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Robinhood lays off 23% of staff

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Re: Robinhood lays off 23% of staff

#141

Post by NovemberWhiskey »

paxys wrote: post #29

> As CEO, I approved and took responsibility for our ambitious staffing trajectory—this is on me Reminder that Vlad Tenev received $800M in compensation in 2021. In the same year the company made terrible bets on crypto and banking, took an irreversible reputation hit among its core user base because of the GME fiasco, had multiple user data breaches, was subject to several investigations and was fined hundreds of mi…

Robinhood's executive compensation clawback policy just FYI:

In March 2021, our board of directors adopted a clawback policy effective upon the closing of this offering. Under our clawback policy, our board of directors may recover incentive compensation from an executive officer in the event of (i) a restatement of our financial statements or a material error in the calculation of one or more performance-based measures used to determine the amount of such compensation or (ii) the executive officer’s “detrimental conduct” (as defined in our clawback policy) that results in an excess performance payout, results in legal proceedings or causes us material financial or reputational harm

ref. https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1783879/000162828021...

Re: Robinhood lays off 23% of staff

#142

Post by adam_arthur »

roughly wrote: post #74
mgfist wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All of this has already happened. Just look at the stocks of all the pandemic companies. Peleton, Teledoc, Zoom, Docusign and on and on. Pretty much all down 80%+ from their highs.

If anyone had any notion that the markets were efficient or rational in any way regarding the actual underlying value of the companies they purport to represent, I certainly hope that notion didn’t survive the pandemic - I’m not sure what world stocks were pricing in over the last two years, but it didn’t pass even a cursory smell test.

It's rational on the predication of completely absurd stories about growth trajectories.

It's what happens when a bunch of dumb money comes into the market

Re: Robinhood lays off 23% of staff

#143

Post by gruez »

yuan43 wrote: post #102
this_user wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because then you'd still have more people than you need, except now everyone is poorly motivated, and your best people will just leave. Germany does actually have a model called "Kurzarbeit" (literally "short work") to reduce hours across the board while some of the wage losses are being offset by payment from the unemployment insurance system. The idea is to avoid layoffs during times of recession etc. which would a…

> ... your best people will just leave. Where is the evidence for this? I get that it seems like what would happen, but where are the cases proving that's what happened? Especially in an economy shedding jobs, there may not be many other places to go. Also, studies seem to find that money doesn't motivate people to perform at a higher level. https://hbr.org/2013/04/does-money-really-affect-motiv

>Also, studies seem to find that money doesn't motivate people to perform at a higher level.

What that really means is that if you're paying $200k now, bumping to $250k isn't going to make your workers more productive. However, if you're paying $200k now and you cut the pay to $180k, and your competitors are offering $230k, your best performers are still going to jump ship.

Re: Robinhood lays off 23% of staff

#144

Post by prh8 »

somehnacct3757 wrote: post #115
paxys wrote: post #29

> As CEO, I approved and took responsibility for our ambitious staffing trajectory—this is on me Reminder that Vlad Tenev received $800M in compensation in 2021. In the same year the company made terrible bets on crypto and banking, took an irreversible reputation hit among its core user base because of the GME fiasco, had multiple user data breaches, was subject to several investigations and was fined hundreds of mi…

The Shopify layoff also contained this phrasing. Shows how tone-deaf these CEOs are. Shopify's version: > Ultimately, placing this bet was my call to make and I got this wrong. Now, we have to adjust. As a consequence, we have to say goodbye to some of you today.

I commented about this when it happened and was met with vitriol. Nice to see people here have some sense.

Re: Robinhood lays off 23% of staff

#145

Post by Phlarp »

bostonpete wrote: post #108
radicaldreamer wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Steve Jobs famously took a $1 salary and everything else was in stock.

That's not really true, at least not in the same way being discussed above. Jobs already owned millions of shares in Apple stock, so yes, he profited from the stock but AFAIK that was only from the appreciation of existing stock, not from new grants.

If nothing else, he also got unlimited personal use of the company jet.

