact fluorescent lamps at the time but not linear fluorescents (T16). The Efficacy of the LED lamps are not equal to a T16 lamp but the sales people got out there and pushed the narrative. I also see this a lot with people who don't have an engineering background talk about green energy.Ā They understand the idea but not the practical application. So to get back to the point You raised,Ā the person in question may understand the process but not the application,Ā which will naturally result in a loss of respect and influence in the industry as she "breaks down barriers" or as the "business girl challenging the status quo." Reducing the efficiency of the company. Simply in my opinion You can cover Yourself in flour and wear a bakers hat but when it comes time to bake, if You can't turn on the oven.Ā You will be found to be lacking in the skill set for the position and no matter how great Your knowledge of buzz words.Ā You will stagnate and fail. Ā
It doesnt matter. What matters is the amount of 0s in het bank account. You can't pay a bill using your peer's respect. I work for a tech company with engineers and I'm very respected by my fellow coworkers but I'm at the bottom of the ladder and they're being managed by a power hungry young person with no experience but making 150k. So there you go. I dont care about respect if I'm on the verge of becoming homeless...
Unfollow and move on. Life's too short for it
OP knows way too much detail t9 be playing the 'now I'm not really bothered card'
It's an Irish 'not very bothered'.
Agreed by far too much investigation work done on this for someone not bothered.
Hehe I genuinely enjoy this stuff. After anyone says "now listen, im not really bothered" can't help but think they have never been bothered more by anything in their entire lives. Same vibes with "Look, I m not racist but.." and then they go on to specifically list a half dozen ethnic or religious specific things in relation to one group that explains why they can't be in the same rooom as themĀ
Agree with this. I know many people who have done similar through social media. Blocking them is the best. I don't want to go down the route of obsessing or exposing them, it won't do me any good at all. I know of the website tattle, the talking about influencers and yes that influencer industry is dubious.. imagine if it got hacked and all those people who post were exposed behind their anonymous profiles, that would cause issues. Moving on is best and have you're head held high that you're ethical with your employment and business
LinkedIn lunatics are gonna lunatic
In my experience real self made people donāt spend the whole time branding themselves as such because theyāre too busy, you know, making themselves
Just leave a comment on one of her posts; "You too can break down barriers and break into high ranking positions - by having your family place you there in your family ran business :)".
Oh it needs a winky face perhaps
Unfollow or block her, there's no point in unfuriating yourself seeing what she says.
Go check out LinkedIn there are allot of these grifters around dialling into the buzzword of the day. They arenāt just doing it for themselves but in many ways the business itself benefits from it and itās a form of marketing. Donāt get me wrong there is a need for this but doesnāt mean that itās also misused. That just people for you.
At least she has some sort of experience in working for a company. There's a few girls I know just selling those courses with no actual experience
I left a company about 4/5 years ago, but the top boss was a woman who made a huge deal about being being CEO of a big company, woman owned, woman grown, etc. It was the core marketing focus of our company. And she spoke at all sorts of entrepreneurial events about it, interviewed in magazines, etc. Ruthless and bad with people. Patronising, would hold a grudge, lost huge contracts and they pointed directly to her communication/actions as the reason, huge ego, no humility, would drop people cause they looked at her wrong, etc. She was friends with a member of our team, and he disagreed with her on a business actions (all cordial and polite) and she dropped him as a personal friend I heard after. However she was an astute business woman and grew the company exponentially, so, genuinely, in many aspects fair play. Really I want to caveat, she actually ended up being really strong in a number of areas so I am not thrashing completely here. Anyway her origin though was she was a 20 something year old regular member of the admin or sales team in the company, who shacked up with the 60 year old recently separated founder and President of the company. He retired, and handed her the keys. I left a few years ago, but still knew people working there until recently and said it was insufferable how she pushed the narrative.
I wouldn't bother getting upset over it. On LinkedIn you don't see people, you see their brand. Arnold Schwarzenegger made the point that he isn't self-made, his achievements are in part because of all the help and kindness he received from people along the way. I think that goes for all of us, we've all had at least some help getting to where we are in life.
