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We actually tracked every laid off individual from Google to understand the story behind the layoffs. Here's the summary: - 747 out of the 2,762 laid-off Goog
by nubela 4y ago
We actually tracked every laid off individual from Google to understand the story behind the layoffs.
Here's the summary:
- 747 out of the 2,762 laid-off Googlers have since updated their profiles to indicate a change of employment status in the last 4 months since November 2022.
- Only 56.7% of these people joined a tech company.
- 1/3 of these ex-Googlers joined startups.
See the full blog post here: https://nubela.co/blog/1-in-3-ex-google-employees-in-15-billion-worth-of-startups-2023-layoffs/#part-ii--747-ex-googlers-found-new-jobs---at-which-companies- https://nubela.co/blog/1-in-3-ex-google-employees-in-15-bill...
- sakex 4y agoGoogle layoffs started in January 2023. How is the November date relevant?
- whiplash451 4y agoBecause you want to marginalize out non-layoff-related variables?
- lucideer 4y agoDo you have any data on accuracy/completeness of LinkedIn profiles to accompany this? I get that LinkedIn is the most used platform, but as someone who doesn't use / update it (I have a largely dormant profile), I got the impression my demographic, while a minority, is still a relatively large minority. Presumably the "total number of identified LinkedIn profiles" & the "total reported layoffs" figures don't match up: what happens to the data gap in your reporting?
- ThunderSizzle 4y ago> I got the impression my demographic, while a minority, is still a relatively large minority. Based on my anecdote experience, your not in the minority.
- robin_reala 4y ago“every laid off individual” should be “every laid off individual with a LinkedIn account”.
- red-iron-pine 4y agoI wouldn't be surprised if most FAANG and similar tier companies require a linkedin account; mine did. HR sent policies, and would help you with a headshot, with the idea you'd use that w/ your email, Teams, etc. as well.
- 300bps 4y agoIs that requirement to aid in the prevention of double-working? That is, people who accept two full time jobs and do a half-assed job at both of them.
- KptMarchewa 4y agoUsually those people do quarter-assed job at best - unless you literally have work that could be done on upwork.
- robin_reala 4y agoThat sounds spicily illegal to my (admittedly EU-based) eyes, unless it’s literally written into the contract.
- whitemary 4y agoSpicily? What is that supposed to mean in this context?
- belter 4y agoplobably because the user was tricked by spellcheck...
- blacksmith_tb 4y ago
- mfbx9da4 4y ago> We then used ChatGPT to clean up and categorize all 2-thousand and more roles into 9 main categories. Finally we did a quick manual comb-through to correct any discrepancy. Yet another example of how times are changing!
- MontyCarloHall 4y ago>Only 56.7% of these people joined a tech company Does this suggest that a large fraction of laid off employees were in non-tech roles (e.g. pro{ject,duct} managers, scrum masters, sales, etc.)? If so, perhaps the layoffs are a good thing—in my experience, the worst tech companies to work for are those dominated by non-technical employees. Perhaps layoffs are being used as a blunt instrument to shift the balance away from that.
- dagw 4y agoI've spent most of my career at places that most people here would classify as "non-tech" companies and have spent my time there working with programming, statistics and data analysis and data science research.
- c03 4y agoOn point. It would be nice with insight into the roles of the lay-offs.
- rcarmo 4y agoThere is a wide mix of roles across most "tech" layoffs I'm aware of. HN only really surfaces the big figures and engineering/dev cuts, but there are a lot of business support folk being laid off _outside_ the tech industry as well, so I'd expect an even mix given a large enough sample.
- madeofpalk 4y agoI disagree with both sentiments that PMs etc are non-technical roles, and that they're not useful. I would say they're just as useful as developers - plenty of developers are bad at their job or are employed extraneously to begin with.
- ThunderSizzle 4y agoI find that an odd question. My initial take was that they went to non-tech companies that have substantial internal IT presence.
- MontyCarloHall 4y ago
- imwithstoopid 4y agoI'm calling BS on the "startups" number...I think this is a lot of people hacking around on side projects on their own dime No mention also of how many will permanently leave tech...this may come down to who has the most savings to fall back on...if you just have to get paid to pay off that BMW lease, you're going to find work wherever you have to
- rcarmo 4y agoAnd if you're leaving Google and willing to relocate, you probably have "enough" savings.
- imwithstoopid 4y agohaving worked at Google doesn't make you a good saver or dictate a sustainable lifestyle
- catmanjan 4y agoWhat is a tech company? Is ford a tech company? Is Goldman Sacha a tech company?
- margorczynski 4y agoYeah, that's a good question. Considering main revenue sources Google is a marketing/ad company and "tech" is simply an implementation detail. I think a good litmus test is - if the Internet would die then would a given company be killed off by that. Ford and GS can function without it (it would be much harder but still they did that for decades) but for Google that would be the end.
- drewcoo 4y ago> if the Internet would die then would a given company be killed off by that That would select for Internet companies, not tech companies. And neither of the two is a strict subset of the other. > for Google that would be the end With no Internet, we'd still need comms, and mobile phones (and Android) would seem to be important there. And if that wasn't enough to keep them alive, they'd buy companies to do that.
