7 ms·

The reality of one's lack of value to one's own employer is often baffling. It makes you wonder how anyone manages to stay employed at all, since apparently eve

The reality of one's lack of value to one's own employer is often baffling. It makes you wonder how anyone manages to stay employed at all, since apparently everyone is replicable and unimportant. I have been through layoffs where other people on my team, doing the same job I did approximately as well, got laid off. No explanation given for why them and not me. And it could happen to me at any time. It doesn't matter how good my evals are or how big my contributions. It doesn't matter that there are multiple multi-million-dollar revenue streams which exist in large part due to my contributions. It doesn't matter that I have been told I am good enough that I should be promoted to the next level. Raises barely exist, let alone promotions. Because theoretically some other engineer could have done the same work I actually did, the fact that I'm the one who did it doesn't matter and I deserve no reward for doing it beyond the minimum money necessary to secure my labor. Under those conditions, why should I - or anyone - do any more than the minimum necessary to not get fired for cause? If the company doesn't see me as more than X dollars for X revenue, why should I?

hyperliner 2y ago
If you do only the minimum necessary to not get fired, then wouldn’t you be the person that needs to be fired the next time the the budget is cut, since you are the lowest ROI of all, all other things equal?
- ivraatiems 2y ago
  No. It's clear individual level of effort doesn't matter. That's the point.
  - lazide 2y ago
    Cheer up - Sometimes it’s also a convenient cover for reprisals, back stabby office politics, racism/sexism, etc.
- tgsovlerkhgsel 2y ago
  In theory, you'd think so. In practice, due to the phenomenon described here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43662738 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43662738, it's less relevant than you think. Specifically at Google, there have been reports of high performers, recently promoted with excellent ratings before and after the promotion, getting the sack. In my experience, people who do good work do so because they enjoy the work and feel motivated, not due to any kind of performance management system or threat. Destroy the joy or motivation, and you've just destroyed a large part of the performance of these self-driven people. People often talk about "10x engineers", but not how it's possible to destroy a 10x engineer and turn them into a (let's be generous) 2x engineer, and I think capricious layoffs are a great way to do just that.
weinzierl 2y ago
"I have been through layoffs where other people on my team, doing the same job I did approximately as well, got laid off. No explanation given for why them and not me. And it could happen to me at any time." Usually there is a hidden variable that you don't know. It is your salary. That is why it sometimes looks surprising when senior roles are cut that look extremely valuable to the company from the outset. Maybe they were that valuable but still deemed to expensive.
- lazide 2y ago
  The part here too is ‘valuable to whom’. If they can saddle the middle manager or director with the same responsibilities/expectations, while cutting 10% (say) of the costs - guess what they are going to do. Is it ultimately short sighted? Probably. But good luck connecting point A and point B in these situations when everyone is thinking quarter to quarter.
- mistrial9 2y ago
  ok, and also "big thieves hate little thieves." Very-well paid executives (stock) remove very well paid employees (salary) and benefit from the actions. This is an old situation in industrial business -- the high tech crowd are filled with self-grandeur and do not believe it, on a large scale IMHO.
  - lazide 2y ago
    Eh, or you could think of it as ‘cut 10 people to move the needle x percent, or cut 1’. If you need to hit a specific number, guess which one is going to be less paperwork….
- marcusb 2y ago
  > Usually there is a hidden variable that you don't know. This is frequently the case. I've worked at big employers (comparable in level of corporate-ness to Google if not absolute size) where the layoff process, roughly was: 1. Aggregate layoff target gets set and apportioned amongst functional leaders, then targets cascaded down to the line manager level. 2. Managers fill out a stack ranking spreadsheet for their team across a few metrics including a boolean "diversity" field[0]. There were many rumors about the "diversity field", most notably that anyone so flagged would not be fired, but so far as I could tell these were false (see point #4) 3. People to be fired are developed based on these lists (I.e., if a manager has to fire two people, then the two lowest-ranked employees per the spreadsheet are selected.) 4. HR does a meta-analysis of all to-be-fired employees, ensuring that a disproportionate number of employees from protected classes are not impacted. If too many are, then some of the next-lowest-ranked employees are selected to be fired in their stead. As far as I could tell, the only part of the process where any sort of individual, human consideration was occurring was maybe at the line manager level if they decided to tweak the stack rankings based on who they felt deserved to be protected. And then, to the extent that happens, you have all the problems with bias and favoritism that come into play. 0 - I realize this is probably controversial, but I saw it with my own eyes.
somesortofthing 2y ago
Layoffs in particular are like this because they're planned very quickly by very small groups of people. Rumors of impending layoffs obliterate morale, so the people in charge do everything they can to maintain secrecy and minimize the time between people hearing about layoffs and the layoffs taking effect. This basically always translates to random-seeming decisions - priority 1 is to cut costs by X amount, choosing the right people to cut is secondary. This means that, for example, engineers that have received performance-based raises are punished since, on paper, they do the same job as lower-performing but lower-paid engineers. Not defending the process(the right way to break this equilibrium is statutory requirements for layoffs a la the WARN act) but that's why you see the outcomes you do.
- ethbr1 2y ago
  > Rumors of impending layoffs obliterate morale Granted, but it seems like the current way of salary-first, performance-blind cutting obliterates it even harder.
  - rincebrain 2y ago
