8 ms·

The article actually doesn’t tell the true horror of the situation which is this: Companies burn out employees and then deal with the consequences by firing the

by w0mbat 5y ago

The article actually doesn’t tell the true horror of the situation which is this: Companies burn out employees and then deal with the consequences by firing them or bullying them into quitting. Employees lie about how their last job ended and limp into the next one, using the unemployment gap to recover as best they can.

fsociety 5y ago
+1 so true. Even companies with good intentions can tend to lead employees to burnout.
bradleyjg 5y ago
Companies that use the: recruit a lot of people, burn out most, rinse and repeat strategy are fairly easy to identify. As an employee you should have your eyes open about this but it’s not necessarily the case that they should be avoided at all costs. Properly used, time at one of these companies can change the trajectory of your career. Depending on where you are in life that can be worth it. Having a time boxed plan makes it more likely you can survive the experience with your health and sanity intact.
- StandardFuture 5y ago
  But, we as a community should get better at calling these companies out publicly. Especially if they show up in a comment on the monthly hiring post. Don't let your fellow engineers get burnt. More community cooperation in this regard would go a long way.
  - Retric 5y ago
    You don’t need to go public, companies that relying on burning people out simply deserve zero respect from their employees. Remember as critical as everything seems it’s no longer your problem once you move on. Sure, moving on to your next job might seem to be leaving them in a lurch, but lack of redundancy isn’t your problem. PS: The best thing you can do for your teammates in that situation is convince them to find a better job.
  - xf1cf 5y ago
    Cancel culture doesn't have to be used for everything (and IMO should not be used for _anything_). Mob justice won't fix the company, and if the company is big enough (perhaps some SV companies who shall not be named), it won't have any real effect. Burnout is often an acceptable "work hazard" for the CV reputation gained. A good parallel to this is finance where burnout is practically built into the program. Medicine also crosses my mind when thinking of fields where burning yourself out could, counter-intuitively, be considered highly beneficial as a long term play. Outlets for this already exist in the form of Glassdoor but much like every other review service once it reaches scales the usefulness of the reviews falls precipitously. You also open yourself up to libel claims. Assuming your canceling actually works I would not be surprised if the company spent significant effort to take you to court and financially ruin you. Even more so if the accusations aren't entirely true (perhaps it's just one division and not the entire company). Instead, it's probably more useful to _train_ people to notice these things and ascertain the risks. Burnout can often be worth it if the net-gain-after-burnout improves your prospects to advance in your field, confers a pedigree, or any other number of small things. Returning to the finance example this is certainly why people risk it. At the end of the day, in the US at least, a little over half of the states in the union are right-to-work. This is the safety valve for companies who deliberately churn employees - just leave. Ideally after you've already lined up a new gig in your field.
- lordnacho 5y ago
  Easy to identify? What are the signs, save for things you could only be told by a friend on the inside?
  - bradleyjg 5y ago
    High turnover, especially if there’s a big peak at 2-3 years of experience. For mid-career professionals, you should be able to tell this from your second or third degree network on LinkedIn or similar. For students, you should be suspicious of any company that’s hiring a lot of fresh grads unless they are gigantic (in which case, consult the alumni whisper network).
    - zikduruqe 5y ago
      Cerner in KC is like that. Grab all the college grads, burn them to death for 3 to 4 years, cull the herd. https://www.kshb.com/news/local-news/cerner-layoffs-part-of-reorganization-spokesperson-says https://www.kshb.com/news/local-news/cerner-layoffs-part-of-... Here is example of the culture: https://www.bizcominthenews.com/files/cerner-1.pdf https://www.bizcominthenews.com/files/cerner-1.pdf
      - mistrial9 5y ago
        that would be from then-CEO Neal Patterson, from Wikipedia : Patterson is infamous for an email[7] scolding managers for not coming to work before 8 am and leaving before 5 pm, now a prominent example used when discussing email netiquette. On the day that the email was posted to Yahoo!, the company's market cap fell by over 22%[8] from a high of US$1.5 billion.[9] [7] "BBC News - AMERICAS - Boss's e-mail bites back". BBC. Archived from the original on February 8, 2009. [8] .. [9] Flynn, Nancy; Kahn, Randolph (2003). E-mail Rules: A Business Guide to Managing Policies, Security, and Legal Issues for E-mail and Digital Communication. AMACOM Div American Mgmt Assn. p. 45. ISBN 9780814471883. netiquette. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neal_Patterson https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neal_Patterson
    - xf1cf 5y ago
      This is highly sector dependent. I've worked at startups for almost my entire career and a big peak of leaving engineers at 2-3 years wouldn't even cause me any concern. In the 10 years in industry I've worked I'd argue the average engineer leaves around the 5 year mark. This typically coincides with a failed seed round or reaching a terminal title (senior, staff, etc) and not being able to go further. The fresh grads case is a good point. The one company I left fairly quickly was almost entirely powered by intern/junior labor. Seniors left quickly due to a combination of bad management, low advancement opportunities, and constantly having to re-train people. This, I think, is worth looking out for.
- hinkley 5y ago
  I was working at such a place when the 2008 recession happened. That was brutal. I still have health issues from that experience. The road to Hell is paved with good intentions. Your plans to get out quick may run into economic epicycles and then your clever plan ain’t so clever.
  - 0x4a42 5y ago
    I had a similar experience at the same time.
  - ardit33 5y ago
