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Layoffs Don't Work

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Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#261

Post by Ancalagon »

clusterhacks wrote: post #161
Workaccount2 wrote: post #150

Real talk here, and I'm sorry for being "that guy" Why do tech workers get so wrapped around the axle of layoffs when most people are in a chronic state of tech job hopping? I know multiple people who have worked their entire career thus far without ever staying at a place for more than 3 or 4 years. Some no more than two. Tech job culture is practically a mono culture with "hop jobs" being a hallmark. From an employ…

Maybe that perception that people chronically job hop is not true? I would welcome a data source that shows chronic job hopping is the norm. Anecdotally speaking, I spent 6+ish years at my first "old tech" company. My org in this (very large) company was constantly simmering with resource actions (mostly small scale layoffs). There was lots of negative energy there. I left to take a programming/data analytics gig in…

Another anecdote from my part. I graduated in roughly 2015. I've had 5 software eng jobs since then. Each one I've had at least 2 different managers in the average 2 years I spent in each. My latest role, however, I was at for 2.5 years and had 6(!) managers. I had originally intended to stay at that role longer term but it was obvious the constant managerial turnover was a negative for my career growth - so I hopped again.

I've not experienced a layoff, but I also think its extremely abnormal to be in a position for so long and only have one manager.

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#262

Post by AlotOfReading »

acdha wrote: post #79
fx1994 wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We are a small team in big company, and management that made wrong decisions is still somewhere there but not my direct management, still getting same paycheck, car, cards and benefits but new managers (that accepted to take over and got brand new car for 100k€, cards and bonuses, bells and whistles) started to layoff workers so we know this is the end for my team, and of course they will do whatever it takes to "sav…

That’s really the key part: if the managers who created the problem are still there, layoffs will just make it worse. There are cases where getting out of a dubious business line can lead to long-term benefit but I’ve seen that a handful of times compared to losing useful people while the bad managers failed upwards.

That's basically the story of Philips. They go through a tough period and choose to divest a "dubious" line of business to focus on higher margin products. The new company, freed of Philips management, goes on to surpass the revenues of the parent. That's how ASML and NXP were born. Signify (Philips lighting) is getting reasonably close.

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#263

Post by momocowcow »

ltbarcly3 wrote: post #200
WalterBright wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm unclear what employers are deriving from this exercise at this point It filters out the complete frauds. Yes, there are people who know all the right things to say in a job interview, but cannot code at all. If you hire one of them, it takes a bit to find out they cannot code, and a bit longer to fire them, so you're out $$$$ paying their salaries for nothing. For example, a recruiter I know will ask a tech can…

I have done probably 500 to 1000 tech screens for big tech companies (as the interviewer) and this is completely true. I have interviewed many people employed in tech as programmers for their entire career and they can't code. I don't meen leetcode, I mean they get confused trying to write brute force substring search. The nested for loop seems to be too complex for them to keep in their head all at once. I have had…

You are still not testing if they can code. But whether under the scrutiny of another person, they can code. Maybe this is important to you, maybe peer programming is important to you for example. I remember a young dev who couldn’t pass such tests, as he would get too nervous, yet he had written the core tech for many shipped products. The type of guy you would just stick in dark room. With age this type of stuff settles down.

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#264

Post by s1artibartfast »

dpkirchner wrote: post #140
billy99k wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, it worked for Twitter. Lots of people screamed that Twitter would implode withing 6 months, after the massive cuts. There was some scrambling for a while, but I haven't noticed any issues. In fact, they've added tons of new features and Grok AI (which is much better than competitors).

Last I heard Twitter is so desperate they've resorted to suing former customers who stopped buying poorly performing ad space. Edit: removed supposition

My understanding is that twitter's struggles are/were a result of advertiser and customer boycotts, not site functionality.

People were aghast at the brutality of the layoffs, and ideological direction. However, my impression was that there was in fact a tremendous amount of bloat.

