Coinbase employees petition to remove execs • Hacker News Board

Re: Coinbase employees petition to remove execs

#171

Post by shanusmagnus » Fri, Jun 10, 2022, 1:39 PM UTC

phillu wrote: post #108

vianneychevalie wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree, emotional work is work, and « positive energy » sums it up quite well. Edge cases exist, but when I’m sad, I just stop being sad at work , because it’s been clearly stated, from the first interview, that positivity was a requirement of performance. One edge case: colleague lost her mother last year, of course we didn’t expect her to perform excruciating emotional work.

This sounds like a company I would never want to work for. No one is positive and happy all the time and having to fake it "as a job requirement" sounds wrong on so many levels.

I don't know anything about coinbase, but you're taking the least-generous possible interpretation of this. A really simple re-statement is that your bearing has consequences for other people, and if you're having a shit day and feeling miserable, you can either conduct yourself in a manner that poisons everyone around you, or you can try to keep yourself together. "Positive energy" is, I'm guessing, one way to get at this idea, though it's not how I would frame it myself.

As an aside: I assume that you know this from your own life, and appreciate when people behave in a manner that cares for the emotional commons of wherever you are. Is your objection to it here the fact that it's a giant stupid company ostensibly trying to curate your feelings, and that's annoying and (probably) hypocritical? Or do you really object to the premise?

Re: Coinbase employees petition to remove execs

#172

Post by ecshafer » Fri, Jun 10, 2022, 1:40 PM UTC

jcims wrote: post #111

highwaylights wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't speak to whether your assertion is true or not (I've no experience of Netflix or it's hiring), but it kind of makes sense that this would happen if you think of the Netflix journey to date. They transitioned from a mail order DVD system to online streaming, building that as they went, then moved the lot to the cloud while keeping everything up during it's exponential growth period. There are a lot of really h…

I'm curious why Zoom doesn't get more shine. In my opinion they were tested like few other companies in history at the start of the pandemic and seem to have pulled it off. My former employer had 60,000 people with technical roles and we all went to zoom in the summer of 2020 after our existing conferencing solution completely shit the bed. I won't say there were zero issues but the number definitely rounds to zero.…

I think Zoom doesn't get more shine for the same reason Alibaba, Baidu, or ByteDance don't. They are large companies doing complex engineering, but they are Chinese and not western.

Re: Coinbase employees petition to remove execs

#173

Post by LatteLazy » Fri, Jun 10, 2022, 1:40 PM UTC

stuff4ben wrote: post #163

Oh for heaven's sake, just quit. Vote with your feet and walk them out the door to another job. The market is good (for now), best do it before that changes. When the people who do the actual work leave and they can't hire anyone due to their poor reputation because of the previously rescinded offers, they'll reap their own rewards.

Exactly.

Re: Coinbase employees petition to remove execs

#174

Post by kdomanski » Fri, Jun 10, 2022, 1:41 PM UTC

itsoktocry wrote: post #156

kstenerud wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been in situations like this before. The end result is one giant popularity contest, with the beautiful people clique getting the highest ratings, and everyone else getting varying degrees of shit based on how unpopular they are and how much intrigue is currently going on. They didn't even have to actively collude; humans come with very sensitive popularity meters built-in, so they instinctively know where to pl…

> with the beautiful people clique getting the highest ratings, I don't think you're wrong, but it's also a cynical interpretation. Another way to look at it is that people who other people want to work with get high ratings. Is that bad? From a company culture standpoint, I'm not sure it is. In fact, I often see posts and comments on these very boards about the toxicity surrounding "really good programmers" who are…

> Another way to look at it is that people who other people want to work with get high ratings. Is that bad? From a company culture standpoint, I'm not sure it is.

Depending on who is it that people do and don’t want to work with, we might call it “discrimination against a protected class”, which is at least bad enough that it’s illegal in many countries.

