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Why top firms fire good workers

rochester.edu

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Re: Why top firms fire good workers

#161

Post by mlrtime »

palmotea wrote: post #70
Denote6737 wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tech attracts the radical independent types.

> Tech attracts the radical independent types. No. I think it's a combination of: 1) HN being associated with a startup incubator, and thus attracting a large contingent of people who see themselves as the boss doing this, not the workers affected; 2) tech attracts a certain kind of gullible person who's easily seduced by tidy little systems like the pop-capitalism of libertarian tracts; and 3) tech workers (until re…

>tech attracts a certain kind of gullible person

This is incredibly condescending. This is exactly the type of elitism speak that tells people how to vote because they know whats better for them.

Re: Why top firms fire good workers

#162

Post by mlrtime »

vincnetas wrote: post #106
ChadNauseam wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tech people would obviously be well served by being in the union. If you make a cartel with other people who can do the same job as you, and you don't profit from that, you're doing something terribly wrong. The reason I'm opposed to it isn't because it wouldn't be good for tech people. I'm opposed to it because in general I think it would be more bad for everyone else than it would be good for tech people. I expect…

why do you think maximising profit for company is ok and everyone is cheering about that, but when employee tries to maximise profit then "oh noes the society will collapse "

What? I try to negotiate maximum profit every time I apply for a new job, don't you?

Re: Why top firms fire good workers

#163

Post by mlrtime »

baq wrote: post #114
lynx97 wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your point 2 is such a condescending take. I read it as: "Everyone who does not think the same way as I do is gullible and has been seduced, because I am obviously right and they must be weak." This kind behaviour convinces me even more that I dont really trust union people.

If you felt personally attacked you’ve let your biases win over rational thought. Tech obviously does attract libertarians (see bitcoin maxis for a single example of a significant cohort). Libertarianism is also blind towards the obvious failure mode of an organized group overpowering the egoistic as a virtue libertarians. (Think barbarians… or HR.)

Ironic considering that tech attracts people with rational thought and less emotional decision making. Is it surprising that I can be rational and not naive?

bad take.

Re: Why top firms fire good workers

#164

Post by mlrtime »

baq wrote: post #115
namlem wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unions often end up decreasing productivity due to added bureaucracy, leading to ultimately worse compensation in the long run.

Let’s talk about how HR increases productivity

Unions remove the need for HR?

Re: Why top firms fire good workers

#165

Post by mlrtime »

ameliaquining wrote: post #13
mcoliver wrote: post #4

No. The reason top firms part ways with good workers is usually political. Either the manager doesn't like the person regardless of their work abilities, or the manager is not politely savvy enough to ensure their team is being recognized for work that grows or is valuable to the business. Or they get caught up in the endlessly popular reorgs (again management failure). It's a failure of management. Nothing more. Not…

You're thinking of a different kind of company than the paper is talking about. (The headline, presumably written by the university's PR team, is a bit misleading about this.) The paper is about a certain kind of firm (e.g., the Big Four accounting firms, management consultancies like McKinsey, some elite law firms) that explicitly uses an "up or out" model, and explains why this kind of firm's business model (in par…

I don't think anyone here is actually reading the paper. The conversation is all about Tech workers and unions. At least thats the way I'm reading these comments as of now.

Re: Why top firms fire good workers

#166

Post by mlrtime »

kamaal wrote: post #107
mcoliver wrote: post #4

No. The reason top firms part ways with good workers is usually political. Either the manager doesn't like the person regardless of their work abilities, or the manager is not politely savvy enough to ensure their team is being recognized for work that grows or is valuable to the business. Or they get caught up in the endlessly popular reorgs (again management failure). It's a failure of management. Nothing more. Not…

>>the manager is not politely savvy enough to ensure their team is being recognized for work that grows or is valuable to the business. Actually in most companies, no ones watching whats happening, no ones watching who performs, who slacks, or anything for that matter. Companies are basically a kind of a loosely assembled random crowd, where no one cares a thing about anything. In this kind of a set up both hardwork…

Sorry you've only worked in places like that. There are places where very smart people doing work that nobody in the company can do and they are well aware and rewarded for it.