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#265

Post by ajkjk »

clusterhacks wrote: post #161
Workaccount2 wrote: post #150

Real talk here, and I'm sorry for being "that guy" Why do tech workers get so wrapped around the axle of layoffs when most people are in a chronic state of tech job hopping? I know multiple people who have worked their entire career thus far without ever staying at a place for more than 3 or 4 years. Some no more than two. Tech job culture is practically a mono culture with "hop jobs" being a hallmark. From an employ…

Maybe that perception that people chronically job hop is not true? I would welcome a data source that shows chronic job hopping is the norm. Anecdotally speaking, I spent 6+ish years at my first "old tech" company. My org in this (very large) company was constantly simmering with resource actions (mostly small scale layoffs). There was lots of negative energy there. I left to take a programming/data analytics gig in…

It seems impossible to think that it's not true given how fundamental it is to (new) tech culture.

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#266

Post by shortrounddev2 »

Workaccount2 wrote: post #150

Real talk here, and I'm sorry for being "that guy" Why do tech workers get so wrapped around the axle of layoffs when most people are in a chronic state of tech job hopping? I know multiple people who have worked their entire career thus far without ever staying at a place for more than 3 or 4 years. Some no more than two. Tech job culture is practically a mono culture with "hop jobs" being a hallmark. From an employ…

I think many people at big tech companies like Facebook truly drank the koolaid there, and when they got laid off it laid bare that the companies they worked at were just companies. Facebook, Google, Amazon, etc are no better than Microsoft, IBM, Oracle, or whatever other 20th century company they had come to represent the answer to. I think a LOT of people had really tied their identities up in being a big tech employee and when they got laid off it was like being cast out of paradise

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#267

Post by mykowebhn »

giantg2 wrote: post #225
filoleg wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I cannot speak for layoffs in all industries ever, but I agree with your assessment of layoffs in big tech from personal experiences. I have way too many “lifer” friends in big tech who are deadly scared of layoffs and job hopping. They are also the ones who rarely got promoted and havent had a significant pay bump pretty much ever. On another hand, half my team at a big tech company got laid off back at the start of…

Yeah, I make the same adjusted for inflation that I did when I got my last/only promotion 10 years ago. I have grey hair, a disability, and a family that relies on the health insurance. Switching or being laid off is a risky proposition for me. It sounds like all your examples are young, childless people (who else could take a month off to go vacationing?). Life is much harder for some of us.

[flagged]

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#268

Post by [deleted] »

mistercheph wrote: post #256
gruez wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Market makers make fractions of a percent per trade. How will your "penalty for higher frequency" deter traders that prey on "ignorance of other participants" or whatever, but don't put market makers out of business?

Easy, bye market makers! It's like a layoff, some good will end up getting culled with the bad.

[deleted]

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#269

Post by PhasmaFelis »

Workaccount2 wrote: post #150

Real talk here, and I'm sorry for being "that guy" Why do tech workers get so wrapped around the axle of layoffs when most people are in a chronic state of tech job hopping? I know multiple people who have worked their entire career thus far without ever staying at a place for more than 3 or 4 years. Some no more than two. Tech job culture is practically a mono culture with "hop jobs" being a hallmark. From an employ…

> Why do tech workers get so wrapped around the axle of layoffs when most people are in a chronic state of tech job hopping?

Most of us job-hop because we have to, not because we want to.

There's a class of people in the tech industry who like to write blogs about how fun and fulfilling it is to constantly change jobs and roles. Those people are highly visible but not representative. Most humans find constant change and uncertainty stressful, not exhilarating.

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#270

Post by forty »

ghaff wrote: post #86
andrenotgiant wrote: post #44

> After the early-2000s dotcom bust, Bain researchers found that stock prices for S&P 500 companies that had no layoffs or laid off less than 3% of their workforce increased an average of 9% in the next year. Meanwhile, stock prices were flat in companies that laid off between 3%-10% of their workers, and prices plummeted 38% for companies that laid off more than 10%. Failing companies go through layoffs. Companies l…

There's a big tendency to look for culprits whether layoffs, PE, MBAs, or whatever. But a lot of companies just made wrong bets or were in the wrong place at the wrong time. Kodak was never going to survive in anything like its pre-digital form.

Yet, those who makes those wrong bets are generally paid very generously and they are generally not those who suffers from the consequences
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