Re: Coinbase employees petition to remove execs

#175

Post by PheonixPharts » Fri, Jun 10, 2022, 1:41 PM UTC

shanusmagnus wrote: post #161

DonHopkins wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds like something that happened at Sun around 1990, which I described earlier: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15660759 At Sun, during the dark days of Solaris, when everyone was depressed and wanted to quit, our manager sat down with each of us and asked: "I want to know your happiness index, a number from 1 to 10. You can use any algorithm you want to come up with it, just use the same algorithm each time…

I don't get why this is viewed as beyond the pale? Sounds like your manager cared about how you all were doing, and wanted a way to observe trends in how you were doing in order to help you, which is the same exact thing a manager does implicitly every time she talks to you. Obviously this isn't reproduceable psychological science, but is there more to the story to explain why you found this to be objectionable?

I see you've never worked in a toxic organization (or at least not noticed).

My experience has been if you voice displeasure it will be reflected in your performance review.

I had a role on a team once, I was doing great, getting work done and all my coworkers enjoyed working with me. Got along well with the team lead etc. However I was grossly mislead as to what the role was. I finally decided to talk to my manager about my displeasure with the role, naively thinking they might be interested in helping improve things.

The next week I was brought into a room with my manager and it was made very clear that I was going to be pip'd in the next review cycle. I was suddenly presented with a laundry list of goals I had to meet in the next 4 weeks and told that this was the minimum acceptable way to even remotely get a passing review. These were goals I had never seen or heard of in the previous 5 months of the review cycle.

I think this is more summed up as in the joking expression "the beatings will continue until morale improves". In my experience this is more common than not.

Re: Coinbase employees petition to remove execs

#176

Post by itsoktocry » Fri, Jun 10, 2022, 1:43 PM UTC

hdjjhhvvhga wrote: post #68

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dunno, it only asks for a thumbs up or thumbs down - unless I misread it - which is a lot less invasive or "ratty" than most employee review systems I know. I prefer human feedback to be honest. And I've only ever given negative feedback on a direct co-worker once, who was a right smug prick.

> I dunno, it only asks for a thumbs up or thumbs down Yeah, but why? Why would I even "rate" my coworkers? I would prefer not to. If someone is a prick, I talk to them first, and if it doesn't help and the case is serious, I go to the manager or file a formal complaint. What's the point of giving people thumbs up/down? Someone has a bad day, let's make it even worse by giving them a thumbs down, it's ridiculous.

>Someone has a bad day, let's make it even worse by giving them a thumbs down, it's ridiculous.

So giving them a thumbs-down is bad, but filing a formal complaint is fine? That seems like an extreme escalation.

Maybe I'm far less cynical than others here, but as has been mentioned in other comments, I don't believe that people are going to down-rank people out of spite. And if you ask a broad question like, "Is this person a good teammate, yes/no?" and the person gets many no's...perhaps it's something to look into?

Re: Coinbase employees petition to remove execs

#177

Post by kstenerud » Fri, Jun 10, 2022, 1:44 PM UTC

itsoktocry wrote: post #156

kstenerud wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been in situations like this before. The end result is one giant popularity contest, with the beautiful people clique getting the highest ratings, and everyone else getting varying degrees of shit based on how unpopular they are and how much intrigue is currently going on. They didn't even have to actively collude; humans come with very sensitive popularity meters built-in, so they instinctively know where to pl…

> with the beautiful people clique getting the highest ratings, I don't think you're wrong, but it's also a cynical interpretation. Another way to look at it is that people who other people want to work with get high ratings. Is that bad? From a company culture standpoint, I'm not sure it is. In fact, I often see posts and comments on these very boards about the toxicity surrounding "really good programmers" who are…

It comes from life experience. I once made the mistake of contradicting a powerful person at my company at a party, and it embarrassed him. Shortly thereafter, people who had been friendly with me became noticeably cooler. My peer reviews took a nosedive and I was let go in the next round of layoffs.

