5 ms·

Loyalty is such a ridiculous thing for most companies to expect. It needs to be earned, and it's not even that complicated. Here's how you get loyal employees:

• jackmaney 11y ago
  > Loyalty is such a ridiculous thing for most companies to expect. It needs to be earned, and it's not even that complicated. In this day and age, anyone who expects loyalty--from an employer or an employee--is either blinded by nostalgia, hopelessly naive, or a blithering idiot. Loyalty in the workplace died many, many years ago.
  • madez 11y ago
    That is not true. I work for a company where firing is kind of a no-go, at least at the the level of engineers. You'd have to provoke it, e.g. by stealing something. Also, if I decide to leave the company, I tell so as early as possible. It seems you must have had experiences at workplaces where there was no trust. Disclaimer: I work for a german company.
    • jackmaney 11y ago
      Yeah, being outside of the US could make a huge difference. For the most part, in the US, you can be laid off/fired for damn near any reason, at any time, with absolutely no warning. Companies such as your employer are prettymuch unheard of around here.
• cmdkeen 11y ago
  I work somewhere like that - and to be honest 5 isn't that big a deal even if is replaced by a 9 to 5 culture and some interesting things to work on and the rest isn't complete drudgery. You'll often find places like this away from the big hubs. They're doing "quite nicely, thank you" with no ambition to become #1, IPO or make the owners richer than Croesus. They also tend to have little to no problem recruiting good people in their 30s and 40s into their nice part of the world where there are good schools, affordable homes and comfortable living. Nowhere is perfect, the grass is always greener etc. You couldn't pay me enough money to move to London from Scotland.
  • vijayr 11y ago
    places like this away from the big hubs Could you please give some examples? Having only worked in mega cities, I am totally unaware of such opportunities.
    • toyg 11y ago
      I suspect parent is working in Edinburgh, Glasgow or Aberdeen -- maybe not mega-cities, but still quite large hubs. Anyway his point was, I think: you can be the best developer (or even co-owner) at Small Web Shop Ltd, Countryshire, be paid 1/3rd of what you would get in London, and still have a good life and (occasionally) get interesting work.
    • cpncrunch 11y ago
      My wife works at a place like this, although it's a construction company and not software. We just made a decision to move to a really nice part of the world (Vancouver Island) a few years ago. My wife started looking for jobs after she got here, picked one, and basically lucked out. This company really does treat their employees like family. My wife got a phone call a few months ago that her father was very ill and in hospital (he's now recovered). Her boss immediately bought her a plane ticket so she could go home to visit him. Last year she had to take a month off for surgery, and the company was really nice about it. They paid part of her salary while she was off to make up for the unemployment benefit (even though they didn't have to), told her to take as long as she needed to recover, sent her flowers at the hospital, etc. She started off on a fairly low salary, but she's got multiple large pay rises since she started there, and is now earning a decent salary. (Her boss talked to her about salary, and basically asked her what she thought she should be making). They do expect hard work and commitment. Quite often she will work overtime if it's busy, and they are very quick to fire useless people. However in return for your commitment they do treat their employees very well.
• cookiecaper 11y ago
  Consider that the employee who makes only vague promises and demands unlimited concessions, seemingly without regard for the owner's interests, is likely a viper a la Aesop [1]. I've made this mistake before. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Farmer_and_the_Viper http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Farmer_and_the_Viper
  • Yakimoto 11y ago
    Sad to see that its voted down so aggressively, because it's true. Many individuals assume it's their privilege to be employed by you.
  • gjm11 11y ago
    1. Very few employees are in a position to demand concessions from their employers at all. 2. My experience is that typically employees are more concerned for their employers' interests than employers are for their employees'. 3. In Aesop's fable, the farmer helps the viper out of the kindness of his heart. I have had some good employers, but not once have I had the impression that they were employing me just to make my life better rather than because they hoped I would do work for them to their benefit.
• ljk 11y ago
  that sounds like "the big 4" but why are people still not satisfied with working in big and innovative companies like those?
