Comment by mschuster91 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by mschuster91 | Hacker News Reader

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> Tenure functions somewhat differently at very large companies; it may take years for someone just to come up to speed and learn how to operate within the system, so they do their best to retain people for decades.

Even if you're "just" a 500 people company, expect the investment into getting a new hire up to speed to be at least a year's worth of salary - initial recruiting cost, dealing with governmental bureaucracy if the employee doesn't have citizenship, actual learning / training / handover time and reduced productivity in adjacent people.

Unfortunately, for most companies only the recruiting cost shows up in their HR budget calculations, so there is no "incentive" per se for HR to look for "leaders" who manage to burn through entire teams worth of people in years. They may achieve stellar business results, but the cost to the company doesn't show up on anyone's radar until enough people dump annoyance in Glassdoor.

> Even if you're "just" a 500 people company, expect the investment into getting a new hire up to speed to be at least a year's worth of salary

That was my case when I was hired to a DAX50: My manager told me to get the first year to learn about the company. At the first moment, I thought that was stupid and in 3 months I could be up to speed. For the technical and product part it was quite everything OK in 6 months; the part that took more time was the organizational and getting the organizational capital.

Ideally, as long as you're not a manager (or hell, even then...) your manager should have taken care of the "organizational capital" bullshit.

When I refer to organizational capital, I mean a form of "social capital" that is essential for effectively implementing changes within a team.

For example, in a large company, no one will allow you to make changes during your first day or month of work. Unlike start-ups and scale-ups, where there may be an automatic assumption of competency, in larger organizations, you need to demonstrate your skills and convince those around you of your capabilities.

It can feel like a ritualistic corporate dance, and for someone like me, who comes from smaller organizations, it was challenging to navigate. However, over time, people began to recognize my work, and now I can handle most tasks independently.

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