    Yup.... for me it was Amazon. And I was in H-1B back then, so I just put it up with it for a while, until the economy improved. The company had such a weird culture. It was pretty stressful. The most insidious thing they did was delay the green card application as much as they could, and just drag things out on purpose. Since I am Albanian/European, I could get it faster as my country is not on the per country cap that Indian and Chinese applicants are. They knew it, as they kept dragging out the first stages of the applications on everything. It was mental abuse. By 2011, the economy was recovering, and I did switch, but I had to redo all the green card application stuff again.
    - mavelikara 5y ago
      Not many realize this, but having the green card process drag out long has a detrimental effect on the whole job market, not just for the specific immigrant.
      - ardit33 5y ago
        Yes, It creates serfs/indentured servitude. Both the H1B visa and GC application should belong to the worker/applicant, with conditions (as long as they are employed with the given salary, pay taxes, etc...). The employee should just be able to do the process themselves, and handle it the papers with their own lawyer. It is clear that the H1B is setup to maximize the benefits to large corps, and not necessary the american economy/people.
- w0mbat 5y ago
  Easy to indentify because it's all of them. Not everyone burns out at every company and some people really do switch for a better opportunity, but burnout is very common and is everywhere.
- eyelidlessness 5y ago
  This is tricky. I don’t necessarily disagree, but evaluating these things can be more difficult for some people. For me, it’s very easy for me to get attached because I care about some combination of the problem and the team. I’ve had some major wins improving things in those cases, but I’ve also had some major losses. And it’s very difficult for me to recognize burnout symptoms until they’re severe enough to require extensive recovery time. Sure, the idea of timeboxing could be useful, but I could also just let that slide given my motivation to improve things. In the end, it’s not worth it to me anymore to put myself in that situation.
- AlexCoventry 5y ago
  > Companies that use the: recruit a lot of people, burn out most, rinse and repeat strategy are fairly easy to identify. How?
- georgeecollins 5y ago
  There is a lot of reporting about companies in two areas I am familiar with: video games and entertainment. Both industries are aware that there are a lot of young people really desperate to break into them. Not all companies take advantage of that, but many do. Some game companies that have only really young workers below senior management and explain this by saying older people don't get what they are doing. They say it quietly, and indirectly because it opens them up to discrimination lawsuits. But what it really means is experienced people aren't putting up with something about the company.. the hours, the management, something. And unfortunately this does not really seem to be an impediment to their success.
- lugged 5y ago
  I suspect Netflix is one of these companies. I'd love to work there but I struggle to justify the burnout that will result i'm not 20 anymore.
- toomanybeersies 5y ago
  Maybe I'm strange, but the idea of starting a new job with the intention of quitting doesn't sit right with me. To me, that would be like getting married with the intention of getting a divorce. I know that realistically, I'm probably going to find a different job at some point, but it's always been a natural progression and not a planned movement.
  - JoeAltmaier 5y ago
    So every job acceptance has to be accompanied by a lifetime commitment? That sounds even stranger.
    - toomanybeersies 5y ago
      Maybe marriage wasn't a good simile... I've never started a job thinking "I'm going to work here for X years, and then quit (for Y reason)". I've also never started a job expecting to work there for the rest of my career, although I would be happy if it was a good job and I did. I might end up quitting my current job after a year or two, I might be here 10 years, maybe I'll leave in a casket. I don't have a set date for when I'll quit. My father has had the same job for over 40 years. He's had different roles (originally a telecommunications rigger, now a network engineer) and worked for different companies (buyouts etc.), but he's never actually had to apply for a new job. He's enjoyed his work and had a good career. I guess there's not many jobs like that these days though.
eyelidlessness 5y ago
I can attest to this from experience. What’s shocking is that I’ve even seen such a company deliberately ignore my mitigation requests, only to fulfill them in my wake when I gave notice. And it’s not as if my work wasn’t valued, I had just been given a rather significant raise a couple months earlier. As far as I could tell, they were happy to throw money at extracting every bit of value out of me until I was completely empty.
BeFlatXIII 5y ago
I wonder just how prevalent the pattern of a perpetually burnt-put employee shuffling to job to job like this is. I imagine that some of them simply need a year off away from the world or a lucky break with a good employer to get back into peak form. However, my suspicion is that the majority of them are simply not cut out for the field but insist on staying in because they believe, correctly or not, that it’s the only kind of job that can give worthwhile pay. (Edit to add) It’s also why I roll my eyes so hard at most of the standard suite of job interview questions. When there is a known and obvious correct answer, all it does is filter out candidates who are too honest to lie, too stupid to know you’re supposed to lie, and candidates who cannot confidently sell a lie.
- dheera 5y ago
  > simply need a year off away from the world It's actually really hard (mentally) to do this if you don't already have a shitton of savings in the bank that you're not worried about paying rent, and aren't worried about getting a new job. For a lot of people it's harder than it sounds. But yes, gap years would be amazing. Another thing I wish was more encouraged is part-time work. Working for a year at maybe 20 hours a week would probably pay all living expenses while you have plenty of space and time to recover and time to spend in the wilderness or beach or whatever strikes your fancy. Everyone seems to want to shovel you in as a full-time employee, and part-time seems to be looked down upon more than it should as a transition and recovery tool.
  - BeFlatXIII 5y ago
    Part-time employment should also be a key to any discussion on preventing mass unemployment due to automation. Rather than have high-paid salary jobs for the few and UBI for everyone else, normalize part-time work and keep keep more people actively engaged in the economy.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
- ipaddr 5y ago