    Really, all options obliterate morale. Laying off people who you rank as "low end" on the acceptable performance scale, might mean you kill structurally important bricks that were not optimizing for being higher than "high enough" on that scale, and cannibalizes people working on anything valuable long-term but hard to justify to management short-term. Laying off high performers means people don't want their head to be poking up, so they sabotage their own visibility to try being "good enough", while also killing people's motivations. Laying off randomly kills people's morale directly worst of all, because that implies there's nothing they can do to change the outcome, and impotence is worse, arguably, than anything else for many people.
  - thesuitonym 2y ago
    Any style of layoff is going to be bad for morale, but rumors floating around tank morale for as long as those rumors exist, and then moral takes another hit on the actual day. In that way it makes sense to just rip the Band-Aid off. Of course, if you ask me, a more sensible plan to keep morale and lower costs would be getting rid of a few executives, but what do I know? I'm just a number on a spreadsheet.
pjmlp 2y ago
This is a lesson that all senior developers know pretty well, that is why companies rather hire naive juniors, instead folks that already mastered how the game gets played, and cannot be sold on company mission, values, or whatever snake oil gets talked about during interview process.
- neilv 2y ago
  Not all. You're talking about douchebag companies. If I try to hire someone in the future, and I'm talking straight with a candidate, about how we do things and what we're looking for, and they just nod their head, like I'm going through BS rituals that your stereotypical MBA thinks is professional to say but not mean... I will be sad. And if, while they're BSing me, they're congratulating themselves on having "mastered how the game gets played"... I will be angry. (This is another reason I won't Leetcode interview. It's signalling that the company is all about disingenuous baggery theatre.)
  - denkmoon 2y ago
    Which are the non douchebag companies?
    - gorbachev 2y ago
      Start by eliminating all publicy traded companies from the list, and you've increased the percentage of non douchebag company in your list by quite a bit.
  - hobs 2y ago
    Unfortunately for you you work and live in an environment created by other companies and its likely that if your company succeeds its one acquisition or bad top level management play from invalidating everything you implicitly or even explicitly promised. I have worked for "good companies" before - and they have a tendency to make money and be targets for bad companies, add enough zeroes and even the good guys sell.
- JKCalhoun 2y ago
windward 2y ago
You're right but our current model of society depends on there being people who don't ask the same question.
BurningFrog 2y ago
You spend half your waking hours at work. Having a shitty attitude for that much of your life is no way to live.
- saghm 2y ago
  On the contrary, being stuck in a situation where your livelihood can disappear at a moment's notice due to factors beyond your control is no way to live, but it's also not really something most people will ever be able to avoid. I don't at all buy into the idea that somehow pretending the situation isn't shitty is somehow more virtuous or fulfilling; what you call a "shitty attitude" sounds more like "being realistic about how one's work is valued" to me.
  - roenxi 2y ago
    > being stuck in a situation where your livelihood can disappear at a moment's notice due to factors beyond your control is no way to live That is literally the only way to live. Disaster stalks us an is only ever one misstep away (sometimes literally). In rare instances people can even just fall over and die. In the sense that there should be food and shelter for everyone, even poor people; strictly speaking I think most countries have already agreed to that. Although how well that gets implemented is open to a lot of debate. But beyond that everything can always change at a moments notice.
  - BurningFrog 2y ago
    I've spent several decades writing software. Got laid off 1-2 times per decade. I still tried doing a good job every day, and feel very good about that. To me, being realistic about the risk of losing my job at any time means having enough money that I can be unemployed for 6-12 months. The major way good programmers get jobs is by being recommended by people they've worked with at previous companies. That doesn't happen if you deliberately do as little good work as you can get away with. My "shitty attitude" comment is maybe more a personal philosophy that something universal. But I do not want to spend each work day being bitter and resentful. You may intend to punish your shitty employer, but I think you're mostly poisoning your own mind.
- 2y ago
nine_k 2y ago
Check out the book called "The Gervais Principle" which develops this kind of cynical approach to a significant depth.
anal_reactor 2y ago
> Under those conditions, why should I - or anyone - do any more than the minimum necessary to not get fired for cause? No, you shouldn't. I know it feels like "but I thought that if I like cleaning my own apartment then getting a job as a janitor would leave me deeply fulfilled" but that's not how it works.
Ferret7446 2y ago
Your relationship with your employer is no different than any other business relationship. You can do the bare minimum, just as there are many businesses that do the bare minimum toward their customers, and those businesses often have a low subsistence level of success; if you do the same, you may have the same level of success in your career. An employment relationship can offer a lot of things for both sides. For the employer, your labor of course. For the employee, a salary of course. But it can also offer experience, access to other talented and intelligent individuals and access to capital to learn and try things, networking, relationships, opportunities for promotion and perhaps opportunities to find better employment elsewhere, or the skills and/or connections to start your own business. Your attitude toward work should be the same as the attitude you take towards the rest of your life. You can "rot" or you can make the most of every opportunity.
jimt1234 2y ago
I've noticed a disturbing trend in the last year or so where a company announces a significant layoff, saying it needed to let go of "underperforming employees" or similar wording. I've been in this industry for a long time, experienced several layoffs, but this way to announce a layoff (publicly calling-out "underperforming employees") feels new to me. It also feels shady - like, announcing to the industry, "Don't hire these losers we just got rid of. LOL"

