4 ms·

True, but what should happen instead? If losing lots of billions won't be enough, what would be?

by smsm42 4y ago

runarberg 4y ago
idk. If this many people were to loose their jobs under my authority, I think I would at the very least loose my job. But perhaps there also ought to be a class action law suite, workers should be able to sue a negligent business leaders that costs them their jobs, similar how a shareholder can sue for lost profits. But honestly a business leader that screws up so bad, should probably loose all their wealth, like 100%.
- jlawson 4y ago
  Such a policy would mean that the consequences of a risk going wrong vastly outweigh the benefits of success. That would incentivize extremely risk-averse decisions by business leaders and lead to society-wide stagnation. The result would be far more suffering overall.
  - runarberg 4y ago
    I think that doesn’t need to be a bad thing. This all depends on what risk behavior does in a societal context and how much a particular leader is actually contributing to the business. We actually have a reason to believe that the standard risk attracted business is a net-negative for society. These businesses tend to rely on government bailouts when their risky behavior doesn’t work out, or they lay off a large number of people, or they cause massive environmental damage, etc. I much prefer a business that plays it safe and doesn’t risk our environment and our economy while maximizing the profits they give to their shareholders. Secondly, there is no reason to believe that a CEO is any sort of supreme decision maker of a company. Perhaps a democratized workplace—where the workers have a say in whether the business should engage in a risky behavior—is better at evaluating the risk. If that is the case then a CEO dictator might not want to lead the business into a risky endeavor at since they might get sued if it goes wrong, but workers who have only their jobs to loose might vote to do exactly that. I find the society-wide stagnation prediction lacking in imagination.
- nomel 4y ago
  > If this many people were to loose their jobs under my authority, I think I would at the very least loose my job. This doesn't seem logical. Companies aren't some static things. Especially social media companies, which usually have very short lives. A corrective, appropriate, action, in response to a changing market, could very easily be a reduction in headcount. All evidence suggests Facebook has no future [1]. > But honestly a business leader that screws up so bad What's your metric for screwing up? Is it short, medium, or long term? Should short term goals/profits be the only goal of a company? 1. https://techcrunch.com/2022/08/11/teens-abandoned-facebook-pew-study/ https://techcrunch.com/2022/08/11/teens-abandoned-facebook-p...
  - runarberg 4y ago
    > What's your metric for screwing up? Is it short, medium, or long term? Should short term goals/profits be the only goal of a company? As a worker my metric is first and foremost about the worker. A company screws up if it fails to bring profits to the workers. Laying off 11,000 workers certainly falls under a big screw up by that metric. I know companies—such as charity/non-profits exists who have humanitarian goals, or even amusement, as their goals, however I don’t see Facebook there. But we live in a capitalist society and most companies’ goals are profits for their shareholders. Facebook seems to have screwed that goal up as well. And instead of letting the person who lead the company into this failure pay the price of failing, they take it down on the workers... This seems quite unfair, and is even illegal in many (most?) countries.
    - nomel 4y ago
      > As a worker my metric is first and foremost about the worker. I can't extract any meaning from this. Could you be more specific? Maybe a scenario will help. What if the company becomes not profitable enough (there can be reason's that don't require leadership fault), and it will fail unless workers are let go? Do you let it fail, causing all to lose their jobs, or do you trim the fat, allowing some to continue? I would assume you would want to look at the whole, more than the individual. Please note the above happened to a company I worked for, during the last recession, and it was, very objectively, not the fault of the leadership.
- smsm42 4y ago
  You'd have to prove negligence, which is practically impossible in this case - he bet on some technology, it didn't work out, that happens thousands of times all over. Also, I know this is not something you'd like to hear, but you are not entitled to be employed at any particular firm, and company owner does not owe you a fiduciary duty to continue your employment. Also, FB employees hardly could complain about being treated poorly - I heard 500k+ compensation packages for engineers aren't out of the ordinary there. Tell it to somebody who works in a factory for 50k and see if they would think you were mistreated, after earning more in you short while than some earn in their whole life. > similar how a shareholder can sue for lost profits. Only if there's negligence or fraud, which you have about zero chance to prove in this case. > But honestly a business leader that screws up so bad, should probably loose all their wealth, like 100%. Would you agree to lose 100% of you money each time you make a mistake? If not, why should he?

