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> Seventeen of our teammates are impacted today. Never allow corporations to speak in passive, weak, blameless terms. Use direct, honest, language, and force them to do the same. "Seventeen of our teammates are impacted today." - > "We laid off 17 employees today" "I was impacted by layoffs" -> "Google laid me off" etc
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I worked with a guy who came up as an engineer in the Soviet Union. Back around 2014 he was laid off from a US tech company that had moved him over from Russia. He couldn't wrap his head around it. Said that in the Soviet Union there was no such thing as a layoff. If they needed to shut down some program they'd move you to another one. The whole layoff was just extremely disorienting for him - especially since the co…
Why lay off people, when state can afford to keep them on minimum wage? and reap the benefit of their work (rockets, weapons, tanks, nukes, etc)
> Seventeen of our teammates are impacted today. Never allow corporations to speak in passive, weak, blameless terms. Use direct, honest, language, and force them to do the same. "Seventeen of our teammates are impacted today." - > "We laid off 17 employees today" "I was impacted by layoffs" -> "Google laid me off" etc
Passive voice afflicts many people's writing, not just corporations. Yes, it's a bad practice, but I don't feel it's egregious in this case.
The issue with corporate passive is that business language is not only ugly but serves evil purposes. In person, it exists to slow down bad news so you can read and manipulate people (“string betting”) and, on paper, its raison d’etre is to project authority to which one has no actual right.
I'd be very interested in the specifics of how and why late stage investing is so different that the success of YC in early stages doesn't translate.
Focus. Much easier to have the entire company focused on one thing.
Specialisation of labour. Become experts, make sure nobody catches you.
When you start diluting your goal you trade off focus and specialisation, potentially reducing your advantages.
Now I’m wondering how to apply that to myself. The answer seems obvious but I like being a generalist.
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Does this accomplish anything other than increasing resentment?
Begs the question, what do you think companies gain by using such passive language?
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Some newspapers are really dreadful about this with regards to people killed/injured by cops. A well-known example from the NYT: > A reporter was hit by a pepper ball on live television by an officer who appeared to be aiming at her https://www.poynter.org/ethics-trust/2020/new-york-times-twe...
There was one circulating where the newspaper headline stated that "A man with no active warrants was shot by police." Which is just about the most nefarious way to say "an innocent man was shot by police".
I'd be very interested in the specifics of how and why late stage investing is so different that the success of YC in early stages doesn't translate.
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I think this is just a matter of opinion. When something severe happens it's natural to not use the most harsh term to describe the event. It doesn't seems like something malicious. When describing a death many people will say "they are no longer with us" instead of describing the circumstance of death. When talking about traumatic events we as a society have a natural propensity to not use triggering words. There is…
Perhaps you could argue over the use of "impacted", but the use of passive voice is pretty objective. "We impacted 17 roles today" or perhaps "I impacted 17 roles today" is, well, it's still pretty bad, but at least it takes some responsibility.
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What does it say about families losing their sustenance? I am intentional in my phrasing. I care about people, not "jobs".
It shows that you have never lived in soviet union and happily eat communist fairy tales. Soviet Workers were exploited and underpaid by state, there was no private property and almost no private sector. Soviet Union employed highly educated PhD rocket scientists and paid everyone minimum wage, because there was no alternative. Literally every scientist family had to grow their own potatoes and veggies at home/dachas…
Your comment is a laundry list of fun talking points, but I couldn't care less. This debate concerns families having reliable material sustenance.
> we’re going to decrease the amount of late stage investing we do
Which allows letting go of 17 employees involved with that, which is 20% of employees. EOF (and that was already more info than the article contained)