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Depends on the company but yes. Stripe, as an example, drastically slowed down hiring when the pandemic hit expecting an economic slowdown. It then turned out

by tyre 4y ago

Depends on the company but yes. Stripe, as an example, drastically slowed down hiring when the pandemic hit expecting an economic slowdown. It then turned out that so much commerce moved to online—rather than stopped—so they ramped up hiring to meet demand. The bet that companies like Shopify and Stripe [1] made was that COVID created a “new normal”; much of the economic activity that went online would stay there. They were wrong, so there were layoffs to correct it. [0]: https://news.shopify.com/changes-to-shopifys-team https://news.shopify.com/changes-to-shopifys-team [1]: https://stripe.com/newsroom/news/ceo-patrick-collisons-email-to-stripe-employees https://stripe.com/newsroom/news/ceo-patrick-collisons-email...

kennywinker 4y ago
Is it called a "bet" when you stand to win big, but if you lose it's the people you hired who've lost, and you don't lose basically anything?
- tyre 4y ago
  You lose great people, you take a huge hit to culture and productivity, you spent a lot of capital that you otherwise wouldn’t have. It create doubts in leadership and cut projects with maintenance debt. People quit after layoffs, which means attrition isn’t as balanced as when the layoffs were planned. Talent isn’t distributed equal to business need, meaning the company will lose great people who were in the wrong place at the wrong time. Depending on how it’s executed, the company could burn bridges. Even if they do it well, some people would never come back. It’s not like the people hired were working for free so I’ve never personally put much stock in the, “employees were screwed over.” But again, it depends on some of the items above. If a company is doing well, less-direct revenue teams are fine. In a sketchier environment, not so.
- anchpop 4y ago
  Who lost? Everyone who got laid off wouldn't have had at a job at all if they weren't hired, and they probably got severance packages for more than the average American makes in a year.
  - kennywinker 4y ago
    > Everyone who got laid off wouldn't have had at a job at all if they weren't hired Maybe I've been lucky, but every time I've been looking for a job I've had AT LEAST two options. People move cities, sell houses, buy houses, give up apartments, plan their finances, and plan their career around their job all the time. Investing a year learning the ropes at a company, finding ways to fit into the structures, etc. only to have the rug pulled out from under you just as you're starting to get the hang of things... > and they probably got severance packages for more than the average American makes in a year. Maybe I've been unlucky, but I've never had a job where my expectation of a severance package was anything more than 2-4 weeks wages.
    - refurb 4y ago
      Maybe I've been unlucky, but I've never had a job where my expectation of a severance package was anything more than 2-4 weeks wages. The FAANGS have severance of several months pay, which to the OP’s point, is likely more than the annual median wage in the US. These laid off workers have some of the best “job loss” conditions around.
    - GaylordTuring 4y ago
      If you feel like this, you shouldn’t take a job that can’t guarantee in writing that they will keep you for X number of years. If you took a calculated risk and took the job anyway, well that’s on you.
      - krisoft 4y ago
        > If you feel like this, you shouldn’t take a job that can’t guarantee in writing that they will keep you for X number of years. Those jobs don’t exist. If there are they are such a minuscule number of openings it is not worth thinking about them. > If you took a calculated risk and took the job anyway, well that’s on you. Let me break it to you: almost everyone works because otherwise they would go hungry, loose their home and die in sad circumstances. People who don’t are statistical anomalies. Are you saying that by having the misfortune of not being born independently rich and working basically any job the poster “took a risk” which is “on them”?
