4 ms·

Firing based on LOC is stupid, but I don't understand this comment: > Elon’s engineers were given instructions to follow: they did. It’s how Elon’s companies a

by dannyw 4y ago

Firing based on LOC is stupid, but I don't understand this comment: > Elon’s engineers were given instructions to follow: they did. It’s how Elon’s companies are operate apparently. Maybe I've worked different comments to everyone else, but if I was told by my boss to do something like deactivate X, change something to Y, or in this case, fire X% of people, do people really expect employees to not follow it?

splitbrain 4y ago
Well, if I'd tell my employees to do something stupid, I'd expect them to tell me why it's a stupid idea. But I also wouldn't fire them for talking back to me...
- delecti 4y ago
  Definitely. And likewise, if my manager told me to do something I thought was stupid, I'd feel totally comfortable telling him (politely of course) why I thought it was a bad idea. Either I know something he doesn't, or he knows something I don't, but either way we want to not do dumb things.
cratermoon 4y ago
What if the employee knows the action, or results, violate the law? What if the employee is part of an important community or organization in the field that has ethical standards that would be violated and result in the employee's ejection from that community? There are many reasons why in many engineering fields there's a licensing process and exam, but one of the most important ones, from the employee's perspective, is being able to say "No, I can't do that, I would lose my license".
- majewsky 4y ago
  Hence also why it's frankly ridiculous when developers refer to themselves as "engineers".
  - cratermoon 4y ago
    I never refer to myself as an engineer, it's mostly a job title that's been bestowed on me by industry trends. (Remember when "web developer" was a job title?) I have tried to learn from my for-real licensed engineer friends what the profession means and emulate them. Without the safety net of a license or a code of ethics, it's mostly a self-indulgent exercise in what might be.
agilob 4y ago
>Firing based on LOC is stupid This is much more than stupid, people who do educational workshops, training, assist others with their problems, SREs and performance engineers, database maintainers, people who delete code by adding functionality are one of the biggest investment in corporations like Twitter. Firing based on LOC is probably why self-driving Tesla is coming next year https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7oZ-AQszEI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7oZ-AQszEI
samstave 4y ago
Fear based mgmt
Kye 4y ago
The idea behind hiring someone to do something is they're supposed to know how to do the thing. Dictating stuff like this is micromanaging, but he should at least have the good sense to listen if they come back with a reason it's not going to work. These aren't school children talking back because theydonwanna. These are professionals who likely know better.
bitshiftfaced 4y ago
Not disagreeing, but I'm assuming they did it this way because they wanted some quick and objective way to make the cuts. Given those priorities, what's the best way to accomplish that?
- TheLoafOfBread 4y ago
  This is not an objective way. You will fire most valuable people (those who knows how stuff works) and you will keep junior grunts who type code by what seniors tells them. Correct approach would be understand why there are so many people, figure out what is their job and then start removing those who are deemed unnecessary. i.e. Imagine that you would come to new codebase and start throwing out code which does not appears to do anything and then be surprised that it is not possible to compile or you can't deploy or whole application will start crashing at random intervals.
  - zastrowm 4y ago
    It may not be the correct way or a smart way, but it is objective - the metric being used cannot be interpreted one way or another, it's just LOC.
- kaba0 4y ago
  Well, it is likely stupid to make the cuts? Engineering talent is hard to find and would have been much easier to retain.
- plorkyeran 4y ago
  Picking people entirely at random would be better than picking them based on a nonsensical metric.
ljm 4y ago
It reads like Elon believes his employees work for him personally, hence reports of people who work for Tesla suddenly being told to work on something related to Twitter. That’s probably the bit people find unusual.
- tablespoon 4y ago
  > It reads like Elon believes his employees work for him personally, hence reports of people who work for Tesla suddenly being told to work on something related to Twitter. Honestly, shouldn't Musk have a lawsuit coming from Telsa shareholders, since he's doing stuff like that? Tesla's employees must be used to make Tesla successful, not to help the CEO on on some personal investment/project of his.
inejge 4y ago
if I was told by my boss to do something like deactivate X, change something to Y, or in this case, fire X% of people, do people really expect employees to not follow it? The implication is that their instructions were much more detailed than "fire X% of people" and included using LoC as the metric, which nobody questioned. (Any quantitative measurement of code quality will have too many outliers to be fair. LoC? Of course not. Number of closed PRs? You can't say much without knowing their complexity or severity. Etc. But they had to be quick, not fair.)
watwut 4y ago
With my team leader, or architect and also higher mangar like CEO I am free to say "I don't think we should do it this way, issue is ...". Or just "sorry not task for me". They may disagree and push back, but I am sure I won't be punished. Side effect is that they are used to argue for what they won't and completely ridiculous decisions (like judging by loc) are avoided.
cratermoon 4y ago
Example: https://twitter.com/stevekrenzel/status/1589700721121058817 https://twitter.com/stevekrenzel/status/1589700721121058817

by dannyw 4y ago

splitbrain 4y ago

Well, if I'd tell my employees to do something stupid, I'd expect them to tell me why it's a stupid idea. But I also wouldn't fire them for talking back to me...

