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GoDaddy Announces Layoffs of “About 8%”

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Re: GoDaddy Announces Layoffs of “About 8%”

#41
post #7

It's interesting seeing GoDaddy/Gitlab lay off so late in the game. Jeff Lawson (TWLO) who is a fantastic financial and product focused CEO did his prep work in September last year with 11% of the company. I find it pretty hard to grok what your FP&A team must be like if you're a b2b supply chain business thinking about this stuff Q1 in global economic downturn.

What do you mean Jeff Lawson is a fantastic financial focused CEO?

His company has never turned a profit has it? I believe TWLO is one of the most unprofitable of large public tech companies.

Re: GoDaddy Announces Layoffs of “About 8%”

#42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you're not kidding. I just did an internet search for "7% layoff" and it's staggering how many results there are.

Same reason Wall St takes a 7% commission on IPOs.

https://www.insidescience.org/news/brain-seven-magic-number

For those unaware the number 7 seems to have a special place in the human brain as it's the number of distinct things most humans can hold in their brain at once before needing abstractions or other devices to keep track of the information.

It's also the point at which our brains seem to switch from "a few" to "many" and because it's prime it's the highest a few number that we don't mentally split into groups of other numbers.

Re: GoDaddy Announces Layoffs of “About 8%”

#43

GoDaddy was the first software engineering job I worked for. I had interned there too. It's understandable that the external perception of the company is bad (and even sexist), but internally GoDaddy was a great place to work. They're always a major sponsor of Grace Hopper. They were adamant about hiring women. They made my internship so much fun, and I am still friends with many of my co-interns from that summer. Of…

I think a lot of us have a good feeling about early/first employer. But I am not sure we would feel the same if we started that job today. "It was better back in the days" mentality.

Re: GoDaddy Announces Layoffs of “About 8%”

#44
post #10

GoDaddy was the first software engineering job I worked for. I had interned there too. It's understandable that the external perception of the company is bad (and even sexist), but internally GoDaddy was a great place to work. They're always a major sponsor of Grace Hopper. They were adamant about hiring women. They made my internship so much fun, and I am still friends with many of my co-interns from that summer. Of…

I've literally never heard about sexism directed their way, but given you worked there I'm sure you know better the story of treatment they get. What was the sexism, who was it directed against and why do you reckon they recieved it? The only experience I have with GoDaddy is their awful support, and predatory practices. Ditching them has been the biggest single improvement to our IT practice.

It was their early ad campaigns that featured Danica Patrick. They even showed some ads during the Super Bowl. You can still find them on YouTube.

It was the high (low?) point of techbro culture in ads (mid 2010's). They got a lot of bad press and pressure campaigns and started to change their culture after that.

Re: GoDaddy Announces Layoffs of “About 8%”

#45
post #41
post #7

It's interesting seeing GoDaddy/Gitlab lay off so late in the game. Jeff Lawson (TWLO) who is a fantastic financial and product focused CEO did his prep work in September last year with 11% of the company. I find it pretty hard to grok what your FP&A team must be like if you're a b2b supply chain business thinking about this stuff Q1 in global economic downturn.

What do you mean Jeff Lawson is a fantastic financial focused CEO? His company has never turned a profit has it? I believe TWLO is one of the most unprofitable of large public tech companies.

You sound like an amazon bear in 2004 - that's not how you measure the financial focus of a CEO.

https://www.vox.com/2017/5/15/15610786/amazon-jeff-bezos-pub...

Re: GoDaddy Announces Layoffs of “About 8%”

#46
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've literally never heard about sexism directed their way, but given you worked there I'm sure you know better the story of treatment they get. What was the sexism, who was it directed against and why do you reckon they recieved it? The only experience I have with GoDaddy is their awful support, and predatory practices. Ditching them has been the biggest single improvement to our IT practice.

GoDaddy's entire brand presence was based on objectification of women for their early life. After GoDaddy's founder Bob left, it got better. Bob was a character and arguably the entire reason for the insane brand -- strange, strange man.

Yes this is what I'm referring to - the Danica Patrick bikini ads in the mid 2000s.

