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Fired

zachholman.com

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Re: Fired

#41

Post by davidu »

There are people who were at OpenDNS in the early days who were incredible, and as we grew, became less and less incredible, largely because the things that made them incredible actually started to be really frustrating as the company grew and they didn't want to change those things. So they had to leave. Usually it was a series of conversations about how the person, their peers, and the company were all unhappy, and why should we perpetuate the pain. We'd do our best to have them leave in a way that made them feel dignified and like they controlled their destiny, and but once in a while, there wasn't a meeting of the minds and we had to say "well, it's not gonna be fixed and it's time to go do something else." Even in those cases, I always thought so highly of the work I did with those people over the long haul, even if it was painful at the end.

The point being, if I started a new company tomorrow, I would, without a doubt, go and try to hire some of those same people to help me start it. And maybe now, as a more capable manager than I was then, maybe some would make it longer, or maybe some would realize as the company goes from 10 to 100, that they are just much more satisfied at really early stages. Maybe we'd even define their comp and equity to reflect the fact that they might not be on board for the long haul, but might be key for the early innings.

The same thing is true for hiring bigger company people too early... without structure and process, some folks go crazy too and have to leave. You need the right people at the right time. This is hard to do. I messed up a bunch of times. Some people grow with the company through stages, and some don't. I think it's a responsibility of the company to help people grow if they want, or to end the misery and let them go back to what they love if they don't want to change.

Finally -- For what it's worth, people are fired all the time ( as I have been ) for all kinds of reasons, and so it's not a reason not to hire someone. Professional hiring managers know this.

Re: Fired

#42

Post by crazypyro »

_bfhp wrote: post #33

> Unless you're embezzling money or using the interns as drug mules or something. Let's say that Holman did something not so hyperbolically terrible as these silly examples, but still terrible enough to reflect on his character for some people but not others (as in, the reason is controversial), and that's what got him fired (this is for arguments sake; I have no idea who he is or why he got fired). This sentence wou…

Can we just stop speculating about this? He didn't come out and tell us, meaning anyone that isn't close to him will never find out. This over-analyzing of the reason (wasn't even an important point in the article) is just off-topic and more importantly, completely without evidence....

(Its not just you, but everyone is trying to play internet detective. Just stop. We don't need to dig into this guy's work life....)

Re: Fired

#43

Post by chuhnk »

eridius wrote: post #21
chuhnk wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. It's a great way to separate one's involvement from the issue. Things like this happen all the time and you don't hear about it because it's treated exactly like this. CEOs are displaced at the top level in a way that makes it look like a natural next step.

If the intent was to make it look like a natural next step, he wouldn't be writing a blog post about how he was fired. If he really was fired for that incident, I'd much prefer GitHub to be open about it and make it clear that was why.

He said he was fired, but not how.

Re: Fired

#44

Post by MCRed »

Incompetent management is a plague on the industry. And the cause of it is that programmers are relatively low status.

In so many businesses, there are "business guys" who end up managing the engineering staff-- at one level or another, but too often it's the direct manager role--and these business guys are incompetent at engineering.

When you don't know whether a direct report is doing good or not because you don't understand what their doing, by definition you cannot manage them. What are you going to do? Listen to the other programmers opinion of their code? It immediately becomes political.

The real tragedy is, learning business is not hard. Any programmer can do it. Biz guys can't learn programming-- despite all the "everyone should be a programmer" initiatives-- even easier is managing development teams. When you've got 10 years experience as a senior engineer, you should be promoted, and working on becoming an engineering manager.

Engineering managers can develop code. Right now this role is called "lead engineer" but they have no people management responsibilities.

This is something we, as engineers need to change.

So long as the "people managers" are biz guys who don't understand engineering (and naturally are often hostile to it) good engineers are going to get fired, and our entire profession will continue to slip lower and lower in status.

Re: Fired

#45

Post by sridca »

samstokes wrote: post #27
sridca wrote: post #11

Back in December 2012, Julie Horvath expressed her desire to have Zach fired. I wonder if these two incidents are actually related. @Holman is my ex-partner. He was complicit in the actions of both Tom and Theresa Preston-Werner and even admitted to plotting with Theresa Preston-Werner to get women at the company fired. He should be let go from GitHub and I regret being kind to him in previous interviews. http://vall…

Maybe we can keep the speculation and character smearing to another thread? I have no connection to the author, but he's written a very personal post about a subject that isn't often discussed, so I don't feel like this thread is an appropriate place to attack him.

My apologies, I didn't mean to attack Zach. I am actually hoping that he was not fired in connection to the Horvath incident.

Re: Fired

#47

Post by MollyR »

mrb wrote: post #13

Human nature is really amazing. After the reading the first 4 paragraph I saw his openness and honesty. I felt compassion and trust. And I was already thinking to myself "Zach really looks like a cool guy; if he is skilled I would probably hire him", without attaching any significance whatsoever to the fact he was fired. If you are reading this, Zach, continue to be open, honest, accept your mistakes, show you do lea…

I agree. I felt the exact same way. Also Zach somehow sounds extremely professional and personal at the same time too. Got to say I'm impressed, and I too know the pain of getting laid off.Reading this article makes me feel alot better about the shame and guilt I felt from being fired.

Re: Fired

#48

Post by loganu »

iamleppert wrote: post #26

Why does everyone feel compelled to live their life in the public? Shut up and sit down! You ain't special, dear..

There are tons of positives, and tons of negatives, to opening up your story to the world. (This isn't really daily life, it's the end of a 5 year stint.) If it's not for you, fine. But that's your decision, not his. And vice versa.

Re: Fired

#49

Post by _bfhp »

crazypyro wrote: post #42
_bfhp wrote: post #33

> Unless you're embezzling money or using the interns as drug mules or something. Let's say that Holman did something not so hyperbolically terrible as these silly examples, but still terrible enough to reflect on his character for some people but not others (as in, the reason is controversial), and that's what got him fired (this is for arguments sake; I have no idea who he is or why he got fired). This sentence wou…

Can we just stop speculating about this? He didn't come out and tell us, meaning anyone that isn't close to him will never find out. This over-analyzing of the reason (wasn't even an important point in the article) is just off-topic and more importantly, completely without evidence.... (Its not just you, but everyone is trying to play internet detective. Just stop. We don't need to dig into this guy's work life....)

My comment explicitly didn't speculate on any particular reason, it pointed to language that could easily be politician-grade rhetorical defense. Did you read my whole comment?

People can speculate about the reasons if they can point to relevant historical record. Why not? This man isn't sacred, is he?

Re: Fired

#50

Post by NotOscarWilde »

samstokes wrote: post #27
sridca wrote: post #11

Back in December 2012, Julie Horvath expressed her desire to have Zach fired. I wonder if these two incidents are actually related. @Holman is my ex-partner. He was complicit in the actions of both Tom and Theresa Preston-Werner and even admitted to plotting with Theresa Preston-Werner to get women at the company fired. He should be let go from GitHub and I regret being kind to him in previous interviews. http://vall…

Maybe we can keep the speculation and character smearing to another thread? I have no connection to the author, but he's written a very personal post about a subject that isn't often discussed, so I don't feel like this thread is an appropriate place to attack him.

It seemed to me the post was tiptoeing around the reason of the dismissal, and the author even alludes to the story behind it with:

> Seemingly everyone’s got stories of being stuck under shit managers, or dealing the fallout from things out of their control.

I don't support "character smearing" or "attacking" in any way, but as a reader of the post, I would like to know more about the reasons for his firing, even in the form of less-than-reliable internet research -- as long as no attacking takes place.

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