4 ms·

> I hadn’t been involved with the company at all for two months through my sabbatical, and I hadn’t even talked to my manager in four months, ever since she had

> I hadn’t been involved with the company at all for two months through my sabbatical, and I hadn’t even talked to my manager in four months, ever since she had decided that 1:1s weren’t really valuable between her and me. > I’m still not fully certain why I got the axe ... My best guess is that it’s Tall Poppy Syndrome Probably some signs here... I wouldn't say he was fired "fast" by any stretch of the imagination. I will explain what firing fast means to me. I get a lot of work done through foreign devs I find on Upwork. I have to manage them closely, but overall, as they become acclimated and trained, they become pretty self-reliant in about 2-3 months. However, I have also invested plenty of time into bad apples hoping to train their dev skills, teach them about our product, and all sorts of things only to get random "hey I'm going away for couple weeks tomorrow" kind of messages or a waning commitment to the project and quality of work. Admittedly, I used to feel bad about firing people. I didn't care if they were "just" some Upwork guys, I try to get everyone involved in my team and feel like they're part of something. These days, I'm experienced enough to see the warning signs and rather than mull over "should I do it?" I just fire them and get onto hiring the next. I've never seen anyone turn around after warning signs, and I've gone through enough "oh come on they're human too, let me try to just understand their situation" moments to know it's a flawed manner of thinking. This is why you "fire fast" and "hire slowly". Business is business. It sucks to get fired, but it's worse for your business to run on rusty cogs that can break at any moment.

laxatives 11y ago
What are some of the warning signs? What do you considerable tolerable/intolerable?
- joslin01 11y ago
  Well you should keep in mind I hire on Upwork, so not everything carries over to real-life. In real-life, these kinds of issues should be recognized during the hiring process. Since most Upwork devs are BS-artists, it's not worth my time to do some lame Skype interview. Instead I just throw them in the gauntlet and see what they can do. Some further background: I don't talk to my devs with my vocal chords -- ever. It's a waste of my time and the communication is better documented in Slack (Zach actually has a good post on this). They join Slack, I assign them Pivotal stories, and they make pull requests that I review. Their onboarding is just me telling them a little about the project and their first task. I don't explain our grand purpose or any of that stuff because 4 times outta 5, they don't make the cut. Warning signs: * They struggle profusely with setting up the project or it takes a long time. If I have to hold your hand installing our necessary dependencies, chances are you're an inexperienced dev and/or have weak problem solving skills. * They have very little to say besides "ok". The good ones always start asking a bunch of questions as they attempt to genuinely understand what's going on. The poor ones feign expertise. * It takes them a long time to deliver their first unit of work and/or it's very low quality and barely meets minimum requirements. * Their work diary shows few hours logged. I ask everyone you're willing to do 30-40 hours a week? They all say yes. About 10% actually take the hours I'm willing to give to them. * They have a poor attitude * They need to be constantly prodded for status updates and to work more Good signs: * They ask questions * They have a positive attitude and seem appreciative of the opportunity * They dive right into work * They work a lot * They hit me up randomly with status updates People reading this are like "well ya," but what makes life interesting is the gray area. It's never this black & white and I have to just monitor them. In fact, I prefer to somewhat leave them alone to see how they really work. Anyone will log on and start coding under fear of being fired, but there's only few that take the reigns into their own hands. Over the course of almost 2 years, I have 2 core guys who have done wonders for me each at $15/hr. They both are very happy with the opportunity and I've made them into very competent devs who I would put up against a college grad (or higher) any day of the week. I have a third who has all the right good signs, but is somewhat rough skill-wise. I don't mind because my core guy was rough in the beginning and he started reading a Scala book to get better. In general, my team is always about 4-5 since I code myself and can only do so much. Honestly, it all comes down to attitude. I can train an earnest, hard-worker into an amazing dev but it's impossible for me to inspire someone who just doesn't care. I'm sure all this stuff carries over into the real world, but it's a lot more rapid fire in the Upwork game.
  - voltagex_ 11y ago
    > * They have a positive attitude and seem appreciative of the opportunity I wonder if you've tested the impact of higher/lower remuneration on this.
    - joslin01 11y ago
      Well, we don't have tons of money to play with, but in general lower price is better and telling them to work up toward the higher price. Money can have an odd effect on people; give them too much, they might appreciate it and work hard or think they "made it" and work lazily. Give them too little, and they might work hard for more or feel used and work begrudgingly. The culture / economy they live in dictates the actual figure.
curun1r 11y ago
> Probably some signs here... I wouldn't say he was fired "fast" by any stretch of the imagination. He didn't mention it, but there was political/PR situation that happened at Github shortly before that and it's entirely conceivable that his firing was Github distancing itself from him for that reason. It was his former partner that was the center of the very public allegations of sexism at the company and she had some none-too-flattering things to say, again publicly, about his role in the matter. As a manager, it wouldn't even cross my mind to fire someone that was underperforming when they had previously been such a strong contributor without at least first trying to figure out why the performance suffered. Where I have been involved in such abrupt terminations, it's always been because of something unrelated to performance (sexual harassment, abusing the corporate card, etc). The fact that he was never given an explanation from the company only makes this explanation seem more likely.
- gingerrr 11y ago
  I'm not sure the lack of an explanation from the company really means anything here. Most companies, especially the more risk-averse, will not tell you why you were let go unless there are clearly-documented performance milestones that were missed (i.e. not meeting your PIP goals). It's a potential liability, up to and including a lawsuit for wrongful termination, to justify a firing in any recordable way unless they've been exceptionally judicious in documenting cause.
  - jonnathanson 11y ago
    Yup. This is why you will rarely, if ever, get a detailed explanation for your firing if you happen to be fired from somewhere. You might not get any explanation. Similarly, don't expect to get feedback from a potential hiring manager as to why you didn't get a job you were interviewing for. Here, again, the company faces liability risk, and usually prefers to offer no comment on the matter.
- madeofpalk 11y ago
  > He didn't mention it, but there was political/PR situation that happened at Github shortly before that and it's entirely conceivable that his firing was Github distancing itself from him for that reason. It was his former partner that was the center of the very public allegations of sexism at the company and she had some none-too-flattering things to say, again publicly, about his role in the matter. I always assumed this was the case, and was surprised (well, not surprised, just disappointed I guess) to not hear this side of the story. It was very peculiar timing.

