Yahoo Inc., the Sunnyvale, California-based tech giant, got slapped with a lawsuit this week alleging gender discrimination, but not the kind one might typically expect, especially in Silicon Valley. Gregory Anderson, a former editorial director of several Yahoo news verticals, claims he lost his job because of discrimination against men in the company’s media department.
The allegation of reverse discrimination in male-dominated Silicon Valley has captured public attention. But what’s just as noteworthy is the role a controversial employee performance rating system, known as “stack ranking” or “forced ranking,” played in Anderson’s allegations. These systems may feed into existing biases or create the appearance of biases in employment practices.
