A great time among the women of Microsoft

Boxing » Betsy Aoki’s WebLog : A great time among the women of Microsoft

Boxing » Betsy Aoki’s WebLog : A great time among the women of Microsoft — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 18:10:54 GMT

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re: A great time among the women of Microsoft

Betsy — Fri, 15 Oct 2004 19:36:00 GMT

Hmm. Your questions are ones that would take a long time to answer and might be better put to the HR bloggers rather than me, but here goes.

We have an internal mentor program and a dedicated training program as well that has classes that are both free to your product team or might cause a cost center charge. (I have taken both kinds - the presentation skills class I have blogged about previously was a class that actually cost my group money and I had to get boss approval for that).

I learn all the time on the job. Mostly because when I first got hired I decided that there was no way I was stupid, just undereducated, and I gave myself permission to ask dumb technical questions ALL THE TIME. My coworkers being long suffering but also nice people have been the ones to explain things such that a year here has been like a cram course in Microsoft technologies. MSDN, being a nexus for all Microsoft technologies, is a great place to ask questions in.

Explicit rewards and status symbols...hmm. I have so many flippant remarks to make but seriously, there are the same kinds of job bonuses and merit raises and such that other corporations have. I am lucky enough to have a Ship-It award (you get this big crystally thing that holds metal tabs for all the products you shipped) very early in my career at Microsoft. That is one of the coveted ones because there's no faking a Ship-It. You either shipped, or you didn't.

I would like to think that since I've arrived at Microsoft many legends have arisen around me, but if you want legends you might want to go to this site: http://www.softwarelegends.com/. It's a lot of fun. :)

re: A great time among the women of Microsoft

Rachel — Fri, 15 Oct 2004 02:07:00 GMT

What deliberate role modeling, training, and teaching are emphasized at Microsoft?

What explicit rewards and status symbols are used to motivate employees?

Are there any stories, legends and myths that are familiar to employes or customers?

re: A great time among the women of Microsoft

Betsy — Mon, 20 Sep 2004 16:38:00 GMT

I work in MSDN where my boss has a huge mission to make us all have enough time to have a life. She is a new mom and so this topic is dear to her heart for good reason. (I'd have to defer to her on this, but she does not blog).

The other odd thing about Microsoft is all the "real life" things that can be done through working here. Like the virtually free health club membership. Like putting on musicals on campus or playing in a soccer league with Microsoft subsidies.

re: A great time among the women of Microsoft

Adam — Thu, 16 Sep 2004 22:22:00 GMT

So does corporate offer any generic work/life balance education/feedback/whatever? As a new parent, the adjustment has been *substantial*.