10 ms·

NOD should be by default in every big company

danieltillett 11y ago
I am in two minds about this. It is great to build a culture where nobody is fired, but at the same time if the weight of carrying dead wood gets too high - well you go the way of DEC. On top of this a lot of dead wood is not dead wood in a different environment - it might be better all round to let people move on to new opportunities.
- cbsmith 11y ago
  I think you don't understand how NOD's work. It's a soul crushing experience that is far worse than firing people and giving them layoff severance.
- driverdan 11y ago
  > It is great to build a culture where nobody is fired No it isn't. You should be firing people who don't pull their weight and everyone should know about it.
- dragonwriter 11y ago
  > It is great to build a culture where nobody is fired It is great to build a culture where you never need to fire anyone because you are good enough at hiring, and at placing, moving, and counseling (a two-way process!) those you have hired to be able to effectively utilize them. And, if you've done that, then its good to actually not fire anyone. But, outside of that, I don't see the value of a culture where nobody is fired; especially if it achieved through internal segregation where it cannot avoid being visible to people within the organization that the "not firing" is largely a charade.
paulajohnson 11y ago
For a while in the 90s Japanese companies had NODs for exactly the same reason Olsen gives: they didn't want to admit that they were firing people. The form varied, but typical examples would be an assignment to guard a tree or wait in a specified room for someone to give you work. The idea was to enforce isolation, boredom and loss of status to the point where the unfortunate employees would voluntarily quit; a kind of 9-5 solitary imprisonment. Its actually a really brutal method of downsizing without paying redundancy money. Be careful what you wish for.
- radoslawc 11y ago
  Yes I've heard about it. It was even mentioned in "Silicon Valley" TV series. I guess it did the trick before internet era. Now you can be paid for looking at cute cat pictures whole day ;) Joking aside I was skeptical about this being a way to force someone to quit, but after some unbelievable boring projects I totally get this. You just cannot for longer time periods just play billiard, table football, browse HN.
- Jedd 11y ago
  In Japan I think the phrase is called Window Gazing -- the employee / victim is provided an office with a nice view (presumably of things they could be doing instead of draining resources from the company) and left to draw their own conclusion. In Australia many years ago -- early to mid 1990's -- we had a spate of large public organisations being privatised, with a predictably large number of HR casualties. There was typically a brief queueing system, as some token effort at redeployment was considered ... but in reality once you'd been side-moted to a Window Gazer role, you know precisely where you stood. The phrase used locally was 'being led into / sitting around in Flight Deck' -- that being the name of the frequent flyer awards club of one of our two major airlines at the time. (That airline's completely gone now -- make of that what you will.)
  - KineticLensman 11y ago
    One of my places of work had a department known as 'the Departure Lounge' because of its high exit rate
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- justin_hancock 11y ago
  It is brutal and in some countries, likely to result in a law suit as it can be construed as 'Constructive Dismissal'. Extraordinarily damaging to the person on the receiving end. Its better to do it the right way, make the position redundant, and enable everyone to move on.
- 11y ago

I am in two minds about this. It is great to build a culture where nobody is fired, but at the same time if the weight of carrying dead wood gets too high - well you go the way of DEC. On top of this a lot of dead wood is not dead wood in a different environment - it might be better all round to let people move on to new opportunities.

cbsmith 11y ago
I think you don't understand how NOD's work. It's a soul crushing experience that is far worse than firing people and giving them layoff severance.
driverdan 11y ago
> It is great to build a culture where nobody is fired No it isn't. You should be firing people who don't pull their weight and everyone should know about it.
dragonwriter 11y ago
> It is great to build a culture where nobody is fired It is great to build a culture where you never need to fire anyone because you are good enough at hiring, and at placing, moving, and counseling (a two-way process!) those you have hired to be able to effectively utilize them. And, if you've done that, then its good to actually not fire anyone. But, outside of that, I don't see the value of a culture where nobody is fired; especially if it achieved through internal segregation where it cannot avoid being visible to people within the organization that the "not firing" is largely a charade.

paulajohnson 11y ago

For a while in the 90s Japanese companies had NODs for exactly the same reason Olsen gives: they didn't want to admit that they were firing people. The form varied, but typical examples would be an assignment to guard a tree or wait in a specified room for someone to give you work. The idea was to enforce isolation, boredom and loss of status to the point where the unfortunate employees would voluntarily quit; a kind of 9-5 solitary imprisonment. Its actually a really brutal method of downsizing without paying redundancy money. Be careful what you wish for.

radoslawc 11y ago
Yes I've heard about it. It was even mentioned in "Silicon Valley" TV series. I guess it did the trick before internet era. Now you can be paid for looking at cute cat pictures whole day ;) Joking aside I was skeptical about this being a way to force someone to quit, but after some unbelievable boring projects I totally get this. You just cannot for longer time periods just play billiard, table football, browse HN.
Jedd 11y ago
In Japan I think the phrase is called Window Gazing -- the employee / victim is provided an office with a nice view (presumably of things they could be doing instead of draining resources from the company) and left to draw their own conclusion. In Australia many years ago -- early to mid 1990's -- we had a spate of large public organisations being privatised, with a predictably large number of HR casualties. There was typically a brief queueing system, as some token effort at redeployment was considered ... but in reality once you'd been side-moted to a Window Gazer role, you know precisely where you stood. The phrase used locally was 'being led into / sitting around in Flight Deck' -- that being the name of the frequent flyer awards club of one of our two major airlines at the time. (That airline's completely gone now -- make of that what you will.)
- KineticLensman 11y ago
  One of my places of work had a department known as 'the Departure Lounge' because of its high exit rate
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
justin_hancock 11y ago
It is brutal and in some countries, likely to result in a law suit as it can be construed as 'Constructive Dismissal'. Extraordinarily damaging to the person on the receiving end. Its better to do it the right way, make the position redundant, and enable everyone to move on.
11y ago