5 ms·

Can you give an example of a situation where a company has laid off, hired, and trained, when re-training would have been equal or less effort?

toyg 8y ago
Just pick any big company that announced large-scale layoffs in the last 20 years. They start re-hiring almost immediately. In some cases they even announce hiring plans while they announce layoffs - and the percentage of workers being retrained or moved internally during these events is usually pretty low. It's difficult to believe that tens of thousands of workers cannot be retrained, when corporate roles are increasingly described as "bullshit jobs" anyway. > when re-training would have been equal or less effort That's the issue, isn't it? You cannot meaningfully measure that effort at scale[1], and even if you could, it's an effort that product/line managers would likely have to make. Whereas firing and hiring is basically zero effort, because most of the donkeywork is done by HR. So as a line manager, you take the hit of a short disruption in operations, cash in a lower wage bill, and your job is done. [1] if we could meaningfully measure training effort vs results, we wouldn't have a market full of e-learning products that are invariably terrible but super-expensive.
- vortico 8y ago
  I don't believe your experience that big companies almost immediately re-hire after layoffs, for jobs that require training from square one (after firing square-one employees). In the tech field, I've seen plenty of re-hires right after layoffs, but the companies are always replacing them with engineers/developers/factory workers who possess an entirely different skill set that is well beyond the scope of what the company is responsible for training them for. E.g. firing your jQueryers to bring in a team with 2+ years of modern web framework experience, laying off data analysts to bring in machine learning experts, letting your financial team go and bringing in a diverse team of accountants with experience in international finance. I've never seen a direct example of a company removing their electricians because they don't have "Acme high voltage" certification and hiring other electricians with the plan to give them Acme high voltage certification. Outside of tech, you've got me. I have no idea. If this is specifically what you're talking about, I'll have to take your word for it. >You cannot meaningfully measure that effort at scale Sure you can. "Do you have experience with our aluminum hydraulic press tool? No? What about you, potential hire? No?" Then the probabilistic expected value of time/money to train would be equal.
  - toyg 8y ago
    > firing your jQueryers to bring in a team with 2+ years of modern web framework experience We clearly have different opinions on what retraining means. If you think "jqueryers" cannot be trained to use more modern JS frameworks, or accountants cannot learn international finance principles, then you are basically saying that retraining is not possible at all. It's a very sad view of the human brain's potential. > I've never seen a direct example of a company removing their electricians because they don't have "Acme high voltage" certification and hiring other electricians with the plan to give them Acme high voltage certification. Indeed: the point is that a company will now hire somebody with that certification already in the bag, avoiding the cost and effort of giving the chance to obtain it to their existing workforce. > the probabilistic expected value of time/money to train would be equal. You have a very simplistic view of what a job entails. There is a lot of related business knowledge that goes with jobs, even some of the most trivial ones: why you have to produce so many widgets at this or that speed can be as important as how you actually operate the necessary tools to achieve that result.
    - vortico 8y ago
      >We clearly have different opinions on what retraining means Well, this post is about training people to hammer out cymbals. >Indeed: the point is that a company will now hire somebody with that certification already in the bag, avoiding the cost and effort of giving the chance to obtain it to their existing workforce. Then that is not what I was asking two messages ago after you claimed >a lot of companies don't even try to "teach new tricks to an old dog"
      - toyg 8y ago
        Sorry, but then I honestly don't think you are arguing in good faith here. Have a good day.
jdietrich 8y ago
Layoffs are financially deceptive, because it's hard to put a dollar value on skills and experience. Training new hires is usually a lossy process. The job still gets done, but the overall effectiveness of your workforce is diminished in ways that are hard to quantify. Off the top of my head, the best example I can give is Circuit City, who pretty much committed suicide through layoffs. Throughout the 2000s, they laid off their more expensive retail staff, initially replacing commission-based sales people with hourly workers, then laying off older workers with seniority pay and replacing them with new hires. It saved money, but sales suffered as a result, particularly for big-ticket items. They wilfully disposed of their key competitive advantage over online retailers - experienced, knowledgeable sales staff. https://www.stereophile.com/news/11569/ https://www.stereophile.com/news/11569/ http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/01/AR2007050101623.html http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05...
- vortico 8y ago
  Hmm, I followed the Circuit City layoffs a while back, but it seems that they didn't trade untrained staff for other untrained staff with the intention of making them better employees than who they replaced, but they traded already trained staff for cheaper untrained staff---and then kept them untrained. If I remember, they did this in response to their impending doom, but it was not the original cause. It was their attempt at a short term problem, but it was not enough to counter the declining trend of retail appliance sales, so this decision ultimately wouldn't have affected them. (But anyway, not really important for this discussion.)

