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SpaceX to lay off 10% of Workforce

latimes.com

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Re: SpaceX to lay off 10% of Workforce

#311

Post by tasssko »

thefounder wrote: post #302
antpls wrote: post #265

I don't understand how anyone in the world accept such social contract of being laid off anytime for arbitrary reasons. If you create a company, you take care of it and all of its members. If you have to cut expenses because the company needs to be "leaner" then you cut the salaries starting from the top executives. Eventually you fire management, because the state of the company is in part the result of their decisi…

Unless the said companies are funded by government I don't understand why there would be a problem. As a CEO your job is to maximize the profit not to create a socialist enterprise. Why should I pay you if I no longer need your services? That being said I believe things could be done to make the transition easier for workers without hurting the company. For example announcing the layoffs in advance(i.e give a 4 month…

The problem here is you said I. Personally if anyone in my company fires someone because “I no longer need your services” will be fired for hiring someone permanent that needed firing. Also if they follow our hiring criteria we want them in other places. This across the board lay-off is a sign of some kind of corporate correction. My advice is to think of it that the people you manage work for the company not for you. Correction: you don’t need advice.

Re: SpaceX to lay off 10% of Workforce

#312

Post by pmontra »

antpls wrote: post #265

I don't understand how anyone in the world accept such social contract of being laid off anytime for arbitrary reasons. If you create a company, you take care of it and all of its members. If you have to cut expenses because the company needs to be "leaner" then you cut the salaries starting from the top executives. Eventually you fire management, because the state of the company is in part the result of their decisi…

I used to work for a mobile phone operator in Europe, so no quick way to lay off people. After the startup phase they ended up with hundreds of people in the software/network department that they really didn't need anymore. Not there at least, as the focus moved from development to operations. Some people were moved to operations but (I spare you the technicalities) we eventually ended up in a separate company providing exactly the same services to the original one. Then we started to get incentives to quit. I left even before they reached that phase. They are still doing the same job with less and less people (I think they moved many jobs in cheaper eastern Europe countries.)

The point is that sometimes you really need less people to do the job or you can find them in other places without affecting the final product or service. There is nothing that can prevent a company to do that, not even employee friendly European legislation.

Re: SpaceX to lay off 10% of Workforce

#313

Post by nullifidian »

alkonaut wrote: post #288
raverbashing wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's just being idealistic. Why would someone ever hire if they wouldn't be able to terminate the contract if it's ever needed? And this goes both ways, I do want to be able to quit (with a "short" notice) Other answers gave plenty of good reasons: employees underperform, projects change, companies close, etc It's a job, not a marriage, and even those are becoming shorter. Note I'm not proposing "at-will" employmen…

There are placees where termination for arbitrary reasons doesn’t exist (see e.g Sweden). Those economies still seem competitive. If you lay off 10% because times are worse and there is less work, then interestingly you are more or less required to re-hire the same people when you hire again (typically that would be negotiated so you’d buy them out instead). The 10% you fire also has to be the 10% last hired, you can…

>arbitrary reasons doesn’t exist (see e.g Sweden)

It's important to note that these countries (Sweden, Japan) with higher employee protections and guarantees are very different in terms of culture from the hyper-individualistic US.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_Jante <- basically an invese of the American culture

Re: SpaceX to lay off 10% of Workforce

#314

Post by azernik »

antpls wrote: post #265

I don't understand how anyone in the world accept such social contract of being laid off anytime for arbitrary reasons. If you create a company, you take care of it and all of its members. If you have to cut expenses because the company needs to be "leaner" then you cut the salaries starting from the top executives. Eventually you fire management, because the state of the company is in part the result of their decisi…

Note that, in this case, the workers are getting "a minimum of eight weeks’ pay and other benefits" - this kind of thing is sadly not mandatory, but it probably should be. Companies can suddenly not need a worker as business requirements change, but the entirety of the resulting insecurity and switching cost should not fall on the worker.