The first day of our internship they briefed us on that history. Bob had thought that the market for small-businesses in need of a domain name were men aged 35-55. Once bob was gone, actual market research was done and it turned out that over half of their clients were women, so he had completely mis-identified the market.

But, because of the commercials, the brand recognition was over 90% in the US so they couldn't change the name.

Re: GoDaddy Announces Layoffs of “About 8%”

#47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really? You think any employer “cares about their employees”? A job is a transaction a way for me to trade labor for money and support ny addiction to food and shelter. It’s my responsibility to save accordingly always expecting a lay off. This has been my mindset since I was 22 years old making 11/hour as a computer operator saving my overtime pay until today at 49 where I stumbled into a role at $BigTech three year…

>You think any employer “cares about their employees”? Employers are people. Some people are cynical and greedy, others are empathetic. Yes, they will fire people as is some times necessary and as an employee you should plan for that. They won't make great sacrifices for you like family or very close friends might, but I've definitely had employers who wanted the best for me and made an effort to help me achieve it.

Employers are not “people”, corporations are legal entities that are specifically created to shield the people.

Any for profit (or for that matter even non profit company ) is most interested in its own survival and well being.

Re: GoDaddy Announces Layoffs of “About 8%”

#48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really? You think any employer “cares about their employees”? A job is a transaction a way for me to trade labor for money and support ny addiction to food and shelter. It’s my responsibility to save accordingly always expecting a lay off. This has been my mindset since I was 22 years old making 11/hour as a computer operator saving my overtime pay until today at 49 where I stumbled into a role at $BigTech three year…

A job is a transaction a way for me to trade labor for money and support ny addiction to food and shelter. It’s my responsibility to save accordingly always expecting a lay off. I'm sorry you're being down-voted, because the frank truth is... you're exactly right. To a first approximation, 0 companies really "care about their employees" in any meaningful sense. Work is simply a transaction arrangement, where you trad…

I think it's being downvoted because it's a little too simplistic to be meaningful. Everything we do, literally everything, we do because it makes us feel good, and therefore everything is a transaction. We provide food and shelter for ourselves because, well, we enjoy those things. We help friends and family in need because we derive pleasure from helping others and seeing our loved ones flourish.

If we all agree on that basic universal law of human behavior, we can talk about higher level meaning about the role of an employer in society beyond the simple transaction of money for labor.

Re: GoDaddy Announces Layoffs of “About 8%”

#49

GoDaddy was the first software engineering job I worked for. I had interned there too. It's understandable that the external perception of the company is bad (and even sexist), but internally GoDaddy was a great place to work. They're always a major sponsor of Grace Hopper. They were adamant about hiring women. They made my internship so much fun, and I am still friends with many of my co-interns from that summer. Of…

> It's understandable that the external perception of the company is bad (and even sexist)

> They were adamant about hiring women.

So it seems like the perception is justified then.

Re: GoDaddy Announces Layoffs of “About 8%”

#50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A job is a transaction a way for me to trade labor for money and support ny addiction to food and shelter. It’s my responsibility to save accordingly always expecting a lay off. I'm sorry you're being down-voted, because the frank truth is... you're exactly right. To a first approximation, 0 companies really "care about their employees" in any meaningful sense. Work is simply a transaction arrangement, where you trad…

I think it's being downvoted because it's a little too simplistic to be meaningful. Everything we do, literally everything, we do because it makes us feel good, and therefore everything is a transaction. We provide food and shelter for ourselves because, well, we enjoy those things. We help friends and family in need because we derive pleasure from helping others and seeing our loved ones flourish. If we all agree on…

We can talk about philosophy all we wish. But reality is that I can’t take the philosophy and exchange it for goods and services. Whatever you think the role of an employee should be, we have to accept reality for what is and take responsibility accordingly.

My wife and kids had no desire to talk prosaically about the role of the employee when I got laid off a decade ago.

They were assured when I told that we had 3 months worth of savings in the bank, that my resume was updated and I had a strong network and could get a job quickly - I had an offer in less than a week at another company. While now admittedly it would take longer, I’ve also reduced my expenses.

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