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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

#431

Post by olyjohn »

jerf wrote: post #329
tshaddox wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> After the first 10 minutes everyone will know what their meeting is about and it makes the problem worse. Huh? It’s not a surprise birthday party. I’m not sure why a key goal would be that each fired person is taken completely by surprise.

The reasons why may not be obvious if you're not a manager or haven't run a large organization before, but the simple truth is, "employees" are not a magically ethical bunch of people simply by virtue of being the underdog and poor and downtrodden and being all fired and stuff. You do not want a significant number of employees running around who are either uncertain they are going to be fired for a significant period…

Right, some people will be jerks, so treat all employees like criminals. That's why I left my last job. Got tired of seeing people escorted out by security. Talk about a toxic work culture.

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

#432

Post by golemotron »

namdnay wrote: post #430
golemotron wrote: post #423

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But, the query wasn't about stability. It was about emotional support.

yes, of which you expect more when you enter an employee-employer relationship than when you are independent

I'm not sure that's wise.

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

#433

Post by namdnay »

golemotron wrote: post #432
namdnay wrote: post #430

Earlier quoted context omitted.

yes, of which you expect more when you enter an employee-employer relationship than when you are independent

I'm not sure that's wise.

I know that the zeitgeist is to say “your employer doesn’t care about you, don’t care about them etc”, but honestly in my experience the employer-employee relationship is much more stable and human than a contractor-client one

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

#434

Post by [deleted] »

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.”

[deleted]

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

#435

Post by PascLeRasc »

fourseventy wrote: post #162
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.”

assuming they did a 20 minute meeting for each employee thats 233 hours or 29 business days to fire all 700 of them...

Now do the math on all the less important meetings that you have every day.

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

#436

Post by PascLeRasc »

dilap wrote: post #44
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…

I was wondering that too. I think ideally you would have a 1-1 video chat with someone. But at such a big, 900 employee, layoff, maybe that wasn't easy to do. I think the CEOs affect on the call made it worse. It was very strange to hear him say stuff like "last time I had to do this, I cried. I hope to be stronger this time." It felt like his focus when laying off 900 people was too much on how it made him personall…

Same with calling people "the unlucky group", that felt really disrespectful.

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

#437

Post by twiddling »

AtNightWeCode wrote: post #199

When you go to management classes you learn to not lay off people this way. That one should talk to each employee individually. At the same time. I have been at workplaces where a message been sent out like that a company must lay off 20% of the staff. I have seen the amount of stress it causes among the staff and especially if it happens several times. Me personally would prefer the axe.

Yeah, it sucks to get that mandate and execute a lifeboat drill ( Who are we saving ). Problem is that a lot of the high performers you end up saving are out the door in six months anyway

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

#439

Post by kodah »

wave_function wrote: post #285
nradov wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The funny thing is that sharks are more likely to be eaten by dolphins (especially orcas) than vice versa. And sharks also get caught in nets. https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/article/killer-wh... I guess Garg is just as weak on marine biology as he is on leadership and business ethics.

I bet this dude talks a lot about alpha wolves too

He is the Sigma Wolf.

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

#440

Post by stormcode »

rkk3 wrote: post #391
stormcode wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, in my opinion it is. Think about abuse in other contexts to put it in perspective. If a teacher in the middle of giving a homework assignment had said the same thing, would that be okay? What about a police officer who pulled someone over during a traffic stop? What about a customer at a drive thru saying this into the speaker? This is not a random person on the street corner shouting at other random passers by.…

> Think about abuse in other contexts to put it in perspective. If a teacher in the middle of giving a homework assignment had said the same thing, would that be okay? What about a police officer who pulled someone over during a traffic stop? What about a customer at a drive thru saying this into the speaker? Calling a group of people "DUMB DOLPHINS" on an email chain ... Inappropriate, un professional, dis-respectfu…

I dunno. Seems clearly abusive to me from someone in a position of power. This wasn't said among friends at a bar or by or about someone unrelated to the people in question. It was their boss, or bosses boss.
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