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Apollo Layoffs

apollographql.com

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Re: Apollo Layoffs

#11

Post by dnissley »

rubyist5eva wrote: post #3

> I am very sad to make this decision. It’s a consequence of the approach that Matt and I took in scaling the company over the last year, and we take full responsibility for the impact that will have on the lives of our departing team members. Why do CEO's always say this empty nonsense. If you accept responsibility, you accept consequences - what consequences is Geoff Schmidt going to be facing? Hurt feelings? Give…

This comes up every thread about layoffs -- accepting responsibility means not passing the buck and saying "it was out of our control!" or "this was due to outside circumstance X".

The explicit consequences are up to the owners of the company, not the court of public opinion. The owners wouldn't be beyond their rights to demand the CEO's resignation, although neither are they obligated to do that either since everyone makes mistakes. And as others have pointed out there are implicit consequences as well -- less trust from remaining employees, etc.

Re: Apollo Layoffs

#13

Post by bberenberg »

rubyist5eva wrote: post #3

> I am very sad to make this decision. It’s a consequence of the approach that Matt and I took in scaling the company over the last year, and we take full responsibility for the impact that will have on the lives of our departing team members. Why do CEO's always say this empty nonsense. If you accept responsibility, you accept consequences - what consequences is Geoff Schmidt going to be facing? Hurt feelings? Give…

The business they built is failing. The emotional toll is extreme. Founders I know are either in poor health due to stress, or place an outsized emphasis on staying healthy. You and others who post this every time seem to be saying "Ah yes, you're not suffering enough in my eyes". How much suffering is enough? Should your degree of blood thirst be applied to employee actions? Are blameless retrospectives a mistake and we should start firing people for making mistakes?

Re: Apollo Layoffs

#14

Post by quonn »

celtain wrote: post #6
rubyist5eva wrote: post #3

> I am very sad to make this decision. It’s a consequence of the approach that Matt and I took in scaling the company over the last year, and we take full responsibility for the impact that will have on the lives of our departing team members. Why do CEO's always say this empty nonsense. If you accept responsibility, you accept consequences - what consequences is Geoff Schmidt going to be facing? Hurt feelings? Give…

What would you prefer that they say instead? "I made no wrong decisions, I have no regrets leaving all of you unemployed."?

Perhaps instead of „responsibility“ they should said „we are to blame“ or „it is our fault“.

Re: Apollo Layoffs

#15

Post by jcoder »

grumple wrote: post #4

> Thanks to an incredible performance by our Talent Acquisition team, one of the best in the industry, we grew headcount 2.5x in about a year. But the problem is that growing the company 2.5x didn’t make us 2.5x more productive. It got harder to get things done because we didn’t add the right mix of skills and seniority levels to our team. From The Mythical Man-Month: "If there are n workers on a project, there are (…

Yeah I read that part and immediately thought “tell me you’ve never read a single book on tech leadership without…”

Re: Apollo Layoffs

#16

Post by tshaddox »

Rooster61 wrote: post #5

Why are software companies still grappling with the mythical man month? You'd think by now we'd have learned our lesson. More hands /= more productivity, at least on a linear scale

If you're talking about Brooks's law, that's a pretty specific observation that doesn't seem like it applies here. It's very specifically about adding workers to a project that is already behind schedule. It doesn't certainly doesn't mean anything as broad as "a company cannot do more things by increasing its employee count."

Re: Apollo Layoffs

#17

Post by robofanatic »

jackson1442 wrote: post #8

Layoffs are going to suck regardless, but this is one of the best severance packages I've seen in this wave: * 15 weeks base pay + 1 week per year of employment * 6 months COBRA + $300 mental health * no 1-yr cliff, options can be exercised thru next year * you can keep all your equipment

just curious, can one collect unemployment during severance?

Re: Apollo Layoffs

#18

Post by wolpoli »

grumple wrote: post #4

> Thanks to an incredible performance by our Talent Acquisition team, one of the best in the industry, we grew headcount 2.5x in about a year. But the problem is that growing the company 2.5x didn’t make us 2.5x more productive. It got harder to get things done because we didn’t add the right mix of skills and seniority levels to our team. From The Mythical Man-Month: "If there are n workers on a project, there are (…

Perhaps management sees tech work in the way they see assembly line workers - they believe that doubling the number of teams will double the ticket throughput.

Re: Apollo Layoffs

#19

Post by nkohari »

sidfthec wrote: post #7
celtain wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What would you prefer that they say instead? "I made no wrong decisions, I have no regrets leaving all of you unemployed."?

"I'll be resigning when [the board/leadership] finds a replacement." I always get massive push back when I suggest this, but it's the only remedy that makes sense. If you have to layoff 15% of the workforce when the growth was under your command, and you want to take responsibility, then step down. Own your mistake.

That's only true if the company is better-suited to be run by someone else. CEOs are prominent, but they're still just people. A person can make mistakes and still be the best person for the job.

Re: Apollo Layoffs

#20

Post by CharlieDigital »

Rooster61 wrote: post #5

Why are software companies still grappling with the mythical man month? You'd think by now we'd have learned our lesson. More hands /= more productivity, at least on a linear scale

Not all of that is dev. After a certain point, a lot of growth comes from marketing, sales, sales engineering, consulting, support, customer success, etc.

I'd wager most core engineering teams in a co like Apollo are probably quite small and focused. I'd guess the cuts are coming from the ancillary teams.

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