Amazon is using algorithms with little human intervention to fire Flex workers
Bad automated policy is bad because the policy is bad, not because automation is bad.Automation applies policy evenly.  An employee can be sure that the firing wasn't due to a boss having a bad day, not liking the employee personally, not noticing worse performance of colleagues, etc.The real problem comes when automated assessment is poorly designed.  And it's a shame not only because of the heartless actions that impact real people's lives and the needless public relations damage that is bound to emerge.  It's also a shame because of the lost opportunity to help workers' performance improve via feedback at a level of detail that the automated systems could provide.Damn the secrecy.  Develop an open rating system that provides continuous feedback to the worker.  Build in dampers that provide ample time to learn, correct mistakes, and improve.  Publish every factor, every consideration, every weight that goes into the assessment.  Openly.  Refine over and over until both management and the workforce see it as fair and helpful.I would take that system over the subjective, unevenly applied, unclear criteria that's historically been used to assess performance.  No surprises to the workers, and management has to own the criteria rather than hide behind unpublished automation.  Objectivity should be a virtue.  Without transparency, it's going to prove to be quite the vice.