by w0mbat 5y ago

fsociety 5y ago

+1 so true. Even companies with good intentions can tend to lead employees to burnout.

bradleyjg 5y ago

Companies that use the: recruit a lot of people, burn out most, rinse and repeat strategy are fairly easy to identify. As an employee you should have your eyes open about this but it’s not necessarily the case that they should be avoided at all costs. Properly used, time at one of these companies can change the trajectory of your career. Depending on where you are in life that can be worth it. Having a time boxed plan makes it more likely you can survive the experience with your health and sanity intact.

StandardFuture 5y ago
But, we as a community should get better at calling these companies out publicly. Especially if they show up in a comment on the monthly hiring post. Don't let your fellow engineers get burnt. More community cooperation in this regard would go a long way.
- Retric 5y ago
  You don’t need to go public, companies that relying on burning people out simply deserve zero respect from their employees. Remember as critical as everything seems it’s no longer your problem once you move on. Sure, moving on to your next job might seem to be leaving them in a lurch, but lack of redundancy isn’t your problem. PS: The best thing you can do for your teammates in that situation is convince them to find a better job.
- xf1cf 5y ago
  Cancel culture doesn't have to be used for everything (and IMO should not be used for _anything_). Mob justice won't fix the company, and if the company is big enough (perhaps some SV companies who shall not be named), it won't have any real effect. Burnout is often an acceptable "work hazard" for the CV reputation gained. A good parallel to this is finance where burnout is practically built into the program. Medicine also crosses my mind when thinking of fields where burning yourself out could, counter-intuitively, be considered highly beneficial as a long term play. Outlets for this already exist in the form of Glassdoor but much like every other review service once it reaches scales the usefulness of the reviews falls precipitously. You also open yourself up to libel claims. Assuming your canceling actually works I would not be surprised if the company spent significant effort to take you to court and financially ruin you. Even more so if the accusations aren't entirely true (perhaps it's just one division and not the entire company). Instead, it's probably more useful to _train_ people to notice these things and ascertain the risks. Burnout can often be worth it if the net-gain-after-burnout improves your prospects to advance in your field, confers a pedigree, or any other number of small things. Returning to the finance example this is certainly why people risk it. At the end of the day, in the US at least, a little over half of the states in the union are right-to-work. This is the safety valve for companies who deliberately churn employees - just leave. Ideally after you've already lined up a new gig in your field.
lordnacho 5y ago
Easy to identify? What are the signs, save for things you could only be told by a friend on the inside?
- bradleyjg 5y ago
  High turnover, especially if there’s a big peak at 2-3 years of experience. For mid-career professionals, you should be able to tell this from your second or third degree network on LinkedIn or similar. For students, you should be suspicious of any company that’s hiring a lot of fresh grads unless they are gigantic (in which case, consult the alumni whisper network).
  - zikduruqe 5y ago
    Cerner in KC is like that. Grab all the college grads, burn them to death for 3 to 4 years, cull the herd. https://www.kshb.com/news/local-news/cerner-layoffs-part-of-reorganization-spokesperson-says https://www.kshb.com/news/local-news/cerner-layoffs-part-of-... Here is example of the culture: https://www.bizcominthenews.com/files/cerner-1.pdf https://www.bizcominthenews.com/files/cerner-1.pdf
    - mistrial9 5y ago
      that would be from then-CEO Neal Patterson, from Wikipedia : Patterson is infamous for an email[7] scolding managers for not coming to work before 8 am and leaving before 5 pm, now a prominent example used when discussing email netiquette. On the day that the email was posted to Yahoo!, the company's market cap fell by over 22%[8] from a high of US$1.5 billion.[9] [7] "BBC News - AMERICAS - Boss's e-mail bites back". BBC. Archived from the original on February 8, 2009. [8] .. [9] Flynn, Nancy; Kahn, Randolph (2003). E-mail Rules: A Business Guide to Managing Policies, Security, and Legal Issues for E-mail and Digital Communication. AMACOM Div American Mgmt Assn. p. 45. ISBN 9780814471883. netiquette. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neal_Patterson https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neal_Patterson
  - xf1cf 5y ago
    This is highly sector dependent. I've worked at startups for almost my entire career and a big peak of leaving engineers at 2-3 years wouldn't even cause me any concern. In the 10 years in industry I've worked I'd argue the average engineer leaves around the 5 year mark. This typically coincides with a failed seed round or reaching a terminal title (senior, staff, etc) and not being able to go further. The fresh grads case is a good point. The one company I left fairly quickly was almost entirely powered by intern/junior labor. Seniors left quickly due to a combination of bad management, low advancement opportunities, and constantly having to re-train people. This, I think, is worth looking out for.