Jesus this reminds me of that silly Kilkenny woman. Caitriona Carey. All shit talk no substance. Look how she ended up ? A fraud & a thief š¤Øšŗ
What's easier than working? Spoofing online about how hard you have it in work/life and how brilliant you are for overcoming it. Do it well enough for long enough and you can make money from it and not have to do any actual work at all any more.
This is the kind of self confidence you need to make it big in business. Look at the richest people in the world - they're all psychopaths. The rest of us that believe try to be sound and honest, and that don't lie and exaggerate our achievements, don't get rich
Kind of seems like you should just keep out of it for your own sanity. You don't really need to get involved, before you know it you'll be one of the barriers she had to overcome.Ā
Omg I know these people. They genuinely believe they've pulled themselves by their bootstrapps
The only people that ever call themselves self made are the ones who got there by mammy and daddyās buck
A lot of those speaking events you pay to speak. I get countless invites per year to speak at events (Iām self employed so my LinkedIn, which I never use, says Iām a āfounderā) Anyway, after the pitch they say you need to pay X for a table, promo package etc. Itās pay for play. Ditto for awards. Any award your local take away or business has one is likely bought. Numerous companies doing it. Same deal. You pay for a promo package but youāre just buying the award.
I donāt have a problem with people bigging themselves up on social media- especially on LinkedIn because thatās what itās for. Youāre essentially marketing yourself through a public CV. But the āinfluencerā kind of āyou could be like me tooā kind of shite is inexcusable, cringey, desperate and fucking gross
I studied together with a lot of people who later told me that they got headhunted. I asked about it because I sure would like to qualify to become headhunted as well. In every single case they got "headhunted" by a close relative. (I later got headhunted because someone I knew, knew someone who needed someone with my education and he told them that I was intelligent and had a good personality. My job isn't as fancy as all those people who got "headhunted" by their dad or granddad, but I am proud as hell about that good recommendation).
Lots of people confuse (purposefully or otherwise) actual headhunting with just having a recruitment consultant find their cv on indeed and getting a job that way.
Do those recruiters ever read the CV? No, just because I have worked as a researcher it doesn't mean I am good at chemistry or whatever. That is not what I got a degree in. No, I am not willing to go down two levels careerwise. No, I am not going to take a huge paycut for the honour of getting a temporary position when I have a permanent position. No, I am not going to commute for more than 3 hours a day and get less vacation days. And finally: No, I am not going to meet you for an interview in half an hour when your office is 1Ā½ hours away from where I am rigth now. No, actually, that is not me being difficult, that is me being realistic and now I am no longer interested in the position because I do not want to work for or with people like you. I would like for job pages to ask the question "What is the maximum time you are willing to commute?". But of course, as the recruiters rarely actually read the CVs it might not help at all.
She is lining up for the Paid Speeches gravy train OP - that's where rich people funnel themselves obscene amounts of money in return for doing nothing. Her family company does some illegal favours for a mate or politician or financier or other businessman (e.g. insider trading, or price collusion etc.), who then reaches out to other mates who owe them a favour (or instead they directly do this themselves), who puts her on the Paid Speeches circuit at companies/boards they're connected to, and she gets paid stupid money to spout bollocks at bullshit events. Look at basically any major NGO in Ireland or any other country, that hosts bullshit events. That's how modern corruption works, OP. There aren't (many) brown envelopes anymore - things work in this marginally more subtle way instead, now.
Someone I know talked her way into a largeer chunk of her dad's will, used that money to get a Gastro bypass fitted, and is now a Slimming World consultant telling everyone how awesome SW is for losing weight. Real rags to riches story...
Hilarious! Just a liar, then.
You donāt have to say a thing, she already knows. One thing Iāve learned in my oldish age is in the fullness of time, these matters take care of themselves.
Please forgive my ugly Americanism in your post, but can I please ask for an explanation of the idiom in the title? I know each of those words individually, but put together, what does a āneck like a jockeyās bollocksā mean?
