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Ask HN: Where are laid off employees gathering?

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Re: Ask HN: Where are laid off employees gathering?

#261

Post by anon7725 »

luckylion wrote: post #136
whatshisface wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The more you contribute, the more you sacrifice by joining a coop. The less you contribute, the more you gain. How do you think co-ops work? Are you imagining a flat organizational structure like Valve Software? An open source project plus invoices? Those are all interesting ideas, but co-ops presently work like employee-owned business and usually have managers and compensation structures that fit the obvious way t…

To be fair, there are worker-owned co-ops that function like companies, and there are those that are heavy on the ideological experience. I once did some consulting for one of the latter ones and it was worse than any bureaucracy I've ever encountered. Everyone has a say, everyone must be heard on everything, decisions take forever and there's a lot of overhead. On the one side, you'll have a normal company where the…

In a public big tech company your ownership is immaterial in terms of your influence on the direction of the company.

Presumably in a smaller private company with 100% insider ownership, it could be arranged that employees have more influence. For example, the employees could vote on board seats or raise and discuss issues at a General Meeting of the company’s shareholders.

This would presumably not be the case in VC-funded startups where the founders and VCs would choose the board and retain the lion’s share of equity and all nominal control.

In practice, in most companies that are not agency-style partnerships the insider ownership doesn’t really matter in terms of influence from what I’ve seen. In agency partnerships there is a dual class issue of partners and regular employees.

A private company with a BDFL who retains 50% + 1 control but has the minority stake dispersed among the rest of the employees seems like an interesting approach. The “B” comes into play in how the majority owner supports decision making. The “D” acts as a forcing function and guardrail to limit the effect of internal politics.

Re: Ask HN: Where are laid off employees gathering?

#262

Post by JackMorgan »

hankish wrote: post #139
marcusverus wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's hard to imagine such an organization working out over the long term. The incentives are all wonky! The more you contribute, the more you sacrifice by joining a coop. The less you contribute, the more you gain. I for one can't think of a less attractive idea than taking a product idea that I love and turning ownership and creative control over to a group of strangers. And that's probably why these things are so r…

The coop that I'm a part of (Quorum1) has been using game theory to play out just those scenarios. We've been at it for two years and you're right it's been like 10x as difficult as starting a normal company (I'm a serial entrepreneur and have started lots of traditional companies too). But we think the payoff is worth it, plus doing things differently is just straight up more fun, so there's that. What we're finding…

I am very interested in what you have built. I've recently stepped down as a director of engineering at a fintech startup where I was building self-organizing teams based off the models I found in the book Reinventing Organizations. I have been considering starting a coop much like Quorum1, but I haven't been sure where to start. I'd love to chat sometime about Quorum1 and perhaps get the chance to work together in the future. My email is email at steve shogren dotcom if you are interested. Thanks!

Re: Ask HN: Where are laid off employees gathering?

#263

Post by bawolff »

throwawaaarrgh wrote: post #14

It just occurred to me that so many people were laid off, we could start the world's largest software co-op (and arguably one of the largest tech orgs, period). We could build software products that every industry needs, that every worker owns a part of and can vote on org-wide decisions. Literally everyone you need was laid off... Tech people, business people, marketing, sales, etc. We just need a forum and some vol…

You have everything you need except a business plan and willing participants.

Re: Ask HN: Where are laid off employees gathering?

#264

Post by bawolff »

asveikau wrote: post #133
robust-cactus wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting fact - valve no longer works this way because it didn't work.

I've always been curious about claims that such an approach inevitably doesn't work. I feel like my intuition tells me it could with the right people and variation on the concept. But it's probably difficult. Even the best managers I've seen usually have blind spots on how the team is running.

My intuition is basically its like networking. Using broadcast on a shared medium works fine for small groups, but in big groups it overwhelms. Similarly, in small groups flat structure is fine, but eventually in large groups you have to spend 110% of your time managing relationships and stakeholders, which simply isn't practical.

And that is true even if the group is the best people possible. The only way would be to have no disagreement, but then you would probably be creatively dead.

To put another way, i suspect communication scales quasi linearly with managers, but at least quadratically without.

Re: Ask HN: Where are laid off employees gathering?

#265

Post by Spooky23 »

asveikau wrote: post #133
robust-cactus wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting fact - valve no longer works this way because it didn't work.

I've always been curious about claims that such an approach inevitably doesn't work. I feel like my intuition tells me it could with the right people and variation on the concept. But it's probably difficult. Even the best managers I've seen usually have blind spots on how the team is running.

It works for attorneys and accountants. It’s an approach with ups and downs. The biggest down being it’s harder to scale.

Re: Ask HN: Where are laid off employees gathering?

#266

Post by anon7725 »

PaulHoule wrote: post #98
galleywest200 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Being laid off does not equate to doing poorly. Some people just get cut because some people who wear suits to work seem to not care.

Or maybe too many people got hired by some guy in a hoodie because they were afraid any talented people they didn’t hire would work for a startup that puts them out of business or that they feel they need to spend $15 billion to buy so they don’t face competition.

Said “guy in hoodie” and his close buddies “guy in khakis” and “athleisure gal” have just materially increased the likelihood that they’ll be spending $15B (or whatever the going rate is in 5 years).

Re: Ask HN: Where are laid off employees gathering?

#267

Post by nitwit005 »

asveikau wrote: post #133
robust-cactus wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting fact - valve no longer works this way because it didn't work.

I've always been curious about claims that such an approach inevitably doesn't work. I feel like my intuition tells me it could with the right people and variation on the concept. But it's probably difficult. Even the best managers I've seen usually have blind spots on how the team is running.

Even assuming those "right people" exist, you'd need a hiring process that could pick them out, and they'd need to want to work for you.

Re: Ask HN: Where are laid off employees gathering?

#269

Post by anon7725 »

pm90 wrote: post #62
maximinus_thrax wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At times? It's a cesspool of negativity and lies. Good content is the exception on Blind. Deleting that app is one of the best things someone can do for their mental health.

I can second this. I made the mistake of downloading it once big players started layoffs in hopes of getting in on the news before it hit. But that forum is toxic sludge for anyone’s mental health. I don’t use it anymore. The only time I download the app is like glassdoor when figuring out if a company is ok or not.

I would not trust Glassdoor reviews whatsoever. Companies can pay to curate reviews.

Re: Ask HN: Where are laid off employees gathering?

#270

Post by zeroonetwothree »

JohnFen wrote: post #76
asdff wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Software development has arguably more gatekeeping even without any guild. Got a CS degree from a university that isn't R1 and didn't score a summer internship? Need a visa sponsor? I don't envy how painful your early career will be. Luck out with the Stanford admission and a summer internship? You are playing on easy mode.

It depends on what part of the industry you're working in. If you're looking at FAANG-style companies, that's absolutely true. But there's much more to the industry than that.

I got my FANG job with a degree from a 50-ish rank school. I think their acceptance rate was 70% so it’s not exactly Ivy League levels of gatekeeping.

Some of my coworkers went to even lower ranked schools or altogether don’t have degrees (though I admit it’s uncommon).

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