4 ms·

They placed a bet, and that bet didn't pay off. But what I'd expect is for them to cut only a little (not 17%), because they would place another bet on somethi

by buro9 3y ago

They placed a bet, and that bet didn't pay off. But what I'd expect is for them to cut only a little (not 17%), because they would place another bet on something else to remain competitive. To cut so heavily looks like they've no great idea on the next bet that they could make, that they don't believe those people they hired could contribute towards another thing in the near future (or they have no runway to explore doing so). Companies should place bets to stay relevant and grow, this looks like there isn't a big bet now.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
kojeovo 3y ago
Interesting way to look at it, a bet. A bet involving people's livelivehoods.
- explaininjs 3y ago
  A bet involving paying people a salary for as long as is feasible? Cool!
  - r3d0c 3y ago
    and destroying their future plans they might have set in motion that will be derailed because of management's incompetance, they don't have money that much money to float on specially in this economy where everything is overpriced, almost like they are humans with their own histories and possibly other people depending on them, did you really try and consider their perspective or was dehumanizing them your first instinct? but i doubt management will be fired will it? they'll end up with nice fat stacks of bonuses for making terrible business decisions keep defending the real incompetants though
    - explaininjs 3y ago
      Believe me, I have very very close experience with what it’s like to go through layoffs, and I feel for those who have just now realized that nothing in this world is guaranteed. But griping that management should have kept paying salaries when the money wasn’t there won’t get anyone anywhere. Take your severance, hone your skills, apply for jobs. If you can, maybe take some time to go on a trip. Life will go on.
      - deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
      - morelisp 3y ago
        > when the money wasn’t there What about when the money is there? Spotify is profitable.
        explaininjs 3y ago
        Barely, and only after their previous layoffs this year.
        morelisp 3y ago
        ... so the money is there.
        explaininjs 3y ago
        And it will be when they rehire later :)
        nkohari 3y ago
        Companies don't stay profitable by investing in unprofitable markets, though. If they don't think this approach is going to work out long-term, they should stop spending money on it, even if that means reducing headcount.
    - robertlagrant 3y ago
      > or was dehumanizing them your first instinct? This is a really poor approach to discourse. I imagine you don't really think that every job must last forever. Jobs come and go, and working them means we can live and make choices. It's not fun being laid off (I have been), but it's just life.
- robertlagrant 3y ago
  > A bet involving people's livelivehoods. Giving the employment market another livelihood option was the bet.
- scarface_74 3y ago
  People should know that know job is permanent and plan accordingly. Do you really expect to work at one company the rest of your career and get a gold watch and a pension ?
  - fragmede 3y ago
    It's worth noting that. Sweden, where Spotify is based, still does that whole pension thing, so culturally, relatively, actually yes.
  - fisf 3y ago
    That is entirely correct. But it also implies that employees need to price that uncertainty into their salary demands.
    - scarface_74 3y ago
      Exactly
    - HDThoreaun 3y ago
      Do they not? American salaries sire much higher than european ones with more job security for example.
    - KptMarchewa 3y ago
      You're stating obvious things.
  - checkyoursudo 3y ago
    But why shouldn't we expect to be able to work for one company and earn a gold watch (at some anniversary date, I guess?) and a pension? It used to work that way. Why not now? It worked that way for my grandpa. It looked like it was going to work that way for my dad, until the corporate world did its huge pension rug-pulls. But it could still work that way. I have a pension now (Sweden). My wife has one (Germany). You could, too.
    - google234123 3y ago
- nkohari 3y ago
  This is literally how all commerce works, though. If someone opens a restaurant, for example, it's a bet that there's a market for the food they're preparing, and that their staff will be capable of being able to meet the demand. Sometimes you're right, and sometimes you're wrong.
echelon 3y ago
> because they would place another bet on something else to remain competitive. Now might not be the best bet making time. Circumstances and the market change. Revolving loans might cost more to service, which also impacts R&D and product expenditures. It's very dynamic. > To cut so heavily looks like they've no great idea on the next bet that they could make, that they don't believe those people they hired could contribute towards another thing in the near future (or they have no runway to explore doing so). Exactly this. And that's just reality. No company has perfect information. > Companies should place bets to stay relevant and grow, this looks like there isn't a big bet now. AI clearly is looking interesting and shaping up in a big way for music, but the iron probably isn't hot enough to strike yet. These are hard problems that leadership constantly grapples with.
- buro9 3y ago
  > Now might not be the best bet making time. Circumstances and the market change. This is true, but I personally believe that the loss of knowledge and experience from within is a significant drag on momentum for when you do want to hire again... these people likely won't return even if the markets change, they've been burned, why would they return. If it's possible to place the next bet, retain as much knowledge and experience as possible, and leverage that towards something new, then surely that is the best thing to do. Could there have been other bets? Probably, if audio is the definition of the market and what you have at the moment is predominantly Western music, then stronger pushes into native apps for different markets? A classical specific app / flavour? A jazz specific app / flavour? Podcasts are good, but I think audiobooks are better... the audiobook market does not feel "done" at all, there's a lot more that could be done here too. Generational AI dynamic music could be a thing too, not streaming a file but streaming the basis of a constantly generated infinite thing, i.e. study aids, sleep aids, etc. Or how about audio app sync with video devices to enable the audio from your film to come out of your smart speakers or Hi-Fi even without a 5.1 amp? A lot of these are smaller bets than "podcasts will be worth a gazillion dollars", but each is still significant, sticky, and leads to higher retention, and fights against the commoditization of music playback and the low margins there. 17% cuts does signal a lack of ambition despite "economic headwinds", it feels like a "we need to cut deep" rather than a "what are all the new bets we can make and then we are compelled to cut the difference".
heyjamesknight 3y ago
This is what happens during periods of economic uncertainty. It's like counting cards with a freshly shuffled deck: nobody can tell what the state of the game is, so you place a minimum bet until you can get a feel for things again. The movie is meh, but the boardroom scene in Margin Call has a great line: "I'm here for one reason and one reason alone. I'm here to guess what the music might do a week, a month, a year from now. That's it. Nothing more. And standing here tonight, I'm afraid that I don't hear - a - thing. Just... silence." Consumer confidence is down three straight quarters in a row. Nobody feels good about what the music is going to do next.
- redleggedfrog 3y ago
  They should feel good, because their capitalist machine has done just what it has aspired to do - get people to spend money they don't have: https://apnews.com/article/spending-consumers-inflation-economy-growth-federal-reserve-b1d34bc43a0da960a152911b7c230881 https://apnews.com/article/spending-consumers-inflation-econ... That's peak capitalism right there - you've got people spending to buy products with money borrowed from credit card companies and banks, which they will have difficulty paying off and will pay a good amount of interest on. If you can't make a company work in that environment, you might want to do a bit of a self examination and notice that your advertising is annoying and off-putting and your web-browser based client is utter shit.
- buro9 3y ago
  > Consumer confidence is down three straight quarters in a row. Nobody feels good about what the music is going to do next. Sure, but you can leave a downturn four ways: 1. You went out of business 2. You experienced a decline and let a lot of people go 3. You managed to stay roughly where you were, no further forward, no further backwards (this is a small success but still a great achievement) and you may have let some people go — the expression "running to stand still" applies here 4. You find a way to come out better than you went in and maybe continued to hire Spotify feel like they've gone from #3 to #2, but they had ambitions to be #4 of those scenarios, they will likely survive, but in what form and with what potential? And more to the point, if their competitors manage to achieve #3 or #4, at what long-term cost to Spotify?