hyperliner 2y ago

If you do only the minimum necessary to not get fired, then wouldn’t you be the person that needs to be fired the next time the the budget is cut, since you are the lowest ROI of all, all other things equal?

ivraatiems 2y ago
No. It's clear individual level of effort doesn't matter. That's the point.
- lazide 2y ago
  Cheer up - Sometimes it’s also a convenient cover for reprisals, back stabby office politics, racism/sexism, etc.
tgsovlerkhgsel 2y ago
In theory, you'd think so. In practice, due to the phenomenon described here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43662738 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43662738, it's less relevant than you think. Specifically at Google, there have been reports of high performers, recently promoted with excellent ratings before and after the promotion, getting the sack. In my experience, people who do good work do so because they enjoy the work and feel motivated, not due to any kind of performance management system or threat. Destroy the joy or motivation, and you've just destroyed a large part of the performance of these self-driven people. People often talk about "10x engineers", but not how it's possible to destroy a 10x engineer and turn them into a (let's be generous) 2x engineer, and I think capricious layoffs are a great way to do just that.

weinzierl 2y ago

"I have been through layoffs where other people on my team, doing the same job I did approximately as well, got laid off. No explanation given for why them and not me. And it could happen to me at any time." Usually there is a hidden variable that you don't know. It is your salary. That is why it sometimes looks surprising when senior roles are cut that look extremely valuable to the company from the outset. Maybe they were that valuable but still deemed to expensive.

