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Changes at YC

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Re: Changes at YC

#321

Post by jchw »

EngManagerIsMe wrote: post #306

> Unfortunately, this means we will no longer need some of the roles on the late stage investing team. Seventeen of our teammates are impacted today. I hate this passive voice. It implies there was nothing that could be done, that this was just a force of nature. That it wasn't an active choice by YC, but rather just some eventuality. Most of us understand the necessity of hard decisions. Own the outcomes. It's ok to…

I think it's time to admit that there's no way they could write announcements like this that will please absolutely everybody. It just can't be done.

On the other hand, that doesn't mean companies will stop doing layoffs either, sometimes it will certainly happen.

I'm at least happy when I see an announcement that spares us the theatrics and just says what it needs to say.

Re: Changes at YC

#322

Post by YetAnotherNick »

EngManagerIsMe wrote: post #306

> Unfortunately, this means we will no longer need some of the roles on the late stage investing team. Seventeen of our teammates are impacted today. I hate this passive voice. It implies there was nothing that could be done, that this was just a force of nature. That it wasn't an active choice by YC, but rather just some eventuality. Most of us understand the necessity of hard decisions. Own the outcomes. It's ok to…

>> we will no longer need some of the roles on the late stage investing team

> I hate this passive voice.

It's active voice, no? How is it different than we fired, except that firing sounds more tied employee performance, no longer needed more seems like employer fault.

Re: Changes at YC

#323

Post by bko »

EngManagerIsMe wrote: post #306

> Unfortunately, this means we will no longer need some of the roles on the late stage investing team. Seventeen of our teammates are impacted today. I hate this passive voice. It implies there was nothing that could be done, that this was just a force of nature. That it wasn't an active choice by YC, but rather just some eventuality. Most of us understand the necessity of hard decisions. Own the outcomes. It's ok to…

> If you think that looks too bad, then don't do the thing -- find other opportunities for the people in the company.

The needs of a business change. Sometimes roles are eliminated and other times roles are added. This is normal and healthy process of every business. Can we get away from infantizing the individuals affected like they're some children whose family disowned them? It's unfortunate and you can certainly empathize with those that no longer have a role in the firm, but it's a business, not a family.

I think they are owning the outcomes. Saying "we fired 17 people" would be more disrespectful and not accurate. If I was let go due to a strategic business decision or through the natural course of the industry I wouldn't want my former employer suggesting they fired me.

Re: Changes at YC

#324

Post by wheels »

ak_111 wrote: post #258
marktani wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure how involved pg was with this post as its stated author Garry Tan

You would imagine he read it at some point. You would also imagine his CEO would have internalised Paul Graham's most important piece of advice about communication (writing clearly).

I have no inside information on this one, but YC has been around for 18 years, and pg left the president role 9 years ago. It's been about half of YC's life that he's been out of the day-to-day stuff. It's absolutely not obvious that he'd be reading each announcement that goes out (I'd be surprised at such).

Re: Changes at YC

#325

Post by yencabulator »

YetAnotherNick wrote: post #322
EngManagerIsMe wrote: post #306

> Unfortunately, this means we will no longer need some of the roles on the late stage investing team. Seventeen of our teammates are impacted today. I hate this passive voice. It implies there was nothing that could be done, that this was just a force of nature. That it wasn't an active choice by YC, but rather just some eventuality. Most of us understand the necessity of hard decisions. Own the outcomes. It's ok to…

>> we will no longer need some of the roles on the late stage investing team > I hate this passive voice. It's active voice, no? How is it different than we fired, except that firing sounds more tied employee performance, no longer needed more seems like employer fault.

"Seventeen of our teammates are impacted today." vs something like "We decided to fire 17 teammates due to this."