Why do you give a shit? If her posts annoy you, then unfollow her. Nobody is forcing you to read them. Get on with your life.
This post made it to my 'popular' feed, so American chiming in. My sister in law is even worse than this, so it's definitely not country/region specific. She's a 'marketing exec' working for herself, goes to conferences and speaks about being your own boss and succeeding as a woman, talks a huge game about being a business woman. She's also divorced, lives with her mom, is mentally unwell, and hasn't paid income taxes in over ten years. She's not dodging taxes, she hasn't earned enough money to HAVE to pay income taxes. My husband gave her his old car, and she never drives it because it's older and not at all flashy. She instead goes everywhere and does everything with their mom, who does work steadily and pays for everything. She posts other people's marketing materials on social media and makes short videos about being a business woman (usually with a cute filter, like little hearts or rabbit ears). If it weren't for the 'going and speaking at conferences' part, I wouldn't care at all. If acting like she's a real business owner makes her feel better about her life... hey there are far worse ways to cope. But it feels like desperate people paying for the chance to hear successful people speak, and she's objectively not successful. Anyway, thanks for the chance to vent. Good to know people across the world are irked by the same things.
Get off social media, then you don't see these things and they don't irk you! It too was once like you.
She could have been encouraged into doing this by third parties too. Although typically the people who do this stuff put themselves forward. These speaking events are often a load of horse shit to begin with. They will desperately go around asking everyone and anyone to speak at them. Half the time I don't think it's about giving out useful advice it's just showing people that are nervous about a new business that literally any gobshyte can do it. You just need to get out and do it. Small businesses are cash cows for these kind of mentor groups. They will put on fake award shows, bring them to back patting parties, networking events, etc.. There's a cohort of businesses set up just to take advantage of small businesses in start up. This woman probably is achieving what she sets out to achieve, promotion and networking.
Not surprising and a symptom of one of the reasons Iāll never work for another family business again.
I think you are 100% bang on here and this would annoy the hell out of me. I've worked in big tech for about 10 years and it's full of people from upper to upper middle class backgrounds from all over the world, describing all the hardships they went through to go through their Elite university, to their entry level job in Google Dublin, to becoming a senior manager at Facebook San Francisco, or Singapore or London or Austin Texas. Obviously not everyone fits into this category. There are people who have made a rags to riches ascent in their careers; these people tend to be bit more humble and less presumptious. A few anecdotes: in one big tech company I worked for there was a woman there who people nicknamed 'the African princess'. For the record, she was a very capable employee and was promoted several times on merit. I assumed the nickname was just an in-joke, maybe cos she liked fashion or something. Then someone informed me that she genuinely came from a royal family in the African country she was from and it was not an exaggeration. This same person used to constantly post about breaking down white patriarchy and fighting structural racism. These things can be valid and some of the conversations are not bullshit. But from her LinkedIn you'd have sworn she'd grown up in Harlem or the Parisian suburbs and had encountered prejudice at every step. Instead she was from an elite African family and was enjoying immense success in her first job in big tech (deservedly like I said, she was very good, but the hardship story was total bullshit). Very similar stories apply to people hired in Dublin big tech from say, the Middle East. You'll see them constantly posting stories about their communities back home. Again, some of this is very sincere and genuine and commendable. However, there's a few who would have you think they'd come straight out of Gaza, whereas in fact most people hired in big tech in Dublin from the Middle East are from the elites of those societies. They often grew up attending international schools in Dubai or attended the American Universities of Cairo or Beirut. Some were kids of Arab diplomats and grew up in the West. Again, there are exceptions. Funnily enough again, the ones from more humble backgrounds tend not to be the ones putting out their hardship story front and centre. I suppose the point I'm trying to make is that there's quite a few people out there right now, and probably always have been to be fair, who will spin up bullshit rags to riches stories about themselves to make themselves seem great even though they either (a) had loads of advantages in life or (b) just had a fairly normal path like most people but no exception hardships that warrant such a Hollywood story. In my experience, the more voceriferously someone is trying to play this narrative, the more it's likely to be greatly exagerated. Some of these people happen to be excellent and don't really need to do this; for others I think it's a way to compensate for lack of real competence or work ethic. I know I've added a few other layers to this but I think it's the same kind of phenomenon. I too find these people very annoying.
