Tech CEOs Should Be Held Accountable, or Even Fired, Amid Layoffs • Hacker News Board

Re: Tech CEOs Should Be Held Accountable, or Even Fired, Amid Layoffs

#21

Post by dangwhy » Mon, Feb 06, 2023, 3:56 PM UTC

throwaway2847 wrote: post #2

My company did a big round of layoffs and it was pretty revealing that not a single director or above were laid off. Despite reduced headcount, the org chart got DEEPER in some cases. For all the talk of bloat in the tech world, nobody wants to point fingers at directors who have little to do but schedule very expensive meetings with the directors under them.

Meta seems to be flattenning the org and mark has publicly clamied that he doesn't doesn't managers of managers and will lay them off next round.

Re: Tech CEOs Should Be Held Accountable, or Even Fired, Amid Layoffs

#22

Post by toomuchtodo » Mon, Feb 06, 2023, 3:58 PM UTC

mabbo wrote: post #20

The goal of the CEO of a publicly traded company is to make the shareholders money. As much money as possible. If laying people off is the best way to do that, they'll do it. Blaming the CEO for doing the job they were hired to do seems short-sighted. Blame the broken system that incentivizes this, that makes doing it profitable. And then, let's change the system.

> The goal of the CEO of a publicly traded company is to make the shareholders money. As much money as possible.

This is a poor take. The function of the CEO of a publicly traded company is to execute on major objectives of the firm. This might be optimizing for max profit, but it might not, depending on what your majority shareholders communicate to the board and management (as well as how they vote their shares).

Agree with the rest of your comment that you have to reach a better power equilibrium between labor, management, and shareholders (who should also be employees to some degree, aligning interests and all that jazz).

Re: Tech CEOs Should Be Held Accountable, or Even Fired, Amid Layoffs

#23

Post by legutierr » Mon, Feb 06, 2023, 3:58 PM UTC

When there is strong demand for a product, a company should hire more people so that it can keep up with demand. Likewise, a company should hire when it has short-term capital investment plans that require additional staffing. I don't think anyone would argue with that.

When demand decreases, or when a capital-intensive buildout is complete, would it be incorrect for the firm to decrease its staffing levels?

If leaders expect to be fired if employees are ever laid off, then they will avoid hiring in the first place—with the consequence that fewer opportunities will be pursued and fewer risks taken. Is that what we want?

Unemployment today in the US is less than 3.5%! It's good for workers—and good for the economy generally—that managers are willing to hire people they may need to fire later on if things don't work out. Otherwise, those jobs wouldn't even exist in the first place.

Re: Tech CEOs Should Be Held Accountable, or Even Fired, Amid Layoffs

#24

Post by watwut » Mon, Feb 06, 2023, 4:00 PM UTC

mabbo wrote: post #20

The goal of the CEO of a publicly traded company is to make the shareholders money. As much money as possible. If laying people off is the best way to do that, they'll do it. Blaming the CEO for doing the job they were hired to do seems short-sighted. Blame the broken system that incentivizes this, that makes doing it profitable. And then, let's change the system.

In most cases, mass layoff is result of unreasonable expansion or other mismanagement years prior.

Re: Tech CEOs Should Be Held Accountable, or Even Fired, Amid Layoffs

#25

Post by loeg » Mon, Feb 06, 2023, 4:02 PM UTC

mabbo wrote: post #20

The goal of the CEO of a publicly traded company is to make the shareholders money. As much money as possible. If laying people off is the best way to do that, they'll do it. Blaming the CEO for doing the job they were hired to do seems short-sighted. Blame the broken system that incentivizes this, that makes doing it profitable. And then, let's change the system.

I think the argument is that the CEOs could have made shareholders more money with the foresight to not overhire.