- midoridensha 4y ago
  Depends: did you really get that much value out of those new people in the time you had them employed? It usually takes a while for a new tech employee to become productive, and just hiring a person costs a lot of money. If you, for instance, hired 10,000 new engineers and then laid them off after only 1 month, you would definitely lost a LOT of money, and not have gained anything for it.
- kortilla 4y ago
  You lose 30+% of your valuation. Those investments weren’t free.
- Yoric 4y ago
  Textbook capitalism is a society in which (among other things) companies belong to investors. In other words, when a company bets, it is typically with other people's money. In that case, it's other people's jobs, which extends a bit this textbook case, but not by much. edit Rewritten to take into account sokoloff's remarks, thanks!
  - sokoloff 4y ago
    Capitalism defines nothing about whether the money invested in a company is yours or other people’s. In practice, it often is, but “in practice” is not nearly the same as “by definition”.
    - Yoric 4y ago
      Good point. Edited.
- scarface74 4y ago
  I don’t get it. What did they lose? They got paid good money during the mean time and have the fact that they worked for $BigTech on their resume. What did they spend all of the money on? Coke and strippers? I was also hired for a remote role at $BigTech in mid 2020. Fortunately I didn’t get laid off. But I wouldn’t exactly be bitter that I got paid 50% more during the interim. I save/invested/paid off debt with 80% of the difference in take home pay. Yes, I’ve been laid off before when I was making a lot less in 2012. I made sure I had savings then
2muchcoffeeman 4y ago
I’m not sure I believe that. It honestly sounds like an excuse to fire people. Or leadership has no clue. The biggest thing I got from the pandemic is flexible work arrangements. But I and everyone I knew all wanted to get back out there. Just not back out on public transport to work. We were doing things online because there was no other option. But once the borders opened and restrictions eased, everyone did what they said they would. Travel. Eat out with their friends. Play their old sports. Who in their right mind would think they would continue to stay home and do everything online?
- largepeepee 4y ago
  The problem with hindsight is people often forget just how chaotic previous events like the entire pandemic was. Even the "experts" were flip flopping globe affecting decisions, we had no idea what the right solution was and how long it would be... 3 months? 6? Permanent? Long term decisions had to be with numerous unknowns, it is clear now they were wrong but I am not certain I would have made the right choice either. I wouldn't go so far to say they wanted an excuse to fire, but they definitely bet the wrong odds.
  - 2muchcoffeeman 4y ago
    You can however react to changes in circumstances when you get new inform. I got my first dose in Sept 2021. Surely people getting vaccines was the signal that things might start reverting a bit. How many employees did these companies add over 2022? Why didn’t they slow down? Because no one else was slowing down?
- prox 4y ago
  Tech also depended a lot on the zero interest backed money from investors. Now that interest is up, money costs money, so the situation as changed as well.
  - wyclif 4y ago
    This is precisely the case and it's what is so often missing from the jobs analysis.
SkyBelow 4y ago
>They were wrong, so there were layoffs to correct it. Aren't the cuts smaller in size than the increased head count going into the pandemic, which would indicate there was a shift, but not one as large as they had prepared for?
tracker1 4y ago
For some companies, hiring more engineering staff probably hurt productivity. Every team added and every engineer added to a team increases the time/effort/communication/planning anything takes. It's often the wrong decision. This of course depends on how work is divided up.

