61–70 of 130 posts
This email exchange is the equivalent of breaking up with your girlfriend over a text message and letting her know that you will now start dating her roommate. Obviously, there is no right way of letting someone know that they are no longer what you desire, but sending an email at 10 o'clock at night is hardly the right approach. How about "Hey Jason, I have some rather bad news that I need to share with you, are you…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> For all we know, the guy might have done something quite bad. Line 46-48 in that email are pretty clear. Gracious and leaving, maybe in person would have been better, but as those emails come it is pretty good. It's not as though he was fired.
Yes but for all you know he could have just spent thousands sending him to conferences or some other specialized training only to have him turn around and quit for a competitor. (I have no idea if that's the case but have seen things like that happen at other businesses) Either way it would be nice if hacker news didn't focus on this drama.
But Evan clearly does not seem to be aware of any reason like that, he's literally clearly confused about the amount of venom that gets thrown his way, for exercising a right that every employee has, to hand in their notice.
To go to work for a large company like Yahoo and to be allowed to work on an open source project is in and off itself plenty of reason to switch and any mature employer would recognize that.
I've never worked at a company where I tried to be professional and gave 2 weeks notice and was NOT immediately shown the door (hence I learned to prepare and not be surprised). Does it really happen in this day and age? Don't companies lockout high value employees immediately as a matter of security and anti-sabotage?
correct.
e.g. instead of 'never return, do not attempt to contact us', you could say 'We're sorry to see you go. Monday will be your last day, come in to pick up your belongings and say goodbye and we'll all go out for lunch.'
Just because other companies do it doesn't mean you have to act like a jerk when you do it too.
Let's be fair here. For all we know, the guy might have done something quite bad. Or not. But if he did, Jason couldn't say so. We just don't know. But what we do know is that this is exactly the kind of half-story that gets people going on forums: an antagonist everyone loves to hate, and structural reasons why we're probably not getting the whole story. Many, many times I've seen users on a forum go on the warpath…
> For all we know, the guy might have done something quite bad. Ultimately it doesn't really matter; Jason has a poor reputation here anyway and, assuming this is the full email conversation, this goes a long way to proving why. How you treat people that piss you off is important in any business; acting like that looks immature and hissy. Polite anger would seem the correct response (if he was angry) - otherwise it j…
So we have a one-sided story, from a source who contradicts himself. I'd rather not jump to conclusions just yet.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> For all we know, the guy might have done something quite bad. Ultimately it doesn't really matter; Jason has a poor reputation here anyway and, assuming this is the full email conversation, this goes a long way to proving why. How you treat people that piss you off is important in any business; acting like that looks immature and hissy. Polite anger would seem the correct response (if he was angry) - otherwise it j…
From the source's mouth: "I've never worked with such a great team and learned so much in such a short period of time. I owe all of it to the opportunity you've given me, Jason and I thank you immensely for that." So we have a one-sided story, from a source who contradicts himself. I'd rather not jump to conclusions just yet.
In fact; it could well be complete bunk. He might have hated working there. But if so it's an example of how to deal with these situations - polite and positive.
Takeaway: if it's email, it's on a server somewhere; if it's on a server somewhere, it's best to assume it'll be public record someday. If it's an outburst, maybe you should do it by phone.
Suggested rewrite: Hey Evan, We're mighty sorry, but we understand. If things don't work out at yahoo! as planned we want you to know the door is always open to return, after all we hate to see you go. Please tell the rest of your team that you go with our blessing and that we look forward to seeing you do great things in the future. We all know if there is one thing they need over there it is quality people. Since w…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
1. Mahalo is a top 200 site, over 10M uniques and operationally profitable. 2. Open Angel Forum has been hosting in five cities in the first four months of 2010. 3. I've done seven angel investments including gdgt.com, gowalla.com and blippy.com. 4. TechCrunch50 has made millions of dollars, but more importantly launched amazing startups like Mint.com, Powerset and yammer. 5. This Week in Startups about to have it's…
Way to toot your own horn. 37prime is clearly quite right about the attention seeking part too.
Suggested rewrite: Hey Evan, We're mighty sorry, but we understand. If things don't work out at yahoo! as planned we want you to know the door is always open to return, after all we hate to see you go. Please tell the rest of your team that you go with our blessing and that we look forward to seeing you do great things in the future. We all know if there is one thing they need over there it is quality people. Since w…
I think it would be legitimate to express some disappointment that the employee decided to tell you he was resigning via a mass email rather than in person or even via a phone call.
Suggested rewrite: Hey Evan, We're mighty sorry, but we understand. If things don't work out at yahoo! as planned we want you to know the door is always open to return, after all we hate to see you go. Please tell the rest of your team that you go with our blessing and that we look forward to seeing you do great things in the future. We all know if there is one thing they need over there it is quality people. Since w…
I think it would be legitimate to express some disappointment that the employee decided to tell you he was resigning via a mass email rather than in person or even via a phone call.
But as these emails go (and they do, I've been on the receiving end of a few of those) it's about as good as they get.