Layoffs Don't Work • Hacker News Board

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#731

Post by milesrout » Mon, Mar 10, 2025, 7:35 PM UTC

snapcaster wrote: post #680

milesrout wrote: post #671

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The labour theory of value that you allude to here makes no sense. People are paid at the market price based on supply and demand, just like other goods and services. Tech employees don't "bring in" the company's revenue. That makes the mistake of attributing the products and services of a business to its workers. >wages haven't tracked productivity growth since the 1970s. Propaganda. Productivity growth literally is…

>Productivity growth literally is just wage growth, by definition. It is impossible for them not to track each other. I don't understand what you mean by this. If i own a business, and employee productivity increases but i don't increase wages doesn't that disprove your statement?

Productivity as a macroeconomic measure (which is what is being discussed here) is just a measure of wages.

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#732

Post by johnnyanmac » Mon, Mar 10, 2025, 7:36 PM UTC

ltbarcly3 wrote: post #658

johnnyanmac wrote: post #644

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"claim" kills? Isn't part of the HR screening about some litmus test to make sure they aren't very obviously lying? And yes, this is part of why the obsession with FAANG on resume is very overrated. Very few companies require the skillsete FAANG needs. Some of thst FAANG culture is orthogonal to what medium/small sized companies require.

I don't think you read the thread. They did have those jobs, and presumably they were on teams that did vaguely what is on their resume. No HR doesn't investigate candidates or do background checks before you interview them, that would be very expensive and silly. I feel like you kind of vaguely are aware of these topics but have never actually had a job or something because you seem completely unfamiliar with the ba…

Quite the opposite (and sadly, still. American). I'm just so frustrated how I'm 10 years into this career and the interview process feels more random than ever. I can apply to 100 job and interview for 10 that all fall through. Then I can just go to a bar and trip into an opportunity I wasn't fully expecting. What does that say about the interview process?

>No HR doesn't investigate candidates or do background checks before you interview

An HR screen isn't a background check. It's "can you talk about your roles and provlems solved like you actually did it. A good HR screen should make sure they aren't blatantly lying

>that would be very expensive and silly.

Let's both not pretend the interview proces is in any way optimized for any metric. You have often non-tech roles create a description for a tech role (leading to famous blunders like "have and jave script is the same") . You have an increasing amount of rounds of interviews to go through for a job that may not exist or may already be reserved. And more and more of the parts are being outsourced, leading to power quality candidates. All that before throwing a reckless reliance of AI on everything.

The most optimal hiring is to focus on high quality hires brought in as fast as possible. Or not to hire if you don't need to hire. But we're not really running on sensible business practices these days.

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#733

Post by bbqfog » Mon, Mar 10, 2025, 7:59 PM UTC

guappa wrote: post #719

bbqfog wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a persistent myth in our industry. If you're a good manager, you can tell within minutes if someone is "for real", if you can't, you aren't qualified to be hiring people. Have you even looked at their GitHub?

> Have you even looked at their GitHub? Lol, considering most big projects are not on github, you're just showing your own lack of clue.

Great, I'll continue my "lack of a clue" and keep hiring the best engineers in the world.

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#734

Post by culi » Mon, Mar 10, 2025, 8:10 PM UTC

conductr wrote: post #440

culi wrote: post #426

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article cited actual statistics and data comparing companies that enacted layoffs vs those that didn't. It showed very clear evidence, even within the same industry, that those that enacted layoffs fared MUCH worse Also many of these layoffs are NOT coming when companies are "bleeding revenue". E.g. Meta and Twitter enacted massive layoffs after posting their most profitable quarters yet

That’s what should be expected. A company in a stronger position can more confidently avoid laying off people and “ride out” the painful market conditions. Not every company’s revenue is composed of similar risk items even within similar industries. Some companies are already knee deep in some new strategy and need everyone on board to roll it out. The other company is just a bunch of variable labor that can be culle…

Okay but you are saying the exact opposite of what the comment I replied to is saying.

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#735

Post by TZubiri » Mon, Mar 10, 2025, 8:19 PM UTC

yodsanklai wrote: post #677

TZubiri wrote: post #486

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>This happens not to reduce cost but to stress out remaining employees. Or to cull the low performers. I personally am less stressed when the competition I outperform gets fired.

In my team, two people who got laid off as "low performers" weren't. One was very good but had a bad luck with a very bad project / manager the previous half. The other picked the wrong topic to work on and they weren't well rewarded. The low performers are usually managed out anyway. The last lay off phase was quite arbitrary. Also note that high performers often do get promoted, and may become low performers at the…

Collateral damage. I'm fine with that.

If there's an interview for a position and the candidate is 30 minutes late or no shows, maybe there is a legitimate excuse and it's a rare event, but the system is that both parties give up on that relationship to damage candidates that do that constantly.

Just look for another job and in the long run you'll be successful. Variance is part of life.

