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Prisma laying off 28% staff

prisma.io

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Re: Prisma laying off 28% staff

#91

Post by OJFord »

orra wrote: post #66
OJFord wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not at all uncommon in restructuring to be both (doing a lot of) hiring & firing - the current filled roles are out of whack with where you want to be, and not things you can transition people between because the skills/qualifications are different or whatever. E.g. if Microsoft decided to sunset its incredible GitHub journey, it would probably find itself with too many web developers. If it got out of Xboxes, t…

Of course developers can be transitioned to do other types of development. Occam's Razor says: or the companies just want to rehire new people at lower pay.

Many of these headline grabbing layoffs are primarily back office roles.

And what you say simply isn't true anyway - I even studied EE, but all my professional experience is on the web, I would have a long ramp up to be productive on an embedded team. I probably shouldn't even be hired for a grad position on such a team, a fresh graduate would have better memory of domain-specific stuff.

What Occam's razor actually says is that in the face of multiple possible explanations, the simpler one is the more likely one. Your suggested explanation seems a more complicated conspiracy than simply not needing/being able to afford people to me.

Re: Prisma laying off 28% staff

#92

Post by itronitron »

satvikpendem wrote: post #87
winter_squirrel wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a counterpart, if you have to layoff that many people, is it really the right time to also put the stress of a leadership shift into the company? I can see the argument for this triggering an eventual change, but having _both_ the chock of a CEO change _and_ 28% of the company being layed off at the same time seems unwise.

Indeed, laying off the CEO too screws over the entire company, not just the portion of people who got laid off.

Most CEOs are quite disposable.

Re: Prisma laying off 28% staff

#93

Post by iLoveOncall »

nemo44x wrote: post #53

Is the word “impact” the latest way of saying “fired” without saying it? We are seeing that particular word in nearly every note regarding these types of action. Why this word and why is everyone using it? It’s not only CEOs and HR but on LinkedIn I see many people referring to themselves as “impacted” and open to word, etc. Is there a word for this type of memetic term suddenly being used everywhere as a substitute…

Being laid off and being fired is not the same and this has legal consequences.

Re: Prisma laying off 28% staff

#95

Post by AdrianB1 »

phoe-krk wrote: post #31
danjac wrote: post #21

"I take full responsibility" is the new "our incredible journey" of failing tech company cliches.

How is this responsibility defined? How is this responsibility measured? What aspects of the ex-Prisma people does this responsibility cover? What measurable and practical effects does this responsibility have when measured in one week, one month, three months, one year from now? If these targets are not met, what are the consequences of that? What are the means of enforcing that responsibility? I seriously think we…

> How is this responsibility defined?

For sure not seppuku. Probably nothing will happen. In big companies it is a golden parachute, but this is not a big company.

Re: Prisma laying off 28% staff

#96

Post by itronitron »

Redsquare wrote: post #7
charcircuit wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why should he face consequences? Instead he should focus on learning from the mistake so that the company can try to avoid making the same mistake again. Punishing him isn't going to solve any of the company's problems.

When you need to cull 28% of the headcount it signifies a huge fail over many many months, not just a one off miscalculation

Yeah, if I was on one of the core teams I'd be quite annoyed at having given a big chunk of my time bringing coworkers on board just to see them laid off.

Re: Prisma laying off 28% staff

#97

Post by Leherenn »

orra wrote: post #65
decasia wrote: post #6

It gets to the point where it's hard to even know what to say about the nth tech layoff announcement. It's a good reminder, if we needed one, of how fragile the good times are, for anyone who is an ordinary professional working in an economy like this. I wish there were something more concrete we could do to support each other - like something more concrete than "sure I would recommend people from my network for jobs…

> I wish there were something more concrete we could do to support each other Unionisation would help. We don't do ourselves any favours by not unionising. Almost all job security and employment rights were won by unions and strike action. No wonder unions are a dirty word—according to corporate America. Even when the jobs can't be saved, employment rights are helpful. The Google? Microsoft? announcement basically sa…

Job security might be a good thing at the individual level, but imo it's pretty awful at the system level. It promotes inefficiencies. It's much better to have a liquid employment market with a solid social net instead.

Switzerland does it pretty well. Employment is at will (in that employers can fire anyone without a justification), but health insurance is mostly not tied to employment, and you get 70% of your salary for up to two years. Compare to say France, where short term contracts are very common and other shitty employment practices abounds because employers are scared to commit.

Re: Prisma laying off 28% staff

#98

Post by AdrianB1 »

simplotek wrote: post #60
danjac wrote: post #21

"I take full responsibility" is the new "our incredible journey" of failing tech company cliches.

"I take full responsibility" sounds more and more like "your sacrifice is a risk I'm willing to make".

That's what a real corporate leader says! (/s)

Re: Prisma laying off 28% staff

#99

Post by phoe-krk »

AdrianB1 wrote: post #95
phoe-krk wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is this responsibility defined? How is this responsibility measured? What aspects of the ex-Prisma people does this responsibility cover? What measurable and practical effects does this responsibility have when measured in one week, one month, three months, one year from now? If these targets are not met, what are the consequences of that? What are the means of enforcing that responsibility? I seriously think we…

> How is this responsibility defined? For sure not seppuku. Probably nothing will happen. In big companies it is a golden parachute, but this is not a big company.

> Probably nothing will happen.

That's what I'm worried about and that's why I'm calling BS on this. The executive uses big words like "responsibility", I'd like to know what concrete measures are then hidden behind it.

Re: Prisma laying off 28% staff

#100

Post by ljm »

hsn915 wrote: post #20

This company is based on an ORM library? How do they make money?

Looking at other popular JS projects, they monetise by basically creating a ‘cloud’ offering which is just re-selling AWS resources in a highly specialised way.
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