by tyre 4y ago

kennywinker 4y ago

Is it called a "bet" when you stand to win big, but if you lose it's the people you hired who've lost, and you don't lose basically anything?

tyre 4y ago
You lose great people, you take a huge hit to culture and productivity, you spent a lot of capital that you otherwise wouldn’t have. It create doubts in leadership and cut projects with maintenance debt. People quit after layoffs, which means attrition isn’t as balanced as when the layoffs were planned. Talent isn’t distributed equal to business need, meaning the company will lose great people who were in the wrong place at the wrong time. Depending on how it’s executed, the company could burn bridges. Even if they do it well, some people would never come back. It’s not like the people hired were working for free so I’ve never personally put much stock in the, “employees were screwed over.” But again, it depends on some of the items above. If a company is doing well, less-direct revenue teams are fine. In a sketchier environment, not so.
anchpop 4y ago
Who lost? Everyone who got laid off wouldn't have had at a job at all if they weren't hired, and they probably got severance packages for more than the average American makes in a year.
- kennywinker 4y ago
  > Everyone who got laid off wouldn't have had at a job at all if they weren't hired Maybe I've been lucky, but every time I've been looking for a job I've had AT LEAST two options. People move cities, sell houses, buy houses, give up apartments, plan their finances, and plan their career around their job all the time. Investing a year learning the ropes at a company, finding ways to fit into the structures, etc. only to have the rug pulled out from under you just as you're starting to get the hang of things... > and they probably got severance packages for more than the average American makes in a year. Maybe I've been unlucky, but I've never had a job where my expectation of a severance package was anything more than 2-4 weeks wages.
  - refurb 4y ago
    Maybe I've been unlucky, but I've never had a job where my expectation of a severance package was anything more than 2-4 weeks wages. The FAANGS have severance of several months pay, which to the OP’s point, is likely more than the annual median wage in the US. These laid off workers have some of the best “job loss” conditions around.
  - GaylordTuring 4y ago
    If you feel like this, you shouldn’t take a job that can’t guarantee in writing that they will keep you for X number of years. If you took a calculated risk and took the job anyway, well that’s on you.
    - krisoft 4y ago
      > If you feel like this, you shouldn’t take a job that can’t guarantee in writing that they will keep you for X number of years. Those jobs don’t exist. If there are they are such a minuscule number of openings it is not worth thinking about them. > If you took a calculated risk and took the job anyway, well that’s on you. Let me break it to you: almost everyone works because otherwise they would go hungry, loose their home and die in sad circumstances. People who don’t are statistical anomalies. Are you saying that by having the misfortune of not being born independently rich and working basically any job the poster “took a risk” which is “on them”?
midoridensha 4y ago
Depends: did you really get that much value out of those new people in the time you had them employed? It usually takes a while for a new tech employee to become productive, and just hiring a person costs a lot of money. If you, for instance, hired 10,000 new engineers and then laid them off after only 1 month, you would definitely lost a LOT of money, and not have gained anything for it.
kortilla 4y ago
You lose 30+% of your valuation. Those investments weren’t free.
Yoric 4y ago
Textbook capitalism is a society in which (among other things) companies belong to investors. In other words, when a company bets, it is typically with other people's money. In that case, it's other people's jobs, which extends a bit this textbook case, but not by much. edit Rewritten to take into account sokoloff's remarks, thanks!
- sokoloff 4y ago
  Capitalism defines nothing about whether the money invested in a company is yours or other people’s. In practice, it often is, but “in practice” is not nearly the same as “by definition”.
  - Yoric 4y ago
    Good point. Edited.
scarface74 4y ago
I don’t get it. What did they lose? They got paid good money during the mean time and have the fact that they worked for $BigTech on their resume. What did they spend all of the money on? Coke and strippers? I was also hired for a remote role at $BigTech in mid 2020. Fortunately I didn’t get laid off. But I wouldn’t exactly be bitter that I got paid 50% more during the interim. I save/invested/paid off debt with 80% of the difference in take home pay. Yes, I’ve been laid off before when I was making a lot less in 2012. I made sure I had savings then

2muchcoffeeman 4y ago

I’m not sure I believe that. It honestly sounds like an excuse to fire people. Or leadership has no clue. The biggest thing I got from the pandemic is flexible work arrangements. But I and everyone I knew all wanted to get back out there. Just not back out on public transport to work. We were doing things online because there was no other option. But once the borders opened and restrictions eased, everyone did what they said they would. Travel. Eat out with their friends. Play their old sports. Who in their right mind would think they would continue to stay home and do everything online?

largepeepee 4y ago
The problem with hindsight is people often forget just how chaotic previous events like the entire pandemic was. Even the "experts" were flip flopping globe affecting decisions, we had no idea what the right solution was and how long it would be... 3 months? 6? Permanent? Long term decisions had to be with numerous unknowns, it is clear now they were wrong but I am not certain I would have made the right choice either. I wouldn't go so far to say they wanted an excuse to fire, but they definitely bet the wrong odds.
- 2muchcoffeeman 4y ago
  You can however react to changes in circumstances when you get new inform. I got my first dose in Sept 2021. Surely people getting vaccines was the signal that things might start reverting a bit. How many employees did these companies add over 2022? Why didn’t they slow down? Because no one else was slowing down?
prox 4y ago
Tech also depended a lot on the zero interest backed money from investors. Now that interest is up, money costs money, so the situation as changed as well.
- wyclif 4y ago
  This is precisely the case and it's what is so often missing from the jobs analysis.

SkyBelow 4y ago

>They were wrong, so there were layoffs to correct it. Aren't the cuts smaller in size than the increased head count going into the pandemic, which would indicate there was a shift, but not one as large as they had prepared for?

tracker1 4y ago

For some companies, hiring more engineering staff probably hurt productivity. Every team added and every engineer added to a team increases the time/effort/communication/planning anything takes. It's often the wrong decision. This of course depends on how work is divided up.