Re: Robinhood lays off 23% of staff

#146

Post by Spivak »

paxys wrote: post #105
Spivak wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good lord, if I resigned every time I caused a production issue my resume length would triple. You are allowed to admit you made a mistake without publicly self flagellating. This is some straight puritanical shit.

Does your company also do mass layoffs whenever you cause a production issue?

The impact doesn’t matter, the magnitude of the mistake does.

* If I take all reasonable precautions and bad thing still happens — not a fuckup.

* If try my best but make an honest mistake like being forgetful — minor fuckup.

* If I try my best but don’t know something crucial — minor fuckup. If I am paid to be an expert on that thing — major fuckup.

* If I deliberately choose to forego necessary precautions because that’s effort it’ll be fine — major fuckup or legal trouble depending on the field.

* If I purposely cause bad thing to happen — legal trouble.

* If I choose to take a calculated risk in good faith after getting the advice of my board and my advisors and bad thing happens — not even a fuckup.

How bad the bad thing is doesn’t matter except at the margins “no harm done” or actual injury. Downsizing a company does not meet that bar.

Being in a leadership position shouldn’t be a job of calling coins in the air and betting your job you get it right.

Re: Robinhood lays off 23% of staff

#147

Post by RSHEPP »

fleddr wrote: post #85

We live in such morally bankrupt times. You can just say "you take responsibility" without actually taking responsibility at all. Our expectations have become so low and we've become so complacent that just the statement is enough. In similar vain, "we care about your mental health" as is the common internal email from HR. No actual care is offered though. Giving staff a day off is a tangible example of doing at leas…

Company I work for gives international Mental Health Day off, October 10th.

Re: Robinhood lays off 23% of staff

#148

Post by prh8 »

jmyeet wrote: post #137
paxys wrote: post #29

> As CEO, I approved and took responsibility for our ambitious staffing trajectory—this is on me Reminder that Vlad Tenev received $800M in compensation in 2021. In the same year the company made terrible bets on crypto and banking, took an irreversible reputation hit among its core user base because of the GME fiasco, had multiple user data breaches, was subject to several investigations and was fined hundreds of mi…

> ... took an irreversible reputation hit among its core user base because of the GME fiasco God I'm so sick of hearing this. It comes from people who seriously don't know what happened. let me explain: RH had (and still has) a service that you can trade immediately on signing up and sending funds rather than waiting for them to clear. This mostly works out fine because people buy different things and you have the un…

They also prevented trading by people who had long running, funded accounts. It was a mess and it wasn't only GME.

Re: Robinhood lays off 23% of staff

#149

Post by renewiltord »

saalweachter wrote: post #83
renewiltord wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure but that's not opex (the context of this thread). That's stuff he has by virtue of founding the company.

Eh, does he deserve $55M for founding a f(l)ailing company? If he wasn't a founder, would you say "No, never mind the $55M he pulled out of the company last year, last year everything was fine. The massive cash shortfall the company is experiencing today has nothing to do with those $55M that are no longer in the company's coffers."?

Mate, ultimately the point is that if you sell $55 m of your stock in a company you're not taking money out of the company. That stuff ceased to be owned by the company when those shares (or derivatives that control them) were granted (way before this point).

Re: Robinhood lays off 23% of staff

#150

Post by idontpost »

saalweachter wrote: post #83
renewiltord wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure but that's not opex (the context of this thread). That's stuff he has by virtue of founding the company.

Eh, does he deserve $55M for founding a f(l)ailing company? If he wasn't a founder, would you say "No, never mind the $55M he pulled out of the company last year, last year everything was fine. The massive cash shortfall the company is experiencing today has nothing to do with those $55M that are no longer in the company's coffers."?

> The massive cash shortfall the company is experiencing today has nothing to do with those $55M that are no longer in the company's coffers.

Do you not understand how stock sales work?

The $55M didn't come from company coffers. It came from pension funds, hedge funds, and retail investors on the other side of the sale.

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