Re: Tech CEOs Should Be Held Accountable, or Even Fired, Amid Layoffs

#26

Post by coding123 » Mon, Feb 06, 2023, 4:03 PM UTC

toomuchtodo wrote: post #22

mabbo wrote: post #20

The goal of the CEO of a publicly traded company is to make the shareholders money. As much money as possible. If laying people off is the best way to do that, they'll do it. Blaming the CEO for doing the job they were hired to do seems short-sighted. Blame the broken system that incentivizes this, that makes doing it profitable. And then, let's change the system.

> The goal of the CEO of a publicly traded company is to make the shareholders money. As much money as possible. This is a poor take. The function of the CEO of a publicly traded company is to execute on major objectives of the firm. This might be optimizing for max profit, but it might not, depending on what your majority shareholders communicate to the board and management (as well as how they vote their shares). A…

This is actually much more correct. We also happen to be in an environment that will want most boards to slow and more carefully steer the ship. Layoffs often come with that.

Re: Tech CEOs Should Be Held Accountable, or Even Fired, Amid Layoffs

#27

Post by Chinjut » Mon, Feb 06, 2023, 4:03 PM UTC

mabbo wrote: post #20

The goal of the CEO of a publicly traded company is to make the shareholders money. As much money as possible. If laying people off is the best way to do that, they'll do it. Blaming the CEO for doing the job they were hired to do seems short-sighted. Blame the broken system that incentivizes this, that makes doing it profitable. And then, let's change the system.

What you are responding to is a proposal to change the system.

Re: Tech CEOs Should Be Held Accountable, or Even Fired, Amid Layoffs

#28

Post by izzydata » Mon, Feb 06, 2023, 4:03 PM UTC

mabbo wrote: post #20

The goal of the CEO of a publicly traded company is to make the shareholders money. As much money as possible. If laying people off is the best way to do that, they'll do it. Blaming the CEO for doing the job they were hired to do seems short-sighted. Blame the broken system that incentivizes this, that makes doing it profitable. And then, let's change the system.

I think their goal is to make money by guiding the company in the right direction. If your company needs to lay off a large portion of workers that seems to indicate they failed at something. Either they failed to correctly judge how many people were needed for future growth or they failed to predict the companies direction.

The board might not care about this though. Maybe they even intentionally put themselves in risky positions with too many employees because they see employees as easily disposable.

Re: Tech CEOs Should Be Held Accountable, or Even Fired, Amid Layoffs

#29

Post by Invictus0 » Mon, Feb 06, 2023, 4:04 PM UTC

toomuchtodo wrote: post #22

mabbo wrote: post #20

The goal of the CEO of a publicly traded company is to make the shareholders money. As much money as possible. If laying people off is the best way to do that, they'll do it. Blaming the CEO for doing the job they were hired to do seems short-sighted. Blame the broken system that incentivizes this, that makes doing it profitable. And then, let's change the system.

> The goal of the CEO of a publicly traded company is to make the shareholders money. As much money as possible. This is a poor take. The function of the CEO of a publicly traded company is to execute on major objectives of the firm. This might be optimizing for max profit, but it might not, depending on what your majority shareholders communicate to the board and management (as well as how they vote their shares). A…

[flagged]

Re: Tech CEOs Should Be Held Accountable, or Even Fired, Amid Layoffs

#30

Post by njovin » Mon, Feb 06, 2023, 4:06 PM UTC

toomuchtodo wrote: post #22

mabbo wrote: post #20

The goal of the CEO of a publicly traded company is to make the shareholders money. As much money as possible. If laying people off is the best way to do that, they'll do it. Blaming the CEO for doing the job they were hired to do seems short-sighted. Blame the broken system that incentivizes this, that makes doing it profitable. And then, let's change the system.

> The goal of the CEO of a publicly traded company is to make the shareholders money. As much money as possible. This is a poor take. The function of the CEO of a publicly traded company is to execute on major objectives of the firm. This might be optimizing for max profit, but it might not, depending on what your majority shareholders communicate to the board and management (as well as how they vote their shares). A…

I'd like to see a few recent examples of CEOs making decisions for the future health of the company that knowingly lower the stock price for more than 2Q.