261–270 of 378 posts
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I used to be this stupid too but then I learned that it's better to just play their game, win and then move on, no point in fighting it, just think of it as another part of the job.
I want to, but I find the lying and mind games to be morally offensive, especially when they can have such a large impact on a person's wellbeing.
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That's a huge amount. I remember working in a large company with easily a hundred people over the years. I'd say there were only 2 employees that were fireable materials.
Yeah but how hard was it to hire new people? There is a direct correlation. It's super easy to hire people at Netflix. It is literally just up to the hiring manager. The flip side is that it is also easy to fire, so you can quickly correct any mistakes you may have made in hiring. This of course means more churn. But to someone working there, this felt like a good thing. It means you didn't have people just biding th…
How's the interview process though? Do managers get to hand pick candidates, without them being subjected to a grueling full day onsite with 6-8 employees?
I'd say that's the biggest issue to hire. Even if referred and highly recommended, it's trivial to be rejected due to any one interviewer having a bad day or an impossible bar.
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Thanks! I might look into trying that mindset.
In another comment you say you find the lying and mindgames to be morally offensive. How do you not find this morally offensive as well?
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I agree, but in the specific case of Netflix, people are let go all the time , and managers have a lot of authority to make the decision to fire someone. Tenure doesn't matter, either -- you could work there for 6 years and end up getting fired when you get a new manager or the existing one decides you're phoning it in.
I think the number of people that are let go is overexaggerated. But yes, it is easy to fire and hire . The two go hand in hand.
My wife worked there for a year, and was used to seeing the emails to her dept. saying so-and-so was fired once or twice a week. Eventually she quit because of it, but she had an overall positive experience.
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If the company's unofficial policy is that if someone gets a high rating on the team, then someone else must be given a low rating to balance that out, even if they don't deserve it.
Thanks, I haven’t experienced that. How painful. I agree with other posters here when I read about your problem in these comments. Personally I think of my manager and performance review more as symptoms or results of a process, rather than the source of anything. Promoting myself - Github, LinkedIn, trainings and brown bag sessions for my coworkers, program completion emails, those are part of my job just as much as…
I loved giving a brown bag on Raspberry Pi project to my teammates. I know it's not a great work related topic, but installing and using linux and tips on securing it was at least tangentially related.
I have to say, I wish I made lots of money.
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If we don't have metrics, how are we to fairly and objectively compare one worker's performance to another?
I mean, what if you just don't? at my company, raises have more to do with the financial situation of the company than subjective reviews (although we do have these, they just don't factor into compensation that much). if the company is doing well, everyone gets a nice raise. everyone gets the same percentage bonus every year which is calculated based on the entire company's performance. maybe this makes us unattract…
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> It can be extremely demoralising for co-workers in all kinds of roles when they see that kind of recognition being given to someone who they feel don't deserve it. This is why wages are secret. Everyone is convinced they deserve to be in the top half of earners.
Source? or is this a personal theory?
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The company only looks out for itself and will support you only when it benefits. It will never benefit from supporting an ex-employee that left on bad terms, and the ex-employee will never benefit either from supporting it. So why bother, there is no rational reason. The bond to co-workers at a former workplace is strange and tenuous - actually it goes the other way around, they reach out to you when they want to im…
> and the ex-employee will never benefit either from supporting it. Like I said, even when you get fired, you still have stock options. So you do in fact benefit by helping the company when you're leaving. > The bond to co-workers at a former workplace is strange and tenuous - actually it goes the other way around, they reach out to you when they want to improve their situation. Let them ask you when they want out, t…
From the average perspective, I have found the parent's commenter's advice to be far more accurate. I don't think you have a good idea of how terrible and vindictive the average mid-level paper pusher in management or HR is outside Silicon Valley (I suspect there are quite a few in SV as well, but maybe you all are a little more skeptical about their utility). I don't want some maniac manager talking crap about me to everyone they know and consequently blowing up my meager job prospects just because I complained to HR about their shitty management style. Oh, and unlike your Netflix example, tens of people complained about terrible management style at a former employer, and not a single manager got fired or even cautioned as a result. So I'm going to smile, nod, and leave a company – nothing more.
So, in summary – hopefully this doesn't sound like flattery, but consider that you might be in the position of a Lakers player giving advice to a local pickup basketball group. The advice doesn't always translate well to a different context :)
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Humans have proven time and time again that we are very good at optimizing for specific metrics, and apparently generally very poor at choosing the right metrics to target. School is a prime example, in my opinion - there is so much I "learned" in school that I'll never remember, because I didn't take a proper approach to learning - I just optimized for grades. I had a 4.7 GPA and could hardly tell you a thing about…
> Humans have proven time and time again that we are very good at optimizing for specific metrics, and apparently generally very poor at choosing the right metrics to target. Maybe it's Goodhart's Law: "When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure."
If I notice that someone has really killed it in something but has no recognition at all for it, I will also/instead point out to that person's manager, especially if it is a junior engineer