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Atlassian says it had right to fire engineer for suggesting CEO is 'rich jerk'

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Re: Atlassian says it had right to fire engineer for suggesting CEO is 'rich jerk'

#151

Post by Arainach »

ivan_gammel wrote: post #116
Drakim wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, why surround yourself with people who are critical of you, when you can surround yourself with yes-men who will loyally toe the line? Positive contributions comes from loyal subjects who agree with their betters.

The “people who are critical of you” are very broad category that includes both toxic behavior and constructive disagreement. The former must not be tolerated, the latter can be encouraged as long as it’s not a blocker. In this case it is clearly the former and it requires suppression, but disciplinary action may have been too harsh or perfectly adequate depending on prior history with this employee. It was not said…

> In this case it is clearly the former and it requires suppression

That's not clear at all. Why do you say so?

Read the article. "Rich jerk" are Atlassian's words, not the employee's. Even if they are it's not obviously the former.

I refuse to believe anyone, including Oracle employees, likes Larry Ellison. If Microsoft/Google/Apple fired everyone who badmouthed Satya/Sundar/Tim, half their products would fall apart overnight.

Re: Atlassian says it had right to fire engineer for suggesting CEO is 'rich jerk'

#152

Post by Arainach »

mingus88 wrote: post #100
neversupervised wrote: post #39

There’s no reason a company should put up with enemies within. In rare instances a disgruntled employee might be able to make a positive contribution. In most cases, even if the employee has valid reasons, by the time they are disgruntled there’s no coming back. It’s best for everyone to move on.

Agreed. I have held similar opinions of leadership at many of my jobs. If you are so burned out that you can’t help but vent publicly, it’s time to go. It’s just not healthy for you. But of course leadership is going to take care of that for you because it’s not healthy for the company either to have open dissent. And most of us are far easier to replace than a CEO

> it’s not healthy for the company either to have open dissent.

It's deeply unhealthy to not have open dissent.

Re: Atlassian says it had right to fire engineer for suggesting CEO is 'rich jerk'

#153

Post by ivan_gammel »

Arainach wrote: post #151
ivan_gammel wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The “people who are critical of you” are very broad category that includes both toxic behavior and constructive disagreement. The former must not be tolerated, the latter can be encouraged as long as it’s not a blocker. In this case it is clearly the former and it requires suppression, but disciplinary action may have been too harsh or perfectly adequate depending on prior history with this employee. It was not said…

> In this case it is clearly the former and it requires suppression That's not clear at all. Why do you say so? Read the article. "Rich jerk" are Atlassian's words, not the employee's. Even if they are it's not obviously the former. I refuse to believe anyone, including Oracle employees, likes Larry Ellison. If Microsoft/Google/Apple fired everyone who badmouthed Satya/Sundar/Tim, half their products would fall apart…

> That's not clear at all. Why do you say so?

Do you see any, even little sign of constructive criticism in what she said? Anything that could improve corporate culture or help her peers or management to understand the problem? Any hint on how it could be fixed? I don’t.

> Read the article.

I did read the article and came to the same conclusion as Atlassian.

> I refuse to believe anyone, including Oracle employees, likes Larry Ellison.

When you sign the working contract, your job is to act in the interests of shareholders. If you despise them or disagree with what they do, you can still work there and use your position to align their interests and the interests of the public. You can try to change it from within. But the moment when you decide to burn the bridges is the moment when you should leave. To me this is pretty obvious, and I’m really surprised to see here some sort of entitlement.

Re: Atlassian says it had right to fire engineer for suggesting CEO is 'rich jerk'

#154

Post by Arainach »

ivan_gammel wrote: post #153
Arainach wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In this case it is clearly the former and it requires suppression That's not clear at all. Why do you say so? Read the article. "Rich jerk" are Atlassian's words, not the employee's. Even if they are it's not obviously the former. I refuse to believe anyone, including Oracle employees, likes Larry Ellison. If Microsoft/Google/Apple fired everyone who badmouthed Satya/Sundar/Tim, half their products would fall apart…

> That's not clear at all. Why do you say so? Do you see any, even little sign of constructive criticism in what she said? Anything that could improve corporate culture or help her peers or management to understand the problem? Any hint on how it could be fixed? I don’t. > Read the article. I did read the article and came to the same conclusion as Atlassian. > I refuse to believe anyone, including Oracle employees, l…

"acting in the interests of shareholders" (which, for the record, no employment contract I've ever signed requires) does not mean blind allegiance to management and certainly doesn't mean not calling out bad actions by management.

The employee's statement here was fact. The CEO did harm the careers of employees and did call in to harass them without even bothering to come to a company office.

The CEO, who has much more of an obligation to act in shareholders' interests than an IC, shouldn't be attacking and alienating their labor force.

Re: Atlassian says it had right to fire engineer for suggesting CEO is 'rich jerk'

#155

Post by bartread »

croon wrote: post #147
dcrazy wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can fail to maintain a wiki written in any software. The value of Confluence is when everyone uses it, so there’s one place to find info to answer questions like “why the hell did we do it this way?”

Yes, but it's easier to fail when the markdown (or NIH markdown in the case of Confluence) is far removed from the code it describes. Which is why you should document closer to the products. Markdown files living by your code and even generated from code is way better than any experience I've had with Confluence (which is closing up on two decades soon enough).

I used Confluence a mere decade ago and, if anything, the 10 years after you used it only magnified its flaws relatively to what else was by then available so you didn’t miss much, and I suspect we haven’t missed much since, except more bloat.

