4 ms·

Firing an employee and then begging them to come back because of how essential they are? Art of the deal.

kergonath 2y ago
Also, completely expected: it all happened already at Twitter. I’d have hoped that they would be a bit more careful with nuclear safety, though.
gotorazor 2y ago
I think that's basically the Elon playbook. He did it with the supercharger team as well at Tesla.
- rco8786 2y ago
  He did it at Twitter also
  - throw310822 2y ago
    "If you don't find yourself in need to add back at least 20% of what you removed, you didn't remove enough". Elon's word. Sounds like an excellent engineering principle, with some caveats of course.
    - lawn 2y ago
      I'm looking forward to Elon applying the same strategy to aviation. I wonder how many crashes it'll take for him to realize that this is a horrible engineering principle?
    - timeon 2y ago
      > excellent engineering principle Imagine structural engineer thinking like this.
      - bediger4000 2y ago
        I talked to a McDonnell Aircraft structural engineer in the 80s. He said something like Old Man McDonnel told us to design for a 0.85 factor of safety on the F101. If anything broke during testing, we'd redesign it. I'm not sure if that was how it really worked out.
    - computerthings 2y ago
      That's as much as an "engineering principle" as him thinking minimum character level of an item is more important than the actual attributes of the item in PoE2. He's just saying stuff his target audience thinks are smart, and whenever checked on it he lashes out. He's got nothing.
    - rco8786 2y ago
      > Sounds like an excellent engineering principle Then you are wildly mistaken about the field of engineering. Imagine needing to add back 20% to a bridge because you removed too much, or a rocket ship, or a team of nuclear scientists (like is actually the case here).
mandeepj 2y ago
> Firing an employee and then begging them to come back because of how essential they are? Typical Elon style - Fired entire Supercharger team, then hired right back. Maybe for PR. Same stunt with Tesla stores and Twitter. He fired Twitter's 80% team is a lie.
itronitron 2y ago
I wonder if the former employees' salary expectations have changed.
nyrikki 2y ago
Too bad it wasn't Tony Schwartz, the actual author of that book, that was elected.
jimt1234 2y ago
I once got let go from a company, and then, 2 weeks later, they offered to re-hire me. They acted like they were doing me a favor, boasting that they'd even pay me the same salary. I declined, as I was planning on quitting anyway. Then, a few days later they sent me a threatening letter, claiming I stole company proprietary data, and they were gonna report the situation to the district attorney if I didn't contact them. I didn't respond and never heard from them again. I heard from former colleagues that no one knew the admin passwords for their critical systems except me. That's true. I told management, over and over, that the whole sysadmin operation revolved around me, which was doomed to fail. That's actually why I was planning on quitting. Oh yeah, when they let me go, I offered to stay on for a short time to cascade to whoever was gonna replace me. They declined and rushed me out the door.
- scarab92 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - random42_ 2y ago
    I don't think they ever said they knew they were the only one to know the admin passwords. Looks like they've heard it from former colleagues after they left: > I heard from former colleagues that no one knew the admin passwords for their critical systems except me And looks like they tried to address the fact that the entire sysadmin operation depended on them and management did nothing? That's a lot of hostility and assumptions about some person on the internet and by the looks of it I'll make the assumption you've never worked on chaotic places where management is just shitty? I'm in the same situation at my company where I'm the only person managing our legacy CI/CD pipelines which are quite complex and nobody wants to learn it and management keeps saying they'll hire somebody as backup but they never do so I can relate to parent.
  - jimt1234 2y ago
    Hmmm. Not exactly. I did give the admin passwords to others (rotated every 90 days), like my manager, but I guess they never wrote them down or otherwise stored them. I also maintained operational documents for the systems, but was told to just keep them on my PC, since I was the only one that would read them. I always viewed my termination as a version of the "sysadmin paradox". If a sysadmin does her job poorly, stuff breaks a lot, and she gets to save the day - she's the hero! Everyone recognizes her awesomeness. However, if she does her job well, nothing ever breaks, everything is quiet, no heroism - well, someone in management will eventually think she's useless and eliminate her position. I think that's what happened in my case. I took pride in the "quietness" of my systems, and I think someone took that as my job being unnecessary. https://blog.devolutions.net/2017/07/sysadminotaur-61-the-sysadmin-paradox/ https://blog.devolutions.net/2017/07/sysadminotaur-61-the-sy...

