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Patreon laying off 20% of staff

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Re: Patreon laying off 20% of staff

#171

Post by cartermatic »

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…

It's decent compared to the severance I just got for getting laid off: 2 weeks of pay and healthcare through the end of the month (at a tech company too)

Re: Patreon laying off 20% of staff

#172

Post by tayo42 »

IshKebab wrote: post #141
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…

> The average time to find a new job is significantly longer Is that really true? https://standout-cv.com/stats/how-long-does-it-take-to-get-a... They found 3.8 months which sounds realistic. I can't imagine the average being significantly longer (like 6+ months?).

It says senior engineer almost 8 months right in that article

Re: Patreon laying off 20% of staff

#173

Post by keiferski »

GlibMonkeyDeath wrote: post #169

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…

I think this is an uncharitable take, and judging by these comments, a pretty common one today on HN – probably because there are less and less founders posting here, and more bitter employees. Patreon isn't IBM, it's not even Google or Amazon. IBM was above even FAANG in its day, it was practically an extension of the US government for decades.

Patreon is in the media/content business. It is perfectly reasonable to think that they have to rethink their company structure with AI completely destroying/changing the way their industry works.

Re: Patreon laying off 20% of staff

#174

Post by [deleted] »

K0balt wrote: post #70
codegeek wrote: post #42

The only possible positive thing out of this cringy article is that the severance is decent (for a US company). 4 months of pay and healthcare coverage through Year end. Everything else could have just been a couple of sentences. Companies need to stop doing this melodrama every time they decide to fire people. Everyone knows the goal is to make money and keep a company profitable for their shareholders. Why these me…

It’s because, and I say this as a person who has made these calls, some leaders do feel a genuine responsibility for the people that work for them. Perhaps too, the ones that don’t, want people to think that they do. But as a founder and CEO by far the most emotionally taxing thing I have ever had to do is cut staff for the good of the company. You want to treat people the way you would want to be treated if you were…

[deleted]

Re: Patreon laying off 20% of staff

#175

Post by WarmWash »

dtech wrote: post #82
yonisto wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really don't get. Twitter used to have 7500 employees and now it is working perfectly ok with 1500~ What am I missing from business perspective?

Twitter had a lot of side projects and people that were not needed to run their core business. E.g. they used to have a Linux kernel engineering team [1]. They argued their value, but I was always a tad skeptical. Even if they earned their keep in terms of ROI, Twitter can definitely be run without kernel engineers. [1] https://danluu.com/in-house/

Ok now do the other 5990 employees.

Re: Patreon laying off 20% of staff

#176

Post by motbus3 »

apart from the fact they are trying to make it in the most possible human way, it feels like they did not need to do it, or at least not at this scale at this moment. everything feels kinda weird in this letter.

Re: Patreon laying off 20% of staff

#177

Post by whatever1 »

K0balt wrote: post #70
codegeek wrote: post #42

The only possible positive thing out of this cringy article is that the severance is decent (for a US company). 4 months of pay and healthcare coverage through Year end. Everything else could have just been a couple of sentences. Companies need to stop doing this melodrama every time they decide to fire people. Everyone knows the goal is to make money and keep a company profitable for their shareholders. Why these me…

It’s because, and I say this as a person who has made these calls, some leaders do feel a genuine responsibility for the people that work for them. Perhaps too, the ones that don’t, want people to think that they do. But as a founder and CEO by far the most emotionally taxing thing I have ever had to do is cut staff for the good of the company. You want to treat people the way you would want to be treated if you were…

Why a company has to survive but not its people?

For example when it comes to the IRS bill, the company will literally cease operations and sell all of its assets to pay IRS.

Why the employees do not deserve this?

Re: Patreon laying off 20% of staff

#178

Post by buellerbueller »

roenxi wrote: post #160
codegeek wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am a founder/CEO myself (a very small company so I don't have experience of mass layoffs for full disclosure). However, I don't get this explanation. If you feel genuine responsibility for the people, then figure out a way to NOT fire them. Or be honest and admit that the company needs to make more money/cut costs. Trust me, no one wants to hear "we love you so much but we have to fire you and I feel so bad". It ju…

The paradox can be resolved by assuming they are fallible and limited human beings - they're laying a bunch of people off, they understand at some level that this is evidence that their poor hiring and management decisions have caused some amount of unnecessary suffering, so they feel bad. But they aren't foresighted enough to have handled the situation appropriately in advance . Or they might have run into the limit…

>In many ways it is a triumph of modern society how ordinary the people are who head these large and complicated world-spanning corporate entities.

But I was told that CEOs were descended from Mount Olympus itself! Billionaires too!

Re: Patreon laying off 20% of staff

#179

Post by scottLobster »

stronglikedan wrote: post #128
ryandrake wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It reminds me of that meme template. “I feel responsible for this layoff.” “Responsible enough to mitigate it or lay yourself off?” “Well, no, not that responsible…”

What an illogical and unrealistic meme template that is...

It's not illogical, it's called leading by example. You consider it unrealistic because most corporate leadership, especially in America, never feels like doing it.

Samsung executives by contrast have a tradition of taking serious pay cuts during bad years. Which is still largely performative given their existing wealth and status, but is at least is a measurable material sacrifice.

Re: Patreon laying off 20% of staff

#180

Post by nitwit005 »

smeeth wrote: post #123
apical_dendrite wrote: post #17

There are so many contradictions in this statement that either the person who wrote it is completely muddle-headed, or just a bad liar. > Nothing about our core business has changed – it remains strong and consistent a few paragraphs later > But our transformation is going to take time and the next paragraph > At the same time, the market in which we operate has undergone profound change over the last 6 months. We ne…

Nothing in there contradicts. A business that works well today may not work well tomorrow; it's management's job to change the business to better meet future conditions. > or do you think that you'll need fewer humans because AI will be doing more of the work? My bet is this one. To be fair, it isn't exactly an unpopular opinion. If I were starting a business today I'd plan to hire far fewer programmers than I would…

They quoted text declaring both that things haven't changed, and that things have changed. There is a basic contradiction there.

One which is present in a lot of layoff messages. Things are fine! Don't worry! Half the staff has to go because things aren't fine though.

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