  • 7Figures2Commas 11y ago
    Because the grass is always greener elsewhere. The reality is that it's difficult to be a happy employee if you're not a happy person. Unfortunately, our society is filled with people who either don't spend enough time working on their own happiness, or who pursue happiness in the wrong ways. Employers can create great environments for their employees, but an environment is only as happy as the people in it.
• deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
• kevinskii 11y ago
  Let's say you are working for a for-profit company that operates like you describe, and the business hits a rough patch. The owners tell you that the only way to prevent layoffs would be for everyone to agree to a 20% pay cut, and they back it up with hard data. Knowing you could get paid more elsewhere, would you accept the pay cut to prevent layoffs or would you leave? I'm not ashamed to say that I would probably leave. Loyalty shouldn't be expected on either side, and that's ok.
  • patmcc 11y ago
    If the company didn't have operational reserves for that kind of rough patch I'd be pretty worried anyway - but I'd probably consider it, yeah. A lot of that would depend on my situation at the time though - if it meant defaulting on my mortgage, then no, it's not happening. I agree it's perfectly fine to make a choice like that. I agree, it's not reasonable to expect loyalty in either direction. I think the key for employers is to remove as many reasons for leaving as possible; then who cares if employees stay out of loyalty or out of logic, they're still staying. edit: typo
  • jrs235 11y ago
    I worked for a company and saw the writing on the wall that tough times were ahead. Realizing this I left, hoping to give more time to my coworkers before cuts were instituted. A few months after leaving, the company had to cut everyone's salary by 20%. They were kind enough that they went from being expected to work 5 eight hour days down to expected to work 4 eight hour days.
  • jdhzzz 11y ago
    I worked for a small company with 20ish employees during the post 2000 tech downturn. There were a number of layoffs and I got a 25% haircut and was happy to remain. It was a struggle for us financially but not a catastrophe. Eventually (3 years on) the job market got better and I got a position at a different company that took my pay beyond what it had been. I have no regrets and no hard feelings. I can envision returning to that company some day in the future as the environment was interesting and challenging.
  • Litost 11y ago
• rayiner 11y ago
  At my wife's firm, there's an unspoken protocol: short of wrongdoing, even if you're not good at your job you get two bad annual performance reviews, then you're given six months after that to find another job. That was true even when the shit hit the fan during the recession. The firm, unsurprisingly, has very loyal employees. That said, writing the biggest checks to get the people chasing the biggest bonuses is also a viable, if potentially unstable, business model. So is hiring people that probably couldn't work somewhere better. The key is being honest to yourself about what glue keeps your organization together.
  • colordrops 11y ago
    What industry is your wife in?
    • rayiner 11y ago
      She's a lawyer.
• deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
• kohanz 11y ago
  1. After some probation period, fire only as a last resort or for really terrible behaviour. Have a plan to correct behavior in all other cases. This is a great way to earn loyalty from the person not being fired and at the same time alienate multiple other employees who may have to work with someone who just might be a bad fit or incompetent. I've seen the situation happen too many times where a company's reluctance to let one person go without a long, dragged-out process of formal correctional measures caused several other, much more valuable team members, to leave instead.
  • sheepmullet 11y ago
    On the other hand I've seen quick firings lead to other very valuable team members leaving as well. Firing somebody who is doing a decent job causes a lot of damage. The first company I worked at fired two devs after implementing new metrics and determining they were 15-20% less productive than the rest of the team. In reality these two guys were doing a good job; just not quite as good a job as the rest of us. I immediately started looking for a new job and within six months the entire rest of the team left.
    • chiph 11y ago
      Sounds like the boss was a fan of Jack Welch's vitality curve, with his strategy of firing the bottom 10% each year. Which can have repercussions when those guys aren't slackers, just merely average.
  • Nadya 11y ago
    Sounds like they failed to have a plan to correct said behavior that caused the others to leave.
    • kohanz 11y ago
      Sometimes it's just not correctable. Bad hires happen. Not everyone can do well in a given position. The idea of dragging things out until firing is a "last resort" makes it sound like it's a long process and that is a bad thing. It can create a poisonous working environment.