Re: Changes at YC

#326

Post by yamtaddle »

lcw wrote: post #123
voz_ wrote: post #46

> 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 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…

> When describing a death many people will say "they are no longer with us"

Fussell describes (in Class) this kind of talking-around situations as a "low" marker (in a class-signaling sense). The "high" version is to just plainly state "X died" or "X is dead". Similar for describing things like pregnancy.

Not sure what significance this has for corporate communication, and I'm also not sure how true it is (though all the things he described that I do know about were remarkably accurate) but, well, there's that I guess. Regardless, I'm not sure that kind of avoidant language is natural (though possibly it is, and it has to be trained out to get the more-direct "high" version—but I suspect either preference is mainly a socialization thing).

Re: Changes at YC

#327

Post by bradrn »

EngManagerIsMe wrote: post #306

> Unfortunately, this means we will no longer need some of the roles on the late stage investing team. Seventeen of our teammates are impacted today. I hate this passive voice. It implies there was nothing that could be done, that this was just a force of nature. That it wasn't an active choice by YC, but rather just some eventuality. Most of us understand the necessity of hard decisions. Own the outcomes. It's ok to…

> I hate this passive voice.

To be pedantically clear, the first sentence here is not passive! Both clauses there have an explicit subject (‘this’ and ‘we’ respectively) and neither verb (‘means’ and ‘need’) is passivised. I like Geoffrey K. Pullum’s article on what is and isn’t passive: http://www.lel.ed.ac.uk/~gpullum/passive_loathing.html

(Not that this means the announcement isn’t problematic, mind you. It still feels like it’s trying to avoid focussing on something. And yes, the second sentence does this by means of the passive voice. I just get annoyed when people misidentify it, as they seem to do regularly.)

Re: Changes at YC

#328

Post by bradrn »

YetAnotherNick wrote: post #322
EngManagerIsMe wrote: post #306

> Unfortunately, this means we will no longer need some of the roles on the late stage investing team. Seventeen of our teammates are impacted today. I hate this passive voice. It implies there was nothing that could be done, that this was just a force of nature. That it wasn't an active choice by YC, but rather just some eventuality. Most of us understand the necessity of hard decisions. Own the outcomes. It's ok to…

>> we will no longer need some of the roles on the late stage investing team > I hate this passive voice. It's active voice, no? How is it different than we fired, except that firing sounds more tied employee performance, no longer needed more seems like employer fault.

> It's active voice, no?

Yes, it is — at least in the first sentence.

> How is it different than we fired, except that firing sounds more tied employee performance, no longer needed more seems like employer fault.

I think this is GP’s issue with the phrasing here. Passive or not, it sounds like it’s deflecting focus away from something — as they said, ‘It implies there was nothing that could be done, that this was just a force of nature’.

Re: Changes at YC

#329

Post by tim333 »

winphone1974 wrote: post #311

Man, total amateur hour. A layoff post without talking about how it's the hardest thing the CEO has ever done, or saying the responsibility lies with me? No mention of how deep he cares about those departing? And delivered on a Monday? Why didn't they use ChatGPT to compose this like everyone else?

I doubt the late stage investing team will suffer that much. They'll probably move to similar high paying roles shortly.

Re: Changes at YC

#330

Post by yamtaddle »

bmelton wrote: post #303
bradleyjg wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My hunch is that the evolution was driven by executives, probably in the 70s and 80s, that didn’t want to say they were firing people in order to make more money. In other words the same dynamic that now leads to ‘impacted’.

Some members of my family (back in the day) used to be laid off from positions seasonally, and were then rehired the next year. I suspect that in its early versions, it referred more to the notion that "we won't have any more work until the spring, so we'll see you then." I don't know its etymology or when it might have been coopted by employers who didn't intend to rehire, but I suspect its intent is to signal that…

Manufacturing can still work like this (and maybe other industries?). You're laid off every now and then, if work slows down, but with the expectation (possibly contractually—many of these have unions) that you'll be brought back when work picks back up. AFAIK they can collect unemployment during the lay-off, so it's better than being kept on with much-reduced hours.
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