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Binance lays off over 1k Employees

wsj.com

31–40 of 234 posts

Re: Binance lays off over 1k Employees

#31
post #21

> Binance had a global staff of 8,000 A 12.5% reduction. Also, they are way larger than I thought with 8k employees. I don't know what's involved with running an exchange but they must be into lots of things with that many folks.

I don't know if I'm just naive, but I'm always confused when I see such a high headcount for companies with such simple tech, the staff of Twitter (even after mass layoffs) confuses me also. I feel like these companies are solving a relatively simple problem, and a single skilled engineer working full time could probably make and maintain a decent scalable solution.

True sign of the arrogant software engineer, believing they can single-handedly recreate an entire company just because they went to school in one subject for 4 years.

Re: Binance lays off over 1k Employees

#32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No offence, but that's usually how capitalism works, the least talented are the first to go - unless we're talking about Twitter and then it's about showing off at the office.

Never in any layoff I've been a part of, have the least talented workers been let go first. It's usually by category: contractors, age (early-retirement), department, or job description.

I've seen some layoffs and the first to go where the people the most "unproductive". So, there were sale people (which were actually pretty decent, but they "cost" money and had to go), and then there were also people who were just "less" good. Less senior, more junior and could not do things autonomously.

But I can agree that it's always very subjective and of course the one who is friend with the boss ABC will have more chance despite maybe performing less good...

Re: Binance lays off over 1k Employees

#33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No offence, but that's usually how capitalism works, the least talented are the first to go - unless we're talking about Twitter and then it's about showing off at the office.

Never in any layoff I've been a part of, have the least talented workers been let go first. It's usually by category: contractors, age (early-retirement), department, or job description.

This is the fundamental conceit of stack-ranking layoffs, which Microsoft did annually for many years.

Re: Binance lays off over 1k Employees

#34
post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

are they bashing people they laid off, assuming that 1k people were less talented than the rest?

No offence, but that's usually how capitalism works, the least talented are the first to go - unless we're talking about Twitter and then it's about showing off at the office.

In larger companies, for some values of “talented” that comprises non-technical factors like political acumen, yes. If the “talented” label is meant as a shorthand for some kind of meritocratic scale, then I have my doubts about that.

I’ve long since lost my astonishment at the revealed preferences in layoff selection criteria. It isn’t a complete Machiavellian free-for-all, but merit and fine-grained logic usually don’t prevail at the top of the criteria list in the trenches.

Re: Binance lays off over 1k Employees

#35

> Binance had a global staff of 8,000 A 12.5% reduction. Also, they are way larger than I thought with 8k employees. I don't know what's involved with running an exchange but they must be into lots of things with that many folks.

They have around 100M registered users, so approximately 1 employee for every 100k users seems reasonable.

Yes, totally. They probably have tons of support, sales, etc. I'd imagine they have tons of contractors too with that many users. Makes sense now.

Re: Binance lays off over 1k Employees

#36
post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know if I'm just naive, but I'm always confused when I see such a high headcount for companies with such simple tech, the staff of Twitter (even after mass layoffs) confuses me also. I feel like these companies are solving a relatively simple problem, and a single skilled engineer working full time could probably make and maintain a decent scalable solution.

True sign of the arrogant software engineer, believing they can single-handedly recreate an entire company just because they went to school in one subject for 4 years.

Such vitriol! It's safer to assume they're inexperienced than arrogant.

Re: Binance lays off over 1k Employees

#37
post #21

> Binance had a global staff of 8,000 A 12.5% reduction. Also, they are way larger than I thought with 8k employees. I don't know what's involved with running an exchange but they must be into lots of things with that many folks.

I don't know if I'm just naive, but I'm always confused when I see such a high headcount for companies with such simple tech, the staff of Twitter (even after mass layoffs) confuses me also. I feel like these companies are solving a relatively simple problem, and a single skilled engineer working full time could probably make and maintain a decent scalable solution.

I mean feel free to make the next Twitter with a single Engineer if you think it is possible.

Re: Binance lays off over 1k Employees

#39

> Binance had a global staff of 8,000 A 12.5% reduction. Also, they are way larger than I thought with 8k employees. I don't know what's involved with running an exchange but they must be into lots of things with that many folks.

They have around 100M registered users, so approximately 1 employee for every 100k users seems reasonable.

That figure seems implausibly high. 1 in 80 humans on Earth are not only participating in crypto but specifically have an account on Binance? It certainly cannot be the number of active users.

Re: Binance lays off over 1k Employees

#40
post #9

> It was not easy saying no to Super bowl ads, stadium naming rights, large sponsor deals a few months ago, but we did. Today, we are hiring for 2000 open positions for #Binance. https://twitter.com/cz_binance/status/1537013824666095617 Jun 2022, didn't age well.

> Jun 2022, didn't age well.

A public statement lasting a year in the Wild West that is crypto isn’t the worst.

Though that’s primarily due to the lowness of the bar.

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