- gamblor956 4y agoFord is probably more of a tech company these days than Google is.
- ducknalddon 4y agoGoogle has been an advertising company for a long time now.
- JohnFen 4y agoAccording to PR and marketing departments the world over, every company is a tech company.
- catmanjan 4y agoExactly! What most people seem to mean by tech is was it founded in the 90s and does their home page use react
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- BXlnt2EachOther 4y agoDoes your dataset include names or personally-identifiable information (IMO being able to key by all those 1-person companies counts)? If so, that seems a little... scuzzy? Would you consider pulling the dataset or at least making it coarse and pseudonymous? I would guess many of the people included and monetized here wouldn't expect or wish to be. If the response is public scraping is legal, then I might suggest your company's framing of the product is making incorrect claims about this group. From your blog page: "[N] people indicated a change of employment in the last 4 months (from the date of writing i.e. 14 February, yes Valentines’ Day) - aka ex-Googlers that got laid off." That 'aka' doesn't necessarily follow, though? People leave companies for many reasons, and therefore this is not a valid "laid-off Googler" dataset. (Edit: I might be misunderstanding but Google's layoffs were announced less than a month before Feb 14. Why look at the three months before that? Edit 2: noting sibling comment already asked this, didn't mean to duplicate) Less important, while you do mention some biases inherent in the source (LinkedIn use by country, who has/updates a profile), please note that some of your blog article's headline claims are contradicted by publicly-available data available from press and WARN act filings.
- stevenzzzzzzz 4y agoRe: WARN act filings, here's a list of all the titles that were laid off in california (the only state with google warn filings that publicizes titles in their warn records): https://www.warntracker.com/?company=Google https://www.warntracker.com/?company=Google
- hgsgm 4y ago> 56.7% Do you know what a sigfig is?
- runlaszlorun 4y agoPerhaps you could tell us.
- oblio 4y agoI don't get your comment, even after reading about significant figures.
- biggoodwolf 4y agoFor a number in the X00s the stuff after the period i.e. .xxx% is not significant
- gumby 4y ago> Only 56.7% of these people joined a tech company. There’s a very good chance that their new jobs are similar to their former jobs. Unfortunately, the term “tech” has become diluted to the point of worthlessness. Every company of any size needs programming, statistics, and such. Conversely many companies swept under the “tech” term don’t develop any technology at all. It’s so bad that actual technology development is now referred to as “deep tech”.
- commandlinefan 4y ago> There’s a very good chance that their new jobs The linked blog post reads like the other 43.3% don't seem to have found any new jobs at all (if I'm reading it right). ("There could of course still be many that have found new jobs, which they might not yet update their profiles - a common practice on LinkedIn").
- gumby 4y agoZero of my friends laid off from google are even looking for a new job. My wife was always asking me to retire, but after a year or so she’d say “it would be good for you to have a job”. Then repeat. Retiring isn’t that fun when you’re in your 30s. So I suspect a bunch of them will be back in the job market eventually.
- than3 4y agoIts actually not that unexpected, a big contributor is inflation. If you've any experience with Argentina, or other hyper-inflationary events, there comes a point where your labor is more valuable to you than what others are willing to pay you for. When the store of value is degrading rapidly, and wages in general always lag, those with options will do something else. Most companies I know simply are unwilling to adjust their wages for inflation. When we were in a 2% inflationary environment, and that 2% could be counted on year after year as being stable, it was more reasonable. With inflation in the double digits, with real inflation according to previous more accurate methods showing roughly a ~33% loss in value YOY, and the corresponding increase in taxes (as inflation increases your taxes increase as you enter higher tax brackets for the same value), it makes a lot more sense to use your efforts for yourself instead of being on the open market. Factor markets and producers decide what they are willing to accept, and with a moving goal post in terms of a currency store, it makes more sense to wait in sheltered assets and produce goods you'll use. People in general won't accept doing $1,000 in work and by the time they can spend it only having $700, or worse for example $1. Do you think they will continue doing that work moving forward if they have no expectation of getting anything comparable in value in return?
- stevenzzzzzzz 4y agoIf you want a more comprehensive list, here's a list of all the titles that were laid off in california (the only state with google warn filings that publicizes titles in their warn records): https://www.warntracker.com/?company=Google https://www.warntracker.com/?company=Google
- quesera 4y agoThree identical comments is two too many.
- purpleblue 4y ago> We actually tracked every laid off individual from Google to understand the story behind the layoffs. This is an extremely inaccurate statement and really makes me question the validity of your research. And after I read it, there's so many problems that I think nothing conclusive can be drawn at all from it.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- onlyrealcuzzo 4y agoSorry to hijack this thread and be pessimistic, but whenever you get emails from recruiters about a startup that's got "ex-Google and ex-Facebook" on the "founding team" - keep in mind that it's 99% bs.
- compiler-guy 4y agoEquating "Everyone who changed their employer on LinkedIn from Google to somewhere else between these dates" and "laid off from Google." is embarrassingly bad methodology. Even in a time of layoffs, hundreds, if not thousands, of people leave Google every month for their own reasons.