Also, completely expected: it all happened already at Twitter. I’d have hoped that they would be a bit more careful with nuclear safety, though.

gotorazor 2y ago

I think that's basically the Elon playbook. He did it with the supercharger team as well at Tesla.

rco8786 2y ago
He did it at Twitter also
- throw310822 2y ago
  "If you don't find yourself in need to add back at least 20% of what you removed, you didn't remove enough". Elon's word. Sounds like an excellent engineering principle, with some caveats of course.
  - lawn 2y ago
    I'm looking forward to Elon applying the same strategy to aviation. I wonder how many crashes it'll take for him to realize that this is a horrible engineering principle?
  - timeon 2y ago
    > excellent engineering principle Imagine structural engineer thinking like this.
    - bediger4000 2y ago
      I talked to a McDonnell Aircraft structural engineer in the 80s. He said something like Old Man McDonnel told us to design for a 0.85 factor of safety on the F101. If anything broke during testing, we'd redesign it. I'm not sure if that was how it really worked out.
  - computerthings 2y ago
    That's as much as an "engineering principle" as him thinking minimum character level of an item is more important than the actual attributes of the item in PoE2. He's just saying stuff his target audience thinks are smart, and whenever checked on it he lashes out. He's got nothing.
  - rco8786 2y ago
    > Sounds like an excellent engineering principle Then you are wildly mistaken about the field of engineering. Imagine needing to add back 20% to a bridge because you removed too much, or a rocket ship, or a team of nuclear scientists (like is actually the case here).

mandeepj 2y ago

> Firing an employee and then begging them to come back because of how essential they are? Typical Elon style - Fired entire Supercharger team, then hired right back. Maybe for PR. Same stunt with Tesla stores and Twitter. He fired Twitter's 80% team is a lie.

itronitron 2y ago

I wonder if the former employees' salary expectations have changed.

nyrikki 2y ago

Too bad it wasn't Tony Schwartz, the actual author of that book, that was elected.

jimt1234 2y ago

I once got let go from a company, and then, 2 weeks later, they offered to re-hire me. They acted like they were doing me a favor, boasting that they'd even pay me the same salary. I declined, as I was planning on quitting anyway. Then, a few days later they sent me a threatening letter, claiming I stole company proprietary data, and they were gonna report the situation to the district attorney if I didn't contact them. I didn't respond and never heard from them again. I heard from former colleagues that no one knew the admin passwords for their critical systems except me. That's true. I told management, over and over, that the whole sysadmin operation revolved around me, which was doomed to fail. That's actually why I was planning on quitting. Oh yeah, when they let me go, I offered to stay on for a short time to cascade to whoever was gonna replace me. They declined and rushed me out the door.

scarab92 2y ago
[flagged]
- random42_ 2y ago
  I don't think they ever said they knew they were the only one to know the admin passwords. Looks like they've heard it from former colleagues after they left: > I heard from former colleagues that no one knew the admin passwords for their critical systems except me And looks like they tried to address the fact that the entire sysadmin operation depended on them and management did nothing? That's a lot of hostility and assumptions about some person on the internet and by the looks of it I'll make the assumption you've never worked on chaotic places where management is just shitty? I'm in the same situation at my company where I'm the only person managing our legacy CI/CD pipelines which are quite complex and nobody wants to learn it and management keeps saying they'll hire somebody as backup but they never do so I can relate to parent.
- jimt1234 2y ago
  Hmmm. Not exactly. I did give the admin passwords to others (rotated every 90 days), like my manager, but I guess they never wrote them down or otherwise stored them. I also maintained operational documents for the systems, but was told to just keep them on my PC, since I was the only one that would read them. I always viewed my termination as a version of the "sysadmin paradox". If a sysadmin does her job poorly, stuff breaks a lot, and she gets to save the day - she's the hero! Everyone recognizes her awesomeness. However, if she does her job well, nothing ever breaks, everything is quiet, no heroism - well, someone in management will eventually think she's useless and eliminate her position. I think that's what happened in my case. I took pride in the "quietness" of my systems, and I think someone took that as my job being unnecessary. https://blog.devolutions.net/2017/07/sysadminotaur-61-the-sysadmin-paradox/ https://blog.devolutions.net/2017/07/sysadminotaur-61-the-sy...