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Comment by Bartweiss | Hacker News Reader

> I don't see evidence that Tesla is doing any more than that

If the lack of promised performance reviews is accurate, that's the obvious issue - it implies a labor force decision disguised as a performance decision. This is a pretty common move in e.g. game development, so it certainly isn't unthinkable.

The point about total workforce size is well taken, though; this still seems like it could be as simple as "times are tough so we're cutting more stringently than we might otherwise".

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Would you say 3,6 % is that stringent though? I remember GE under Welch fired 10 % of the lowest performers every year, that seemed kind of stringent. But Tesla is fast-hiring and acquiring, so seem to have a larger need to fix hiring-errors than GE. At the end of 2015 they had only 14,000 employees! In light of that, 3,6 % seems completely reasonable to me. Low, even.

Concerning the performance review: would expect that after acquisition, SolarCity would adjust to Tesla's performance standards. So even if they were based on prior performance reviews, still seems like a reasonable action and level to me.

As much as I try to squint, I'm having troubles seeing the smoking gun here.

> Welch has said his first rule of firing an employee as a manager is to avoid any element of surprise. Your workplace ought to be built on constructive criticism and feedback.

> Expectations should be so clear that anyone in the aforementioned bottom tenth of your firm knows they'll be there before the ranking and yanking starts. "Anybody who is fired and surprised? That's the bosses' fault," Welch said on Bloomberg TV in 2015.

Contrast the GE description to what happened here with Tesla: absolute blindsiding where the employees were not given any performance feedback before getting axed.

https://www.thestreet.com/story/14315785/1/how-to-fire-peopl...

When MS fired people for performance every year people hated them for it, and their culture was considered notoriously awful.

They had stack rankings. Fire one guy per department even if everyone is ok.

Any signs this is what tesla did? Lowest 2% is fine. Lowest 2% per team is not fine, means you need a scape goat for each team.

I thought the concensus now was that Welch's leadership under GE was not good.

There's been a lot of rants about the utility of stack ranking and this sort of "fire the worst performers because everyone else is better" attitude. Namely wrong incentives.

You have John Carmack and a clone of John Carmack working on your game engine. You have stack ranking. Which one should you let go during review season? Should you hire some extra people to protect your good people?

That worked at GE largely because they were getting rid of the gold watch retirement crowd. That worked in the past as companies had people who worked there all life, and most of the time late in career they would come to work, do nothing all day and go home.

Jack Welch was simply doing long pending layoffs.

That worked at GE largely because they were getting rid of the gold watch retirement crowd

You mean, getting rid of people who had been promised deferred compensation, before having to make good on it? That was the deal with old-skool companies, remain loyal for 30 years then ease your way into retirement. GE got the loyalty then shafted those guys.

The economic set ups across the world changed. You can't fault companies for doing what was needed.

In India many old people got shafted both the ways being asked to take voluntary retirements and being subjected to high inflation rates at the same time.

You can't fault companies for doing what was needed.

Well, you can, or no obligation means anything anymore. Why should a company even pay you your wages if things are a little tight this month, by that logic?

Salary is an obligation in return for your services. The company doesn't owe a person a job for passing time at office.

Its just people woke up to the fact that socialism wasn't a feasible model anymore.

OK, a company decides it won't pay your pension anymore then - identical scenario.

Its not an identical scenario. Companies don't pay pensions in most countries. These largely get paid through Pension funds, which by and large investment money in Government backed securities.

These are debt obligations at the level of a country. On 'your' investments.

This is totally different than saying a person should be given a job, even if they don't work.

Companies don't pay pensions in most countries

Ummm airlines and automakers in the US do, or did. Lots of companies/countries are the same.

That isn't what happened though. You are just assuming they might have fired the bottom. If they did, that might be reasonable.

I'm not able to provide evidence, so my assertion that their firings were a lot of bullshit isn't going to carry much weight. I'm ok with that. But likewise, you might want to consider waiting for evidence that they did in fact cut underperformers, because I don't think you will see that either.

Then the WARN act applies

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