lazide 2y ago
The part here too is ‘valuable to whom’. If they can saddle the middle manager or director with the same responsibilities/expectations, while cutting 10% (say) of the costs - guess what they are going to do. Is it ultimately short sighted? Probably. But good luck connecting point A and point B in these situations when everyone is thinking quarter to quarter.
mistrial9 2y ago
ok, and also "big thieves hate little thieves." Very-well paid executives (stock) remove very well paid employees (salary) and benefit from the actions. This is an old situation in industrial business -- the high tech crowd are filled with self-grandeur and do not believe it, on a large scale IMHO.
- lazide 2y ago
  Eh, or you could think of it as ‘cut 10 people to move the needle x percent, or cut 1’. If you need to hit a specific number, guess which one is going to be less paperwork….
marcusb 2y ago
> Usually there is a hidden variable that you don't know. This is frequently the case. I've worked at big employers (comparable in level of corporate-ness to Google if not absolute size) where the layoff process, roughly was: 1. Aggregate layoff target gets set and apportioned amongst functional leaders, then targets cascaded down to the line manager level. 2. Managers fill out a stack ranking spreadsheet for their team across a few metrics including a boolean "diversity" field[0]. There were many rumors about the "diversity field", most notably that anyone so flagged would not be fired, but so far as I could tell these were false (see point #4) 3. People to be fired are developed based on these lists (I.e., if a manager has to fire two people, then the two lowest-ranked employees per the spreadsheet are selected.) 4. HR does a meta-analysis of all to-be-fired employees, ensuring that a disproportionate number of employees from protected classes are not impacted. If too many are, then some of the next-lowest-ranked employees are selected to be fired in their stead. As far as I could tell, the only part of the process where any sort of individual, human consideration was occurring was maybe at the line manager level if they decided to tweak the stack rankings based on who they felt deserved to be protected. And then, to the extent that happens, you have all the problems with bias and favoritism that come into play. 0 - I realize this is probably controversial, but I saw it with my own eyes.

somesortofthing 2y ago

Layoffs in particular are like this because they're planned very quickly by very small groups of people. Rumors of impending layoffs obliterate morale, so the people in charge do everything they can to maintain secrecy and minimize the time between people hearing about layoffs and the layoffs taking effect. This basically always translates to random-seeming decisions - priority 1 is to cut costs by X amount, choosing the right people to cut is secondary. This means that, for example, engineers that have received performance-based raises are punished since, on paper, they do the same job as lower-performing but lower-paid engineers. Not defending the process(the right way to break this equilibrium is statutory requirements for layoffs a la the WARN act) but that's why you see the outcomes you do.

ethbr1 2y ago
> Rumors of impending layoffs obliterate morale Granted, but it seems like the current way of salary-first, performance-blind cutting obliterates it even harder.
- rincebrain 2y ago
  Really, all options obliterate morale. Laying off people who you rank as "low end" on the acceptable performance scale, might mean you kill structurally important bricks that were not optimizing for being higher than "high enough" on that scale, and cannibalizes people working on anything valuable long-term but hard to justify to management short-term. Laying off high performers means people don't want their head to be poking up, so they sabotage their own visibility to try being "good enough", while also killing people's motivations. Laying off randomly kills people's morale directly worst of all, because that implies there's nothing they can do to change the outcome, and impotence is worse, arguably, than anything else for many people.
- thesuitonym 2y ago
  Any style of layoff is going to be bad for morale, but rumors floating around tank morale for as long as those rumors exist, and then moral takes another hit on the actual day. In that way it makes sense to just rip the Band-Aid off. Of course, if you ask me, a more sensible plan to keep morale and lower costs would be getting rid of a few executives, but what do I know? I'm just a number on a spreadsheet.

pjmlp 2y ago

This is a lesson that all senior developers know pretty well, that is why companies rather hire naive juniors, instead folks that already mastered how the game gets played, and cannot be sold on company mission, values, or whatever snake oil gets talked about during interview process.

