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> That's not invalid by itself as long as everyone knows that the game is purely transactional. But it isn't fair to expect employee "passion" when their own co

> That's not invalid by itself as long as everyone knows that the game is purely transactional. But it isn't fair to expect employee "passion" when their own continued employment is contingent on whether management thinks they're still necessary. This still seems to hold no?

theptip 6y ago
Maybe to some extent, but I’m not certain. If you are passionate about what you do, then you are probably not enjoying the job which shifted into not being a fit for your skill set, so the need to find someone else can be a mutual/positive conversation. It’s also really fraught with ego and self-worth landmines so it doesn’t always go that way.
- dwohnitmok 6y ago
  There's a significant difference between being passionate about what you do and being passionate about the company/mission. A software developer might care immensely about the craft of software and the intricacies of tooling, programming languages, etc. but none at all about the company or mission, or a developer might care only about the company and view the craft of software as just the thing that happens to be most helpful for the company at the moment. Most people probably fall somewhere in the middle. I suspect employers would like both, but would prefer to subordinate the former to the latter, because otherwise that employee is easily going to jump ship to a competitor or potentially not be an effective employee at all and get lost in the weeds of their craft rather than the mission. This sort of passion for the mission/company itself is also the impression I get from the article. And that's a pretty big ask if as an employer you also want the ability to discard people who are no longer good skill fits for the company. I mean you can ask it and you may well succeed, but I would expect quite a few burned bridges along the way.
  - theptip 6y ago
    > There's a significant difference between being passionate about what you do and being passionate about the company/mission. Absolutely. > I suspect employers would like both, but would prefer to subordinate the former to the latter I think this depends on the company - size in particular seems very relevant. A lot of startups want their hires to be "mission driven", i.e. passionate about the company's objectives. This is more important if (like most startups) you're hoping for your hires to be generalists, and figure things out as they go along. In this scenario you can have meta-level "passionate about what you do" regardless of what the object-level task is (or more realistically, within a broad range of tasks that fall within your area of competence-but-not-expertise). But that's not as important as passion for the mission, and I do wonder if "passionate for whatever thing you're working on" is an oxymoron. In this situation I think your point is correct, the small companies want passion about the mission. One of the complaints in the OP was that Google employees are _not_ (as) mission-driven. My model here would be that at a big company, you're looking for a bunch of highly-specialized individuals that are effectively PhD-level experts in their field (not saying you completely discard/devalue generalists, but the trend is towards more specialists as you get bigger since you have more tasks that can actually keep a specialist busy full-time). For hiring/motivating specialists, you need to select for people that are passionate about the craft, not necessarily the mission. Not to mention if I understand correctly at the lower levels at least you tend to apply to a broad "Software engineer" role and get slotted in to a team, rather than applying specifically for a role in a specific subject area. I'm guessing the median Googler is substantially less mission-oriented than the median 10-person-startup engineer. Indeed to the extent that your mission is "boring" (I don't know many people that are excited by selling ads, for example) I suspect you want to actively select for people that are passionate about the craft, not the mission; these people will be happy with any mission, as long as they get to craft well. So for large companies I think I disagree with your theory about preferences between the two passions. Note with all of this -- you can still be a primarily mission-based small/growth startup, and have a situation where a skill mismatch emerges, and you need to replace someone. I don't think it's hypocritical to want your employees to be passionate about the mission, while also having the skills required to do the job, and recognize that sometimes your passionate and mission-driven employee is just not the right person for the role they are currently in. > And that's a pretty big ask if as an employer you also want the ability to discard people who are no longer good skill fits for the company. Perhaps there is some hypocrisy if you are really encouraging passion about _the company_, and selling the "we are a family" story, and then turn around and terminate someone because you pivoted and no longer need them. I know some startups do this and it's a bit awkward. Your company may be close, but you're not a family. But I don't think "hires mission driven people" and "fires fast if there's a lack of fit" are mutually incompatible asks/expectations in general.
modeless 6y ago
> when their own continued employment is contingent on whether management thinks they're still necessary Talk about entitlement. You think that when a company hires you, that should be a commitment to employ you forever regardless of need? Passion can come from your own investment in the success of the business, through equity and through the opportunities that come to productive employees at growing companies, both before and after they leave. Or it can come from a belief in the mission, distinct from faith in the company. You can pursue the same mission at a different company. But I guarantee you one thing: passion does not come from a guarantee of continued employment.
- dwohnitmok 6y ago
  > You think that when a company hires you, that should be a commitment to employ you forever regardless of need? Hardly. I can't speak for the original comment I quoted, but I personally view employment as pretty transactional. You pay me this, I give you this. I may or may not have passion, but that should be immaterial to the job at hand. The employer sets a bar. The employee clears it or does not. That bar may change over time. If the employee does not clear the bar the employer fires the employee. If the employee clears the bar the employer continues paying the employee. To the extent that passion comes into the conversation, it's an internal issue for the employee to sort out by themselves and not really the business of the employer. Are you saying something different? Because I don't think we're actually in disagreement, but maybe we are?
  - modeless 6y ago
    > I may or may not have passion, but that should be immaterial to the job at hand. Perhaps this is our disagreement. Employees with passion often perform better and there is nothing "unfair" about employers desiring passionate employees for that reason. I agree that passion shouldn't be a requirement per se (whatever that means) if job performance is otherwise good, but passion is very highly correlated with job performance.
    - dwohnitmok 6y ago
      > Employees with passion often perform better That sounds really weird to me to bring up, regardless of whether it's true or not. As in this makes sense when you're thinking of trying to hire folks trying to gauge passion as a proxy for their performance when you can't directly observe it, but when they're working for you, you don't need proxies! You can directly observe performance! So passion seems pretty irrelevant as soon as someone is hired, unless you're afraid of them jumping ship. But that's the nature of the beast. Employers can fire employees and employees can jump ship. Such is life. > there is nothing "unfair" about employers desiring passionate employees I'm a bit confused; I mean there's nothing unfair about desires in general? Someone could want a billion dollars to fall from the sky into their lap and I might say "good luck," but there's nothing unfair about it. Employers might desire their employees to want literally zero pay and employees might desire their employers to give literally zero work. Good luck to the both of them. The question then is not so much desires as it is the actual dynamics of the job itself and to what extent those desires are actually manifested in observable behavior. I think the overarching theme that the_local_host was bringing up has to do with the language of morality in general. You can talk about the employee-employer relationship in a very dispassionate sense as one of mutual transactional need with one discarding the other when one is no longer needed, which is fine. You can also talk about the relationship in the language of fairness and passion, which is also fine. But there's something pretty unsettling about crossing the two together, especially when the perceived dynamic is that when it's convenient for the employer they slip into one or the other rather than when it's convenient for the employee. EDIT: In response to your additional new line: "I agree that passion shouldn't be a requirement per se (whatever that means) if job performance is otherwise good, but passion is very highly correlated with job performance." I think the original point of the_local_host's comment is that it's just kind of weird to talk about passion at all or whether an employee "should" do something or not or even the notion of employer/employee entitlement. Just make the job expectations explicit. If an employer wants employees to work weekends make that explicit in the job description. If the employer wants a work product that a typical employee can only produce after 100 hours of work in a week then fine, ask for it, just make it clear upfront. If the employer wants employees to work extra hours for deadlines, fine just make it explicit. The employee then takes it or leaves it. And from the employer side either the employee fulfills those expectations or doesn't. But don't leave it implicit and then complain about the lack of passion, which is what I think the_local_host was pointing out. (There's wider policy questions of whether you want to incentivize or disincentivize that behavior on a societal level, but that's an altogether different scope/level of conversation.)

