Comment by ath3nd | Hacker News Reader

Comment by ath3nd | Hacker News Reader

What a funny write!

Despite it being funny, if it wasn't for the outright satire, it would be virtually indistinguishable from the recent tech layoff messages:

Gitpod - https://www.gitpod.io/blog/building-for-the-long-run

Microsoft (this is maybe the classiest) - https://blogs.microsoft.com/blog/2023/01/18/subject-focusing...

Zuck/Meta - https://about.fb.com/news/2022/11/mark-zuckerberg-layoff-mes...

Stripe - https://stripe.com/en-nl/newsroom/news/ceo-patrick-collisons...

Spotify - https://newsroom.spotify.com/2023-01-23/an-update-on-january...

The industry had been, for quite some time, growing both in terms of headcount and compensation, without regards to boundaries, sanity or practicality.

With that in mind, it looked like it was only a matter of time for this to happen. However, one cannot help wondering how much influence did profitability and future outlook had to do with it, versus how much it was about regaining control over workers and salaries and about "fixing" the stock price.

For me, the biggest crime is the fanatic enthusiasm and we-are-all-a-family narrative these companies were pushing while growing well beyond needed in 2020 through 2021 contrasted with the generic messages they are peddling now when laying off.

Maybe I've lost my heart but it's hard for me to find fault with the way Nadella communicated MSFT's layoffs. They're a business, they need to reallocate capital and headcount, he doesn't shed any crocodile tears, but they are providing above market severance benefits, end of transmission. If I have to be laid off I want it to go something like this.

It's called subjectivism for a reason.

The word layoff does not appear in that post. It's word salad for 2 paragraphs.

It's bad writing, it's an even worse communique from a CEO.

Start with the point. The point is that X percent of the workforce is to be let go. And that it has been already in the works for some time because some people have been let go that day. "some notifications happening today" = we already have a list and we'll go through it as fast as labor laws allow.

I can't stand all the beating around the bush language.

All stuff like "best wishes to those impacted by the course correction in our employee base".

Like they aren't just numbers or human resources, it's real people losing their jobs and facing difficult situations with work visas, mortgages, etc. - the same people who have helped build the products they work on.

It's isn't an unfortunate natural disaster but a deliberate decision made by executives, where in the majority of cases it's just that the rate of growth of profit has fallen - nowhere near severe losses and economic trouble.

> Start with the point. The point is that X percent of the workforce is to be let go

If he did, he'd be criticized for being heartless. There's really no winning here, I can't blame them for phrasing things the way they do.

Clear away all the words, and you're left with a massively profitable company putting thousands of people out of work just so that they can boost their stock price.

You are telling the truth, half the truth, and nothing but half the truth.

“A massively profitable company putting thousands of people out of work so that they can boost their stock price which millions of people own (directly or indirectly).”

A dumber variant: the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. You thousand gotta go so us millions can get richer.

My comment should not imply that I endorse this “fuller” point of view.

The number of people gaining any significant amount of wealth due to the increase in MS's quarterly stock price is minuscule.

Just because "millions of people" have, through some indirect means, some small investment in MS doesn't mean there's anywhere near a proportionate gain as compared to the loss being suffered. This is especially true if those people don't sell their MS stock during that period to realize the gain, as there's plenty of chance that the price will fall again later.

> They're a business, they need to reallocate capital and headcount

Consider this: no, they don't.

To that point - didn't these companies and their investors "invest" in a bunch of human resources and then devalue them by either laying them off or giving the work of laid-off workers to the remaining resources?

If executives at a company rented a bunch of store fronts expecting to increase their footprint and then said "we're bad at our jobs and didn't realize we weren't going to do anything with these store fronts" the investors would (presumably) ask them to leave or cut their performance bonuses. It's not like these companies don't have massive amounts of data (I'm looking at you Google) to analyze and estimate a market and determine if they needed the resources to begin with.

Another thing I don't see mentioned often enough is the impact that this has on state governments. I can imagine that the people working in the California state government would be concerned if several large companies took a bunch of store fronts off the market and then just dumped them all in one fell swoop.

Are these managers, executives, and presidents so bad at their job that they can't find anything to do with a bunch of talented employees that they spent time and money on-boarding?

I've considered it, and of all the possible takes, I think this is the worst one.

It's simple:

- They are chartered as a for-profit entity

- FAANG workers who are making an average $200K or whatever don't need welfare.

Like I'm all for class warfare, but not between the super rich and the very rich. I don't have any sympathy whatsoever for the $200K class when they get laid off - being worth this much money includes understanding how the game is played and preparing accordingly.

So no, if you get laid off at this level, you are not working class, you are not an average American, the package MSFT gives you is above market and that is good enough. Let's save the extra help for people who actually need it.

Well said. For me, complaints of layoffs in tech companies and startups fall on deaf ears. I say this as someone who works for a startup, and whose partner works for Google.

It has been incredibly obvious that technology companies over-hired during the pandemic and that the growth they were seeing was not sustainable. The “we prepared for a different economic reality than the one we face today” is hogwash. Rather than preparing, they post-pared for the economic reality they were in, not the one that they could easily have seen coming.

Rather than directing anger toward the managerial class for layoffs, I’d rather see anger directed toward them for over-hiring in the first place. Nobody is mad when they’re at the party, even when they know it can’t last forever, but everyone will is upset when the music stops.

Also, FWIW regarding compensation, I agree. I recently saw on levels.fyi what a recruiter at Google makes - starting, with equity and bonus, is substantially more than me as a software engineer ~5 years out of college. I voiced my amazement to my girlfriend, and she told me, “well at least you still have a job”. Sorry, I don’t feel an ounce of sympathy. That recruiter could take the next four years off from working entirely, and we’d come out about the same in earnings. As tech workers, we are all out of touch with “everyday people”, but those working at FAANG companies are out of touch even with the rest of the tech ecosystem.

> Rather than directing anger toward the managerial class for layoffs, I’d rather see anger directed toward them for over-hiring in the first place.

Almost every criticism I see if the “managerial class” includes criticism for over hiring. That’s the point. Management making strategically unsustainable decisions is what resulted in over hiring. It’s a mistake by those in management, but the consequences, layoffs, are entirely born by those who had no hand in it.

For better or for worse, over hiring is a deliberate practice at many companies. It's hard to know who is good and who is not from the interview process alone, so they over hire, and cut lower performers later through a layoff (though it is never communicated this way).

> The industry had been, for quite some time, growing both in terms of headcount and compensation, without regards to boundaries, sanity or practicality.

Tech has been addicted to VC funds and investors don't care what happens as long as their stock price grows in the short term.

At this point I'm considering just never working for a public company ever again.

Pretty sure the corpus of layoff letters is large enough to just let ChatGPT handle them from here on out.

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