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

Cloudflare Termination Video: A Master Class in How Not to Terminate Someone

inc.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

111–120 of 201 posts

Re: Cloudflare Termination Video: A Master Class in How Not to Terminate Someone

#111

Post by spacemadness »

paul7986 wrote: post #100
barbazoo wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> as that can tank a person's entire career trajectory Plus the act of career suicide by publishing company meeting recordings on social media.

That depends I think on the demographic hiring her as the TikTok generation as you can see are all on her side (older generation might view her as young/inexperienced/whiny to entitled brat). It might be a good PR stunt to hire her and thus look good in the eyes of possibly the millions who commented in her favor. As well after Covid things are different like people don't and don't want to work as hard as they use to…

Or looked at another way, employers value workers time even less and people notice.

Re: Cloudflare Termination Video: A Master Class in How Not to Terminate Someone

#112

Post by pentagrama »

barbazoo wrote: post #89
JustLurking2022 wrote: post #78

Saw a variation of this during the recent bout of tech layoffs. Shortly before end of year eval time, a senior executive sent out emails questioning whether it was even possible for new hires to have made sufficient impact and suggesting they should consequently be given a poor rating as the default. It's amazing that leaders at these companies which, for years, acted as though they had all the answers and were more…

> as that can tank a person's entire career trajectory Plus the act of career suicide by publishing company meeting recordings on social media.

There is almost no perception that the company acted professionally. So she came out as a person who can stand up for herself.

Re: Cloudflare Termination Video: A Master Class in How Not to Terminate Someone

#113

Post by [deleted] »

greatgib wrote: post #40

This video also give us an example of a trend of recent years that is really awful: In very short cycles, going on a hire spree and then redundancies plans without real consequences for the management or companies. Basically it costs them almost nothing to mess with people's lives. For example, when doing unreasonable mass hiring, the market goes up, because it is a sign of growth. Then, when firing people in mass, t…

[deleted]

Re: Cloudflare Termination Video: A Master Class in How Not to Terminate Someone

#114

Post by NoImmatureAdHom »

The language really gets me. Maybe (happily) I've been out of corporate America for too long to get it...

"...part ways with you..." --> "We've decided to fire you."

"...Rosie might be better to explain the process of who's giving this information..." --> "Rosie can talk about why it's us vs. your manager."

"...this is a collective calibration for Cloudflare..." --> what the fuck?

"...if you can respect that. We can totally respect that..." --> at a loss

"...meet the expectations that you're communicating to us..." --> "...tell you what you want to know..."

"...give you the data that was calibrated..." --> ...how do you calibrate data? FFS.

"...extremely traumatizing for people..." --> ha ha ha...goddamn snowflake. You're getting fired, it's not fun, but it's not like watching your buddies get blown up in front of you and waking up in bed screaming for the next forty years.

"...I cannot speak to what your manager has communicated to you directly..." --> "I don't know what your manager said"

"...I hear you and what you're saying..." --> "I understand"

"...from a process perspective, your questions are valid but this isn't going to be the forum and situation where..." --> "We aren't going to have that conversation with you now"

"...I don't think there's anything we can say in this moment and today..." --> "Sorry"

In particular, what's up with the duplication? "this moment & today", etc.? I hear it from people with a low bureaucratic position a lot. Think firefighter making an announcement, HR drone, etc.

Re: Cloudflare Termination Video: A Master Class in How Not to Terminate Someone

#115

Post by theodric »

barbazoo wrote: post #89
JustLurking2022 wrote: post #78

Saw a variation of this during the recent bout of tech layoffs. Shortly before end of year eval time, a senior executive sent out emails questioning whether it was even possible for new hires to have made sufficient impact and suggesting they should consequently be given a poor rating as the default. It's amazing that leaders at these companies which, for years, acted as though they had all the answers and were more…

> as that can tank a person's entire career trajectory Plus the act of career suicide by publishing company meeting recordings on social media.

If I were still in the business, and someone posted a video of me fucking up this badly as a manager, I'd be embarrassed, but I wouldn't hold it against them; rather, I'd try to fuck up less badly in the future.

She seems like a good hire: -smells bullshit -calls it out -articulate throughout -keeps cool, even while being fired, and while clearly (successfully) fighting back her emotions -defends her position, and doesn't back down when weak and unsatisfactory answers are provided

I can't comment on the quality of her work, but she seems tenacious and put together. She'd have done very well in the bank I worked at last. I hope she's swamped with offers from better companies.

