6 ms·

I feel like "lays off" is the wrong term here. If you're closing an office of 20 people at a company of 3,800, that feels more like firing a team for not produc

I feel like "lays off" is the wrong term here. If you're closing an office of 20 people at a company of 3,800, that feels more like firing a team for not producing, not making bottom-of-the-stack-rank cuts because you need to free up budget.

pearjuice 10y ago
What do you think generates more clicks and thus more ad revenue, a dramatization of occurring events or the actual truth?
omouse 10y ago
Each of those 20 people have lives and families. Not producing by whose measurement? Who defines that ,they were obviously hired for a particular job and have been doing it for a while and pretty well if they weren't fired before. I wonder how much help Twitter is giving them in looking for their next jobs.
- nine_k 10y ago
  Maybe they were given ample prior notice, then Twitter reported only the actual closure, not the plan.
- kaliku2 10y ago
  Not producing by twitter's measurement. If it was their fault, or their manager's or maybe it was simply a bad decision to open that office there, is completely irrelevant. What if they didn't have families, would their discomfort mean less to you?
- coldtea 10y ago
  >Each of those 20 people have lives and families. Not producing by whose measurement? Who defines that ,they were obviously hired for a particular job and have been doing it for a while and pretty well if they weren't fired before. Don't necessarily disagree on the human impact, but this is a strange reasoning. >Not producing by whose measurement? Obviously by the one who hired them? >Who defines that, they were obviously hired for a particular job and have been doing it for a while and pretty well if they weren't fired before. Nobody is fired until they are fired. So by the same logic, everybody who wasn't fired immediately did their job "pretty well". Alternatives not considered: (a) they did their a bad or mediocre job for a longish time, but company only ever cared to fire when money got tight, cuts needed to be made, performance review was completed and they came up empty. (b) they did their job bad for a short time, and they're fired as soon as it was discovered. Of course firing is can be also because they were hired for a specific project that they completed and now they no longer needed, or because the project went south or went out of favour with Twitter management and Twitter wants to kill it, etc. Or they do their job perfectly well, but it doesn't bring Twitter the money it expected, so they are canned. >I wonder how much help Twitter is giving them in looking for their next jobs None? Like most employees? Besides maybe a good recommendation letter?
  - sremani 10y ago
    There is difference between reorg and firing, even though the result is loss of job for the individual. The person is not evaluated at individual basis rather at team or org level. Anyway, just for those using this as india = underperf team train of thought, Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Amazon and every respectable company under the Sun has a India team, are they on par with mothership, I do not know, but if they are not, some one doing it wrong.
  - omouse 10y ago
    And you're okay with an employer not offering any help beyond a recommendation letter and you're okay with not knowing whether or not Twitter is a supportive employer? I'm not, that's why I brought up. Perhaps the beginning of my comment isn't so great but it is damned important that we know what kind of support employees and former employees will get when they're fired and something that needs to change in industry.
    - coldtea 10y ago
      >And you're okay with an employer not offering any help beyond a recommendation letter and you're okay with not knowing whether or not Twitter is a supportive employer? I'm all for employee rights, but how exactly is Twitter different than the average (or all?) employees in this, or in any other industry, in this case? Do other employers actively help fired employees to find a new job?
    - tomschlick 10y ago
      Twitter is a supportive employer. Employer being the key word there. If you're no longer employed by them there should be no expectation of support. Especially to spend resources to find you another job. Nothing needs to change in the industry. Thats how the world works. You get fired, you find another job.
    - riboflava 10y ago
      What sort of help would you want or expect? A severance package or help by having the employer pay a recruiter to pimp the former employee? Or something else? In any case I'm totally fine with the idea of no help being offered provided such an exit clause is not part of the contract of employment the employee signed. If you want some specific sort of help from your old company in the event they fire you for cause, require that to be in the contract before you accept employment.
- greenshackle 10y ago
  Not necessarily. I'm a programmer and I have neither a life nor a family.
- greenshackle 10y ago
  Not necessarily. I'm a programmer and I have neither a life nor a family.
- ben_jones 10y ago
  Your comment is unfair given the fact that we know nothing about the situation other then what is immediately provided.
blinkingled 10y ago
I know it is much more satisfying to go with the under producing team in India stereotype but generally there is much more to it than just the team that was laid off. Who knows if higher ups at twitter had a proper vision/plan for the team and how much authority they were given for instance - both very crucial to getting things done. Example: Had a chance to work with a team from Poland couple years ago. Great people with lots of experience and skills. By purpose or not, they were just not well integrated into the existing team. They were never given clear targets, nobody ever thought what they had to offer and how they could fit into the overall structure. A project later everything got blamed on them and many from that team disappeared - many left because of the whole negative experience, some were let go. I would not say it was their fault for under producing really. It's not that simple when you don't get to define producing what is valued and what is not and you don't have much authority over changing things.
- GrinningFool 10y ago
  Conversely, my experience working with teams out of India has been bad without exception even when we had proper planning and authority. Which only goes to say that you can have bad teams anywhere. I'm disappointed to see the same ingredients that led to failure with offshoring a decade ago now taking more firm root here than even during the dotcom boom: perception that 'coding' is a path to easy money and certain success, dime-a-dozen "coding boot camps" that teach how to make an Angular site but don't get into any fundamentals[1]. The perception existed in the waning years of the boom, but at least the most common path then was through a full degree. While my perception is that the situation is improving in India (at least if you avoid the well known warm body suppliers), it's getting worse locally. 1. This isn't to say that there is no value to boot-camp style programs - but there are presently a whole lot more that exist solely to capitalize on a financial opportunity than focus on providing a foundation for skills growth. edit: I should add that this was just an opportunity to express my general sentiment, and given the phrasing of the news from Twitter, I doubt performance was a factor.
  - blinkingled 10y ago
    > Which only goes to say that you can have bad teams anywhere. Oh totally - much harder to find a good team in India if you are just another corporation looking to outsource. But if you are Microsoft, Google, Twitter or any other well known product company they have no trouble hiring the best and it usually speaks for itself. I wanted to point out that you can do acceptably well with offshore teams by doing your research, hiring right people, doing proper planning, getting used to more communication than usual and encouraging the team take up authority. Most of these apply to any team but the communication part becomes of more importance when the team is offshore.
pm90 10y ago
It might be that. Or it might be that, there are much more administrative costs to be recouped from just closing the office, than by firing a few employees there, a few employees in US etc. I don't think its fair to comment on their performance without knowing the facts. Quite frankly, I'm surprised to see the "Indian programmers are terrible" prejudice common even on HN.
- mathattack 10y ago
  The challenge with an Indian office of 20 in Bangalore is you're not saving any money. The good employees are cheaper than in the US, but not enough to recoup the administrative and managerial overhead required for it. If the office is 100 people, and you're also doing it for access to talent, then it pays off. Independent of performance, if they didn't see the office growing, it can make sense to close it.
godzilla82 10y ago
Exactly. Especially if you consider the total IT workforce in a place like Bangalore. It is not rare for 100 candidates to show up for walk in interviews even at small IT companies.