Re: Atlassian says it had right to fire engineer for suggesting CEO is 'rich jerk'

#156

Post by ivan_gammel »

Arainach wrote: post #154
ivan_gammel wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That's not clear at all. Why do you say so? Do you see any, even little sign of constructive criticism in what she said? Anything that could improve corporate culture or help her peers or management to understand the problem? Any hint on how it could be fixed? I don’t. > Read the article. I did read the article and came to the same conclusion as Atlassian. > I refuse to believe anyone, including Oracle employees, l…

"acting in the interests of shareholders" (which, for the record, no employment contract I've ever signed requires) does not mean blind allegiance to management and certainly doesn't mean not calling out bad actions by management. The employee's statement here was fact. The CEO did harm the careers of employees and did call in to harass them without even bothering to come to a company office. The CEO, who has much mo…

> no employment contract I've ever signed requires

The sole reason for existence of for-profit corporations does not have to be explicitly stated in the contract. It’s implied and better be understood.

> does not mean blind allegiance to management…

Yes, it doesn’t. Nobody said it does.

> The employee's statement here was fact.

Sure. It it wasn’t the fact, it would be even worse.

> The CEO shouldn't be attacking and alienating their labor force.

It’s irrelevant. One person’s bad judgement does not justify another’s.

Re: Atlassian says it had right to fire engineer for suggesting CEO is 'rich jerk'

#157

Post by Arainach »

ivan_gammel wrote: post #156
Arainach wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"acting in the interests of shareholders" (which, for the record, no employment contract I've ever signed requires) does not mean blind allegiance to management and certainly doesn't mean not calling out bad actions by management. The employee's statement here was fact. The CEO did harm the careers of employees and did call in to harass them without even bothering to come to a company office. The CEO, who has much mo…

> no employment contract I've ever signed requires The sole reason for existence of for-profit corporations does not have to be explicitly stated in the contract. It’s implied and better be understood. > does not mean blind allegiance to management… Yes, it doesn’t. Nobody said it does. > The employee's statement here was fact. Sure. It it wasn’t the fact, it would be even worse. > The CEO shouldn't be attacking and…

No, employees have no obligations to shareholders. They get money for their labor. End of obligation. They are not the corporation.

This is ignoring that the concept of companies having to care about shareholders above everything else is a lie spread to justify evil behavior.

Re: Atlassian says it had right to fire engineer for suggesting CEO is 'rich jerk'

#158

Post by ivan_gammel »

Arainach wrote: post #157
ivan_gammel wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> no employment contract I've ever signed requires The sole reason for existence of for-profit corporations does not have to be explicitly stated in the contract. It’s implied and better be understood. > does not mean blind allegiance to management… Yes, it doesn’t. Nobody said it does. > The employee's statement here was fact. Sure. It it wasn’t the fact, it would be even worse. > The CEO shouldn't be attacking and…

No, employees have no obligations to shareholders. They get money for their labor. End of obligation. They are not the corporation. This is ignoring that the concept of companies having to care about shareholders above everything else is a lie spread to justify evil behavior.

> They get money for their labor.

Yes, and what is the essence of that labor? It is to create profits for shareholders. You are not getting paid to contribute to toxic culture or to seize the means of production. CEO could have been in the wrong, but the moment when the “us vs them” idea starts dominating in corporate culture is the moment company dies and those jobs that everyone is so afraid to loose are ceasing to exist.

>This is ignoring that the concept of companies having to care about shareholders above everything else is a lie spread to justify evil behavior.

Nobody is claiming the “above everything else” here

Re: Atlassian says it had right to fire engineer for suggesting CEO is 'rich jerk'

#159

Post by Arainach »

ivan_gammel wrote: post #158
Arainach wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, employees have no obligations to shareholders. They get money for their labor. End of obligation. They are not the corporation. This is ignoring that the concept of companies having to care about shareholders above everything else is a lie spread to justify evil behavior.

> They get money for their labor. Yes, and what is the essence of that labor? It is to create profits for shareholders. You are not getting paid to contribute to toxic culture or to seize the means of production. CEO could have been in the wrong, but the moment when the “us vs them” idea starts dominating in corporate culture is the moment company dies and those jobs that everyone is so afraid to loose are ceasing to…

> Yes, and what is the essence of that labor? It is to create profits for shareholders

No, it's not. I'm not sure what your source of capitalism koolaid is, but employees are transacting labor for money, and shareholders do not come into it at all.

The nature of labor is stocking shelves, writing code, emptying trash bins, or whatever else you do. Full stop.

If you want employees to "think of the shareholders first", you give them enough ownership that the stock price actually makes a major difference in their life, and crucially, enough control at the company to actually influence the stock price. In practice that's the C Suite and maybe some senior VPs. No one else should be stressing out trying to make the owners richer.

Re: Atlassian says it had right to fire engineer for suggesting CEO is 'rich jerk'

#160

Post by ivan_gammel »

Arainach wrote: post #159
ivan_gammel wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They get money for their labor. Yes, and what is the essence of that labor? It is to create profits for shareholders. You are not getting paid to contribute to toxic culture or to seize the means of production. CEO could have been in the wrong, but the moment when the “us vs them” idea starts dominating in corporate culture is the moment company dies and those jobs that everyone is so afraid to loose are ceasing to…

> Yes, and what is the essence of that labor? It is to create profits for shareholders No, it's not. I'm not sure what your source of capitalism koolaid is, but employees are transacting labor for money, and shareholders do not come into it at all. The nature of labor is stocking shelves, writing code, emptying trash bins, or whatever else you do. Full stop. If you want employees to "think of the shareholders first",…

This conversation is not about „employees thinking/not thinking about shareholders“. You are cherry-picking that topic and taking it out of context, for what reason exactly?

I have explained already a few times why and what context matters here. Are you struggling to understand it or just avoiding it?

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