by buro9 3y ago

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

kojeovo 3y ago

Interesting way to look at it, a bet. A bet involving people's livelivehoods.

explaininjs 3y ago
A bet involving paying people a salary for as long as is feasible? Cool!
- r3d0c 3y ago
  and destroying their future plans they might have set in motion that will be derailed because of management's incompetance, they don't have money that much money to float on specially in this economy where everything is overpriced, almost like they are humans with their own histories and possibly other people depending on them, did you really try and consider their perspective or was dehumanizing them your first instinct? but i doubt management will be fired will it? they'll end up with nice fat stacks of bonuses for making terrible business decisions keep defending the real incompetants though
  - explaininjs 3y ago
    Believe me, I have very very close experience with what it’s like to go through layoffs, and I feel for those who have just now realized that nothing in this world is guaranteed. But griping that management should have kept paying salaries when the money wasn’t there won’t get anyone anywhere. Take your severance, hone your skills, apply for jobs. If you can, maybe take some time to go on a trip. Life will go on.
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
    - morelisp 3y ago
      > when the money wasn’t there What about when the money is there? Spotify is profitable.
      - explaininjs 3y ago
        Barely, and only after their previous layoffs this year.
        morelisp 3y ago
        ... so the money is there.
        explaininjs 3y ago
        And it will be when they rehire later :)
      - nkohari 3y ago
        Companies don't stay profitable by investing in unprofitable markets, though. If they don't think this approach is going to work out long-term, they should stop spending money on it, even if that means reducing headcount.
  - robertlagrant 3y ago
    > or was dehumanizing them your first instinct? This is a really poor approach to discourse. I imagine you don't really think that every job must last forever. Jobs come and go, and working them means we can live and make choices. It's not fun being laid off (I have been), but it's just life.
robertlagrant 3y ago
> A bet involving people's livelivehoods. Giving the employment market another livelihood option was the bet.
scarface_74 3y ago
People should know that know job is permanent and plan accordingly. Do you really expect to work at one company the rest of your career and get a gold watch and a pension ?
- fragmede 3y ago
  It's worth noting that. Sweden, where Spotify is based, still does that whole pension thing, so culturally, relatively, actually yes.
- fisf 3y ago
  That is entirely correct. But it also implies that employees need to price that uncertainty into their salary demands.
  - scarface_74 3y ago
    Exactly
  - HDThoreaun 3y ago
    Do they not? American salaries sire much higher than european ones with more job security for example.
  - KptMarchewa 3y ago
    You're stating obvious things.
- checkyoursudo 3y ago
  But why shouldn't we expect to be able to work for one company and earn a gold watch (at some anniversary date, I guess?) and a pension? It used to work that way. Why not now? It worked that way for my grandpa. It looked like it was going to work that way for my dad, until the corporate world did its huge pension rug-pulls. But it could still work that way. I have a pension now (Sweden). My wife has one (Germany). You could, too.
  - google234123 3y ago
nkohari 3y ago
This is literally how all commerce works, though. If someone opens a restaurant, for example, it's a bet that there's a market for the food they're preparing, and that their staff will be capable of being able to meet the demand. Sometimes you're right, and sometimes you're wrong.

