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Can Netflix Survive in the New World It Created?

nytimes.com

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Re: Can Netflix Survive in the New World It Created?

#21

Post by quantumhobbit »

yarapavan wrote: post #2

Spoiler: It's a long read! > Does this still holds? Is there any other organization in dissimilar industry where this works? McCord also convinced Hastings that he should ask himself a few times a year whether he would hire the same person in the same job if it opened up that day. If the answer was no, Netflix would write a larger check and let the employee go. “If you are going to insist on high performance,” McCord…

Netflix gets a lot of flack for their approach here, but at least they are honest about it and try to compensate by paying employees very well.

The truth is there are many companies that are just as ruthless about firing employees they view as underperforming but try to hide it with layoffs and don't compensate employees nearly as well.

If you take a job with Netflix at least you know what you are getting into.

Re: Can Netflix Survive in the New World It Created?

#22

Post by 11thEarlOfMar »

yarapavan wrote: post #2

Spoiler: It's a long read! > Does this still holds? Is there any other organization in dissimilar industry where this works? McCord also convinced Hastings that he should ask himself a few times a year whether he would hire the same person in the same job if it opened up that day. If the answer was no, Netflix would write a larger check and let the employee go. “If you are going to insist on high performance,” McCord…

It's this: 'The key concept is summed up in the 23rd slide. “We’re a team, not a family,” it reads. “Netflix leaders hire, develop and cut smartly, so we have stars in every position.” '

I see it like a professional sports team. Players have to deliver performance game after game. If they can't keep it up, they are traded or released, or their contract is not renewed. When they age-out, they either go into coaching, buy or start their own team, or move on to do something different entirely. They are taken off the field.

Applying this approach to a corporate workplace is controversial and I'd be interested in knowing what policies the legal department has put in place regarding employee agreements and termination processes to specifically accommodate Netflix' approach.

Re: Can Netflix Survive in the New World It Created?

#23

Post by koralatov »

maxerickson wrote: post #19
koralatov wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Partly it's also because of the transparency of it all. What's transparent about it? The process is totally opaque -- some executive evaluates whether they feel you're meeting their standards, which may or may not be obvious, and then decides to let you go if they feel you aren't. I don't think it could be any less transparent.

That they fire people rather arbitrarily is being written about in a national publication. So someone applying for a job has a good chance of understanding it going into the process. That's a pretty high degree of transparency about how they do things.

That's not really what we're talking about when we're talking about 'transparency' her. Just because it's known that something happens doesn't mean it happens in a transparent fashion. Transparency of process is important, too, and required before you can really call something 'transparent'.

As it stands, the person making the decision could be doing so for totally arbitrary reasons. It doesn't appear that there's an established process or criteria in place beyond "I don't feel like I'd hire X now" -- the rationale "Because Executive Y says so" is not transparent in the slightest.

Re: Can Netflix Survive in the New World It Created?

#24

Post by koralatov »

perseusprime11 wrote: post #7
yarapavan wrote: post #2

Spoiler: It's a long read! > Does this still holds? Is there any other organization in dissimilar industry where this works? McCord also convinced Hastings that he should ask himself a few times a year whether he would hire the same person in the same job if it opened up that day. If the answer was no, Netflix would write a larger check and let the employee go. “If you are going to insist on high performance,” McCord…

Did Reed hold McCord's hands and say 'Nothing lasts forever.'

We can only hope that he did.

Re: Can Netflix Survive in the New World It Created?

#25

Post by jasonkostempski »

distances wrote: post #13
jasonkostempski wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So someone can get hired, stop showing up and still get paid?

No they can't, they have a requirement to be at work and to perform their assigned duties. If they suck at their duties, well, employer should provide training I suppose. But they have to work of course, no question about that -- this was just about firing not being possible "at will" as it is often the case in the US. Also, stuff like coming to work drunk is a valid reason for immediate firing.

Is it legal to negotiate terms for them to leave voluntarily?

Re: Can Netflix Survive in the New World It Created?

#26

Post by distances »

jasonkostempski wrote: post #25
distances wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No they can't, they have a requirement to be at work and to perform their assigned duties. If they suck at their duties, well, employer should provide training I suppose. But they have to work of course, no question about that -- this was just about firing not being possible "at will" as it is often the case in the US. Also, stuff like coming to work drunk is a valid reason for immediate firing.

Is it legal to negotiate terms for them to leave voluntarily?

Yes, of course. For example in Finland it's ~common in big companies to offer "packages" for employees that leave voluntarily if the company needs to downsize. The problem with this approach, of course, is that the best people take the package and get a job elsewhere. This could perhaps be tailored just for the lower achievers too, but I don't think the big companies have such ranking systems in place because they aren't part of the work culture.

Re: Can Netflix Survive in the New World It Created?

