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

Twitter CEO fires two top executives, freezes hiring

theverge.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

351–360 of 1000 posts

Re: Twitter CEO fires two top executives, freezes hiring

#351

Post by toyg »

mattmaroon wrote: post #311
jmyeet wrote: post #258

The two execs fired were: - Kayvon Beykpour, Head of Consumer Product (3 years, 11 months) [1]; and - Bruce Falck, Revenue Product Lead (5 years at Twitter, 3 years and 11 months in this position) [2] Kinda weird that both people were just shy of serving 4 years in their current roles. When I see moves like this my immediate thought is always, it's to save or make money. For example, there could be an options pool in…

If the moves were made at 11 months I'd agree. It'd be really unusual if there was some large vest at the 4 year mark. Unless maybe they've recently been granted something for retention.

More likely they had initial vests at two years, then additional ones every extra year, on a rolling basis.

Re: Twitter CEO fires two top executives, freezes hiring

#352

Post by SemanticStrengh »

paganel wrote: post #325
SemanticStrengh wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where is the revolution? There are competitive cars vs tesla for electric. Even if tesla have an edge, it's evolutionary, not at all revolutionary.

> There are competitive cars vs tesla for electric It is my belief that those "competitive cars" wouldn't have happened if it hadn't been for Tesla.

But why? Did tesla open source key scientific innovations in the scaling of batteries? Don't think so. See e.g. The seres f5 from Huawei. I don't know wether it's great but about the main metric, it has a higher range than teslas (1000km)

Re: Twitter CEO fires two top executives, freezes hiring

#353

Post by [deleted] »

wnevets wrote: post #334
jmyeet wrote: post #258

The two execs fired were: - Kayvon Beykpour, Head of Consumer Product (3 years, 11 months) [1]; and - Bruce Falck, Revenue Product Lead (5 years at Twitter, 3 years and 11 months in this position) [2] Kinda weird that both people were just shy of serving 4 years in their current roles. When I see moves like this my immediate thought is always, it's to save or make money. For example, there could be an options pool in…

Are there really no clauses in contracts or laws to prevent something like this? That sounds incredibly scummy.

[deleted]

Re: Twitter CEO fires two top executives, freezes hiring

#354

Post by trothamel »

shapefrog wrote: post #341
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Elon is margin called by year end is roughly 40% according to option prices The margin loans will almost certainly be replaced with outside equity prior to closing.

I am wondering what is in it for those people lining up - they are paying 20% over the market value to be locked in with musk.

Tesla is up 995% over the past 5 years.

Re: Twitter CEO fires two top executives, freezes hiring

#355

Post by dghlsakjg »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #172
rcoder wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I strongly disagree. Firing someone while they’re on leave sends a direct signal to anyone else considering taking leave: “watch out, you won’t be able to defend yourself if you aren’t here.” ICs follow the lead that executives set. A chilling effect like this will cause folks who most _need_ the leave — single parents, people with family in need of care, or those struggling with their own health issues — to second-g…

Totally disagree, primarily because Twitter offers nearly 5 months of paternity leave. I don't know when the Twitter's Head of Product originally left for paternity leave, but if it was a couple months ago, obviously the world has changed under Twitter's feet in that time. A business can't just stop because someone is on leave. I would expect them to be treated fairly, and the same as if they were not on leave when i…

The ENTIRE point of parental leave benefit is to ensure that your employment status doesn’t change while you are using it. The business doesn’t have to stop in it’s tracks, but the legal expectation is generally that you will come back to the same job you left.

This sends a horrifying message to employees.

Re: Twitter CEO fires two top executives, freezes hiring

#356

Post by zamfi »

SemanticStrengh wrote: post #308
paganel wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That "mid-sized car company" has revolutionised an ~120-year industry while still managing to remain at the forefront, that's why its valuation is so high (even though I also do believe it's over-valued). I'm not saying this as a Tesla-lover nor as a fan of Musk, in fact, as a lover of gasoline engines and of cars in general I see this as a tragedy (I regard EVs as refrigerators with some wheels attached), but it is…

Where is the revolution? There are competitive cars vs tesla for electric. Even if tesla have an edge, it's evolutionary, not at all revolutionary.

Tesla produced the first ICE-equivalent EV sedan that was not merely a "compliance vehicle" in decades.

