[throwaway_au_1]

I am also a software developer in Australia (NSW). I was 'headhunted' (in the loose sense) for a role and they booked me in for a "pre-employment medical check".

I assumed it would be something like: medical professional is briefed on my typical duties; medical professional assesses my abilities to perform these duties; medical professional then makes a recommendation to the employer. However on arriving and being presented the T&Cs and pre-check questionnaires, it became clear that the exercise was actually one of me declaring any and all medical information I could, with the T&Cs requiring that I consent to all of this information being provided to the employer.

I phoned my contact at the employer and said that this was ridiculous, and that none of the information I was asked to provide was relevant to the role: "it's just company policy for all employees", "we have a solid privacy policy".

They said that they had another health provider who was more 'lax' about what they asked. I contacted the provider and got a hold of their equivalent T&Cs and questionnaire, and it was way worse. Example questions: "Are you happy with your current weight?", "Has your weight changed in the past 5 years?", "In terms of noise, have you ever been exposed to (chainsawing|scuba diving|panel beating)?", "Are you pregnant or do you think you could be?". There were also questions about health conditions of family etc.

Ultimately I told them I wasn't interested in the organisation whilever they required me to unnecessarily disclose personal medical information. That said, I recognise I am very fortunate to be in a financial position to 'die on that hill', but I wish enough of us felt able to stand up to this bullshit so that none of us would have to.

[me_me_me]

"All of our workers here at ACME corp were happy about annual anal probing to ensure they are all fit to work here, you should feel privileged to be able refuse ACME anal probing."

Thats some grim future we are heading with this. And that software dev field, one of most competitive fields for finding personnel. As soft dev you are in position of power and yet people put up with this stupid shit.

Good on you for telling them to fuck off.

It sounds like its quite common in Australia, but why?

[irvingprime]

No employer has ever given me the feeling that my software dev skills put me in a position of power. Quite the opposite. Every place I have ever worked at has acted as if

1) My skills are unimportant (except when they want overtime. Then, no noe else could possibly do the wonderful job I can!); 2) I am easily replaced (maybe by much cheaper contractors) and 3) My salary requirements are ridiculous. Only the top executives are worth that kind of money!

When I turn down an offer or even an interview over something ridiculous (What do you mean I need to sign an NDA just to be interviewed? Hell no!) they act as if I'm the unreasonable one. Somehow this never changes my mind.

[progman32]

Keep looking, friend. Respectful places _do_ exist!

[flashgordon]

I dunno about now about back when I was in Australia (about 10 years ago), over there swe felt a very under appreciated role. One company's non compete was so eggregious it forbade even ludicrous scenarios like "after leaving us thou shall not work with another ex-employee (who did not overlap in tenure with yours) even in an unrelated field (say pig farming) for atleast 9 months". Wtf!

[toyg]

The annoying part is that these bad practices tend to spread. They start in the worst jurisdiction, and then slowly spread to the adjacent ones - e.g. first in Australia or US, then to all anglo-speaking countries, then via UK to Western Europe... Unless they get hit by some brave soul with the stomach for a lengthy and expensive judicial process, they just become standard by way of bureaucracy, one overreaching form at a time.

[ericfrazier]

Or if workers universally say no. But if enough don't say no and the practice grows, then the workers get what they allow.