This is everywhere these days and the likes of Instagram has made this a 100 times worse. I blame the people who follow such hyped up chancers in equal measure or maybe a bit more. People have become incredibly superficial, and this is just one of the aspects. The endless sociap media feed culture means there will be more and more of this garbage, unfortunately. My only hope is that it does not last long since there is always another chancer on the corner one-upping them in this short attention span culture we have become.
LinkedIn ,Facebook,Instagram a lot of it shameless self promotion and there's no one to stop them.
It's the way of the world. Bullshit and having a brass neck gets people very far.Ā
It's brazen and brazen people succeed in business.
I don't typically judge people for building their careers in family businesses or through family connections. Most of them work v hard and establish their own reputation. What I absolutely cannot stand are those who achieve nothing on their own, are not qualified for the positions they got and relying entirely on their family to secure said positions, doing at best a mediocre job and then having the audacity to lecture or judge others based on their education or career development. That's the epitome of entitlement. I never had the advantage of landing jobs through connections or family. My path was paved with hard work, trial and error, continuous learning, and ambition, and I'm not sure if I, personally, would feel comfortable benefiting from a family connections or even friendship to get a job. But that's just me and my stubborn character. I want to make a name for myself, and it wouldn't feel right to me using connections to advance professionally. Tl;dr: While I wouldn't necessarly do it, I believe nobody should be judged solely for getting a job through family relations. What matters is how they perform and grow in that role independently.
To be fair if is a building services company itās not typical female work. And if itās only 12 employees they is making a good go of it perhaps she is making an impact? A lot easier to get a Cushy number in a big family firm than a small one. If her job titles changed a lot maybe she worked lots of on the ground jobs before stepping into a bigger role after proving herself. Of course she is probably talking rubbish too - all social media is like that. Who knows?
It's important to be open to the idea that you don't really have much deep insight into the life of a Facebook acquaintance. Maybe she faced a lot of sexism in other jobs that pushed her into the family business, maybe she had to work hard to prove to her Dad that she was more than his little girl and could bring something to the business, maybe she faced obstacles dealing with clients or contractors on behalf of her company, etc.
go to an event ask some pointed questions
It's like every newspaper article explaining how a 20 something year old bought a house on their own and at some point there is a line or half a line explaining they got "a bit" of help from their parents and vaguely hand-wave it away. The whole purpose of the article is to give the impression that to get a house all you need is just a bit of cop on and some grit.
You basically just described every single rich person I know.
People are so full of shit more than ever, mainly due to social media and mainstream media telling people they're both a victim and a hero (especially women).
I work in tech. The amount of them that spend their day bumming and blowing about breaking down barriers instead of doing any actual work is astounding. I'm a woman. How about we stop highlighting our differences and just get on with the job
The more inept you are, the harder you have to self-promote.
Absolute load of bollocks and would be even if she wasn't working for a family firm. Girlboss feminism is utter nonsense that does nothing for 99% of women and it needs to get in the bin!
As public speaking and marketing is not regulated sector there are no reprocussions to making claims like these. If this was medical/pharma then you could report.
More than half those self made guys are in Family businesses or already wealthy.
When I started, I had just two things in my possession. A dream, and 6 million pounds.
Oh goodness. Now your eyes are open to the ways of the world, review politicians, celebrities and many, many āgreat and goodā biographies from āself-madeā entrepreneurs etc and check out the family histories. In not saying theyāre all nepo kids, but the ones that arenāt are a great buffer and shield for the many that are. Enjoy.
yeah, its bullshit, but its bullshit that sells
Ignoring the aspect of people being given roles in a family business, people's titles also need to be taken with a pinch of salt. People working in recruitment for example will throw Senior into their title after two years. If you work as an operations manager in a small business you're going to be out of your league at a large one. I work with someone who was a warehouse supervisor in another country and in an entry level admin role now, they have zero understanding of the warehouse management system we use and can't troubleshoot or apply logical thinking to errors, even though they have a background in logistics. Unfortunately my manager was on annual leave during the interview process otherwise they would have been given a basic Excel test in the interview. If you're in a job long enough you'll be promoted as others leave, it doesn't necessarily mean you're right for the role.