That's how things work in the real world, but this kind of review system makes it MUCH easier to sabotage others when you have the clout to do so, because there's no manager to protect them from the bullshit anymore. It's basically inviting these sorts of shenanigans rather than forcing saboteurs to do a lot of extra work to get people fired.

Re: Coinbase employees petition to remove execs

#178

Post by jdr23bc » Fri, Jun 10, 2022, 1:45 PM UTC

shanusmagnus wrote: post #161

DonHopkins wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds like something that happened at Sun around 1990, which I described earlier: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15660759 At Sun, during the dark days of Solaris, when everyone was depressed and wanted to quit, our manager sat down with each of us and asked: "I want to know your happiness index, a number from 1 to 10. You can use any algorithm you want to come up with it, just use the same algorithm each time…

I don't get why this is viewed as beyond the pale? Sounds like your manager cared about how you all were doing, and wanted a way to observe trends in how you were doing in order to help you, which is the same exact thing a manager does implicitly every time she talks to you. Obviously this isn't reproduceable psychological science, but is there more to the story to explain why you found this to be objectionable?

a company I worked at tried this. it didn't work out for these reasons:

A) it's a strange request B) it's an imposition C) it implies a callous touch. why don't you care enough to check in directly? D) it wasn't clear what the data was actually used for. or if it was ever used.

Re: Coinbase employees petition to remove execs

#179

Post by afavour » Fri, Jun 10, 2022, 1:45 PM UTC

User23 wrote: post #167

kstenerud wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been in situations like this before. The end result is one giant popularity contest, with the beautiful people clique getting the highest ratings, and everyone else getting varying degrees of shit based on how unpopular they are and how much intrigue is currently going on. They didn't even have to actively collude; humans come with very sensitive popularity meters built-in, so they instinctively know where to pl…

> The end result is one giant popularity contest, with the beautiful people clique getting the highest ratings, and everyone else getting varying degrees of shit based on how unpopular they are and how much intrigue is currently going on. Welcome to life. Human social hierarchies have always worked like this. The only thing this dot collector is doing is presenting it explicitly in a way even people with poor social…

So, because it’s a base human urge, we shouldn’t ever try to improve on it or do better?

Sounds very defeatist to me. Plenty of workplaces try a lot harder: setting specific goals to achieve in order to get promotions rather than relying on interpersonal relationships, for example.

> Interestingly male social spaces are actually less focused on appearance than female ones.

I think it’s telling that your example here is high school. IMO the focus is always on who has the most power. In high school, yes, the pretty girls have power, because of the way the boys treat them. I can’t say I’ve seen the same dynamic play out in adult workspaces.

Re: Coinbase employees petition to remove execs

#180

Post by itsoktocry » Fri, Jun 10, 2022, 1:49 PM UTC

kstenerud wrote: post #177

itsoktocry wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> with the beautiful people clique getting the highest ratings, I don't think you're wrong, but it's also a cynical interpretation. Another way to look at it is that people who other people want to work with get high ratings. Is that bad? From a company culture standpoint, I'm not sure it is. In fact, I often see posts and comments on these very boards about the toxicity surrounding "really good programmers" who are…

It comes from life experience. I once made the mistake of contradicting a powerful person at my company at a party, and it embarrassed him. Shortly thereafter, people who had been friendly with me became noticeably cooler. My peer reviews took a nosedive and I was let go in the next round of layoffs. That's how things work in the real world, but this kind of review system makes it MUCH easier to sabotage others when…

>I once made the mistake of contradicting a powerful person at my company at a party, and it embarrassed him. Shortly thereafter, people who had been friendly with me became noticeably cooler. My peer reviews took a nosedive and I was let go in the next round of layoffs.

Obviously I have no idea the circumstances of your experiences here, so don't take this personally, this is hypothetical: but what if "you" actually were the asshole here? Wouldn't you be saying the same thing? Maybe this incident made people realize that "you" weren't a good person to work with?

If you were on the other side, isn't that a good outcome?