echelon 3y ago

> because they would place another bet on something else to remain competitive. Now might not be the best bet making time. Circumstances and the market change. Revolving loans might cost more to service, which also impacts R&D and product expenditures. It's very dynamic. > To cut so heavily looks like they've no great idea on the next bet that they could make, that they don't believe those people they hired could contribute towards another thing in the near future (or they have no runway to explore doing so). Exactly this. And that's just reality. No company has perfect information. > Companies should place bets to stay relevant and grow, this looks like there isn't a big bet now. AI clearly is looking interesting and shaping up in a big way for music, but the iron probably isn't hot enough to strike yet. These are hard problems that leadership constantly grapples with.

buro9 3y ago
> Now might not be the best bet making time. Circumstances and the market change. This is true, but I personally believe that the loss of knowledge and experience from within is a significant drag on momentum for when you do want to hire again... these people likely won't return even if the markets change, they've been burned, why would they return. If it's possible to place the next bet, retain as much knowledge and experience as possible, and leverage that towards something new, then surely that is the best thing to do. Could there have been other bets? Probably, if audio is the definition of the market and what you have at the moment is predominantly Western music, then stronger pushes into native apps for different markets? A classical specific app / flavour? A jazz specific app / flavour? Podcasts are good, but I think audiobooks are better... the audiobook market does not feel "done" at all, there's a lot more that could be done here too. Generational AI dynamic music could be a thing too, not streaming a file but streaming the basis of a constantly generated infinite thing, i.e. study aids, sleep aids, etc. Or how about audio app sync with video devices to enable the audio from your film to come out of your smart speakers or Hi-Fi even without a 5.1 amp? A lot of these are smaller bets than "podcasts will be worth a gazillion dollars", but each is still significant, sticky, and leads to higher retention, and fights against the commoditization of music playback and the low margins there. 17% cuts does signal a lack of ambition despite "economic headwinds", it feels like a "we need to cut deep" rather than a "what are all the new bets we can make and then we are compelled to cut the difference".

heyjamesknight 3y ago

This is what happens during periods of economic uncertainty. It's like counting cards with a freshly shuffled deck: nobody can tell what the state of the game is, so you place a minimum bet until you can get a feel for things again. The movie is meh, but the boardroom scene in Margin Call has a great line: "I'm here for one reason and one reason alone. I'm here to guess what the music might do a week, a month, a year from now. That's it. Nothing more. And standing here tonight, I'm afraid that I don't hear - a - thing. Just... silence." Consumer confidence is down three straight quarters in a row. Nobody feels good about what the music is going to do next.

redleggedfrog 3y ago
They should feel good, because their capitalist machine has done just what it has aspired to do - get people to spend money they don't have: https://apnews.com/article/spending-consumers-inflation-economy-growth-federal-reserve-b1d34bc43a0da960a152911b7c230881 https://apnews.com/article/spending-consumers-inflation-econ... That's peak capitalism right there - you've got people spending to buy products with money borrowed from credit card companies and banks, which they will have difficulty paying off and will pay a good amount of interest on. If you can't make a company work in that environment, you might want to do a bit of a self examination and notice that your advertising is annoying and off-putting and your web-browser based client is utter shit.
buro9 3y ago
> Consumer confidence is down three straight quarters in a row. Nobody feels good about what the music is going to do next. Sure, but you can leave a downturn four ways: 1. You went out of business 2. You experienced a decline and let a lot of people go 3. You managed to stay roughly where you were, no further forward, no further backwards (this is a small success but still a great achievement) and you may have let some people go — the expression "running to stand still" applies here 4. You find a way to come out better than you went in and maybe continued to hire Spotify feel like they've gone from #3 to #2, but they had ambitions to be #4 of those scenarios, they will likely survive, but in what form and with what potential? And more to the point, if their competitors manage to achieve #3 or #4, at what long-term cost to Spotify?