271–280 of 562 posts
187 comments almost entirely focused on language usage, and at best two to three words. Fascinating.
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Favorite example has to be Luis Suarez in his apology for very clearly biting a World Cup opponent in front of the world some years ago: "The truth is that my colleague Giorgio Chiellini suffered the physical result of a bite"
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...
> 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
I, too, prefer that companies spoke in direct, plain terms, without PR shenanigans. Does anyone know why do they do this, though? Is it to de-risk potential lawsuits or do they believe people prefer that way ("sounds professional")?
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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…
Please don't compare death with layoffs. One if an inevitable but tragic part of life the other is an inevitable but tragic part of keeping the shareholders happy.
Does that change if YC doesn’t plan to make as many late stage investments?
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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".
That one I actually understand. Calling somebody innocent is a very strong and contextual / scoped statement, and ultimately that's what the courts take their time to do (and even they I think kinda stop shy? I don't know if acquitted is the same as innocent. I feel it's more "not proven guilty").
Most modern countries consider this a fundamental right.
187 comments almost entirely focused on language usage, and at best two to three words. Fascinating.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Do you have some data to back that up? I'm not sure if a small percentage of employees are so expensive as to be the tipping point for a company to go out of business.
Employees are one of or the most expensive part of doing business for many. I guess you could google Gross vs Net margins in various companies or industries as an example (maybe here[1]). But layoffs aren't merely firing people, they are "firing people and not re-hiring for their positions or work." So it's often closing out on entire product strategies, such as the case here with YC. [1]: https://pages.stern.nyu.edu…
Not debating that. I'm debating:
> Layoffs are often a choice between letting a small percentage go or causing the entire company to go out of business
Show me a company that MUST let go a SMALL PERCENTAGE of its workforce in order to not go out of business. Meaning a company which is hanging by a thread and that thread is (again) a small percentage of the workforce. Because if a small percentage of the workforce is expensive enough to provide you with the runway you need to continue doing business, that runway is short enough that the company will cease to exist anyway, so the point is moot.
The change that the title hints at: > 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)
can those employees not be staffed to other projects? surely the skillsets are reusable. Something is very fishy about this and the timing.
> 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
I, too, prefer that companies spoke in direct, plain terms, without PR shenanigans. Does anyone know why do they do this, though? Is it to de-risk potential lawsuits or do they believe people prefer that way ("sounds professional")?