Then, it turned out, people bought them by the hundreds of thousands, single-handedly recreating the market for EVs.

Then, other manufacturers noticed, and started realizing they might be left behind if they didn't take EVs seriously.

Now, sure, there are many competitors, but even still they have only been built in small quantities.

How long Tesla's edge will last is an open question, but there's no question that Tesla has single-handedly exploded the demand for EVs in the consumer vehicle market.

Re: Twitter CEO fires two top executives, freezes hiring

#357

Post by t_mann »

wnevets wrote: post #334
jmyeet wrote: post #258

The two execs fired were: - Kayvon Beykpour, Head of Consumer Product (3 years, 11 months) [1]; and - Bruce Falck, Revenue Product Lead (5 years at Twitter, 3 years and 11 months in this position) [2] Kinda weird that both people were just shy of serving 4 years in their current roles. When I see moves like this my immediate thought is always, it's to save or make money. For example, there could be an options pool in…

Are there really no clauses in contracts or laws to prevent something like this? That sounds incredibly scummy.

Well, there are clauses saying after condition X is met you get Y. Clauses that would say you can't be fired up to Z days before you reach X are neither common, nor would they fundamentally fix the problem if you think about it. If you can prove that preventing bonus vesting was the reason you were let go, it might be worth talking to a lawyer, though - courts have the power in principle to intervene in such cases.

Re: Twitter CEO fires two top executives, freezes hiring

#358

Post by seydor »

TameAntelope wrote: post #140
hintymad wrote: post #96

Growing up outside of the US, I feel kinda cringed when he said he was "INSANELY proud of our collective teams achieved". Such an interesting cultural difference.

What's odd about it? Why wouldn't he be proud of his team for successfully building stuff he thought was important to build?

I will expect more people to mock this decade of extreme marketingspeak that was funded with fake money and fat investor pockets. The people doing the mocking will lead the next wave of tech growth

Re: Twitter CEO fires two top executives, freezes hiring

#359

Post by jmyeet »

wnevets wrote: post #334
jmyeet wrote: post #258

The two execs fired were: - Kayvon Beykpour, Head of Consumer Product (3 years, 11 months) [1]; and - Bruce Falck, Revenue Product Lead (5 years at Twitter, 3 years and 11 months in this position) [2] Kinda weird that both people were just shy of serving 4 years in their current roles. When I see moves like this my immediate thought is always, it's to save or make money. For example, there could be an options pool in…

Are there really no clauses in contracts or laws to prevent something like this? That sounds incredibly scummy.

There's a ton of scummy behaviour with things like this.

Skype was particularly scummy. Not only were executives fired to avoid a payout, their options/shares were bought back at a low price (called a clawback agreement) and the company was incorporated in the Caymand Islands (IIRC) so suting them was going to be incredibly difficult.

Mark Pincus of Zynga fame decided a bunch of people didn't deserve to get rich on the IPO so went to some people to get them agree to a smaller options package than they had in exchange for not being fired.

These two fired suggests they didn't have clauses in their contracts for acceleration in the event of termination and/or they possibly had clauses that would give them a big payout. Or maybe it was just the timing to avoid a final vest (assuming a 4 year vest, which isn't a given).

The two may even have grounds to sue so Twitter may have settled with them prior to this announcement for less than they would've had to pay out. This avoids litigation, the two exxecs get something and Twitter has to pay out less. Win, win, win (sort of).

Re: Twitter CEO fires two top executives, freezes hiring

#360

Post by aetherson »

lesstenseflow wrote: post #267
minimaxir wrote: post #2

> I’m just now learning that Parag fired Kayvon while he was on paternity leave, which is truly awful. > Parag is on his way out too. Why is he firing his product leaders during his lame-duck period? https://twitter.com/CaseyNewton/status/1524790595968901122

Why would firing someone who's on paternity leave be an issue at all? We're talking multi-millionaires who will get multi-million dollar severance. It's pretty hilarious to see the pearl clutching of techno-bourgeoisie over something like this, pretending other tech-lords are getting mistreated over some supposed breach of decorum. The mere fact that he gets to take parental leave puts him head and shoulders above mo…

Part of the deal with being an executive is no job security. It's part of the trade you make for gigantic compensation. I never really feel bad for executives who are fired, even for unfair reasons -- it's just part of what they sign up for.
Post reply on HN