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Better.com CEO fires 900 employees on Zoom call

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Re: Better.com CEO fires 900 employees on Zoom call

#151

Post by dredmorbius »

agrippanux wrote: post #94
wedowhatwedo wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Each person being laid off deserves a private meeting with their manager where they are told this. The fact that they hired 900 people they now no longer need is a failing of the CEO by itself. If they work remotely, it can be a zoom meeting. Being told in a meeting with 900 people by someone you don't know is rude and tells me that anyone in leadership in this company are people I would not like to work for. The fac…

If you’re letting go of 900 people, for the average person their manager is also being let go. In a good amount of cases, probably their manager’s manager. I think it was a good call for the CEO to do it instead of outsourcing to HR or a COO. He didn’t try to hide behind another exec. Anyone being let go - especially at the holidays - is going to be pretty pissed about it, and it was the right thing for the CEO to ta…

Part of the 1:1 meeting basis is to address any concerns and address return of assets or information.

In the Before Times, there might be a group meeting, that would typically be for a department or site. It would be followed by a 1:1 with a manager (whomever is left standing in the chain of command), or (fairly frequently) with an outsourced consultant (see the film Up in the Air for reasonably accurate depiction of this).

Better did ... Worse.

Re: Better.com CEO fires 900 employees on Zoom call

#152

Post by the-pigeon »

SkittyDog wrote: post #76
beerandt wrote: post #16

>>Garg told Fortune that a month earlier, the company began to review employee productivity data, including missed telephone call rates, number of inbound and outbound calls, employees showing up late to meetings with a customer, and other metrics. >>“You guys know that at least 250 of the people terminated were working an average of 2 hours a day while clocking 8 hours+ a day in the payroll system? They were stealin…

Wait, they only started reviewong employee data ONE MONTH ago?? Thats some serious management incompetence. What's with this weaselly language, too... "At least 250 employees" also means "No more than 250 employees". If it was more, they would have just said the bigger number to prove their point. Which means the other 650 employees they fired did not have productivity problems, and they're just trying to blame their…

Obviously this is "hey HR we need to layoff 900 people, what can we do to make it their fault?"

Maybe it's a reasonable cover your ass move but comes off very slimy.

Re: Better.com CEO fires 900 employees on Zoom call

#153

Post by [deleted] »

DangerousPie wrote: post #20

I know this sounds horrible but in the days of covid and working from home, what are companies supposed to do if they have to lay off large amounts of people? Make them all risk their health to come to an in-person event, only to be fired? Drive to every employee's house to fire them in person? It obviously sucks but I don't see how, in 2021, this is any different from the kind of thing that would happen all the time…

[deleted]

Re: Better.com CEO fires 900 employees on Zoom call

#154

Post by gambiting »

tyingq wrote: post #101
post-it wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Zoom call part isn't really the issue, although individual Zoom meetings would have been better. > In another email obtained by Forbes last year, Garg wrote: > > ‘You are TOO DAMN SLOW. You are a bunch of DUMB DOLPHINS and…DUMB DOLPHINS get caught in nets and eaten by sharks. SO STOP IT. STOP IT. STOP IT RIGHT NOW. YOU ARE EMBARRASSING ME.”

This is what seems right to me. It's not the virtual nature, it's the lazy mass group layoff that's objectionable and disrespectful. If you're being laid off, you probably have a lot of questions. A 1:1 meeting would allow for that.

The problem is that 900 people is a lot of people. Imagine all managers scheduling meetings with their reports to tell them, then the managers themselves are probably being let go, in the meantime it would create A LOT of stress not knowing whether you will be called in for a meeting or not, just sitting there seeing people being let go around you 1 by 1. The whole process would take a week just to have a proper meeting and give everyone decent time to process and ask questions.

In a way, I think this is better - it's quicker, everyone knows where they stand, there is no uncertainty about it.

However, I do agree that

1) the communication from the CEO could be better

2) people should be given an opportunity to then still ask questions, either for HR or their managers(if still employed).

Re: Better.com CEO fires 900 employees on Zoom call

#155

Post by chrisseaton »

YetAnotherNick wrote: post #145
post-it wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Zoom call part isn't really the issue, although individual Zoom meetings would have been better. > In another email obtained by Forbes last year, Garg wrote: > > ‘You are TOO DAMN SLOW. You are a bunch of DUMB DOLPHINS and…DUMB DOLPHINS get caught in nets and eaten by sharks. SO STOP IT. STOP IT. STOP IT RIGHT NOW. YOU ARE EMBARRASSING ME.”