True, but what should happen instead? If losing lots of billions won't be enough, what would be?

by smsm42 4y ago

True, but what should happen instead? If losing lots of billions won't be enough, what would be?

idk. If this many people were to loose their jobs under my authority, I think I would at the very least loose my job. But perhaps there also ought to be a class action law suite, workers should be able to sue a negligent business leaders that costs them their jobs, similar how a shareholder can sue for lost profits. But honestly a business leader that screws up so bad, should probably loose all their wealth, like 100%.

jlawson 4y ago
Such a policy would mean that the consequences of a risk going wrong vastly outweigh the benefits of success. That would incentivize extremely risk-averse decisions by business leaders and lead to society-wide stagnation. The result would be far more suffering overall.
- runarberg 4y ago
  I think that doesn’t need to be a bad thing. This all depends on what risk behavior does in a societal context and how much a particular leader is actually contributing to the business. We actually have a reason to believe that the standard risk attracted business is a net-negative for society. These businesses tend to rely on government bailouts when their risky behavior doesn’t work out, or they lay off a large number of people, or they cause massive environmental damage, etc. I much prefer a business that plays it safe and doesn’t risk our environment and our economy while maximizing the profits they give to their shareholders. Secondly, there is no reason to believe that a CEO is any sort of supreme decision maker of a company. Perhaps a democratized workplace—where the workers have a say in whether the business should engage in a risky behavior—is better at evaluating the risk. If that is the case then a CEO dictator might not want to lead the business into a risky endeavor at since they might get sued if it goes wrong, but workers who have only their jobs to loose might vote to do exactly that. I find the society-wide stagnation prediction lacking in imagination.
nomel 4y ago
> If this many people were to loose their jobs under my authority, I think I would at the very least loose my job. This doesn't seem logical. Companies aren't some static things. Especially social media companies, which usually have very short lives. A corrective, appropriate, action, in response to a changing market, could very easily be a reduction in headcount. All evidence suggests Facebook has no future [1]. > But honestly a business leader that screws up so bad What's your metric for screwing up? Is it short, medium, or long term? Should short term goals/profits be the only goal of a company? 1. https://techcrunch.com/2022/08/11/teens-abandoned-facebook-pew-study/ https://techcrunch.com/2022/08/11/teens-abandoned-facebook-p...
- runarberg 4y ago
  > What's your metric for screwing up? Is it short, medium, or long term? Should short term goals/profits be the only goal of a company? As a worker my metric is first and foremost about the worker. A company screws up if it fails to bring profits to the workers. Laying off 11,000 workers certainly falls under a big screw up by that metric. I know companies—such as charity/non-profits exists who have humanitarian goals, or even amusement, as their goals, however I don’t see Facebook there. But we live in a capitalist society and most companies’ goals are profits for their shareholders. Facebook seems to have screwed that goal up as well. And instead of letting the person who lead the company into this failure pay the price of failing, they take it down on the workers... This seems quite unfair, and is even illegal in many (most?) countries.
  - nomel 4y ago
    > As a worker my metric is first and foremost about the worker. I can't extract any meaning from this. Could you be more specific? Maybe a scenario will help. What if the company becomes not profitable enough (there can be reason's that don't require leadership fault), and it will fail unless workers are let go? Do you let it fail, causing all to lose their jobs, or do you trim the fat, allowing some to continue? I would assume you would want to look at the whole, more than the individual. Please note the above happened to a company I worked for, during the last recession, and it was, very objectively, not the fault of the leadership.
smsm42 4y ago
You'd have to prove negligence, which is practically impossible in this case - he bet on some technology, it didn't work out, that happens thousands of times all over. Also, I know this is not something you'd like to hear, but you are not entitled to be employed at any particular firm, and company owner does not owe you a fiduciary duty to continue your employment. Also, FB employees hardly could complain about being treated poorly - I heard 500k+ compensation packages for engineers aren't out of the ordinary there. Tell it to somebody who works in a factory for 50k and see if they would think you were mistreated, after earning more in you short while than some earn in their whole life. > similar how a shareholder can sue for lost profits. Only if there's negligence or fraud, which you have about zero chance to prove in this case. > But honestly a business leader that screws up so bad, should probably loose all their wealth, like 100%. Would you agree to lose 100% of you money each time you make a mistake? If not, why should he?