Tesla fired hundreds of employees in past week • Hacker News Board

Re: Tesla fired hundreds of employees in past week

#111

Post by awad » Sat, Oct 14, 2017, 4:22 AM UTC

jws wrote: post #25

ProfessorLayton wrote: post #4

It’s interesing that the company can just decide not to report this as a mass layoff. While the performance reasons for letting someone go may be true, it seems like an easily exploitable loophole. Model 3 production rates were missed by a wide margin, so at least a few people should have known that management would react.

Company's don't get to decide. It is written in law. Check the WARN act, but the key threshold seems to be 500 workers at a single facility. As an employer, getting rid of your worst 1% of workers once a year is just housekeeping.

While it is common amongst companies to remove some % of lower performing individuals, or housekeeping as you have phrased, it is important to note that there is a distinction between being fired due to performance and being laid off.

The former is your fault as the employee, the latter is due to larger business conditions and generally recognized as no immediate fault of your own. In real world terms, you can be personally fired for not doing your job and can be laid off because the company can't afford to keep your plant/office/division running due to outside conditions.

Re: Tesla fired hundreds of employees in past week

#112

Post by alexasmyths » Sat, Oct 14, 2017, 4:23 AM UTC

hkmurakami wrote: post #54

Avshalom wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1% is a hell of a lot of percent for a company of 30000.

The typical headline making layoff % at a Fortune500 type company is ~10%, fwiw.

It's definitely not a layoff, and FYI 10% is also very high for a F500 layoff.

This is a 'company on the up' dropping people, which is quite a different thing from a 'company who can't afford to keep people and letting them go;

Re: Tesla fired hundreds of employees in past week

#113

Post by dredmorbius » Sat, Oct 14, 2017, 4:24 AM UTC

jefferson123 wrote: post #103

dredmorbius wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Check your DNS provider. Google seems better (8.8.8.8, 8.8.4.4), OpenDNS possibly. I used to get those every so often. Since I've been massively firewalling sketchy domains, not so much. (About 33k entries, mostly based on uBlock and other blocklists.)

Any way to do this for LTE on a non jail broken phone?

Not off the top of my head.

I've discovered that Android does seem to have dnsmasq installed by default in explorations of my own non-jailbroken phone. Though I've not configured it.

Most of this I deal with at the router, using wifi.

AT&T in particular are exceptionally bad about this based on my exploration.

Re: Tesla fired hundreds of employees in past week

#114

Post by grandalf » Sat, Oct 14, 2017, 4:26 AM UTC

iainmerrick wrote: post #84

beager wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could we get a citation for, like, any of this?

Unlikely.

added

Re: Tesla fired hundreds of employees in past week

#115

Post by late2part » Sat, Oct 14, 2017, 4:26 AM UTC

komaromy wrote: post #50

late2part wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really? I don't agree. Average CXO position lasts 3-5 years... https://www.marketingprofs.com/charts/2017/31713/the-average... Lots of fat trimmed all around. Kalanick, etc...

I don't see how you can possibly construe Kalanick's firing as a result of 'trimming the fat'. He generated controversies for years and he was finally taken out in the face of massive public backlash.

Fat.... Cancer.... Ma Ma Hu Hu - same same but different. Things that must be removed.

Re: Tesla fired hundreds of employees in past week

#116

Post by asveikau » Sat, Oct 14, 2017, 4:26 AM UTC

lotsofpulp wrote: post #41

Molkar wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Trimming fat" is a funny euphemism for sending people into unemployment.

Not all people add value to an organization, and they might stop adding value too. Unfortunately, it's not possible to know this for sure prior to hiring, so the only realistic way to maintain the organization is with constant pruning.

It can be hard to correctly and objectively measure and determine who adds value and who does not. My experience in the workplace is that lots of people add value seemingly indirectly or through unexpected social connections that management is unaware of.

Re: Tesla fired hundreds of employees in past week

#117

Post by loeg » Sat, Oct 14, 2017, 4:27 AM UTC

dilemma wrote: post #105

loeg wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Be bold. Make the claim, or don't make the claim. Half-heartedly making the claim is shoddy journalism.

This is Reuters REPORTING on the case. Not make a claim. Take of your fanboy glasses or go home.

If you can't report on pro-union organizers being fired in retribution because the facts aren't there, don't make the suggestion.

I have no Tesla stock, products, nor am I employed by them. Not a "fanboy" in any way.

Re: Tesla fired hundreds of employees in past week

#118

Post by alexasmyths » Sat, Oct 14, 2017, 4:27 AM UTC

dmitrygr wrote: post #9

virtuabhi wrote: post #6

"Tesla has a hearing before the National Labor Relations Board in November for charges that company supervisors and security guards harassed workers distributing union literature. Tesla denied the accusations. Openly pro-union workers were among those fired this week. Some believe they were targeted." - Local paper http://www.mercurynews.com/2017/10/13/4819750/ Edit: Added more lines from the preceding paragraph

> pro-union workers were among those fired this week. Some believe they were targeted I hate sneakily-worded sentences like this. Also among them, were women, hetrosexuals, and probably one or two Vietnam veterans. Some believe they were targetted.

Though it may or may not be true, it would be very easy for Tesla to do a trimming and to 'make sure the baddies' got let go.

I generally don't like unions, but I've of the mind that wherever they are 'trying to be formed' - that there is probably a reason for it.

Quite a number of auto-plants in the US don't have unions, because there's some kind of 'de facto' standard-ops that have been established, and as long as the company plays by those rules, it works out.

There has been some negative press about worker situations at Tesla, and it's hard to say for sure, but I wouldn't be a bit surprised if there were corners being cut etc..

Re: Tesla fired hundreds of employees in past week

#119

Post by dredmorbius » Sat, Oct 14, 2017, 4:28 AM UTC

KGIII wrote: post #107

dredmorbius wrote: post #93

WARN Act: [A] US labor law which protects employees, their families, and communities by requiring most employers with 100 or more employees to provide 60 calendar-day advance notification of plant closings and mass layoffs of employees, as defined in the Act. In 2001, there were about 2,000 mass layoffs and plant closures which were subject to WARN advance notice requirements and which affected about 660,000 employee…

Your link indicates they aren't covered by the WARN act. It is fewer than 499 employees and less than 33% at a single facility.

Ah, good eyes. I wasn't sure quite what the threshold was.

I've seen companies get spanked for a pattern of layoffs which stay just below the threshold, so there's that. If there's a plausible case that this is targeted at union organisers / organisation, there's that as well, though prosecution at the national level strikes me as unlikely, even with Musk's testy relationship with the Trump administration.

There's also California law to contend with. Same article:

California requires advance notice for plant closings, layoffs, and relocations of 50 or more employees regardless of percentage of workforce, that is, without the federal "one-third" rule for mass layoffs of fewer than 500 employees. Also, the California law applies to employers with 75 or more employees, counting both full-time and part-time employees.

Re: Tesla fired hundreds of employees in past week

#120

Post by dilemma » Sat, Oct 14, 2017, 4:28 AM UTC

grandalf wrote: post #28

It's important to keep in mind that Tesla (like Walmart, Whole Foods, and Amazon) has been targeted by big labor for infiltration and union formation [1] [2] This is not necessarily because working conditions make workers feel that they would prefer the tradeoffs of unionization, but simply because Tesla is much more competitive without its workforce unionized, and so labor groups that are entrenched in legacy car ma…

worst astroturfing i've ever seen on HN