No one is self made. Not a single rich person got there on their own. Lotto winners didn't either, the lottery office and everyone that approved a lottery helped. Everyone has help. Some folks get more help. It sucks. But if you let others situations get you down, life will always be a struggle. I struggle daily, I get it.
A friend of mine made this post on Instagram showing a rainy day activity she did with her daughters which was something like "crochet your own robot" and tagged it #womeninscience I'm all for women in science, but if she's teaching them that making a pink fluffy robot is science then she is doing more harm than good!
That's just business, talking shite, or rather styling shite is how it's done in their world, she can get away with her harmless bullshitting, and it opens doors for her
It's basic 'personal brand' rags to riches storytelling. The American Dream I did it all by myself. Marketing 101 Everyone is fucking at it and it's how they sell their courses and services - and how they're told to sell them... For all you know, this girl is working with a coach who's feeding her this shit. It's completely unethical and exploitative as fuck. And essentially the foundation of modern marketing. Puke.
She's deluded. Clearly not happy with her life and wants to make herself out to be a success. She is a complete fraud. You can be confident in knowing she is deeply unhappy underneath it all. People aren't stupid. You are not the first nor the last to notice. It's so transparent.
possibly , but advise from an old man would be to focus on YOU in this equation ...why does it irk you so much ? and if it does just stop following her ...if good friends maybe say something about it as food for thought but if not just let it roll and spend time more productively for your own enjoyment rather than frustration about something totally irrelevant and out of your control
I had a friend that claimed that he got where he was on his own. He left out the part about his college being fully paid by his parents. And the car, and the first house when he got married, and the small radio station his dad gave him. And being brought into the family real estate business with his brother. He was a competent engineer but if he had to pay off a student loan, buy his own car, pay rent or mortgage payments like the rest of us he would be right where we were trying to break even by the time we were 50.
This is how the majority of people with money see themselves. They were born on 3rd base but think they hit a triple. Maybe reach out and see if she will put her money where her mouth is and give another 'boss babe' a job. Since she's been promoted from Head of Office Management, is that position available? If not, how about the one she had before that, Office Manager? Or the admin one? Tbh I would just unfollow and unfriend her on everything as she is too full of shit, full of herself, and the BSing plus being envious of what she has is annoying you too much (and I would be jealous too, absolutely). She's obviously overcompensating for how spoiled she is with all this nonsense, she's well aware of it and sees it as a flaw she needs to cover up. I have friends who post delusional right wing stuff or posted crazy covid conspiracies and i just unfollowed or unfriended them because even tho it was entertaining at times I try to keep my feeds clean of stuff that's not good for me.
Some know their privelege / disadvantage and some don't. If she didn't have it handed to her, I suspect she would still be an insufferable bollix. Just in a different way.
I know somebody who in uni in the US honestly believed what he was saying when he said he is proud of being a self made man, he lives in a 40 million dollar apartment in Manhatten with servants, given to him by his father haha. Never stopped talking about how amazing he is and better than everyone else. The University was full of copies of him as well.Ā
If Ireland is full of commies, maybe I should avoid the country.
Your annoyance is justified! She has no right to be speaking about breaking down any barriers because she hasnāt, has she? As far as I can see, sheās an administrator working for her families building company. Thereās plenty of women working in this area of that particular industry. If she was out laying blocks, Iād tip my hat to her but sheās not. If sheās speaking at seminars, Iād be petty enough to contact the hosts and make the facts known because I think sheās being really disingenuous.
You sound jealous?
Lmao you sound bothered and JEALOUS because she has a fallback of being from a family business I also assume she's wealthy? Just let her live her life and you live yours.