hinkley 5y ago
I was working at such a place when the 2008 recession happened. That was brutal. I still have health issues from that experience. The road to Hell is paved with good intentions. Your plans to get out quick may run into economic epicycles and then your clever plan ain’t so clever.
- 0x4a42 5y ago
  I had a similar experience at the same time.
- ardit33 5y ago
  Yup.... for me it was Amazon. And I was in H-1B back then, so I just put it up with it for a while, until the economy improved. The company had such a weird culture. It was pretty stressful. The most insidious thing they did was delay the green card application as much as they could, and just drag things out on purpose. Since I am Albanian/European, I could get it faster as my country is not on the per country cap that Indian and Chinese applicants are. They knew it, as they kept dragging out the first stages of the applications on everything. It was mental abuse. By 2011, the economy was recovering, and I did switch, but I had to redo all the green card application stuff again.
  - mavelikara 5y ago
    Not many realize this, but having the green card process drag out long has a detrimental effect on the whole job market, not just for the specific immigrant.
    - ardit33 5y ago
      Yes, It creates serfs/indentured servitude. Both the H1B visa and GC application should belong to the worker/applicant, with conditions (as long as they are employed with the given salary, pay taxes, etc...). The employee should just be able to do the process themselves, and handle it the papers with their own lawyer. It is clear that the H1B is setup to maximize the benefits to large corps, and not necessary the american economy/people.
w0mbat 5y ago
Easy to indentify because it's all of them. Not everyone burns out at every company and some people really do switch for a better opportunity, but burnout is very common and is everywhere.
eyelidlessness 5y ago
This is tricky. I don’t necessarily disagree, but evaluating these things can be more difficult for some people. For me, it’s very easy for me to get attached because I care about some combination of the problem and the team. I’ve had some major wins improving things in those cases, but I’ve also had some major losses. And it’s very difficult for me to recognize burnout symptoms until they’re severe enough to require extensive recovery time. Sure, the idea of timeboxing could be useful, but I could also just let that slide given my motivation to improve things. In the end, it’s not worth it to me anymore to put myself in that situation.
AlexCoventry 5y ago
> Companies that use the: recruit a lot of people, burn out most, rinse and repeat strategy are fairly easy to identify. How?
georgeecollins 5y ago
There is a lot of reporting about companies in two areas I am familiar with: video games and entertainment. Both industries are aware that there are a lot of young people really desperate to break into them. Not all companies take advantage of that, but many do. Some game companies that have only really young workers below senior management and explain this by saying older people don't get what they are doing. They say it quietly, and indirectly because it opens them up to discrimination lawsuits. But what it really means is experienced people aren't putting up with something about the company.. the hours, the management, something. And unfortunately this does not really seem to be an impediment to their success.
lugged 5y ago
I suspect Netflix is one of these companies. I'd love to work there but I struggle to justify the burnout that will result i'm not 20 anymore.
toomanybeersies 5y ago
Maybe I'm strange, but the idea of starting a new job with the intention of quitting doesn't sit right with me. To me, that would be like getting married with the intention of getting a divorce. I know that realistically, I'm probably going to find a different job at some point, but it's always been a natural progression and not a planned movement.
- JoeAltmaier 5y ago
  So every job acceptance has to be accompanied by a lifetime commitment? That sounds even stranger.
  - toomanybeersies 5y ago
    Maybe marriage wasn't a good simile... I've never started a job thinking "I'm going to work here for X years, and then quit (for Y reason)". I've also never started a job expecting to work there for the rest of my career, although I would be happy if it was a good job and I did. I might end up quitting my current job after a year or two, I might be here 10 years, maybe I'll leave in a casket. I don't have a set date for when I'll quit. My father has had the same job for over 40 years. He's had different roles (originally a telecommunications rigger, now a network engineer) and worked for different companies (buyouts etc.), but he's never actually had to apply for a new job. He's enjoyed his work and had a good career. I guess there's not many jobs like that these days though.