pearjuice 10y ago

What do you think generates more clicks and thus more ad revenue, a dramatization of occurring events or the actual truth?

omouse 10y ago

Each of those 20 people have lives and families. Not producing by whose measurement? Who defines that ,they were obviously hired for a particular job and have been doing it for a while and pretty well if they weren't fired before. I wonder how much help Twitter is giving them in looking for their next jobs.

nine_k 10y ago
Maybe they were given ample prior notice, then Twitter reported only the actual closure, not the plan.
kaliku2 10y ago
Not producing by twitter's measurement. If it was their fault, or their manager's or maybe it was simply a bad decision to open that office there, is completely irrelevant. What if they didn't have families, would their discomfort mean less to you?
coldtea 10y ago
>Each of those 20 people have lives and families. Not producing by whose measurement? Who defines that ,they were obviously hired for a particular job and have been doing it for a while and pretty well if they weren't fired before. Don't necessarily disagree on the human impact, but this is a strange reasoning. >Not producing by whose measurement? Obviously by the one who hired them? >Who defines that, they were obviously hired for a particular job and have been doing it for a while and pretty well if they weren't fired before. Nobody is fired until they are fired. So by the same logic, everybody who wasn't fired immediately did their job "pretty well". Alternatives not considered: (a) they did their a bad or mediocre job for a longish time, but company only ever cared to fire when money got tight, cuts needed to be made, performance review was completed and they came up empty. (b) they did their job bad for a short time, and they're fired as soon as it was discovered. Of course firing is can be also because they were hired for a specific project that they completed and now they no longer needed, or because the project went south or went out of favour with Twitter management and Twitter wants to kill it, etc. Or they do their job perfectly well, but it doesn't bring Twitter the money it expected, so they are canned. >I wonder how much help Twitter is giving them in looking for their next jobs None? Like most employees? Besides maybe a good recommendation letter?
- sremani 10y ago
  There is difference between reorg and firing, even though the result is loss of job for the individual. The person is not evaluated at individual basis rather at team or org level. Anyway, just for those using this as india = underperf team train of thought, Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Amazon and every respectable company under the Sun has a India team, are they on par with mothership, I do not know, but if they are not, some one doing it wrong.
- omouse 10y ago
  And you're okay with an employer not offering any help beyond a recommendation letter and you're okay with not knowing whether or not Twitter is a supportive employer? I'm not, that's why I brought up. Perhaps the beginning of my comment isn't so great but it is damned important that we know what kind of support employees and former employees will get when they're fired and something that needs to change in industry.
  - coldtea 10y ago
    >And you're okay with an employer not offering any help beyond a recommendation letter and you're okay with not knowing whether or not Twitter is a supportive employer? I'm all for employee rights, but how exactly is Twitter different than the average (or all?) employees in this, or in any other industry, in this case? Do other employers actively help fired employees to find a new job?
  - tomschlick 10y ago
    Twitter is a supportive employer. Employer being the key word there. If you're no longer employed by them there should be no expectation of support. Especially to spend resources to find you another job. Nothing needs to change in the industry. Thats how the world works. You get fired, you find another job.
  - riboflava 10y ago
    What sort of help would you want or expect? A severance package or help by having the employer pay a recruiter to pimp the former employee? Or something else? In any case I'm totally fine with the idea of no help being offered provided such an exit clause is not part of the contract of employment the employee signed. If you want some specific sort of help from your old company in the event they fire you for cause, require that to be in the contract before you accept employment.
greenshackle 10y ago
Not necessarily. I'm a programmer and I have neither a life nor a family.
greenshackle 10y ago
Not necessarily. I'm a programmer and I have neither a life nor a family.
ben_jones 10y ago
Your comment is unfair given the fact that we know nothing about the situation other then what is immediately provided.

