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Why top firms fire good workers

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Re: Why top firms fire good workers

#241

Post by throwaway2037 »

jonahx wrote: post #58
SilverElfin wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No one’s mentioning caste here except for you. This thread is describing managers taking credit for their employees’ work, which absolutely happens in the US. It’s less frequent at the best companies like in big tech - but I bet it’s very common at random mid sized companies. Especially outside of tech.

It makes sense that caste would amplify this effect, because unequal treatment is already a cultural norm. In the US, even in most corporate cultures, truly egregious credit stealing is harder. Not to say it never happens, just that people are generally slier about it.

    > unequal treatment is already a cultural norm
I am not from India, but I cringe when I read this sentence. What you wrote is harsh, and untrue. I have met and known well many Indians in my life, and unequal treatment was not the cultural norm for them. More personally: I can remember starting my first job at a big ibank in New York City. I was surprised by how much favouring went on between different ethnic and religious groups. It happens less now, but there was absolutely gate-keeping around these groups.

Re: Why top firms fire good workers

#242

Post by throwaway2037 »

unmole wrote: post #63
jonahx wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It makes sense that caste would amplify this effect, because unequal treatment is already a cultural norm. In the US, even in most corporate cultures, truly egregious credit stealing is harder. Not to say it never happens, just that people are generally slier about it.

Yeah, no. The white-collar workforce is almost entirely made up of people from the so called upper castes . The idea that caste has anything to do with the toxic behaviour in corporate India simply doesn't hold up.

No way! 100% untrue. There are so many co-workers I have had over the years who were from mid-level to very low caste. Lots of my co-workers grew up where their parents were barely above sustenance/subsistence farming. They worked very hard in school, got into IIT, then their career skyrocketed. In their first year of employment, they earned multiples of their parents.

Where I have noticed discrimination in hiring in India is non-Muslims (Hindu, Christian, etc.) hiring Muslims. Generally (and sadly), if a Muslim is hired, they are offered the lowest position. To be clear, I can only speak from my personal experience. Maybe it is different (and better) in other industries.

Re: Why top firms fire good workers

#243

Post by throwaway2037 »

unmole wrote: post #108
jonahx wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

India scores high on the Power Distance Index: https://clearlycultural.com/geert-hofstede-cultural-dimensio... Seems like that would influence the behavior we're talking about. Maybe it's culturally independent of the caste system, but it feels like it would be connected. I don't have much personal experience here so I may be wrong.

> Maybe it's culturally independent of the caste system Is exactly my point. There seems to be tendency among Western observers to treat the caste system as a catch-all explanation for social dynamics in India. That kind of reductionism doens't have a lot of explanatory value.

Thank to write this post. It drives me crazy on HN how many people tout this reductionist view of Indian culture. One thing I tell myself: The Indian nation is changing so fast that it is a new country every 10 years.

Re: Why top firms fire good workers

#244

Post by djmips »

mnemotronic wrote: post #209

I'm sorry, this article reads like something a low-level HR drone was ordered to write with the help of AI. "Come up with an excuse we can feed to the board of directors about why we fired all the high-paid productive SMEs, lost our most profitable customers and tanked our profits this year".

it definitely sounds like AI

Re: Why top firms fire good workers

#245

Post by vincnetas »

mlrtime wrote: post #159
vincnetas wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"unions dont set max salaries" you are free to negotiate better salary. fact that union had agreed with company on minimum salary, does not change anything for you. yes the company can say "hey you asking too much, we talked with unions" but company can say the same either way "hey you asking too much, market is tough". so unions just the lower bar.

Who is free, individuals or the entire group?

being part of the group does not limit your max salary.

Re: Why top firms fire good workers

#246

Post by elevation »

autoexec wrote: post #211
ryandrake wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's so wild. So many HN commenters have this exaggerated caricature in their heads about what a Union must be: "Unions mean every worker gets paid the same!" "Unions mean I will make less money!" "Unions make it impossible to fire underperformers!" "Unions are run by bosses whose incentives are different than workers!" "Unions mean I can't plug in my own workstation!" "Unions reward seniority over everything else!"…

Companies have spent a fortune paying companies just to spread lies and misrepresentations about unions to workers. I guess their money is being well spent. All their big talking points are here, being regurgitated just like they wanted.

If companies are spreading lies/misrepresentations about unions, they're leaving a lot of good material on the table! I have a lifetime of union abuse stories from family and neighbors in the trades, service work, factories, and even elementary education.