eyelidlessness 5y ago

I can attest to this from experience. What’s shocking is that I’ve even seen such a company deliberately ignore my mitigation requests, only to fulfill them in my wake when I gave notice. And it’s not as if my work wasn’t valued, I had just been given a rather significant raise a couple months earlier. As far as I could tell, they were happy to throw money at extracting every bit of value out of me until I was completely empty.

BeFlatXIII 5y ago

I wonder just how prevalent the pattern of a perpetually burnt-put employee shuffling to job to job like this is. I imagine that some of them simply need a year off away from the world or a lucky break with a good employer to get back into peak form. However, my suspicion is that the majority of them are simply not cut out for the field but insist on staying in because they believe, correctly or not, that it’s the only kind of job that can give worthwhile pay. (Edit to add) It’s also why I roll my eyes so hard at most of the standard suite of job interview questions. When there is a known and obvious correct answer, all it does is filter out candidates who are too honest to lie, too stupid to know you’re supposed to lie, and candidates who cannot confidently sell a lie.

dheera 5y ago
> simply need a year off away from the world It's actually really hard (mentally) to do this if you don't already have a shitton of savings in the bank that you're not worried about paying rent, and aren't worried about getting a new job. For a lot of people it's harder than it sounds. But yes, gap years would be amazing. Another thing I wish was more encouraged is part-time work. Working for a year at maybe 20 hours a week would probably pay all living expenses while you have plenty of space and time to recover and time to spend in the wilderness or beach or whatever strikes your fancy. Everyone seems to want to shovel you in as a full-time employee, and part-time seems to be looked down upon more than it should as a transition and recovery tool.
- BeFlatXIII 5y ago
  Part-time employment should also be a key to any discussion on preventing mass unemployment due to automation. Rather than have high-paid salary jobs for the few and UBI for everyone else, normalize part-time work and keep keep more people actively engaged in the economy.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
ipaddr 5y ago