This is why I prefer working for smaller companies. Your work makes a big difference. You have a big say in the future of the company, and chances to learn something new come quickly.
'Too many employees, but few work': Pichai, Zuckerberg sound the alarm
851–860 of 1001 posts
Re: 'Too many employees, but few work': Pichai, Zuckerberg sound the alarm
#852Earlier quoted context omitted.
RE: your example, what exactly does that example have to do with the federal government? The guy threatened to sue, those laws apply the same in the private sector.
> I was told by our HR department that we could get rid of him, or at least demote him, if he failed two annual reviews in a row. Eventually he did, but we were then told by HR that he had to fail two annual reviews in a row in the same way; if he failed twice, but differently in the second year, that didn't count Government HR processes make it _very_ difficult to be fired.
This is ignorant nonsense…
Edit: to be a little more clear, most govt groups (Treasury, Trade, etc.) are at the mercy of non-govt contractors in the private sector.
Re: 'Too many employees, but few work': Pichai, Zuckerberg sound the alarm
#853As a consultant, I come around a bit. I have seen many companies with very poor productivity, and in zero of those cases was it laziness of the employees. In fact they usually would have loved to be more productive. Nobody wants to spend their life being dead weight. But as companies grow they install more and more rules and regulations that end up making sure nothing ever gets done. It is not unusual to meet "develo…
"Nobody wants to spend their life being dead weight." I disagree. There are plenty of people who would love to be dead weight just to float around in a company. The larger the team/company, the more chances of those people being around. They pretend to be always busy and doing something but don't actually get anything done. Seen it all for 18+ years. Having said that, there are plenty of people as well who would LOVE…
I think spending about 20 minutes on r/antiwork will get most folks to agree with you.
I think most people want a purpose. Many are perfectly happy for that to be something other than their work or means of earning an income. Nothing wrong with this of course but try be the person where some of your purpose is tied up in your work on that forum, or even this forum at times, and you get accused of having Stockholm syndrome toward your employment captors.
Re: 'Too many employees, but few work': Pichai, Zuckerberg sound the alarm
#854Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've been at places where I would love to hear the CEO say that. Being forced to work with poor performers, lazy people, and people who deliver poor quality results is frustrating and demoralizing. Those kinds of people can stick around for years, especially in good times when the company is making so much money that leadership doesn't need to care. Netflix is one of the few large companies that has a culture of cull…
It depresses me no end that someone can see poor performance, laziness etc only as a trait others possess, and not as a reaction to circumstance that they themselves might experience one day. I guarantee that anyone -- anyone -- can find themselves viewed as substandard. It's truly disturbing when Zuckerberg says something so dystopian, and people 'in the trenches' call for more.
I had a coworker whom I sat next to that reflected a lot of these qualities, that I had worked very hard to eliminate from myself just a few years earlier. It was simultaneously irritating because I was waiting on him for work, while also invoking sympathy. I knew what kinds of problems he was struggling with, and could guess at a few of the causes.
Re: 'Too many employees, but few work': Pichai, Zuckerberg sound the alarm
#855A lot of the comments seem to focus on ICs/devs, but for me the people who fit the category of person being discussed are managers, people who basically do nothing and don't contribute anything of value.
Every single manager I’ve had continued to be a solid IC. The only difference is that they had a larger portion of the vote when we decided what we wanted to work on but we were all in the trenches together.
Re: 'Too many employees, but few work': Pichai, Zuckerberg sound the alarm
#856As a consultant, I come around a bit. I have seen many companies with very poor productivity, and in zero of those cases was it laziness of the employees. In fact they usually would have loved to be more productive. Nobody wants to spend their life being dead weight. But as companies grow they install more and more rules and regulations that end up making sure nothing ever gets done. It is not unusual to meet "develo…
"Nobody wants to spend their life being dead weight." I disagree. There are plenty of people who would love to be dead weight just to float around in a company. The larger the team/company, the more chances of those people being around. They pretend to be always busy and doing something but don't actually get anything done. Seen it all for 18+ years. Having said that, there are plenty of people as well who would LOVE…
"There are plenty of people who would love to be dead weight just to float around in a company."
One of my favourite corporate laziness stories was a friend of my brother's who would regularly nap for most of the working day in some unused basement room. After a while, his preferred room got converted into something else and he had to find a new sleeping spot.