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#736

Post by giantg2 » Mon, Mar 10, 2025, 8:57 PM UTC

snapcaster wrote: post #679

giantg2 wrote: post #493

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep. The subliminal message I'm getting from my current managers is that I should just be a good little disabled person and work as a Walmart greeter. It's turning into harassment at this point. Just all sorts of BS. Like telling me they are doing so much for me, when my ADA accommodation is weekly 1-on-1s with the manager and my tech lead. Is that really a lot? There are people without disabilities getting weekly 1-…

At my current job, in the manager training we were told "you should have weekly 1:1 with your direct reports" and i thought "who the fuck needs to be told that?". This is an illuminating comment, seems absurd to me

I had only 2-3 1-on-1s over the course of about 5 months last year. But nobody will hold the manager accountable.

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#737

Post by giantg2 » Mon, Mar 10, 2025, 9:03 PM UTC

nickd2001 wrote: post #710

giantg2 wrote: post #493

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep. The subliminal message I'm getting from my current managers is that I should just be a good little disabled person and work as a Walmart greeter. It's turning into harassment at this point. Just all sorts of BS. Like telling me they are doing so much for me, when my ADA accommodation is weekly 1-on-1s with the manager and my tech lead. Is that really a lot? There are people without disabilities getting weekly 1-…

Such a subliminal message might be "constructive dismissal" and against disability legislation. With a good lawyer you might get a decent result if they ever did fire you? On the plus side, the fact they haven't fired you means either (a) they do actually value you performance even if they're claiming otherwise (perhaps to avoid paying more) or (b) they'd quite like to fire you but fear being sued big time if they di…

Off and on they've been threatening me with a PIP for the past year, but haven't actually triggered one. I did talk to a lawyer. They said there's not much I can do until they terminate me, or risk losing the job. They could help me respond to a PIP when they PIP me. But even if the company terminates me, the lawyer said they are inclined to negotiate higher severance than going to court because it's tricky to prove that any bias or singled out treatment was because of the disability and not something else. Although I do have notes of my manager saying requesting accommodations might have hurt me and that my department head is targeting me for some reason.

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#738

Post by grandempire » Mon, Mar 10, 2025, 10:21 PM UTC

Dylan16807 wrote: post #729

grandempire wrote: post #728

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True, let’s simplify. The people who have a say are higher up managers who have been granted that power by the owners.

Are we discarding the analogy then? Okay. The owner has a bunch of space and equipment they can grant power over, but that's only half a company. They don't naturally start with power over the employees.

> Are we discarding the analogy then

It’s not an analogy. It’s another example of ownership in another context.

Employee’s authority over something owned by another party is delegated by that party and varies according to the trust from that management.

Employees do not own goods or services they have produced and sold. And do not continue to have authority or rights to them.

> They don't naturally start with power over the employees.

Indeed. What they have power over is what their employees do while the employee chooses to rent their time to them.

The details of this are defined in the employment contract. Which tends not to include voting rights in regards to the owner’s property.

If you seek voting rights, you should negotiate that as part of your employment - or don’t agree to it. Many white collar employees receive this in the form of stock.

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#739

Post by cutemonster » Mon, Mar 10, 2025, 10:49 PM UTC

roenxi wrote: post #60

trescenzi wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn’t how all layoffs work though. Some, yes they are due to over hiring and a failure of management to plan. They are likely necessary for survival of the firm and generally last course of action. Although even those come with a cost to current and departing employees which harms the business. But the ones being discussed in the article are the consistent ones. The ones you do while you’re ahead to make your ba…

> But the ones being discussed in the article are the consistent ones. The ones you do while you’re ahead to make your balance sheet look better. That has to be matched with a strategy of intentional overhiring though, and the damage is being done there. That is the insight that should be drawn from the research - intentionally doing something silly (in this case, overhiring) is a classic form of waste and economical…

> That has to be matched with a strategy of intentional overhiring though, and the damage is being done there

No, doesn't have to. Looking at the article, sometimes they had hired the right number of people, but (new?) management decided to let people go because that looked better short term (saved money, higher profits), but was bad long term.

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#740

Post by suzzer99 » Mon, Mar 10, 2025, 10:56 PM UTC

milesrout wrote: post #730

kelnos wrote: post #711

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is no such thing as what minimum wage should be "fairly". Sure there is. It's the amount you have to pay someone such that they can work a reasonable amount of hours (40/week), such that they can afford all of life's essentials while having a little extra to save for a rainy day, as well as have a little fun. But certainly some people's poilitics ignore the human aspects of the world we live in, and think tha…

What are life's essentials? Do you have the right to a car? To one bedroom per child or should they share? Do you have the right to central heating so you can wear a tshirt indoors or should you be expected to wear a jersey in winter? The minimum wage doesn't make anyone be paid more. It only causes anyone paid less than it to instead be paid $0, and instead be paid an unemployment benefit. How is that reasonable?

A higher minimum wage puts upward pressure on wages at the lower end of the scale, which helps the working class so that they aren't working and on medicare, section 8, food stamps etc. - as many Wal-mart workers currently are. That saves us money in the long run.

When Seattle raised the minimum wage to $15/hour, everyone screamed it would lead to mass unemployment. That never happen. Suddenly the lower class had more money to spend, which boosted the economy as much or more than higher wages hurt bottom lines.