'Too many employees, but few work': Pichai, Zuckerberg sound the alarm • Hacker News Board

Re: 'Too many employees, but few work': Pichai, Zuckerberg sound the alarm

#401

Post by hbrn » Wed, Aug 10, 2022, 7:56 PM UTC

clusterhacks wrote: post #131

potatolicious wrote: post #111

It's frustrating that this thread seems to be focused so heavily on people sitting around resting and vesting. Having been inside Google (and multiple other FAANGs) this is generally untrue, and focusing on this element of the problem misses a much larger productivity problem: Most engineers at Google aren't "sitting around doing nothing", they are very busy shipping projects that do not matter. Their days are filled…

>Their days are filled with doing work that will not move the needle on any metric that matters to the company This, 100%. I think this simple observation reverberates across the entire software engineering field and at many (most?) non-FAANG companies as well. I am not confident there is a real solution to the problem of making sure people only work on things that matter. Medium to small organizations seem to strugg…

> Medium to small organizations seem to struggle with having management even understand what "good" product looks like

The ones that struggle are the ones that die in a year or two, thus learning the lesson the hard way. Google on the other hand has unlimited money, so people just get moved elsewhere and don't learn from failure.

Re: 'Too many employees, but few work': Pichai, Zuckerberg sound the alarm

#402

Post by BeetleB » Wed, Aug 10, 2022, 7:56 PM UTC

fefe23 wrote: post #317

codegeek wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Nobody wants to spend their life being dead weight." I disagree. There are plenty of people who would love to be dead weight just to float around in a company. The larger the team/company, the more chances of those people being around. They pretend to be always busy and doing something but don't actually get anything done. Seen it all for 18+ years. Having said that, there are plenty of people as well who would LOVE…

I have met a few of those people, but every single one of them needed a justification. Some told me they felt wronged by the company somehow. For example they had experienced bullying, or didn't get promoted when they felt they should have been, or they had contributed something and then it got cut from the product, something like that in most cases. Now didn't feel they owed the company anything. Yet others said the…

> or didn't get promoted when they felt they should have been, or they had contributed something and then it got cut from the product, something like that in most cases

Can definitely speak to these cases - especially where you do great work and have a narrative that it was unappreciated - and clearly see lesser performing or less impressive colleagues getting ahead. For a lot of people, it takes only a few instances of this to switch to "I'll do the bare minimum not to get fired - why sacrifice much of my life and mental energy for this?"

I've been there a few times, and to speak to your point: I decided that instead of being a dead weight I should just look for another job where I don't feel this way. I can say that amongst my peers, that behavior is an exception. Most people who become deadweights will remain that way. It's work to find a new job, and you may have to move, etc. Amusingly enough, Leetcode style interviews are effective at ensuring deadweights remain so.

Re: 'Too many employees, but few work': Pichai, Zuckerberg sound the alarm

#403

Post by onion2k » Wed, Aug 10, 2022, 7:57 PM UTC

colechristensen wrote: post #304

codegeek wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Nobody wants to spend their life being dead weight." I disagree. There are plenty of people who would love to be dead weight just to float around in a company. The larger the team/company, the more chances of those people being around. They pretend to be always busy and doing something but don't actually get anything done. Seen it all for 18+ years. Having said that, there are plenty of people as well who would LOVE…

If somebody wants to pay me $300k to work 4 hours a week, I'll happily take the deal. As long as that's the actual acknowledged situation and not "most of your job is pretending to work and making people think you're important". I wonder how successful a lot of companies would be if they openly cut required hours in half.

If somebody wants to pay me $300k to work 4 hours a week, I'll happily take the deal.

Would you take that over $300k to work 40 hours doing something you actually care about? I don't think I would.

Re: 'Too many employees, but few work': Pichai, Zuckerberg sound the alarm

#404

Post by lmeyerov » Wed, Aug 10, 2022, 7:58 PM UTC

onlyrealcuzzo wrote: post #211

bobobob420 wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is exactly the mindset of failure. The team standup has 10x more priority than some dumb basketball league

Agree to disagree. A team standup has close to no value. Having a high quality of life has a lot of value (including increased work productivity). As the California Milk Campaign went - happy cows make quality cheese, and happy workers make quality work... Again - one can be moved, the other cannot.

If team happiness comes from basketball, that's (probably) not the team driving revenue. I've mostly only seen that tied to results in professional basketball teams.

(Not to hate on balls: it was great playing volleyball in grad school. After 5pm. A couple of $B companies came out of that group.)

Re: 'Too many employees, but few work': Pichai, Zuckerberg sound the alarm

#405

Post by nr2x » Wed, Aug 10, 2022, 7:58 PM UTC

refulgentis wrote: post #373

colechristensen wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If somebody wants to pay me $300k to work 4 hours a week, I'll happily take the deal. As long as that's the actual acknowledged situation and not "most of your job is pretending to work and making people think you're important". I wonder how successful a lot of companies would be if they openly cut required hours in half.

At a FAANG and I can tell you it's not nearly so positive as this. It was shocking coming from startup world. It's not so much "gee I only have 4 hours of work to do this week" It's...well, it's impossible to say how long it takes to do anything in particular, so I shouldn't feel stressed trying to get it done... oh there's actually no real management style/pressure to get things done here? Promo is seniority-based?…

I don’t see how giving an up-leveled employee time to adjust to a new responsibility scope is a bad thing.