Re: Cloudflare Termination Video: A Master Class in How Not to Terminate Someone

#116

Post by FireBeyond »

pandaman wrote: post #110
JustLurking2022 wrote: post #78

Saw a variation of this during the recent bout of tech layoffs. Shortly before end of year eval time, a senior executive sent out emails questioning whether it was even possible for new hires to have made sufficient impact and suggesting they should consequently be given a poor rating as the default. It's amazing that leaders at these companies which, for years, acted as though they had all the answers and were more…

>I'm honestly curious how CloudFlare will handle reference checks for these people Just like every other company: confirm the start date, the end date, and the job title. Nobody in their sane mind will give anything else.

I'd say that a very large portion of companies also ask, and answer, the question, "Is the person eligible for re-hire?"

Re: Cloudflare Termination Video: A Master Class in How Not to Terminate Someone

#117

Post by FireBeyond »

abadpoli wrote: post #107
barbazoo wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> as that can tank a person's entire career trajectory Plus the act of career suicide by publishing company meeting recordings on social media.

I think it’s interesting how subjective this can apparently be. What I saw in the video was someone standing up for themselves and fighting against perceived wrongdoing in an articulate way. That’s exactly the type of person I want on my team. I’d hire them in a heartbeat. Recording and posting company videos is bad in the general sense, but not in this case. There’s nothing sensitive or confidential in the video tha…

> What I saw in the video was someone standing up for themselves and fighting against perceived wrongdoing in an articulate way. That’s exactly the type of person I want on my team. I’d hire them in a heartbeat.

Initially. But then they respond by saying that they are willing to follow up with her separately with the answers to her questions, but they don't have them there and then. Not having them there and then is a failing on their part, absolutely. But she won't let go. "How was my performance bad?" repeatedly. At some point in the video it goes from someone having a legitimate grievance to someone just trying to make a point and not listening to feedback or responses.

Re: Cloudflare Termination Video: A Master Class in How Not to Terminate Someone

#118

Post by omnimus »

abadpoli wrote: post #107
barbazoo wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> as that can tank a person's entire career trajectory Plus the act of career suicide by publishing company meeting recordings on social media.

I think it’s interesting how subjective this can apparently be. What I saw in the video was someone standing up for themselves and fighting against perceived wrongdoing in an articulate way. That’s exactly the type of person I want on my team. I’d hire them in a heartbeat. Recording and posting company videos is bad in the general sense, but not in this case. There’s nothing sensitive or confidential in the video tha…

You might want to hire this person but the question is if your boss would want them. There is a high chace they wouldn’t want to hire specifically this disobedient person.

Re: Cloudflare Termination Video: A Master Class in How Not to Terminate Someone

#119

Post by theodric »

paul7986 wrote: post #100
barbazoo wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> as that can tank a person's entire career trajectory Plus the act of career suicide by publishing company meeting recordings on social media.

That depends I think on the demographic hiring her as the TikTok generation as you can see are all on her side (older generation might view her as young/inexperienced/whiny to entitled brat). It might be a good PR stunt to hire her and thus look good in the eyes of possibly the millions who commented in her favor. As well after Covid things are different like people don't and don't want to work as hard as they use to…

> Some will cuss you out in a nice way for you making them do their job close to closing hours.

Try asking a Swiss man in his late 50s/early 60s at a Swiss bank to do a medium-sized but achievable task at 15:00 on a Friday and see what kind of response you get. I had several under me, so I know firsthand that you'll likely get grumbling and pushback. You'll probably get the work product, but it will come with critical commentary.

Re: Cloudflare Termination Video: A Master Class in How Not to Terminate Someone

#120

Post by pythonaut_16 »

A_D_E_P_T wrote: post #27
JazCE wrote: post #23

You can also see a comment from Matthew Prince on this video: https://twitter.com/eastdakota/status/1745697840180191501?t=... Edit: Also discussed here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38969065

> "W-we actually didn't fire that many people." > "I-it could be that she didn't actually listen to the feedback, guys. What if she had bad feedback?!" (Implying, without evidence, that the employee is at fault. The most tone-deaf part of his response.) > "Maybe she'd be a star on another team!" (Pointless sports analogy. Another tone-deaf moment.) > "W-we'll do better next time." An embarrassing display.

Editorializing this with an implied stutter really detracts from the points you're trying to make.
Post reply on HN