toyg 8y ago

Just pick any big company that announced large-scale layoffs in the last 20 years. They start re-hiring almost immediately. In some cases they even announce hiring plans while they announce layoffs - and the percentage of workers being retrained or moved internally during these events is usually pretty low. It's difficult to believe that tens of thousands of workers cannot be retrained, when corporate roles are increasingly described as "bullshit jobs" anyway. > when re-training would have been equal or less effort That's the issue, isn't it? You cannot meaningfully measure that effort at scale[1], and even if you could, it's an effort that product/line managers would likely have to make. Whereas firing and hiring is basically zero effort, because most of the donkeywork is done by HR. So as a line manager, you take the hit of a short disruption in operations, cash in a lower wage bill, and your job is done. [1] if we could meaningfully measure training effort vs results, we wouldn't have a market full of e-learning products that are invariably terrible but super-expensive.

vortico 8y ago
I don't believe your experience that big companies almost immediately re-hire after layoffs, for jobs that require training from square one (after firing square-one employees). In the tech field, I've seen plenty of re-hires right after layoffs, but the companies are always replacing them with engineers/developers/factory workers who possess an entirely different skill set that is well beyond the scope of what the company is responsible for training them for. E.g. firing your jQueryers to bring in a team with 2+ years of modern web framework experience, laying off data analysts to bring in machine learning experts, letting your financial team go and bringing in a diverse team of accountants with experience in international finance. I've never seen a direct example of a company removing their electricians because they don't have "Acme high voltage" certification and hiring other electricians with the plan to give them Acme high voltage certification. Outside of tech, you've got me. I have no idea. If this is specifically what you're talking about, I'll have to take your word for it. >You cannot meaningfully measure that effort at scale Sure you can. "Do you have experience with our aluminum hydraulic press tool? No? What about you, potential hire? No?" Then the probabilistic expected value of time/money to train would be equal.
- toyg 8y ago
  > firing your jQueryers to bring in a team with 2+ years of modern web framework experience We clearly have different opinions on what retraining means. If you think "jqueryers" cannot be trained to use more modern JS frameworks, or accountants cannot learn international finance principles, then you are basically saying that retraining is not possible at all. It's a very sad view of the human brain's potential. > I've never seen a direct example of a company removing their electricians because they don't have "Acme high voltage" certification and hiring other electricians with the plan to give them Acme high voltage certification. Indeed: the point is that a company will now hire somebody with that certification already in the bag, avoiding the cost and effort of giving the chance to obtain it to their existing workforce. > the probabilistic expected value of time/money to train would be equal. You have a very simplistic view of what a job entails. There is a lot of related business knowledge that goes with jobs, even some of the most trivial ones: why you have to produce so many widgets at this or that speed can be as important as how you actually operate the necessary tools to achieve that result.
  - vortico 8y ago
    >We clearly have different opinions on what retraining means Well, this post is about training people to hammer out cymbals. >Indeed: the point is that a company will now hire somebody with that certification already in the bag, avoiding the cost and effort of giving the chance to obtain it to their existing workforce. Then that is not what I was asking two messages ago after you claimed >a lot of companies don't even try to "teach new tricks to an old dog"
    - toyg 8y ago
      Sorry, but then I honestly don't think you are arguing in good faith here. Have a good day.

jdietrich 8y ago

Layoffs are financially deceptive, because it's hard to put a dollar value on skills and experience. Training new hires is usually a lossy process. The job still gets done, but the overall effectiveness of your workforce is diminished in ways that are hard to quantify. Off the top of my head, the best example I can give is Circuit City, who pretty much committed suicide through layoffs. Throughout the 2000s, they laid off their more expensive retail staff, initially replacing commission-based sales people with hourly workers, then laying off older workers with seniority pay and replacing them with new hires. It saved money, but sales suffered as a result, particularly for big-ticket items. They wilfully disposed of their key competitive advantage over online retailers - experienced, knowledgeable sales staff. https://www.stereophile.com/news/11569/ https://www.stereophile.com/news/11569/ http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/01/AR2007050101623.html http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05...

vortico 8y ago
Hmm, I followed the Circuit City layoffs a while back, but it seems that they didn't trade untrained staff for other untrained staff with the intention of making them better employees than who they replaced, but they traded already trained staff for cheaper untrained staff---and then kept them untrained. If I remember, they did this in response to their impending doom, but it was not the original cause. It was their attempt at a short term problem, but it was not enough to counter the declining trend of retail appliance sales, so this decision ultimately wouldn't have affected them. (But anyway, not really important for this discussion.)