delecti 4y ago
Definitely. And likewise, if my manager told me to do something I thought was stupid, I'd feel totally comfortable telling him (politely of course) why I thought it was a bad idea. Either I know something he doesn't, or he knows something I don't, but either way we want to not do dumb things.

cratermoon 4y ago

What if the employee knows the action, or results, violate the law? What if the employee is part of an important community or organization in the field that has ethical standards that would be violated and result in the employee's ejection from that community? There are many reasons why in many engineering fields there's a licensing process and exam, but one of the most important ones, from the employee's perspective, is being able to say "No, I can't do that, I would lose my license".

majewsky 4y ago
Hence also why it's frankly ridiculous when developers refer to themselves as "engineers".
- cratermoon 4y ago
  I never refer to myself as an engineer, it's mostly a job title that's been bestowed on me by industry trends. (Remember when "web developer" was a job title?) I have tried to learn from my for-real licensed engineer friends what the profession means and emulate them. Without the safety net of a license or a code of ethics, it's mostly a self-indulgent exercise in what might be.

agilob 4y ago

>Firing based on LOC is stupid This is much more than stupid, people who do educational workshops, training, assist others with their problems, SREs and performance engineers, database maintainers, people who delete code by adding functionality are one of the biggest investment in corporations like Twitter. Firing based on LOC is probably why self-driving Tesla is coming next year https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7oZ-AQszEI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7oZ-AQszEI

samstave 4y ago

Fear based mgmt

Kye 4y ago

The idea behind hiring someone to do something is they're supposed to know how to do the thing. Dictating stuff like this is micromanaging, but he should at least have the good sense to listen if they come back with a reason it's not going to work. These aren't school children talking back because theydonwanna. These are professionals who likely know better.

bitshiftfaced 4y ago

Not disagreeing, but I'm assuming they did it this way because they wanted some quick and objective way to make the cuts. Given those priorities, what's the best way to accomplish that?

TheLoafOfBread 4y ago
This is not an objective way. You will fire most valuable people (those who knows how stuff works) and you will keep junior grunts who type code by what seniors tells them. Correct approach would be understand why there are so many people, figure out what is their job and then start removing those who are deemed unnecessary. i.e. Imagine that you would come to new codebase and start throwing out code which does not appears to do anything and then be surprised that it is not possible to compile or you can't deploy or whole application will start crashing at random intervals.
- zastrowm 4y ago
  It may not be the correct way or a smart way, but it is objective - the metric being used cannot be interpreted one way or another, it's just LOC.
kaba0 4y ago
Well, it is likely stupid to make the cuts? Engineering talent is hard to find and would have been much easier to retain.
plorkyeran 4y ago
Picking people entirely at random would be better than picking them based on a nonsensical metric.

ljm 4y ago

It reads like Elon believes his employees work for him personally, hence reports of people who work for Tesla suddenly being told to work on something related to Twitter. That’s probably the bit people find unusual.

tablespoon 4y ago
> It reads like Elon believes his employees work for him personally, hence reports of people who work for Tesla suddenly being told to work on something related to Twitter. Honestly, shouldn't Musk have a lawsuit coming from Telsa shareholders, since he's doing stuff like that? Tesla's employees must be used to make Tesla successful, not to help the CEO on on some personal investment/project of his.

inejge 4y ago

if I was told by my boss to do something like deactivate X, change something to Y, or in this case, fire X% of people, do people really expect employees to not follow it? The implication is that their instructions were much more detailed than "fire X% of people" and included using LoC as the metric, which nobody questioned. (Any quantitative measurement of code quality will have too many outliers to be fair. LoC? Of course not. Number of closed PRs? You can't say much without knowing their complexity or severity. Etc. But they had to be quick, not fair.)

watwut 4y ago

With my team leader, or architect and also higher mangar like CEO I am free to say "I don't think we should do it this way, issue is ...". Or just "sorry not task for me". They may disagree and push back, but I am sure I won't be punished. Side effect is that they are used to argue for what they won't and completely ridiculous decisions (like judging by loc) are avoided.

cratermoon 4y ago

Example: https://twitter.com/stevekrenzel/status/1589700721121058817 https://twitter.com/stevekrenzel/status/1589700721121058817