neilv 2y ago
Not all. You're talking about douchebag companies. If I try to hire someone in the future, and I'm talking straight with a candidate, about how we do things and what we're looking for, and they just nod their head, like I'm going through BS rituals that your stereotypical MBA thinks is professional to say but not mean... I will be sad. And if, while they're BSing me, they're congratulating themselves on having "mastered how the game gets played"... I will be angry. (This is another reason I won't Leetcode interview. It's signalling that the company is all about disingenuous baggery theatre.)
- denkmoon 2y ago
  Which are the non douchebag companies?
  - gorbachev 2y ago
    Start by eliminating all publicy traded companies from the list, and you've increased the percentage of non douchebag company in your list by quite a bit.
- hobs 2y ago
  Unfortunately for you you work and live in an environment created by other companies and its likely that if your company succeeds its one acquisition or bad top level management play from invalidating everything you implicitly or even explicitly promised. I have worked for "good companies" before - and they have a tendency to make money and be targets for bad companies, add enough zeroes and even the good guys sell.
JKCalhoun 2y ago

windward 2y ago

You're right but our current model of society depends on there being people who don't ask the same question.

BurningFrog 2y ago

You spend half your waking hours at work. Having a shitty attitude for that much of your life is no way to live.

saghm 2y ago
On the contrary, being stuck in a situation where your livelihood can disappear at a moment's notice due to factors beyond your control is no way to live, but it's also not really something most people will ever be able to avoid. I don't at all buy into the idea that somehow pretending the situation isn't shitty is somehow more virtuous or fulfilling; what you call a "shitty attitude" sounds more like "being realistic about how one's work is valued" to me.
- roenxi 2y ago
  > being stuck in a situation where your livelihood can disappear at a moment's notice due to factors beyond your control is no way to live That is literally the only way to live. Disaster stalks us an is only ever one misstep away (sometimes literally). In rare instances people can even just fall over and die. In the sense that there should be food and shelter for everyone, even poor people; strictly speaking I think most countries have already agreed to that. Although how well that gets implemented is open to a lot of debate. But beyond that everything can always change at a moments notice.
- BurningFrog 2y ago
  I've spent several decades writing software. Got laid off 1-2 times per decade. I still tried doing a good job every day, and feel very good about that. To me, being realistic about the risk of losing my job at any time means having enough money that I can be unemployed for 6-12 months. The major way good programmers get jobs is by being recommended by people they've worked with at previous companies. That doesn't happen if you deliberately do as little good work as you can get away with. My "shitty attitude" comment is maybe more a personal philosophy that something universal. But I do not want to spend each work day being bitter and resentful. You may intend to punish your shitty employer, but I think you're mostly poisoning your own mind.
2y ago

nine_k 2y ago

Check out the book called "The Gervais Principle" which develops this kind of cynical approach to a significant depth.

anal_reactor 2y ago

> Under those conditions, why should I - or anyone - do any more than the minimum necessary to not get fired for cause? No, you shouldn't. I know it feels like "but I thought that if I like cleaning my own apartment then getting a job as a janitor would leave me deeply fulfilled" but that's not how it works.

Ferret7446 2y ago

Your relationship with your employer is no different than any other business relationship. You can do the bare minimum, just as there are many businesses that do the bare minimum toward their customers, and those businesses often have a low subsistence level of success; if you do the same, you may have the same level of success in your career. An employment relationship can offer a lot of things for both sides. For the employer, your labor of course. For the employee, a salary of course. But it can also offer experience, access to other talented and intelligent individuals and access to capital to learn and try things, networking, relationships, opportunities for promotion and perhaps opportunities to find better employment elsewhere, or the skills and/or connections to start your own business. Your attitude toward work should be the same as the attitude you take towards the rest of your life. You can "rot" or you can make the most of every opportunity.

jimt1234 2y ago

I've noticed a disturbing trend in the last year or so where a company announces a significant layoff, saying it needed to let go of "underperforming employees" or similar wording. I've been in this industry for a long time, experienced several layoffs, but this way to announce a layoff (publicly calling-out "underperforming employees") feels new to me. It also feels shady - like, announcing to the industry, "Don't hire these losers we just got rid of. LOL"