#27

Post by SyneRyder »

mercer wrote: post #9
kefka wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And this precisely is why we Millenials have no qualms about leaving a job. They have no problem divorcing us because of some vapid "performance" metric. How do they quantify understanding how to get things done in that org? I know with my job, I'm learning how the institution hinders growth, except through certain channels. That meta-knowledge is absolutely essential... yet seemingly ignored.

Instinctively and ideologically I mostly oppose the idea of this lack of loyalty toward employees. At the same time, for some reason it bothers me less the way it is presented to work within Netflix. I'm not sure why, though. Maybe it's to do with the fact that there are plenty of jobs in tech right now and Netflix apparently pays very well, enough for a future employee to accept that disadvantage. Partly it's also b…

"I often thought they and the team would be much better off if they found work somewhere else where either they'd feel challenged to develop themselves further, or where their current skills were good enough."

This echoes one of the chapters in Fire Someone Today, a book with a seemingly heartless title, written by the CEO of a Bible software company. They had an underperforming employee that everyone liked & no-one wanted to fire, so they moved him through different roles to find something that suited him. After moving him through the entire company with negative results, they finally conceded they had to fire him. The punch line: the employee flourished as soon as he was fired - his dream had been to join the ministry, but he'd worried about quitting a stable job to do so.

The rest of the book is pretty good, about 20 anecdotes from running a software business.

https://www.amazon.com/Fire-Someone-Today-Surprising-Busines...

Re: Can Netflix Survive in the New World It Created?

#28

Post by dismal2 »

mercer wrote: post #9
kefka wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And this precisely is why we Millenials have no qualms about leaving a job. They have no problem divorcing us because of some vapid "performance" metric. How do they quantify understanding how to get things done in that org? I know with my job, I'm learning how the institution hinders growth, except through certain channels. That meta-knowledge is absolutely essential... yet seemingly ignored.

Instinctively and ideologically I mostly oppose the idea of this lack of loyalty toward employees. At the same time, for some reason it bothers me less the way it is presented to work within Netflix. I'm not sure why, though. Maybe it's to do with the fact that there are plenty of jobs in tech right now and Netflix apparently pays very well, enough for a future employee to accept that disadvantage. Partly it's also b…

The idea that there is an ideal place for everyone in capitalism and be able to pay for all the costs of day to day life is some kind of libertarian hacker news delusion.

Re: Can Netflix Survive in the New World It Created?

#29

Post by amyjess »

talmand wrote: post #6
yarapavan wrote: post #2

Spoiler: It's a long read! > Does this still holds? Is there any other organization in dissimilar industry where this works? McCord also convinced Hastings that he should ask himself a few times a year whether he would hire the same person in the same job if it opened up that day. If the answer was no, Netflix would write a larger check and let the employee go. “If you are going to insist on high performance,” McCord…

I hope there's more to it than that. Firing "really nice, hard-working people" is stupid. There are far better things to do with such people than firing them. All that teaches people is to have no loyalty whatsoever to their company since the company's leader directly gives them a reason not to. All that leads to is "really nice, hard-working people" you would not fire jumping ship at the first sign of a slightly bet…

I agree. While it's nice that they're honest about it, and I'm glad they also have a policy against hiring "brilliant jerks", it's still not a company I would ever work for.

i'd rather get paid less and work at a place where I don't constantly have a sword hanging over my neck. I'd take job security over more pay in a heartbeat, and I'd rather work at a company where being "nice" and "hard-working" is more valuable than performance. It's a problem with the whole Silicon Valley culture; like, I'm not interested in doing something world-changing at my job, so I don't care about working at a big household name like "Netflix", and this whole culture is something that can only exist in SV -- your company wouldn't get far firing so many people in any other place -- and it's one of the reasons why I have no desire to ever set foot in NorCal.

Honestly, the next time I end up looking for a job, I'm thinking about getting out of the private sector and doing government work, just to avoid this kind of scenario.

Re: Can Netflix Survive in the New World It Created?

#30

Post by yardie »

11thEarlOfMar wrote: post #22
yarapavan wrote: post #2

Spoiler: It's a long read! > Does this still holds? Is there any other organization in dissimilar industry where this works? McCord also convinced Hastings that he should ask himself a few times a year whether he would hire the same person in the same job if it opened up that day. If the answer was no, Netflix would write a larger check and let the employee go. “If you are going to insist on high performance,” McCord…

It's this: 'The key concept is summed up in the 23rd slide. “We’re a team, not a family,” it reads. “Netflix leaders hire, develop and cut smartly, so we have stars in every position.” ' I see it like a professional sports team. Players have to deliver performance game after game. If they can't keep it up, they are traded or released, or their contract is not renewed. When they age-out, they either go into coaching,…

The minimum salary in the NFL is currently $450,000. The "job" is unionised and you have lifetime benefits (negotiated after some players with chronic concussion related illnesses were found broke and homeless).

While the careers are short the compensation is fair. And you are legally allowed to work a side job, i.e. sponsorships.

I don't imagine corporate USA saying yes to high salaries, unionisation, pensions, nor side projects willingly.

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