6 ms·

It was Microsoft (or other company I don't recall) that every 5 years would lay off 5% of its work force (the least capable or productive people) - this would c

It was Microsoft (or other company I don't recall) that every 5 years would lay off 5% of its work force (the least capable or productive people) - this would cause those that remain to work harder next year. Then, they would open positions. Rinse and repeat.

drcross 7y ago
See: stack ranking
ceejayoz 7y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitality_curve#Microsoft https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitality_curve#Microsoft
walshemj 7y ago
General Electric was famous for doing this is the problem is you cant keep doing it every year. Also people just game the system and only do what will get them a good review. I know some on at a big UK company who was bucking for a promotion and they blew through 1 Mill and 15 Man years for no good reason.
- asdasdasdasdwd 7y ago
  > Also people just game the system and only do what will get them a good review. Wouldn't doing a good job earn a good review? This reminds me of the xkcd comic about the bots starting to have constructive messages to avoid spam filters. Mission fucking accomplished.
  - zozbot234 7y ago
    > Wouldn't doing a good job earn a good review? Nope, because incentives are not aligned to that extent. The whole point of a company is that it's not a pure market where incentives are everything by definition; it's a rather more complex organization and these often rely on "soft" constraints as better sources of drive, guidance, cooperation/coordination etc. If you're relying on "hard" incentives (like firing the 'worst' 5% no matter what) you'll invariably distort behaviors in ways that are hard to even predict, and are almost never what you really want.
  - kyllo 7y ago
    You get what you measure, for better or for worse. But what tends to happen with stack ranking is that people only do what their direct manager values and rewards in the short term, and avoid other work that really needs to be done, or what the actual customer wants. Your boss becomes your only customer. You invent redundant new shit because that's more impressive than fixing your existing shit that's broken. This can be incredibly damaging to the quality of the product, and also to the careers of anyone the boss just doesn't personally like for whatever reason. It creates a monoculture of like-minded, demographically similar people who suck up and shit down. You even can see pathological behaviors like managers purposefully recruiting low performers as sacrificial lambs to offer up at the next review time. Companies got rid of the rank-and-yank system in the last decade or so for a very good reason.
  - JohnFen 7y ago
    > Wouldn't doing a good job earn a good review? If only life were that simple.
  - cookie_monsta 7y ago
    I thought this was an interesting take on the review process from an xoogler: https://mtlynch.io/why-i-quit-google/ https://mtlynch.io/why-i-quit-google/
throwawayhhakdl 7y ago
Note, the fatal mistake in Microsoft’s case was not laying off the bottom 5%, it was laying off the bottom ranked people WITHIN small groups, even if said groups were doing very well. If you’re going to lay off the bottom x% every n period of time, it might be fine. But you’d better be damn sure your metrics are good (sales comes to mind though even then there’s a lot of ambiguity). If you’re dropping the weakest performer in groups you’re not only going to create the most toxic environment ever, you’re going to lay off plenty who are probably middle of the bell curve. Microsoft’s plan was, in addition to being unwise, just poorly reasoned statistically.
sithlord 7y ago
it also makes for a miserable work environment
disordinary 7y ago
Microsoft used to do stack ranking which puts everyone on a curve and ranks them against each other but they got rid of it when the regime at the top changed. This sort of ruthless management is a way to destabilise the workforce and disrupt the team. What I've often found is management might cull the worst performing people but the best people follow them voluntarily because of the toxic culture, and then there's the fact that the worst performing person in the best performing team might be better than the best performing person in the worst performing team.
D-Coder 7y ago
I think they don't do that any more. For one thing, it was too easy to game the system by hiring lousy people as targets for the next year's firings. And if a group was all good people... you ended up firing someone anyway.

drcross 7y ago

See: stack ranking

ceejayoz 7y ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitality_curve#Microsoft https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitality_curve#Microsoft

walshemj 7y ago

General Electric was famous for doing this is the problem is you cant keep doing it every year. Also people just game the system and only do what will get them a good review. I know some on at a big UK company who was bucking for a promotion and they blew through 1 Mill and 15 Man years for no good reason.

asdasdasdasdwd 7y ago
> Also people just game the system and only do what will get them a good review. Wouldn't doing a good job earn a good review? This reminds me of the xkcd comic about the bots starting to have constructive messages to avoid spam filters. Mission fucking accomplished.
- zozbot234 7y ago
  > Wouldn't doing a good job earn a good review? Nope, because incentives are not aligned to that extent. The whole point of a company is that it's not a pure market where incentives are everything by definition; it's a rather more complex organization and these often rely on "soft" constraints as better sources of drive, guidance, cooperation/coordination etc. If you're relying on "hard" incentives (like firing the 'worst' 5% no matter what) you'll invariably distort behaviors in ways that are hard to even predict, and are almost never what you really want.
- kyllo 7y ago
  You get what you measure, for better or for worse. But what tends to happen with stack ranking is that people only do what their direct manager values and rewards in the short term, and avoid other work that really needs to be done, or what the actual customer wants. Your boss becomes your only customer. You invent redundant new shit because that's more impressive than fixing your existing shit that's broken. This can be incredibly damaging to the quality of the product, and also to the careers of anyone the boss just doesn't personally like for whatever reason. It creates a monoculture of like-minded, demographically similar people who suck up and shit down. You even can see pathological behaviors like managers purposefully recruiting low performers as sacrificial lambs to offer up at the next review time. Companies got rid of the rank-and-yank system in the last decade or so for a very good reason.
- JohnFen 7y ago
  > Wouldn't doing a good job earn a good review? If only life were that simple.
- cookie_monsta 7y ago
  I thought this was an interesting take on the review process from an xoogler: https://mtlynch.io/why-i-quit-google/ https://mtlynch.io/why-i-quit-google/

throwawayhhakdl 7y ago

Note, the fatal mistake in Microsoft’s case was not laying off the bottom 5%, it was laying off the bottom ranked people WITHIN small groups, even if said groups were doing very well. If you’re going to lay off the bottom x% every n period of time, it might be fine. But you’d better be damn sure your metrics are good (sales comes to mind though even then there’s a lot of ambiguity). If you’re dropping the weakest performer in groups you’re not only going to create the most toxic environment ever, you’re going to lay off plenty who are probably middle of the bell curve. Microsoft’s plan was, in addition to being unwise, just poorly reasoned statistically.

sithlord 7y ago

it also makes for a miserable work environment

disordinary 7y ago

Microsoft used to do stack ranking which puts everyone on a curve and ranks them against each other but they got rid of it when the regime at the top changed. This sort of ruthless management is a way to destabilise the workforce and disrupt the team. What I've often found is management might cull the worst performing people but the best people follow them voluntarily because of the toxic culture, and then there's the fact that the worst performing person in the best performing team might be better than the best performing person in the worst performing team.

D-Coder 7y ago

I think they don't do that any more. For one thing, it was too easy to game the system by hiring lousy people as targets for the next year's firings. And if a group was all good people... you ended up firing someone anyway.