4 ms·

and small companies don't fire people?

by amitutk 14y ago

deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
- jonathanwallace 14y ago
  Small companies don't have to. They're small and the culture is immediately affected by the owners/founders/executive team directly.
jussij 14y ago
Small companies pay you less, make up the shortfall in stock options, work you longer hours and then go belly up ;)
YZF 14y ago
In big companies good people can end up being laid off because they happen to be in the wrong team/group/project and some clueless bean counter decides that's the business that needs to be eliminated. As far as large companies go it gets a lot worse than VMware though they seem to have lost direction somewhat. The problem of largeness is that decision makers are so far removed from the decision they can't possibly make good decisions. It's certainly possible for small companies to make bad decisions as well.
- untog 14y ago
  In small companies good people can end up being laid off because they happen to not be buddy-buddy with their boss, and there's no oversight. Or because they aren't related to the owner. It cuts both ways, for sure.
- kyrra 14y ago
  And at small companies, a boss may fire someone they just don't like personally. And not all bosses at small companies necessarily understand what their underlings do for a company. At big companies, if it is done right, the upper level management may ask for input from 1st line managers as to who they should fire. Also, my last company, all managers had to rank their underlings, and those at the bottom had a chance of being trimmed if there were layoffs. Many big companies will listen to those first line managers, and almost any upper-level manager is aware of their lack of knowledge about the leaves of the management tree.
  - jiggy2011 14y ago
    Yes, you can be laid off from a small company because they lose one of their large clients for reasons that are absolutely nothing to do with you. They will then look to trim off "luxury expenses" and if they are not a tech company, having a full time IT/dev guy is likely to be one of them.
- dredmorbius 14y ago
  Employment is capricious in most situations. Large and small organizations can both have politics, can see drastic restructuring when business changes or a major client makes a change (drops a product, demands a change, ...). Large companies may insulate somewhat against capricious changes, though non-operational circumstances (particularly mismanagement or liquidity crunches of the holding corporation) can cause sudden and drastic changes (Borders, UAL, American Airlines). Small companies can have cash-flow issues as well. There's very little that's assured in life. Death and taxes you can count on.
- darkarmani 14y ago
  > In big companies good people can end up being laid off because they happen to be in the wrong team/group/project and some clueless bean counter decides that's the business that needs to be eliminated. Why do they have to be clueless? Projects are never failures? They could cut a terrible project and still end up laying off good people. Is that a bad thing?
ttar 14y ago
I was fired from a startup, and I was their best developer. Needless to say, they are now going down. Making the engineering team political will doom any startup.

and small companies don't fire people?

by amitutk 14y ago

and small companies don't fire people?

deleted 14y ago

[deleted]

jonathanwallace 14y ago
Small companies don't have to. They're small and the culture is immediately affected by the owners/founders/executive team directly.

jussij 14y ago

Small companies pay you less, make up the shortfall in stock options, work you longer hours and then go belly up ;)

YZF 14y ago

In big companies good people can end up being laid off because they happen to be in the wrong team/group/project and some clueless bean counter decides that's the business that needs to be eliminated. As far as large companies go it gets a lot worse than VMware though they seem to have lost direction somewhat. The problem of largeness is that decision makers are so far removed from the decision they can't possibly make good decisions. It's certainly possible for small companies to make bad decisions as well.

untog 14y ago
In small companies good people can end up being laid off because they happen to not be buddy-buddy with their boss, and there's no oversight. Or because they aren't related to the owner. It cuts both ways, for sure.
kyrra 14y ago
And at small companies, a boss may fire someone they just don't like personally. And not all bosses at small companies necessarily understand what their underlings do for a company. At big companies, if it is done right, the upper level management may ask for input from 1st line managers as to who they should fire. Also, my last company, all managers had to rank their underlings, and those at the bottom had a chance of being trimmed if there were layoffs. Many big companies will listen to those first line managers, and almost any upper-level manager is aware of their lack of knowledge about the leaves of the management tree.
- jiggy2011 14y ago
  Yes, you can be laid off from a small company because they lose one of their large clients for reasons that are absolutely nothing to do with you. They will then look to trim off "luxury expenses" and if they are not a tech company, having a full time IT/dev guy is likely to be one of them.
dredmorbius 14y ago
Employment is capricious in most situations. Large and small organizations can both have politics, can see drastic restructuring when business changes or a major client makes a change (drops a product, demands a change, ...). Large companies may insulate somewhat against capricious changes, though non-operational circumstances (particularly mismanagement or liquidity crunches of the holding corporation) can cause sudden and drastic changes (Borders, UAL, American Airlines). Small companies can have cash-flow issues as well. There's very little that's assured in life. Death and taxes you can count on.
darkarmani 14y ago
> In big companies good people can end up being laid off because they happen to be in the wrong team/group/project and some clueless bean counter decides that's the business that needs to be eliminated. Why do they have to be clueless? Projects are never failures? They could cut a terrible project and still end up laying off good people. Is that a bad thing?

ttar 14y ago

I was fired from a startup, and I was their best developer. Needless to say, they are now going down. Making the engineering team political will doom any startup.