laxatives 11y ago

What are some of the warning signs? What do you considerable tolerable/intolerable?

joslin01 11y ago
Well you should keep in mind I hire on Upwork, so not everything carries over to real-life. In real-life, these kinds of issues should be recognized during the hiring process. Since most Upwork devs are BS-artists, it's not worth my time to do some lame Skype interview. Instead I just throw them in the gauntlet and see what they can do. Some further background: I don't talk to my devs with my vocal chords -- ever. It's a waste of my time and the communication is better documented in Slack (Zach actually has a good post on this). They join Slack, I assign them Pivotal stories, and they make pull requests that I review. Their onboarding is just me telling them a little about the project and their first task. I don't explain our grand purpose or any of that stuff because 4 times outta 5, they don't make the cut. Warning signs: * They struggle profusely with setting up the project or it takes a long time. If I have to hold your hand installing our necessary dependencies, chances are you're an inexperienced dev and/or have weak problem solving skills. * They have very little to say besides "ok". The good ones always start asking a bunch of questions as they attempt to genuinely understand what's going on. The poor ones feign expertise. * It takes them a long time to deliver their first unit of work and/or it's very low quality and barely meets minimum requirements. * Their work diary shows few hours logged. I ask everyone you're willing to do 30-40 hours a week? They all say yes. About 10% actually take the hours I'm willing to give to them. * They have a poor attitude * They need to be constantly prodded for status updates and to work more Good signs: * They ask questions * They have a positive attitude and seem appreciative of the opportunity * They dive right into work * They work a lot * They hit me up randomly with status updates People reading this are like "well ya," but what makes life interesting is the gray area. It's never this black & white and I have to just monitor them. In fact, I prefer to somewhat leave them alone to see how they really work. Anyone will log on and start coding under fear of being fired, but there's only few that take the reigns into their own hands. Over the course of almost 2 years, I have 2 core guys who have done wonders for me each at $15/hr. They both are very happy with the opportunity and I've made them into very competent devs who I would put up against a college grad (or higher) any day of the week. I have a third who has all the right good signs, but is somewhat rough skill-wise. I don't mind because my core guy was rough in the beginning and he started reading a Scala book to get better. In general, my team is always about 4-5 since I code myself and can only do so much. Honestly, it all comes down to attitude. I can train an earnest, hard-worker into an amazing dev but it's impossible for me to inspire someone who just doesn't care. I'm sure all this stuff carries over into the real world, but it's a lot more rapid fire in the Upwork game.
- voltagex_ 11y ago
  > * They have a positive attitude and seem appreciative of the opportunity I wonder if you've tested the impact of higher/lower remuneration on this.
  - joslin01 11y ago
    Well, we don't have tons of money to play with, but in general lower price is better and telling them to work up toward the higher price. Money can have an odd effect on people; give them too much, they might appreciate it and work hard or think they "made it" and work lazily. Give them too little, and they might work hard for more or feel used and work begrudgingly. The culture / economy they live in dictates the actual figure.

curun1r 11y ago

> Probably some signs here... I wouldn't say he was fired "fast" by any stretch of the imagination. He didn't mention it, but there was political/PR situation that happened at Github shortly before that and it's entirely conceivable that his firing was Github distancing itself from him for that reason. It was his former partner that was the center of the very public allegations of sexism at the company and she had some none-too-flattering things to say, again publicly, about his role in the matter. As a manager, it wouldn't even cross my mind to fire someone that was underperforming when they had previously been such a strong contributor without at least first trying to figure out why the performance suffered. Where I have been involved in such abrupt terminations, it's always been because of something unrelated to performance (sexual harassment, abusing the corporate card, etc). The fact that he was never given an explanation from the company only makes this explanation seem more likely.

gingerrr 11y ago
I'm not sure the lack of an explanation from the company really means anything here. Most companies, especially the more risk-averse, will not tell you why you were let go unless there are clearly-documented performance milestones that were missed (i.e. not meeting your PIP goals). It's a potential liability, up to and including a lawsuit for wrongful termination, to justify a firing in any recordable way unless they've been exceptionally judicious in documenting cause.
- jonnathanson 11y ago
  Yup. This is why you will rarely, if ever, get a detailed explanation for your firing if you happen to be fired from somewhere. You might not get any explanation. Similarly, don't expect to get feedback from a potential hiring manager as to why you didn't get a job you were interviewing for. Here, again, the company faces liability risk, and usually prefers to offer no comment on the matter.
madeofpalk 11y ago
> He didn't mention it, but there was political/PR situation that happened at Github shortly before that and it's entirely conceivable that his firing was Github distancing itself from him for that reason. It was his former partner that was the center of the very public allegations of sexism at the company and she had some none-too-flattering things to say, again publicly, about his role in the matter. I always assumed this was the case, and was surprised (well, not surprised, just disappointed I guess) to not hear this side of the story. It was very peculiar timing.