Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Tanium is facing employee unrest and an executive exodus

bloomberg.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 93 posts

Re: Tanium is facing employee unrest and an executive exodus

#21

Post by tptacek »

posguy wrote: post #18
tptacek wrote: post #11

There are bad reasons to quit a company and good ones, but there are few better ways to make an exit than on the spot when the CEO of your company personally and publicly berates a low-level employee in front of the team.

Huh? Sure, the employee could sit through the CEO taking a dump on them in front of their coworkers, but if the employee has other options for employment, I'd say there isn't a usually solid reason to stick around a hostile work environment. The bridge is already burned with the CEO, and your unlikely to burn the bridge any worse with your direct boss/coworkers by quiting immediately versus a few days/a week later. M…

I'm not talking about the CEO's victim. I'm talking about every employee that watched him victimize a team member.

Re: Tanium is facing employee unrest and an executive exodus

#22

Post by tptacek »

pcl wrote: post #14
tptacek wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did I miss the part of this story where they said they had nonstandard vesting? The industry standard is 4 year vesting, month by month, with a 1-year cliff. The traditional horror story is employees being fired just before they cliff.

I think that's becoming less of a norm. More and more companies seem to be moving to 4-year vesting, distributed annually.

I'm a vocal defender of vesting and cliffs, but even I think you shouldn't take a job somewhere where you vest in annual chunks after your cliff.

Re: Tanium is facing employee unrest and an executive exodus

#23

Post by CalChris »

posguy wrote: post #18
tptacek wrote: post #11

There are bad reasons to quit a company and good ones, but there are few better ways to make an exit than on the spot when the CEO of your company personally and publicly berates a low-level employee in front of the team.

Huh? Sure, the employee could sit through the CEO taking a dump on them in front of their coworkers, but if the employee has other options for employment, I'd say there isn't a usually solid reason to stick around a hostile work environment. The bridge is already burned with the CEO, and your unlikely to burn the bridge any worse with your direct boss/coworkers by quiting immediately versus a few days/a week later. M…

There must be 50 ways to leave your lover.

If you've made up your mind, you can just tell them off and walk out. You can take your sweet time and interview while you still have a paycheck and benefits. You can wait until the cliff and leave the next day. You can give two weeks notice.

It's your choice just as it's their choice.

Re: Tanium is facing employee unrest and an executive exodus

#24

Post by posguy »

tptacek wrote: post #21
posguy wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huh? Sure, the employee could sit through the CEO taking a dump on them in front of their coworkers, but if the employee has other options for employment, I'd say there isn't a usually solid reason to stick around a hostile work environment. The bridge is already burned with the CEO, and your unlikely to burn the bridge any worse with your direct boss/coworkers by quiting immediately versus a few days/a week later. M…

I'm not talking about the CEO's victim. I'm talking about every employee that watched him victimize a team member.

Ah, that makes more sense, was trying to figure that out. I've usually waited a bit before quitting so I could line up a new job when I've been an employee witnessing a coworker get beat down on by management needlessly.

Re: Tanium is facing employee unrest and an executive exodus

#25

Post by posguy »

jacquesm wrote: post #20
posguy wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its just another form of indenturing workers, by holding these ballooning stock vesting schedules over their heads in the uneven employer/employee relationship. The employer gets stability from the employee, while being able to fire the employee after a few years just before they vest, saving the company $$$ and maintaining control for the current shareholders.

> while being able to fire the employee after a few years just before they vest Never ever agree to a vesting schedule where it takes longer than a year to get your stock. 1 year cliff maximum.

Yeah, a fair vesting schedule should evenly vest as you work, ideally as often as possible (eg: every month or week). Its akin to compounding, as a savings account holder you want the interest on your account to compound as often as possible.

Re: Tanium is facing employee unrest and an executive exodus

#26

Post by jacquesm »

tptacek wrote: post #22
pcl wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that's becoming less of a norm. More and more companies seem to be moving to 4-year vesting, distributed annually.

I'm a vocal defender of vesting and cliffs, but even I think you shouldn't take a job somewhere where you vest in annual chunks after your cliff.

It's pretty normal though.

What does it cost to transfer stock in the US in a privately held company? Here in Europe it can be up to ~$1K to transfer stock in a GMBH or BV, other countries more or less depending on the local situation regarding notary public roles and rates. In a public company it is dirt cheap but this is prior to IPO.

That + accelerated vesting in case of wrongful termination or termination without cause can be reason enough to batch share vesting events.

Re: Tanium is facing employee unrest and an executive exodus

#27

Post by posguy »

CalChris wrote: post #23
posguy wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huh? Sure, the employee could sit through the CEO taking a dump on them in front of their coworkers, but if the employee has other options for employment, I'd say there isn't a usually solid reason to stick around a hostile work environment. The bridge is already burned with the CEO, and your unlikely to burn the bridge any worse with your direct boss/coworkers by quiting immediately versus a few days/a week later. M…

There must be 50 ways to leave your lover. If you've made up your mind, you can just tell them off and walk out. You can take your sweet time and interview while you still have a paycheck and benefits. You can wait until the cliff and leave the next day. You can give two weeks notice. It's your choice just as it's their choice.

Definitely, there are a ton of ways to end a relationship, whether it be an employment relationship or social one. I prefer short & definitive endings myself, so long as I'm ready for it to end.

Letting a bad relationship hang on is just bad for my health, I gain a ton of weight and stress!

Re: Tanium is facing employee unrest and an executive exodus

#28

Post by hackuser »

mvpu wrote: post #17

I'm getting sick of reports like this. Setting up unfair vesting schedules and firing people before their stock vests... somebody should vigorously investigate it and put the CEO in jail. Startups are fucking hard work and a CEO stealing glory is a crime not a culture issue. These guys need fear of God.

I agree it's wrong and wish it could be stopped. But why do the employees trust that they will become vested? They can see the risk in their agreements and see what happens to their co-workers.

Re: Tanium is facing employee unrest and an executive exodus

#29

Post by anon42387 »

Where is the evidence? Where are the quotes by previous employees making this claim? These employees were fired because they were failing to do their job. If you are running a company will sit aside and do nothing and continue to let anyone stay in the company that proved to miss their target repetitively? These claims are 100% false. This story is not only poorly written but it is full of false information crafted only for click bait. It's sad that I can no longer feel as though Bloomberg is a creditable source of news.

Re: Tanium is facing employee unrest and an executive exodus

#30

Post by tptacek »

brazzledazzle wrote: post #12

I went through a long drawn out sales engagement with them. It seemed like a cool product at its core (basically a sort of meshed set of interconnected nodes that you could do live "natural language" queries against predefined collected data (i.e. "what machines are running ntpd?") but the stuff they were trying to sell on top of it at the time like patch management ranged from half finished to promises for future re…

So... osquery?
Post reply on HN