theptip 6y ago

Maybe to some extent, but I’m not certain. If you are passionate about what you do, then you are probably not enjoying the job which shifted into not being a fit for your skill set, so the need to find someone else can be a mutual/positive conversation. It’s also really fraught with ego and self-worth landmines so it doesn’t always go that way.

dwohnitmok 6y ago
There's a significant difference between being passionate about what you do and being passionate about the company/mission. A software developer might care immensely about the craft of software and the intricacies of tooling, programming languages, etc. but none at all about the company or mission, or a developer might care only about the company and view the craft of software as just the thing that happens to be most helpful for the company at the moment. Most people probably fall somewhere in the middle. I suspect employers would like both, but would prefer to subordinate the former to the latter, because otherwise that employee is easily going to jump ship to a competitor or potentially not be an effective employee at all and get lost in the weeds of their craft rather than the mission. This sort of passion for the mission/company itself is also the impression I get from the article. And that's a pretty big ask if as an employer you also want the ability to discard people who are no longer good skill fits for the company. I mean you can ask it and you may well succeed, but I would expect quite a few burned bridges along the way.
- theptip 6y ago
  > There's a significant difference between being passionate about what you do and being passionate about the company/mission. Absolutely. > I suspect employers would like both, but would prefer to subordinate the former to the latter I think this depends on the company - size in particular seems very relevant. A lot of startups want their hires to be "mission driven", i.e. passionate about the company's objectives. This is more important if (like most startups) you're hoping for your hires to be generalists, and figure things out as they go along. In this scenario you can have meta-level "passionate about what you do" regardless of what the object-level task is (or more realistically, within a broad range of tasks that fall within your area of competence-but-not-expertise). But that's not as important as passion for the mission, and I do wonder if "passionate for whatever thing you're working on" is an oxymoron. In this situation I think your point is correct, the small companies want passion about the mission. One of the complaints in the OP was that Google employees are _not_ (as) mission-driven. My model here would be that at a big company, you're looking for a bunch of highly-specialized individuals that are effectively PhD-level experts in their field (not saying you completely discard/devalue generalists, but the trend is towards more specialists as you get bigger since you have more tasks that can actually keep a specialist busy full-time). For hiring/motivating specialists, you need to select for people that are passionate about the craft, not necessarily the mission. Not to mention if I understand correctly at the lower levels at least you tend to apply to a broad "Software engineer" role and get slotted in to a team, rather than applying specifically for a role in a specific subject area. I'm guessing the median Googler is substantially less mission-oriented than the median 10-person-startup engineer. Indeed to the extent that your mission is "boring" (I don't know many people that are excited by selling ads, for example) I suspect you want to actively select for people that are passionate about the craft, not the mission; these people will be happy with any mission, as long as they get to craft well. So for large companies I think I disagree with your theory about preferences between the two passions. Note with all of this -- you can still be a primarily mission-based small/growth startup, and have a situation where a skill mismatch emerges, and you need to replace someone. I don't think it's hypocritical to want your employees to be passionate about the mission, while also having the skills required to do the job, and recognize that sometimes your passionate and mission-driven employee is just not the right person for the role they are currently in. > And that's a pretty big ask if as an employer you also want the ability to discard people who are no longer good skill fits for the company. Perhaps there is some hypocrisy if you are really encouraging passion about _the company_, and selling the "we are a family" story, and then turn around and terminate someone because you pivoted and no longer need them. I know some startups do this and it's a bit awkward. Your company may be close, but you're not a family. But I don't think "hires mission driven people" and "fires fast if there's a lack of fit" are mutually incompatible asks/expectations in general.