Working under conditions of pressure and stress provides few long term benefits and is the refuge of those who don’t have the smarts to perform well and need to look like they do.

Re: 'Too many employees, but few work': Pichai, Zuckerberg sound the alarm

#406

Post by chasebank » Wed, Aug 10, 2022, 7:59 PM UTC

outworlder wrote: post #330

codegeek wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Nobody wants to spend their life being dead weight." I disagree. There are plenty of people who would love to be dead weight just to float around in a company. The larger the team/company, the more chances of those people being around. They pretend to be always busy and doing something but don't actually get anything done. Seen it all for 18+ years. Having said that, there are plenty of people as well who would LOVE…

> There are plenty of people who would love to be dead weight just to float around in a company Not really. Even they will carve out some niche and pretend (even to themselves) to be doing useful work. Middle managers love to schedule irrelevant meetings, but they will provide some business justification to themselves and to others. You'll find the odd developer that's maintaining some internal app by themselves. It'…

I probably know north of 30 people in sales, all in my somewhat close friend circle. They all brag about not working and making money. I think it's part of the sales culture. It's like a badge of honor to not work hard and make money. Hell, I don't blame them. Visit any golf course since covid and you'll see tee time and tee time stacked with people 'working from home'.

Re: 'Too many employees, but few work': Pichai, Zuckerberg sound the alarm

#407

Post by mortenjorck » Wed, Aug 10, 2022, 7:59 PM UTC

codegeek wrote: post #287

fefe23 wrote: post #245

As a consultant, I come around a bit. I have seen many companies with very poor productivity, and in zero of those cases was it laziness of the employees. In fact they usually would have loved to be more productive. Nobody wants to spend their life being dead weight. But as companies grow they install more and more rules and regulations that end up making sure nothing ever gets done. It is not unusual to meet "develo…

"Nobody wants to spend their life being dead weight." I disagree. There are plenty of people who would love to be dead weight just to float around in a company. The larger the team/company, the more chances of those people being around. They pretend to be always busy and doing something but don't actually get anything done. Seen it all for 18+ years. Having said that, there are plenty of people as well who would LOVE…

The two types you describe can also be the same person at different times.

At my last company, my workload started to thin out considerably. Initially, it was pretty great having so much free time, even as I made my extra bandwidth clear to my manager (while being careful not to overstate the case!). There was a period of novelty to coasting, but after a few months, it began to wear off.

My ideal workload may not be being plugged in a full 40+ hours a week, but I learned I also need something far north of 4 hours a week. When a combination acquisition and spinoff took even more off my plate, it looked like I'd have months ahead of very nearly nothing at all. With a promise of no layoffs post-transaction, it looked like a coaster's dream.

Instead, I left.

Re: 'Too many employees, but few work': Pichai, Zuckerberg sound the alarm

#408

Post by e40 » Wed, Aug 10, 2022, 8:00 PM UTC

codegeek wrote: post #287

fefe23 wrote: post #245

As a consultant, I come around a bit. I have seen many companies with very poor productivity, and in zero of those cases was it laziness of the employees. In fact they usually would have loved to be more productive. Nobody wants to spend their life being dead weight. But as companies grow they install more and more rules and regulations that end up making sure nothing ever gets done. It is not unusual to meet "develo…

"Nobody wants to spend their life being dead weight." I disagree. There are plenty of people who would love to be dead weight just to float around in a company. The larger the team/company, the more chances of those people being around. They pretend to be always busy and doing something but don't actually get anything done. Seen it all for 18+ years. Having said that, there are plenty of people as well who would LOVE…

I think it varies widely by job. I've met few programmers, percentages wise, that want to be dead weight. At generic office jobs (where my SO works) it seems to be the norm, and it's a problem for her because she's not like that and people load her up with work because they know it will be done right and on time.

Re: 'Too many employees, but few work': Pichai, Zuckerberg sound the alarm

#409

Post by colinmhayes » Wed, Aug 10, 2022, 8:00 PM UTC

bastardoperator wrote: post #180

I'm reading this as "Executive leadership makes hiring and planning mistakes and punishes employees opposed to taking personal responsibility" Also, I block everything Facebook at the router level with unbound.

Mistake is a big word here. Maybe they figured the pandemic would provide the company opportunities it hadn’t foreseen and in order to be the first to capitalize they need to hire 30,000 people. Now those extra employees aren’t necessary, but that doesn’t mean they didn’t provide value earlier. I guess it’s a bit rude to hire someone knowing that their position will be eliminated in a few years, but that doesn’t make it a mistake, just ruthless.

Re: 'Too many employees, but few work': Pichai, Zuckerberg sound the alarm

#410

Post by colechristensen » Wed, Aug 10, 2022, 8:02 PM UTC

onion2k wrote: post #403

colechristensen wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If somebody wants to pay me $300k to work 4 hours a week, I'll happily take the deal. As long as that's the actual acknowledged situation and not "most of your job is pretending to work and making people think you're important". I wonder how successful a lot of companies would be if they openly cut required hours in half.

If somebody wants to pay me $300k to work 4 hours a week, I'll happily take the deal. Would you take that over $300k to work 40 hours doing something you actually care about? I don't think I would.

I am more than capable of finding other things I value to do with my time. Not everyone is that way, especially when peoples lives are set up from a very young age to "work" for a third of the hours in their life.