Re: SpaceX to lay off 10% of Workforce

#315

Post by unethical_ban »

antpls wrote: post #265

I don't understand how anyone in the world accept such social contract of being laid off anytime for arbitrary reasons. If you create a company, you take care of it and all of its members. If you have to cut expenses because the company needs to be "leaner" then you cut the salaries starting from the top executives. Eventually you fire management, because the state of the company is in part the result of their decisi…

So cut from the top down, period? Cut the people with the vision and strategy of the company, until nothing but the assemblers and forklift drivers are left?

I believe in worker rights, and the ability of a person to live in relative economic security. But should a company not EVER be able to restructure when it realizes it has too many workers, or too broad a mission?

Is 2 months pay and medical not a decent send-off for workers who provide little value to a company?

I wish healthcare were publicly provided, but besides that, if the alternative were for SpaceX to file bankruptcy or to go broke for lack of competent management, I'll take some laid off workers.

Re: SpaceX to lay off 10% of Workforce

#316

Post by nullifidian »

wolco wrote: post #282
nullifidian wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>If you create a company, you take care of it and all of its members. Companies are not created to take care of their employees. They are created to make profit and/or accomplish a societal goal. If a company is non-profit then it's just the latter. As someone from a post-communist state, it's plainly obvious to me that people on average don't work as well as they could if the threat of termination does not exist. My…

The threat of randomly being fired will cause many focused workers to change how they act. They stop trying to help each other, blame increases and internal politics dominates. If this continues the remaining employees try to hire new employees with a fatal flaw so when the next wave comes they will be the first out.

I'm not saying that N% layoff is a necessarily a good practice. My main objection was to the notion that companies are created to take care of the employees. To me it's the role of the state to take care of the people, the companies are here to be efficient for eveyone's benefit.

Re: SpaceX to lay off 10% of Workforce

#317

Post by buchanan »

throwaway4DFe5 wrote: post #97
Rebelgecko wrote: post #2

Sounds like 90% of their employees will be working an extra 10% more hours per week

i've done a lot of contract work for spacex. imo i think part of the reason they work so much is because they have no formal methods group. everyone seems to solve similar problems in slightly different ways instead of having a vetted and documented 'right' way to approach certain things. i've literally been paid to write code that does the same thing for different groups in slightly different ways. having done a lot…

Appreciate if you can provide an anecdata: those you’ve worked with should have no problems landing another job? Just trying to get a feel of whether this will be a minor or major stress event for those fired.

Re: SpaceX to lay off 10% of Workforce

#318

Post by consumer451 »

ricardobeat wrote: post #293
consumer451 wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What's odd is why SpaceX is cutting staff with the new development underway on the larger rockets and the satellite business. I'm curious about how they're going to increase development while cutting staff. The oddness diminishes when you look at their open jobs listing [1], as it looks that they have >300 open positions. [1] https://www.spacex.com/careers/list

At <5% of the employee count, those hires might barely cover churn.

That’s a really good point.

Re: SpaceX to lay off 10% of Workforce

#319

Post by unethical_ban »

skrebbel wrote: post #294
vasco wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about when people get comfortable and stop performing at initial levels. Or if you realize you have too much middle management?

Yeah, comfortable employees, we shouldn't have that. At my company I ensure that everyone is always borderline burned out!

I think you're missing the point, with or without intention.

"Comfortable" doesn't mean that they have a nice house and are happy with their life at work. Comfortable in this context means they no longer have any concern about their own job performance, knowing they have a "sure thing" and underperform in their duties.

Re: SpaceX to lay off 10% of Workforce

#320

Post by mango7283 »

rb666 wrote: post #185
sonnyblarney wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

10% is huge by any measure.

Really? Look around you next time you're in the office, could you really not lose at least 1 of those 9 slackers around you?

And if you can't find a slacker, that means you must be the slacker, I suppose!
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