modeless 6y ago

> when their own continued employment is contingent on whether management thinks they're still necessary Talk about entitlement. You think that when a company hires you, that should be a commitment to employ you forever regardless of need? Passion can come from your own investment in the success of the business, through equity and through the opportunities that come to productive employees at growing companies, both before and after they leave. Or it can come from a belief in the mission, distinct from faith in the company. You can pursue the same mission at a different company. But I guarantee you one thing: passion does not come from a guarantee of continued employment.

dwohnitmok 6y ago
> You think that when a company hires you, that should be a commitment to employ you forever regardless of need? Hardly. I can't speak for the original comment I quoted, but I personally view employment as pretty transactional. You pay me this, I give you this. I may or may not have passion, but that should be immaterial to the job at hand. The employer sets a bar. The employee clears it or does not. That bar may change over time. If the employee does not clear the bar the employer fires the employee. If the employee clears the bar the employer continues paying the employee. To the extent that passion comes into the conversation, it's an internal issue for the employee to sort out by themselves and not really the business of the employer. Are you saying something different? Because I don't think we're actually in disagreement, but maybe we are?
- modeless 6y ago
  > I may or may not have passion, but that should be immaterial to the job at hand. Perhaps this is our disagreement. Employees with passion often perform better and there is nothing "unfair" about employers desiring passionate employees for that reason. I agree that passion shouldn't be a requirement per se (whatever that means) if job performance is otherwise good, but passion is very highly correlated with job performance.
  - dwohnitmok 6y ago
    > Employees with passion often perform better That sounds really weird to me to bring up, regardless of whether it's true or not. As in this makes sense when you're thinking of trying to hire folks trying to gauge passion as a proxy for their performance when you can't directly observe it, but when they're working for you, you don't need proxies! You can directly observe performance! So passion seems pretty irrelevant as soon as someone is hired, unless you're afraid of them jumping ship. But that's the nature of the beast. Employers can fire employees and employees can jump ship. Such is life. > there is nothing "unfair" about employers desiring passionate employees I'm a bit confused; I mean there's nothing unfair about desires in general? Someone could want a billion dollars to fall from the sky into their lap and I might say "good luck," but there's nothing unfair about it. Employers might desire their employees to want literally zero pay and employees might desire their employers to give literally zero work. Good luck to the both of them. The question then is not so much desires as it is the actual dynamics of the job itself and to what extent those desires are actually manifested in observable behavior. I think the overarching theme that the_local_host was bringing up has to do with the language of morality in general. You can talk about the employee-employer relationship in a very dispassionate sense as one of mutual transactional need with one discarding the other when one is no longer needed, which is fine. You can also talk about the relationship in the language of fairness and passion, which is also fine. But there's something pretty unsettling about crossing the two together, especially when the perceived dynamic is that when it's convenient for the employer they slip into one or the other rather than when it's convenient for the employee. EDIT: In response to your additional new line: "I agree that passion shouldn't be a requirement per se (whatever that means) if job performance is otherwise good, but passion is very highly correlated with job performance." I think the original point of the_local_host's comment is that it's just kind of weird to talk about passion at all or whether an employee "should" do something or not or even the notion of employer/employee entitlement. Just make the job expectations explicit. If an employer wants employees to work weekends make that explicit in the job description. If the employer wants a work product that a typical employee can only produce after 100 hours of work in a week then fine, ask for it, just make it clear upfront. If the employer wants employees to work extra hours for deadlines, fine just make it explicit. The employee then takes it or leaves it. And from the employer side either the employee fulfills those expectations or doesn't. But don't leave it implicit and then complain about the lack of passion, which is what I think the_local_host was pointing out. (There's wider policy questions of whether you want to incentivize or disincentivize that behavior on a societal level, but that's an altogether different scope/level of conversation.)