He eventually found a room where a large laundry hamper would be left full of towels until they were washed or folded. Perfect, he thought. Secretive and soft! He went to get in and go to sleep, only to find someone else already in there asleep.
Re: 'Too many employees, but few work': Pichai, Zuckerberg sound the alarm
#857Earlier quoted context omitted.
I went through a similar struggle to how I read your story. I had a cushy job that paid more than ever, my manager was great, and the work was easy, but I was struggling with depression. I ended up quitting and crashing on a friend's couch for a while, and despite making that change to be able to pursue more meaningful work, my depression didn't abate. I ended up crashing and burning in a pretty significant way, and…
You've hit the nail on the head, and I think many people who have struggled with substance abuse disorders would agree: You can't fix whats inside by changing the outside... sure maybe changing external circumstance can help nudge you in the right direction, but it wont fix anything. Recovering drug addicts don't magically become functioning members of society just because they stopped using drugs... They do a lot of…
Yes!! I haven't had struggles with substance addiction, but I see SO much overlap in what you described as how much extra work and problem solving and self-leadership addicts have to foster and constantly practice to survive, let alone thrive, in what I've had to do to try to heal my depression and other maladies. It's like, I can't even begin to describe how much work it's been to someone who hasn't had to deal with that kind of a problem.
I was given an irrevocable 100 hour a week job called "try to survive while depressed" when I was 17, and thrown in the deep end with no guide, no mentors, and no reasons why. Every day of my life is a battle to keep my head above water. For years I barely managed and somehow am still here, but it is relentlessly difficult. Some days you think you're starting to get things figured out, on a roll, and then your positive wellbeing evaporates into thin air from the time it takes you to walk from your car to your apartment door. What is this life? You start to lose all hope of even figuring out any rhyme or reason or pattern in your depression, and just try to get through the day.
When it gets to be like that, I have found MUCH solace in the mantra of the substance abuse recovery world, "One day at a time." It's like an alien tongue to someone who's never dealt with the kind of waking death spirit companion depression comes to be. How could anything be so bad that you can only focus on a single day at a time, or that doing so would help in any kind of way? Thank your everything that that phrase gives you no feeling or hope. It's the last refuge of the damned.
Re: 'Too many employees, but few work': Pichai, Zuckerberg sound the alarm
#858In every other HN thread, people slam FAANGs for being so bloated, and we praise the small startup where everyone on the team gets shit done fast . And in every other thread, people ask "What the hell does need 10,000 engineers for??" And now Zuck says "We've gotten complacent as a company, and we have to turn up the heat and sense of urgency, and get rid of people who aren't contributing"... and HN freaks out at thi…
Well said. Slashdot was groundbreaking for many things, especially so for categories.
I wouldn’t mind having the ability to filter HN replies to “+5 Insightful” and drop anything else marked “Contrarian”.
Re: 'Too many employees, but few work': Pichai, Zuckerberg sound the alarm
#859Earlier quoted context omitted.
Then say that and don't blame employee laziness for poor planning.
I didn’t see them call the employees lazy. They said they weren’t productive. And again calling a conscious decision to hire people you won’t need in a couple years isn’t necessarily poor planning. If being the first to release a product gives you a big advantage it’s probably a good idea to hire all those people in the right situation.
If the employees were not being productive, that would show up in their KPIs and reviews and they would be fired. That process already exsists so you can't use it as a scapegoat. This is squarely about leadership's poor planning.
Re: 'Too many employees, but few work': Pichai, Zuckerberg sound the alarm
#860Earlier quoted context omitted.
This seems crazy to me, but I don't work in FAANG. A basketball game (I'm assuming recurring) during work hours? Quality of life from inside work? Are you all at campus for most of your day (ie, longer than 8h?) To me, quality of life is working hard and smart during the 8h, and keeping the rest of the day for you and your family. Quality of life comes from outside work, and the company respects and encourages that b…
> To me, quality of life is working hard and smart during the 8h, and keeping the rest of the day for you and your family Mate, I browsed your profile and you live in Australia. Why would you want to spend the better, sunnier part of the day inside of an office? How is that "quality of life" better than spending an hour or so to play some basketball with some friends? > Of course we still do team building activities,…
> no one likes to hang out with their boss or coworkers for "fun" after work hours.
Oh, there absolutely are people who like to do this, but their intent is not at all altruistic.