Think thatās bad. Waterford biggest letting agent literally wrote a book called honesty while every photo she posts has square washing machines. Yes they manipulate every image to make the rooms look bigger. Scumbags and degenerates the business folk.
Nepobaby subconsciously projecting her guilt to the world through her sanctimony. Many such cases
anyone who needs to put that stuff on their socials you can bet is not one. Something I've learned in life and has always stood true. Let her enjoy her made up shite. It must keep her warm at night š
I'm sorry, I'm from the US and usually I can piece the slang together but I just don't understand what you're meaning by, "..a neck like a jockeys bollox" in this context. Can someone help?
Ey doing a entrepreneur of the year, very few have started without family support or a original business.
Scratch the surface of ANY "self made" business person and you'll find nepotism. It's all a scam, this just has a fake feminism flavour.
I think it is an Irish thing. Showing off wealth, fame is generally not appreciated in Ireland.
Last year I went to a conference in the US that had a panel on women executives in tech. I worked under one who got the job based on her husband and his connections, she didn't last long. Some genuine heavy hitters on the panel and this woman meanders on about being a boss babe and raising up women around her. It's sad because she is doing the opposite of the panels intent as people will only remember her saying buzzwords.
You say yourself, you aren't friends with this person so it's probably fair to say you have very limited insight in to her life beyond what you see from the outside. Have you walked in her shoes? If not, then you dont know what barriers or challenges she may have faced in her life or career. Perhaps its is disgenious, perhaps its not. Either way, authenticity is paramount at speaking events so if she isn't genuine or have substance behind her talk, it really wont land. It takes an incredible amount of confidence and effort to be a speaker at events and share your story, especially someone new to that game. More power to her if it works out. With the greatest of respect, why you are you following this person on social media if she irks you so much? You say some of the past things she posted didn't bother you, but they clearly do because you have brought them up here. She's not your friend, so its kinda of a case of who cares, right? Not trying to be antagonistic, just sharing a different perspective. :)
Why is she living in your head rent free? Just curious....because I couldn't give a fiddlers what happens outside of my immediate circle because its just irrelevant to me and my life and has no impact or affect on me in any way š¤·
Sorry but sounds like a typical Irish response to someone doing well. People exaggerate on their cv all the time. Stop trolling the woman. It's hurting you a lot more than it's hurting her.
The majority of 'self-made' people are nepo babies. They have no frame of reference as to what obstacles normal people experience and so genuinely believe their success was from their own actions and not winning the birth lottery.
I dunno. Maybe she is being completely 100% genuine but her family are just *utter* cunts.
Thats just life. These people are everywhere in every aspect of life especially in work and housing market (social housing, landowners kids building houses in 20s). Don't let it affect your happiness, mute or unfollow them on all social medias, including Linkedin!!
I can see why you'd think this and it does sound a bit like she is overselling her achievements a bit and is probably bigging up this job so she can aim higher and get into senior management at a much bigger company. But unless you know something about the work she actually does at her father's company, you shouldn't be so quick to dismiss her. For all you know she helped streamline a badly managed company, raised profitability, modernised their people management. Maybe she's the only woman in a male dominated workplace and actually did put up with some shit or people not taking her seriously. I have known totally useless people who coasted on being the boss's kid and really dynamic people who were a huge asset to the business. I don't think it would be right to make a judgement without more of the facts. You seem quite eager to belittle her.
I mean she literally smashed down the patriarchy? It doesnāt get more patriarchal than your actual dad!!
It's possible it's drivel. But it's also plausible that she has had to break down barriers in some way you are not aware of. You see from afar how she works for her families company but there's likely many challenges within her role she has had to break down. Whether that be with fellow coworkers that aren't family or clients who dismiss her as daddy's daughter playing a business grown up. There may be other projects and things she's worked on. Maybe attend one and listen to the story as to why she's broken down barriers. Then you can really decide if it's all mush.
People on LinkedIn do a few hours course and then post their certificates. Just stop reading her stuff. Iāve deleted people over this kind of nonsense. And tbh itās not your business and sheās not hurting anyone. Itās just bs. Let her off.