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Patreon laying off 20% of staff

patreon.com

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Re: Patreon laying off 20% of staff

#161

Post by datadrivenangel »

the_sleaze_ wrote: post #131
ryandrake wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never understand these replies. Has nobody ever worked for a medium sized, yet global-reach company? I think a lot of HN has a very narrow view of how many different roles are required to run a company bigger than a local diner. Feels like a weird confirmation bias where “I only see a dozen engineers around me every day, therefore companies only need engineers to function.”

Hard disagree, the concrete evidence is that that can delete 20% of that bloated workforce and operate just fine. If we don't run a business then we're running a business of a single employee. You are your own employee with 100% concentration risk. All of your income depends on one employee (you) with 1 source of income. If you had a business with 1 single revenue stream, then you would really focus on the health of…

There's a lot of nice to have time and responsibility that an extra 20% of people get you.

Re: Patreon laying off 20% of staff

#162

Post by goatking »

xnx wrote: post #86
tamimio wrote: post #30

>it was a hard decision It wasn’t, I bet executives were laughing reading that

Getting rid of headcount was probably an easy choice, but picking how many and who stays can still be hard.

I am pretty sure they opened their excel sheet, ordered the employees by salary, and got rid of the highest paid 10% of each department. Or the lowest performing 10% based on a score in the excel.

They are just numbers to them

Re: Patreon laying off 20% of staff

#163

Post by ghostly_s »

ecocentrik wrote: post #130
nightski wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These posts seem more like emotional therapy for the founder, helping them cope. It's not about the people being let go at all.

You should really look into who Jack Conte is and why he created Patreon. He's a smart guy who relies heavily on maintaining a positive social image and is more emotionally aware and stable than most tech founders. I imagine from his perspective the decision, severance and post were all just the smart thing to do.

His name is Jack, and I would describe him as a deeply weird narcissist. You got the "relies heavily on maintaining a positive social image" part right.

Re: Patreon laying off 20% of staff

#164

Post by WarmWash »

chrisss395 wrote: post #103

I see others mentioning the severance package being decent for a US company. I'm glad they received something, but I'm sorry, can we stop calling this decent? It's markedly lopsided when a company can one day decide to lay off a large portion of their workforce and think 4 months is anywhere near acceptable. The average time to find a new job is significantly longer, especially depending on role and seniority. I'm ti…

If the executive team is stupid, and the company making bad decisions, you should be actively searching for a different job. I've never worked at a place where it was any secret when things were getting rough.

You're not a slave to your employer. You have all the same autonomy that they have. No one is forcing you to be there.

People are so hopelessly confused about what a business relationship is. They actually drink the kool-aid of "We're a family here". No, you're work is not your family, it's a business, treat it like one, because I can assure you that leadership does.

Re: Patreon laying off 20% of staff

#165

Post by Mezzie »

ricardobayes wrote: post #88
ab71e5 wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. I would be insulted if I was part of this layoff, brutal honesty would be much better

Not trying to be snarky, but how exactly? How would it help your mental health to be told "your work was borderline useless anyway and we needed to get rid of you to boost shareholder value. Goodbye!"

I prefer extremely direct communication because it signals respect to me.

Attempts at empathy in cases like this read to me as insulting, like how you'd speak to a toddler. I know you're lying, you know you're lying, and now I have to pretend like I don't know you're lying. It's one more indignity of status being used against me and demanding I play a part and accept the lie, primarily for their ego.

Whereas directness feels more equal to me.

Re: Patreon laying off 20% of staff

#167

Post by Barbing »

maxehmookau wrote: post #116

> First, the people who work at Patreon are special, beautiful humans, through and through. If you're calling me "special" and "beautiful" and removing my ability to pay my mortgage in the same sentence through no fault of my own, you can absolutely get in the bin. Fundamentally weird behaviour.

You could divorce a special and beautiful partner, and be making the right decision. A business decision that wrecks your life does not necessarily speak to any faults of your own.

  “It's not personal Sonny. It's strictly business!”
The CEO probably believes it, which would make the difference to me. I think I would skim that line but perhaps it would have a subconscious benefit. Feels more human than weird to me.

Re: Patreon laying off 20% of staff

#168

Post by hajile »

colechristensen wrote: post #59

>Creators are earning billions of dollars each year on Patreon, and those earnings have continued to exhibit steady, strong growth. >Creators, members, revenue, and processing volume continue to show strong, consistent growth every month. lol strong consistent growth -> 20% layoff

He sees what is coming. Crowd funding HAS to be dropping off as people choose between feeding their family or their favorite content creators (the creator will be fine as they have lots of other patrons is a guilt-free rationalization too).

Re: Patreon laying off 20% of staff

#169

Post by GlibMonkeyDeath »

Just going to lay this here: https://www.marketplace.org/story/2016/06/13/profit-ibm

IBM went seven decades without layoffs. Yes, part of that was the unique situation of post WWII America. But read TJ Watson Jr.'s words - they really took seriously the fact that they weren't just a business - they had a responsibility to people who worked for them. IBM went through a LOT of transformation in those seven decades BTW - they somehow found ways to re-deploy people in their growing business each time.

The words of this CEO are about as good as they can be under the circumstances, but all the happy talk about "special, beautiful humans" and "Patreon’s core business is healthy and strong" and "we’re not changing our roadmap or priorities" are obviously self-contradictory. Of course, if your business can't survive with its current headcount, it would be foolish to run it into the ground - then everyone loses. But this doesn't appear to be the case here.

He took a long time to get to the punch line: "AI has fundamentally transformed the tech industry, though, including how we work, how we build products, how we communicate, and more. That does have an impact on how we operate and organize."

So, there it is, finally. Management realized we can do the exact same thing with 20% fewer (more productive) employees. That means the shareholders (including the CEO and the remaining employees), will have a more valuable company. Sorry, we couldn't share this with the 20% we let go, who helped build the company to this point, and we can't even wait for our business to grow into our headcount, which if everything is so rosy, should be a matter of months. So good luck with the "my journey has come to an end, I am so grateful [to have been fired]..." LinkedIn posts!

Re: Patreon laying off 20% of staff

#170

Post by WarmWash »

ryandrake wrote: post #96
Ekaros wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Make me always question what is going on in these companies. They are essentially a middle man reoffering payment providers services. Host some content. Lot of time just links to external platforms. There is some marketing but not really that much. They really should be running sustainable service for like tenth of that many employees... If even that. Most of the people don't care about them just the creators on thei…

I never understand these replies. Has nobody ever worked for a medium sized, yet global-reach company? I think a lot of HN has a very narrow view of how many different roles are required to run a company bigger than a local diner. Feels like a weird confirmation bias where “I only see a dozen engineers around me every day, therefore companies only need engineers to function.”

Elon cut 80% of twitter staff and...well it's still there.

Every tech CEO was watching that closely, and it didn't come out in the workers favor.

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