I know this looks bad but I generally appreciate manage giving clear warnings like this before firing. I have seen firings in companies where employee had no clue that the manager was not happy with him. I know this type of warning is the thing that would get published in the press by disgruntled employee and so managers couldn't give negative feedback and in the firing speech managers just tell that someone is not a…

I think you can warn people about their performance without using abuse.

Re: Better.com CEO fires 900 employees on Zoom call

#156

Post by adwww »

agrippanux wrote: post #94
wedowhatwedo wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Each person being laid off deserves a private meeting with their manager where they are told this. The fact that they hired 900 people they now no longer need is a failing of the CEO by itself. If they work remotely, it can be a zoom meeting. Being told in a meeting with 900 people by someone you don't know is rude and tells me that anyone in leadership in this company are people I would not like to work for. The fac…

If you’re letting go of 900 people, for the average person their manager is also being let go. In a good amount of cases, probably their manager’s manager. I think it was a good call for the CEO to do it instead of outsourcing to HR or a COO. He didn’t try to hide behind another exec. Anyone being let go - especially at the holidays - is going to be pretty pissed about it, and it was the right thing for the CEO to ta…

While true, you could do it in waves - task low level managers to inform their directs, then task the senior managers to inform the middle managers, and so on...

Re: Better.com CEO fires 900 employees on Zoom call

#157

Post by knicholes »

kittiepryde wrote: post #118
contravariant wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Off topic but this might be the first time I've seen someone use the noun affect correctly.

emotion or desire, especially as influencing behavior or action. I had to look it up, I wasn't even aware affect had a noun definition - I had believed it was only a verb. TIL

I heard it a lot in psychology classes in college. People can have a "flat affect."

Re: Better.com CEO fires 900 employees on Zoom call

#158

Post by tyingq »

baby wrote: post #144
tyingq wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is what seems right to me. It's not the virtual nature, it's the lazy mass group layoff that's objectionable and disrespectful. If you're being laid off, you probably have a lot of questions. A 1:1 meeting would allow for that.

Disagree. Why make the HR team go through 900 individual calls? At the same time this will leak and other employees will learn that they might get fired before they get their own call. Recipe for disaster. Just rip off the band aid.

Presumably the 900 people already had leaders that could talk to them.

Re: Better.com CEO fires 900 employees on Zoom call

#159

Post by jmull »

sailingparrot wrote: post #88
bronco21016 wrote: post #7

I know it’s just an anecdote but as a customer I kind of believe this. I just completed a transaction with them that had to be extended beyond the rate lock window. For about 10 days there was a daily back and forth where they asked me to provide some documentation. I would provide the requested documentation and about 12 hours later I would receive a task of uploading the same required documentation. The document wa…

> but if there’s any truth to these employees essentially stealing wages from their employer then they’re lucky they’re just being fired and not being prosecuted. Do you think the company just happened to be extremely unlucky and only hired dishonest employees? If your company is at a stage where your support employees are only working 2 hours a day, and where a customer cannot get support for what they need in less…

> ...only hired dishonest employees?

Apparently this is 9% or 15% of the employees (there's some discrepancy). So not "only".

I agree that it's on management if employees are only working 2 hours a day and getting paid 8... but one of the things management can do about it is lay off the excess employees. Either they aren't needed or they need some different people.

Re: Better.com CEO fires 900 employees on Zoom call

#160

Post by mrits »

post-it wrote: post #54
DangerousPie wrote: post #20

I know this sounds horrible but in the days of covid and working from home, what are companies supposed to do if they have to lay off large amounts of people? Make them all risk their health to come to an in-person event, only to be fired? Drive to every employee's house to fire them in person? It obviously sucks but I don't see how, in 2021, this is any different from the kind of thing that would happen all the time…

The Zoom call part isn't really the issue, although individual Zoom meetings would have been better. > In another email obtained by Forbes last year, Garg wrote: > > ‘You are TOO DAMN SLOW. You are a bunch of DUMB DOLPHINS and…DUMB DOLPHINS get caught in nets and eaten by sharks. SO STOP IT. STOP IT. STOP IT RIGHT NOW. YOU ARE EMBARRASSING ME.”

You can't really fire 900 people on individual Zoom calls. After the first 10 minutes everyone will know what their meeting is about and it makes the problem worse. People will be texting their managers begging for information and the manager will have to lie for a day or two until they are authorized to say in the meeting.
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