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When I hire an accountant who promised to find tax deductions, but he didn't, I am firing them for not fulfilling a promise. A new hire, especially at lower le

When I hire an accountant who promised to find tax deductions, but he didn't, I am firing them for not fulfilling a promise. A new hire, especially at lower levels, has not promised anything except an exchange of skills for money. I would even say that the hiring manager promised the company that hiring more headcount will give some benefits. But those benefits never materialized for the company. So by your own logic, a company should first fire the manager who did not fulfil their promise.

HeyLaughingBoy 4y ago
> I am firing them for not fulfilling a promise I believe what OP meant was that they fulfilled the promise by finding tax deductions, just not enough to justify the cost of their bill. Likewise firing employees has nothing to do with promises: it's just unprofitable to keep them on. If there is no short to medium-term need for the employees, they have to go. The decision may be unpopular, but necessary.
- nine_zeros 4y ago
  I understand the necessity from a business perspective. People will have to go if there's no money to pay. The real question is, who is let go first? The bad decision maker or the skilled workforce that could continue to produce goods with a better decision maker?
  - shostack 4y ago
    Your comment assumes it was a bad decision at the time, or that they might make bad future decisions that a new person would not. It is entirely possible when budgets were available certain initiative made sense to fund. If budgets dry up you start cutting the least harmful thing even if it was still a good idea. It may just not be better than the thing over here that is more profitable or cost effective.
    - nine_zeros 4y ago
      The higher up the ladder you go, the more important your skill of "foresight" is. If the hiring decisions are made on simple heuristics such as budget in so hire more, budget gone so fire more - it's not surprising that most engineers don't like their managers, which was my original post. We can argue all day long about what management could have done but ultimately the bad decision was made by the management chain, not by the employee. In a fairer system, the expectation is that the bad decision makers go first.
      - listenallyall 4y ago
        > Notice how the vast majority of workers laid off will not be the same managers who made those bad choices. You've been working off these assumptions -- that low-level people will be fired first, and that some group of people clearly made "bad decisions" -- since your original comment, and keep repeating them in some form in all subsequent comments, without a single shred of evidence for either. They are getting rid of 200 people, not very many at Wal-Mart's size, and are still hiring in multiple key areas. Maybe they just decided, with business contracting, it was the right time to eliminate the slackers, the less-skilled, the I'd-never-shop-at-Wal-Marts, the morale-draggers. > the more important your skill of "foresight" is Nobody foresaw a global pandemic shutting down economies and freezing major trade routes from Asia, to be followed by massive inflation and huge increases in borrowing costs.
  - MomoXenosaga 4y ago
    Last in first out. That's how I've seen it happen.
listenallyall 4y ago
a) and plenty of new hires don't actually have the skills they claimed to have, but, regardless, more importantly b) Yes, using my examples above, the company should fire the head of the corp analytics department, and the in-house creative agency, and the head of some digital initiatives. But the entire dept has to go too. Sorry if you just got hired, or you're low-level, that's life. c) "fulfill a promise" doesn't fly in corporate world. There are no "promises". Companies try things, some work and some don't. They make good decisions and bad ones. Sometimes a thing works great, then the economy changes, a competitor comes in, or new tech is developed. I'm sure that President of 35mm film at Kodak was a prestigious job for decades. Now it isn't. It's not because someone failed to deliver on a "promise".

HeyLaughingBoy 4y ago

> I am firing them for not fulfilling a promise I believe what OP meant was that they fulfilled the promise by finding tax deductions, just not enough to justify the cost of their bill. Likewise firing employees has nothing to do with promises: it's just unprofitable to keep them on. If there is no short to medium-term need for the employees, they have to go. The decision may be unpopular, but necessary.

nine_zeros 4y ago
I understand the necessity from a business perspective. People will have to go if there's no money to pay. The real question is, who is let go first? The bad decision maker or the skilled workforce that could continue to produce goods with a better decision maker?
- shostack 4y ago
  Your comment assumes it was a bad decision at the time, or that they might make bad future decisions that a new person would not. It is entirely possible when budgets were available certain initiative made sense to fund. If budgets dry up you start cutting the least harmful thing even if it was still a good idea. It may just not be better than the thing over here that is more profitable or cost effective.
  - nine_zeros 4y ago
    The higher up the ladder you go, the more important your skill of "foresight" is. If the hiring decisions are made on simple heuristics such as budget in so hire more, budget gone so fire more - it's not surprising that most engineers don't like their managers, which was my original post. We can argue all day long about what management could have done but ultimately the bad decision was made by the management chain, not by the employee. In a fairer system, the expectation is that the bad decision makers go first.
    - listenallyall 4y ago
      > Notice how the vast majority of workers laid off will not be the same managers who made those bad choices. You've been working off these assumptions -- that low-level people will be fired first, and that some group of people clearly made "bad decisions" -- since your original comment, and keep repeating them in some form in all subsequent comments, without a single shred of evidence for either. They are getting rid of 200 people, not very many at Wal-Mart's size, and are still hiring in multiple key areas. Maybe they just decided, with business contracting, it was the right time to eliminate the slackers, the less-skilled, the I'd-never-shop-at-Wal-Marts, the morale-draggers. > the more important your skill of "foresight" is Nobody foresaw a global pandemic shutting down economies and freezing major trade routes from Asia, to be followed by massive inflation and huge increases in borrowing costs.
- MomoXenosaga 4y ago
  Last in first out. That's how I've seen it happen.

listenallyall 4y ago

a) and plenty of new hires don't actually have the skills they claimed to have, but, regardless, more importantly b) Yes, using my examples above, the company should fire the head of the corp analytics department, and the in-house creative agency, and the head of some digital initiatives. But the entire dept has to go too. Sorry if you just got hired, or you're low-level, that's life. c) "fulfill a promise" doesn't fly in corporate world. There are no "promises". Companies try things, some work and some don't. They make good decisions and bad ones. Sometimes a thing works great, then the economy changes, a competitor comes in, or new tech is developed. I'm sure that President of 35mm film at Kodak was a prestigious job for decades. Now it isn't. It's not because someone failed to deliver on a "promise".