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Startup Uses Eggs to Poach Employees from Facebook, Google

freshtechapps.com

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Re: Startup Uses Eggs to Poach Employees from Facebook, Google

#21

Post by smoyer »

dasil003 wrote: post #19
smoyer wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I usually associate the idea of "poaching" employees with convincing those that weren't thinking of leaving that they should join you (I'm not saying my impression is correct). Think about Jobs "poaching" Sculley from PepsiCo. Jobs didn't even give him an egg sandwich (just the famous line: "Do you want to sell sugared water for the rest of your life? Or do you want to come with me and change the world?").

I see, so you were originally saying that you don't think the campaign would cause anyone to consider leaving Facebook or Google that wasn't already thinking about it? I think it's really hard to pinpoint the moment in my own head when an idea like leaving my job first crosses my mind, probably even harder for an abstract class of people such as Google or Facebook employees. To me, poaching is more concrete, it means…

Two good points ... it's also interesting that the word "poaching" has negative connotations [1] but if you read those definitions the impression is that poaching employees is somehow wrong rather than being a facet of a competition-based economy. How can an at-will employee be considered "another's property, rights, ideas, or the like".

[1] http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/poaching

Re: Startup Uses Eggs to Poach Employees from Facebook, Google

#22

Post by lost_my_pwd »

I have no issues with companies courting employees from other companies; it shifts the power balance a bit back towards the individual for a change.

I am, however, a little put off by the term "poached", which BigCommerce is actively using in their campaign. It implies the sentiment that these people are simply a quarry being hunted as a prize rather people, of their own free will, deciding that the grass is greener elsewhere. Language matters.

Re: Startup Uses Eggs to Poach Employees from Facebook, Google

#23

Post by walshemj »

bayesianhorse wrote: post #14

The article uses an interesting phrase "[BC] has been accused of poaching [employees]". As if competition on the buyer-side of the labor market was morally suspect... Steve Jobs would have approved of the sentiment!

This is a well know political trick to shift the axis of a debate towards your position by continually drip feeding stories using loaded words so that eventually everyone tends to accept some or all of your position by osmosis.

Re: Startup Uses Eggs to Poach Employees from Facebook, Google

#24

Post by AYBABTME »

bayesianhorse wrote: post #14

The article uses an interesting phrase "[BC] has been accused of poaching [employees]". As if competition on the buyer-side of the labor market was morally suspect... Steve Jobs would have approved of the sentiment!

I think in this case, it's just a literary device to make the text more interesting.

At least it's more credible to me than a conspiration about manipulating the tech masses into disliking poaching.

Re: Startup Uses Eggs to Poach Employees from Facebook, Google

#25

Post by 001sky »

smoyer wrote: post #21
dasil003 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I see, so you were originally saying that you don't think the campaign would cause anyone to consider leaving Facebook or Google that wasn't already thinking about it? I think it's really hard to pinpoint the moment in my own head when an idea like leaving my job first crosses my mind, probably even harder for an abstract class of people such as Google or Facebook employees. To me, poaching is more concrete, it means…

Two good points ... it's also interesting that the word "poaching" has negative connotations [1] but if you read those definitions the impression is that poaching employees is somehow wrong rather than being a facet of a competition-based economy. How can an at-will employee be considered "another's property, rights, ideas, or the like". [1] http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/poaching

Poaching is going after anyone employed currenty, IMHO.

Taking applicants from un-employed job seekers was traditional "hiring". World has moved on, presumably tho. Switching contexts, ou would be "poaching" someones significant other (~negative connotation). vs Just "picking up" a single person you met at a bar (~fair game connotation).

TLDR english is a loaded language

Re: Startup Uses Eggs to Poach Employees from Facebook, Google

#26

Post by maxerickson »

001sky wrote: post #25
smoyer wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Two good points ... it's also interesting that the word "poaching" has negative connotations [1] but if you read those definitions the impression is that poaching employees is somehow wrong rather than being a facet of a competition-based economy. How can an at-will employee be considered "another's property, rights, ideas, or the like". [1] http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/poaching

Poaching is going after anyone employed currenty, IMHO. Taking applicants from un-employed job seekers was traditional "hiring". World has moved on, presumably tho. Switching contexts, ou would be "poaching" someones significant other (~negative connotation). vs Just "picking up" a single person you met at a bar (~fair game connotation). TLDR english is a loaded language

I would think the allusion is rooted in hunting, where poaching is taking something you don't have a right to take.

Re: Startup Uses Eggs to Poach Employees from Facebook, Google

#27

Post by dasil003 »

maxerickson wrote: post #26
001sky wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Poaching is going after anyone employed currenty, IMHO. Taking applicants from un-employed job seekers was traditional "hiring". World has moved on, presumably tho. Switching contexts, ou would be "poaching" someones significant other (~negative connotation). vs Just "picking up" a single person you met at a bar (~fair game connotation). TLDR english is a loaded language

I would think the allusion is rooted in hunting, where poaching is taking something you don't have a right to take.

I disagree with you both because as the GGP said, companies don't own employees. In the business world I see poaching as hiring a person who you learned about solely through their employment at the company in question.

Re: Startup Uses Eggs to Poach Employees from Facebook, Google

#28

Post by 001sky »

maxerickson wrote: post #26
001sky wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Poaching is going after anyone employed currenty, IMHO. Taking applicants from un-employed job seekers was traditional "hiring". World has moved on, presumably tho. Switching contexts, ou would be "poaching" someones significant other (~negative connotation). vs Just "picking up" a single person you met at a bar (~fair game connotation). TLDR english is a loaded language

I would think the allusion is rooted in hunting, where poaching is taking something you don't have a right to take.

That usage + slang is the source of the concept what i'm referring to...

Some of this stuff is archaic.

Hunting/Fishing laws in europe were restricted to the nobility for hundreds of years.

And at the same time: "Most European noblewomen were party to chattel marriages" {etc}

Anyways, that's all different than poaching in Africa today, for example (personal vs state "property"), but it's likely the source of the term... so i agree.

Re: Startup Uses Eggs to Poach Employees from Facebook, Google

#30

Post by ryandrake »

lost_my_pwd wrote: post #22

I have no issues with companies courting employees from other companies; it shifts the power balance a bit back towards the individual for a change. I am, however, a little put off by the term "poached", which BigCommerce is actively using in their campaign. It implies the sentiment that these people are simply a quarry being hunted as a prize rather people, of their own free will, deciding that the grass is greener…

I posted a rant about that word on an earlier discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7463417

Really, unless we think of ourselves as deer being stolen from the local land owner, we should stop using that word.

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