31–40 of 419 posts
the head of HR thought that the company's ~5% attrition was "unhealthy" because it was too low and in another, HR thought that the company's attrition sitting at a bit under 10% was too low Can someone explain to me why fewer people quitting is seen as an unhealthy metric? Retaining employees seems like something companies should want to try to prioritize above all else, especially in this market.
Abstraction is necessary to deal with things at scale, on a programming focused site i think we all know that and know that often the trade off is inefficiency. Its probably to expensive to track all these peoples real value and really it doesn't even matter. What was the consequence of all these supposedly valuable people leaving? Did the stock drop after the guy saving millions a year left? Probably some pointless…
If you're at some adtech company where the entire point of the advertising is to cancel out some competitor's advertising and you're only there for the paycheck, efficiency is irrelevant because the company could be destroyed by a giant meteor and nobody else in the entire would would have any reason to care.
But not all jobs are like that. Some people make medical devices that save lives. If the company is inefficient, they don't save as many lives, and that matters. Some people are in charge of making loans to people or selling legally mandated insurance and the rate the customers pay has a significant effect on their economic well-being. Some jobs are in the production of food and the work impacts the quality and price of food. Some companies make fire suppression systems or automobiles or industrial equipment, and it needs to be safe without being unaffordable.
Not all jobs are an exercise in futility.
I laughed because I've been on the other end of these conversations (poaching a talented engineer going remote). I guess I have some random HR department to thank!
Realizing this is important for retention. It's damaging when upper management falsely thinks people are interchangeble, which is a common view among non-technical types and HR. This leads to 10x people feeling underappreciated and resentful, ultimately causing them to resign for higher compensation and more appreciation elsewhere. It can literally destroy small companies if an individual's unique contribution isn't…
It's generally cheaper to poach engineers than to buy a company. Just food for thoughts.
This is what those stand up meetings were supposed to be for. It’s not supposed to be a meaningless ritual. If people can’t get help, or are afraid to ask for help, something is wrong.
That said, even I know that while individuals matter, teams matter more. And I don't see anything in this entire post about how to build a team or sustain a team or inspire them to support each other. Absolutely nothing about how you can develop skill and aptitude in junior folks or redirect conflict or conveying the importance of actually shipping something vs running marathons on the tech debt treadmill. You know all the shit that has to happen in the real world to keep people happy and invested. All I see is an ode to the 10x'er and how sucking up to them might keep them around long enough to be successful.
I love HN and the community overall but there are few things more predictable than this story making it from new to the front page lol.
I'm an introvert, I love working from home, I live in the woods with a 1/3rd mile long driveway. Since my youngest went off to college I'm here alone with her fish and a cat. I go into town once or twice a week for supplies and the rest of the time I'm just out here in my little sanctuary enjoying the lack of people. That said, even I know that while individuals matter, teams matter more. And I don't see anything in…
the head of HR thought that the company's ~5% attrition was "unhealthy" because it was too low and in another, HR thought that the company's attrition sitting at a bit under 10% was too low Can someone explain to me why fewer people quitting is seen as an unhealthy metric? Retaining employees seems like something companies should want to try to prioritize above all else, especially in this market.
Having myself made these mistakes another thing I have to make the effort to extract is "how long would it take me" vs "how long would it have taken me 5years ago before I knew what I know now".
It's amazing how many times the "big picture" changes can lead to complete overhauls or rewrites of otherwise consistent and well built software stacks.
the head of HR thought that the company's ~5% attrition was "unhealthy" because it was too low and in another, HR thought that the company's attrition sitting at a bit under 10% was too low Can someone explain to me why fewer people quitting is seen as an unhealthy metric? Retaining employees seems like something companies should want to try to prioritize above all else, especially in this market.
Depends how good your hiring is. At the places I've worked, I'd want to see 0.1 (involuntary) attrition at least, given that mishires happened 1 in 10 to 1 in 5 times. A low attrition rate in the context of lots of mishires means we're not firing people quickly enough.