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Googler... ex-Googler

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Re: Googler... ex-Googler

#461

Post by 123pie123 »

dzogchen wrote: post #458
abdj8 wrote: post #110

Layoffs are a difficult thing for employees and their managers. I have seen people (one was a VP of Engineering) escorted out of the building, sent in a cab to home along with a security guard (this was in India), not allowed access to computer or talk with other employees. But, recently have had a very different experience. The current company I work for announced 30% layoffs. The list was made public within one hou…

> the laid off employees were given a few days in the company to allow them to say goodbyes This is just so wild for me as an European, because at least in Germany if you get fired (or if you quit) you need to stay 1 - 3 MONTHS at the company still.

this happens in the UK (called garden leave) but in my experience you're typically sent home with full pay

Re: Googler... ex-Googler

#463

Post by hnlmorg »

varispeed wrote: post #431
hnlmorg wrote: post #380

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're focusing on one word and missing the meat of my comment. The EU equivalent to US employment in terms of employee rights and pay is contracting. People in IT who take the employment route rather than contracting, do so because they want job security. eg they might have families. And much as you might be happy with your arrangement, there are plenty in the UK and Europe who do prefer longer-term job security ove…

In the UK you have worst of both worlds now - insecurity of contracting and employee level wages, thanks to amended IR35 lobbied by big consultancies.

I think the bust of the job market played a bigger part here. When IR35 originally came in, some companies would bump pay inside IR35 to compensate elsewhere risk getting poorer pol of talent. Since the job market crashed there have been fewer jobs all round, which has pushed the contractor market down too.

But you’re right that IR35 really hasn’t helped situations either.

Some of my friends have commented that the last few years has been the worst time in their 20+ years as a contractor.

Re: Googler... ex-Googler

#464

Post by hectormalot »

lnsru wrote: post #220
apexalpha wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah but that's kinda the point of being a contractor, no? Here in the Netherlands contractors are also 'at will employed' as the Americans say. But they pay you more so...

Sounds like a case every lawyer in Germany would like to take. 500€ for first letter to send to the manager reminding the contract conditions. It is enough for most companies not to go further with shady activities. As a contractor one should know how to deal with the clients.

I don’t think that’s shady? When I was hiring contractors it was always project based with mutual understanding things could end quickly if the project or collaboration didn’t work out.

Yes, they get paid 1.5-2x, and that also prices in that it’s not always 100% utilization. Only once had a contractor oppose that, but that was in the context of (severe) underperformance.

Re: Googler... ex-Googler

#466

Post by margorczynski »

Spooky23 wrote: post #414
scarface_74 wrote: post #372

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I doubt the tech workers making three to four times EU wages in the US feel “exploited”. My job is purely transactional. I’ve worked for 10 companies in almost 30 years. I gave them labor and they gave me money. Whenever one side decided the arrangement wasn’t working, I moved on to another job.

Tech is always boom/bust. We’re lucky to have had a long boom. I’m personally well acquainted with many people in tech, especially big tech. Many of them are doing little or nothing, certainly not justifying $300k+ salaries. What you do has risk but is fundamentally more honest - your skills are around technology and output, not navigating corporate bureaucracy.

Your post somehow suggests that when a bust comes European companies won't start laying off people. And in the same boom period the US dev will make much more money (and have a biggger safety pillow) than the European one.

Re: Googler... ex-Googler

#467

Post by rincebrain »

ethbr1 wrote: post #40
somesortofthing wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Layoffs in particular are like this because they're planned very quickly by very small groups of people. Rumors of impending layoffs obliterate morale, so the people in charge do everything they can to maintain secrecy and minimize the time between people hearing about layoffs and the layoffs taking effect. This basically always translates to random-seeming decisions - priority 1 is to cut costs by X amount, choosing…

> Rumors of impending layoffs obliterate morale Granted, but it seems like the current way of salary-first, performance-blind cutting obliterates it even harder.

Really, all options obliterate morale.

Laying off people who you rank as "low end" on the acceptable performance scale, might mean you kill structurally important bricks that were not optimizing for being higher than "high enough" on that scale, and cannibalizes people working on anything valuable long-term but hard to justify to management short-term.

Laying off high performers means people don't want their head to be poking up, so they sabotage their own visibility to try being "good enough", while also killing people's motivations.

Laying off randomly kills people's morale directly worst of all, because that implies there's nothing they can do to change the outcome, and impotence is worse, arguably, than anything else for many people.

Re: Googler... ex-Googler

#468

Post by spicyusername » 

    I really was just a fuckin cog in a mega corp.
Yep. One of the most unfortunate realities of modernity.

Your managers, or your managers managers, or their managers don't care about you. At all. If you ask them on the weekend, they'll decry that the things they are asked to do are horrible. but they'll still do it. Some gladly.

They are themselves cogs in the machine.

A machine that goes all the way to the executive class, and they really don't care about you. In fact, more likely than not, they detest you.

We all participate in this hostile culture, in various ways. Usually using the excuse that we need to pay rent, eat, find the work interesting, or with some other excuse that justify the means.

It seems like it's hard to do the right thing when you have something you want to buy or otherwise spent your whole life getting here, before realizing what here is.

Re: Googler... ex-Googler

#469

Post by VagabundoP »

javawizard wrote: post #396

That was painful to read. I had a very similar experience at Google about a year ago, and the worst part of it was that they did it 2 weeks before I was set to receive a 6-figure retention bonus for sticking around for 2 years after an acquisition. Several other members of my team got the boot at the same time. All of us had come in via that acquisition and were set to receive that bonus, and because of the layoffs,…

Did you sue? Because that's bullshit. The retention agreement should have included that clause anyway.

Re: Googler... ex-Googler

#470

Post by LPisGood »

abdj8 wrote: post #110

Layoffs are a difficult thing for employees and their managers. I have seen people (one was a VP of Engineering) escorted out of the building, sent in a cab to home along with a security guard (this was in India), not allowed access to computer or talk with other employees. But, recently have had a very different experience. The current company I work for announced 30% layoffs. The list was made public within one hou…

Is that company in data storage?
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