Re: Why top firms fire good workers

#167

Post by mlrtime »

komali2 wrote: post #45
inetknght wrote: post #6

How to tell that some "researchers" spent too much time in economics classes and not enough time in ethics classes: they publish stuff like this (source [0]). [0]: https://www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=10.1257/aer.20200169

Exactly. > In short, the “up-or-out” path of professional life may not just be a cultural phenomenon among top professional service firms but also an efficient response to how reputation is maintained and information flows. What looks like a ruthless system of constant turnover, the researchers argue, is in reality a finely tuned mechanism that helps the market discover and reward true talent. For people who are fans…

Calling something a cult should have its own godwin law.

I don't think you'll find any "fans" of a up-or-out system, but you will find people who will gravitate towards it because the 'up' part of it can be extremely lucrative. Not everyone can make it, but people will try and I think that is good.

Re: Why top firms fire good workers

#168

Post by anal_reactor »

tasuki wrote: post #143
anal_reactor wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that as you go further up in hierarchy, people by definition have less specialized, and more general knowledge. This means that there are things that lower-level employee understands but their manager doesn't. This in turn means that it's impossible for the manager to tell whether the employee is doing a good or a bad job because the manager simply doesn't understand the details of the job. This is ope…

Cynical! (and probably true too) I work for a small company (~10 people), solving reasonably interesting problems, earn peanuts, and am happier than I was at big tech.

If I get kicked out from big tech I might search for such a place, but for the time being, I am in a position where I get paid to do nothing, it's literally free money. My plan A is to keep doing same nothing until retirement (about 15 years). Plan B is not to have plan B and just look at the job market when I need to switch, because it's utterly unpredictable long-term.

Re: Why top firms fire good workers

#169

Post by imtringued »

renewiltord wrote: post #102
SanjayMehta wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes and no. The real cause of our dysfunctional system is the debris of nehruvian socialism (he was a covert communist masking himself as a Fabian socialist). He didn't reform the British divide and control mechanisms but continued them and in fact made them worse. If you think your bureaucracy is bad, wait till you see ours. These are "one exam wonders." They clear one exam, and with zero life experience at the age…

The one great commonality I've noticed about California Democrats and Online Indians is that each region's problems seem exclusively the fault of some long dead fellow. Apparently this Nehru chap has been dead for 60 years. In fact, India has only been a country for 80 years so he's been dead for most of the time India has been around. Likewise with Ronald Reagan. Supposedly he's responsible for all the woes of Calif…

I don't know if this source is biased [0], but Nehru sounds refreshingly pragmatic and does not come across as a burden to India and his "socialism" is different from the standard US boogieman socialism or Soviet socialism that you could hardly argue that India was ever on the path towards communism. At some point it's just a kneejerk reaction to the word "socialism".

[0] https://www.thehindu.com/society/nehrus-socialism-was-evolut...

Re: Why top firms fire good workers

#170

Post by triceratops »

mlrtime wrote: post #153
baq wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most everyone is a temporarily embarrassed unicorn founder around here.

This is such a cynical unoriginal take. No, I don't care about being in a unicorn and I'm not a embarrassed billionaire. But I don't idolize unions either. I don't want to be paid the same as all other workers with the same title, I like getting personal bonuses based on performance. I don't want to be in a union.

> I don't want to be paid the same as all other workers with the same title

That's not what unions do.

> I like getting personal bonuses based on performance

A union doesn't prevent that.

Film and TV actors, and professional athletes are in unions. They are not all paid the same. They get lavish bonuses based on performance.

Retail and fast food workers are usually not in unions. They don't make much money.

A union can't increase wages (much) and it doesn't decrease wages. Only supply and demand can do that.

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