A close female relative declined to cooperate with a unionization effort at her job -- she made good tips and didn't want to pay dues. She started receiving threatening calls at night describing her indoor pets and other details of her home that heavily implied that the caller had physically surveilled it, or was perhaps currently nearby. While the unionization effort ultimately failed, the harassment she endured left psychological scars.

My best friend's brother lost his union job after refusing to work unpaid overtime for them. When he showed up at his second job (with another union) he found out he was also fired there -- the union bosses in town had collaborated to blacklist him. So he took a non-union job framing houses. Months later, some union goons caught him alone on a job site and assaulted him for being a scab. They struck him several times with a 2x4 and kicked him. He nearly died.

Other friends in town have had their tires slashed, windows broken, or had out-of-state union members show up at their house on the weekend after trying to step down as union steward.

Even when I don't know the people involved, I can see the union machinery at work around me. When my local children's hospital awarded a parking garage contract to the lowest bidder, the local carpenter's union wanted a cut of the action. So the union brought in ruffians from out of state to protest the job site, causing delays. Someone covered the downtown with defamatory posters with pictures of the man who owned the construction company, so that his family, friends, and people he'd never met would see him made out to be the devil. The hospital and construction company could have made all the sabotage and harassment go away if they paid their protection money.

All the unions my family has experienced this century are just organized crime.

Re: Why top firms fire good workers

#247

Post by monerozcash »

vincnetas wrote: post #106
ChadNauseam wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tech people would obviously be well served by being in the union. If you make a cartel with other people who can do the same job as you, and you don't profit from that, you're doing something terribly wrong. The reason I'm opposed to it isn't because it wouldn't be good for tech people. I'm opposed to it because in general I think it would be more bad for everyone else than it would be good for tech people. I expect…

why do you think maximising profit for company is ok and everyone is cheering about that, but when employee tries to maximise profit then "oh noes the society will collapse "

Cartels are generally considered pretty bad when formed by companies.

Re: Why top firms fire good workers

#248

Post by port11 »

ameliaquining wrote: post #13
mcoliver wrote: post #4

No. The reason top firms part ways with good workers is usually political. Either the manager doesn't like the person regardless of their work abilities, or the manager is not politely savvy enough to ensure their team is being recognized for work that grows or is valuable to the business. Or they get caught up in the endlessly popular reorgs (again management failure). It's a failure of management. Nothing more. Not…

You're thinking of a different kind of company than the paper is talking about. (The headline, presumably written by the university's PR team, is a bit misleading about this.) The paper is about a certain kind of firm (e.g., the Big Four accounting firms, management consultancies like McKinsey, some elite law firms) that explicitly uses an "up or out" model, and explains why this kind of firm's business model (in par…

We don't editorialise titles but this is a good case for renaming the post to that of the paper or something like it. “Why the top consulting firms fire consultants” is a very different topic.

Re: Why top firms fire good workers

#249

Post by fuzztester »

labcomputer wrote: post #239
wakawaka28 wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unions can't defeat the forces of supply and demand. If people feel it is in their best interest to take a pay cut, they should be free to do so. If you want to take a job for a lower rate because of a mismatch in experience, union rates can amount to a ban on you getting a job. Likewise, if you can command a higher wage than average, no union should be able to tell you that you're not fit for the pay grade. If the s…

> Unions can't defeat the forces of supply and demand Oh, but they do! A core part of most union contracts is figuring out how to limit the number of people eligible to be hired. That’s why “union shops” exist. Or: why (in the entertainment industry) a production pays a heavy fine to hire non-union actors. Doctors do a similar thing by having the AMA lobby to limit the number of credentials granted each year.

The CAs (Chartered Accountants) official body does the same thing in India, so I've heard, from friends who were studying for the CA exams.

Limiting the number of CA who get qualified per year.

Re: Why top firms fire good workers

#250

Post by idiotsecant »

elevation wrote: post #246
autoexec wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Companies have spent a fortune paying companies just to spread lies and misrepresentations about unions to workers. I guess their money is being well spent. All their big talking points are here, being regurgitated just like they wanted.

If companies are spreading lies/misrepresentations about unions, they're leaving a lot of good material on the table! I have a lifetime of union abuse stories from family and neighbors in the trades, service work, factories, and even elementary education. A close female relative declined to cooperate with a unionization effort at her job -- she made good tips and didn't want to pay dues. She started receiving threate…

LOL what. I am in a union and nobody has ever threatened my cat or beat me with a 2x4 and I've never even heard of such a thing. Unions get you double time overtime and good healthcare. It's wild how deep in the owne class propaganda some people will get. Really get in there and take a good whiff.
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