blinkingled 10y ago

I know it is much more satisfying to go with the under producing team in India stereotype but generally there is much more to it than just the team that was laid off. Who knows if higher ups at twitter had a proper vision/plan for the team and how much authority they were given for instance - both very crucial to getting things done. Example: Had a chance to work with a team from Poland couple years ago. Great people with lots of experience and skills. By purpose or not, they were just not well integrated into the existing team. They were never given clear targets, nobody ever thought what they had to offer and how they could fit into the overall structure. A project later everything got blamed on them and many from that team disappeared - many left because of the whole negative experience, some were let go. I would not say it was their fault for under producing really. It's not that simple when you don't get to define producing what is valued and what is not and you don't have much authority over changing things.

GrinningFool 10y ago
Conversely, my experience working with teams out of India has been bad without exception even when we had proper planning and authority. Which only goes to say that you can have bad teams anywhere. I'm disappointed to see the same ingredients that led to failure with offshoring a decade ago now taking more firm root here than even during the dotcom boom: perception that 'coding' is a path to easy money and certain success, dime-a-dozen "coding boot camps" that teach how to make an Angular site but don't get into any fundamentals[1]. The perception existed in the waning years of the boom, but at least the most common path then was through a full degree. While my perception is that the situation is improving in India (at least if you avoid the well known warm body suppliers), it's getting worse locally. 1. This isn't to say that there is no value to boot-camp style programs - but there are presently a whole lot more that exist solely to capitalize on a financial opportunity than focus on providing a foundation for skills growth. edit: I should add that this was just an opportunity to express my general sentiment, and given the phrasing of the news from Twitter, I doubt performance was a factor.
- blinkingled 10y ago
  > Which only goes to say that you can have bad teams anywhere. Oh totally - much harder to find a good team in India if you are just another corporation looking to outsource. But if you are Microsoft, Google, Twitter or any other well known product company they have no trouble hiring the best and it usually speaks for itself. I wanted to point out that you can do acceptably well with offshore teams by doing your research, hiring right people, doing proper planning, getting used to more communication than usual and encouraging the team take up authority. Most of these apply to any team but the communication part becomes of more importance when the team is offshore.

pm90 10y ago

It might be that. Or it might be that, there are much more administrative costs to be recouped from just closing the office, than by firing a few employees there, a few employees in US etc. I don't think its fair to comment on their performance without knowing the facts. Quite frankly, I'm surprised to see the "Indian programmers are terrible" prejudice common even on HN.

mathattack 10y ago
The challenge with an Indian office of 20 in Bangalore is you're not saving any money. The good employees are cheaper than in the US, but not enough to recoup the administrative and managerial overhead required for it. If the office is 100 people, and you're also doing it for access to talent, then it pays off. Independent of performance, if they didn't see the office growing, it can make sense to close it.

godzilla82 10y ago

Exactly. Especially if you consider the total IT workforce in a place like Bangalore. It is not rare for 100 candidates to show up for walk in interviews even at small IT companies.