Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

GM self-driving tech unit Cruise laying off about 8% of staff

reuters.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 296 posts

Re: GM self-driving tech unit Cruise laying off about 8% of staff

#11

Post by linuxftw »

tehjoker wrote: post #6
thoraway1010 wrote: post #2

"doubling down on our engineering work and engineering talent,” Cruise spokesperson Milin Mehta told Reuters. Do these folks even try to hide their lies? Doubling down = 2x the engineering staff. This is as they lay off in their lidar team. Can companies be sued for these types of basically false claims or are we just stuck commenting on what lies they seem come up with. Can you imagine if your day to day life involv…

They mean they're increasing the workload of the remaining engineers, not that they're doing something to benefit or other wise honor them.

There's no better time to exploit your employees than when the job market is in the toilet.

Re: GM self-driving tech unit Cruise laying off about 8% of staff

#12

Post by runawaybottle »

thoraway1010 wrote: post #2

"doubling down on our engineering work and engineering talent,” Cruise spokesperson Milin Mehta told Reuters. Do these folks even try to hide their lies? Doubling down = 2x the engineering staff. This is as they lay off in their lidar team. Can companies be sued for these types of basically false claims or are we just stuck commenting on what lies they seem come up with. Can you imagine if your day to day life involv…

This is the kind of stuff I always advise people in long term careers to be privy of. First to go always means least cared about.

Nothing wrong with it, but always know your place in a company. Don’t ever be lulled into rhetoric such as ‘doubling down on engineering’.

‘We care about code quality’ - code quality sucks at the company, ‘we care about work life balance’ - there is none at the company, ‘we value innovation’ - can’t even suggest anything to product, stay on spec....

‘We care about future tech’ — lay off r&d at the first sight of a downturn.

Just shut the fuck up already.

Re: GM self-driving tech unit Cruise laying off about 8% of staff

#13

Post by runawaybottle »

deminature wrote: post #8
thoraway1010 wrote: post #2

"doubling down on our engineering work and engineering talent,” Cruise spokesperson Milin Mehta told Reuters. Do these folks even try to hide their lies? Doubling down = 2x the engineering staff. This is as they lay off in their lidar team. Can companies be sued for these types of basically false claims or are we just stuck commenting on what lies they seem come up with. Can you imagine if your day to day life involv…

They obviously don't mean it literally in terms of headcount, but more likely in terms of focus and determination.

Proof is in the pudding right?

First to go.

Re: GM self-driving tech unit Cruise laying off about 8% of staff

#14

Post by thoraway1010 »

cactus2093 wrote: post #5
thoraway1010 wrote: post #2

"doubling down on our engineering work and engineering talent,” Cruise spokesperson Milin Mehta told Reuters. Do these folks even try to hide their lies? Doubling down = 2x the engineering staff. This is as they lay off in their lidar team. Can companies be sued for these types of basically false claims or are we just stuck commenting on what lies they seem come up with. Can you imagine if your day to day life involv…

I never hear the phrase "doubling down" used to mean "doubling", except maybe in the original usage in gambling. But colloquially it just means "increasing focus on". In that use there is no inherent contradiction in downsizing + attempting to increasing focus. In fact that seems to be what almost all companies who downsize are attempting to do. Edit: In fact come to think of it, even in blackjack when you double dow…

doubling down is not about increasing focus. It is about increasing risk by making a BIGGER (not smaller) bet on something.

This is in the original meaning in gambling (you are convinced you are right and so double your bet) and elsewhere.

Only in PR land is a cash flow pullback and risk reduction step such as a headcount reduction called a doubling down. It goes to show how pernicious these types of intentional miswordings are.

Re: GM self-driving tech unit Cruise laying off about 8% of staff

#15

Post by monadic2 »

thoraway1010 wrote: post #2

"doubling down on our engineering work and engineering talent,” Cruise spokesperson Milin Mehta told Reuters. Do these folks even try to hide their lies? Doubling down = 2x the engineering staff. This is as they lay off in their lidar team. Can companies be sued for these types of basically false claims or are we just stuck commenting on what lies they seem come up with. Can you imagine if your day to day life involv…

This could just mean they aren’t developing lidar further. Because there is no retraining culture it’s difficult to tell.

Re: GM self-driving tech unit Cruise laying off about 8% of staff

#16

Post by aphextron »

thoraway1010 wrote: post #2

"doubling down on our engineering work and engineering talent,” Cruise spokesperson Milin Mehta told Reuters. Do these folks even try to hide their lies? Doubling down = 2x the engineering staff. This is as they lay off in their lidar team. Can companies be sued for these types of basically false claims or are we just stuck commenting on what lies they seem come up with. Can you imagine if your day to day life involv…

>Doubling down = 2x the engineering staff. This is as they lay off in their lidar team.

Self driving will be solved with computer vision. Lidar is an unnecessary technology even for full level 5 autonomy. Most self driving companies have come to this conclusion by now.

Re: GM self-driving tech unit Cruise laying off about 8% of staff

#17

Post by thoraway1010 »

runawaybottle wrote: post #12
thoraway1010 wrote: post #2

"doubling down on our engineering work and engineering talent,” Cruise spokesperson Milin Mehta told Reuters. Do these folks even try to hide their lies? Doubling down = 2x the engineering staff. This is as they lay off in their lidar team. Can companies be sued for these types of basically false claims or are we just stuck commenting on what lies they seem come up with. Can you imagine if your day to day life involv…

This is the kind of stuff I always advise people in long term careers to be privy of. First to go always means least cared about. Nothing wrong with it, but always know your place in a company. Don’t ever be lulled into rhetoric such as ‘doubling down on engineering’. ‘We care about code quality’ - code quality sucks at the company, ‘we care about work life balance’ - there is none at the company, ‘we value innovatio…

Somewhat true.

My favorite: "We adhere to the highest ethical principles" - as they give you a 500 page ethics doc that no one reads or follows.

But I've actually found it's a good / reliable tell. You just stay away from companies like this that can't talk straight and you end up a LOT happier. I don't mean they need to be nice - but just clear relatively honest normal English language communication.

ie, "we're cutting back to reduce our burn rate." vs "we are doubling down on engineering talent." Some PR people actually get it I think and can basically be honest while adding some things you may not have thought of. Not in this case though!

Re: GM self-driving tech unit Cruise laying off about 8% of staff

#18

Post by aphextron »

supernova87a wrote: post #9

Funny, as they were just a few weeks ago (even during the lockdown) certain recruiters were saying they were aggressively hiring -- and are still listed as hiring for example here: https://layoffs.fyi/tracker/ Seems like suddenly they got worried about how long they can maintain the burn rate. Doesn't help that driving and commuting fell off the map.

It's not at all uncommon for companies to simultaneously perform layoffs while actively hiring.

Re: GM self-driving tech unit Cruise laying off about 8% of staff

#20

Post by dragosmocrii »

aphextron wrote: post #18
supernova87a wrote: post #9

Funny, as they were just a few weeks ago (even during the lockdown) certain recruiters were saying they were aggressively hiring -- and are still listed as hiring for example here: https://layoffs.fyi/tracker/ Seems like suddenly they got worried about how long they can maintain the burn rate. Doesn't help that driving and commuting fell off the map.

It's not at all uncommon for companies to simultaneously perform layoffs while actively hiring.

Sell the highs, buy the lows
Post reply on HN