[luisgvv]

I began as a junior dev and climbed up the ranks til the point where I became the SME in some areas of the product.

Got laid off because sales goals were not met while they retained people which I think were incompetent in their work. Even some guys which I think were better and more critical to the projects were dumped.

I'm not climbing that ladder by being proactive and "pragmatic" again...

Call me a paycheck stealer, quiet quitter etc.

Just give me some JIRA ticket and let me read books while I get my job done in 1-2 hours a day.

[hinkley]

I’ll be you ten bucks they got rid of people who bring up bad news and kept the yes-men. A company that doesn’t know what’s broken is doomed to mediocrity.

But some people want to play music while the ship sinks. So they arrange for the most pleasant rest of the voyage they can, instead of saving as many people as they can.

[klabb3]

> I’ll be you ten bucks they got rid of people who bring up bad news and kept the yes-men

I’m pretty cynical and assumed this was how layoffs worked but at least in faang and even smaller (maybe 500 people) SV companies, I actually don’t think this is the case anymore. Most I’ve seen have been extremely random – it seems like they cut teams/orgs very differently but on an individual level it seems random. I got the impression it’s some lawsuit thing, because they never leak the info beforehand so managers and other seniors can chime in, so it appears they’re cutting blindly from the exec level. There’s probably some politics going on in the higher echelons and maybe they force individuals out but with managers (including decorated ones) and regular employees it has not looked like a surgical political - not performance - play. From what I’ve seen.

[godelski]

The part I'm confused at is it doesn't seem that they are doomed, and end up being very successful companies. But I think this is likely due to lack of competition.

I recently did an internship at one of these big companies, doing ML. I'm a researcher but had a production role. Coming in everything was really weird to me from how they setup their machines to training and evaluation. I brought up that the way they were measuring their performance was wrong and could tell they overfit their data. They didn't believe me. But then it came to be affecting my role. So I fixed it, showed them, and then they were like "oh thanks, but we're moving on to transformers now." Main part of what I did is actually make their model robust and actually work on their customer data! (I constantly hear that "industry is better because we have customers so it has to work" but I'm waiting to see things work like promised...) Of course, their transformer model took way more to train and had all the same problems, but were hidden a few levels deeper due to them dramatically scaling data and model size.

I knew the ML research community had been overly focused on benchmarks but didn't realize how much worse it was in production environments. It just seems that metric hacking is the explicitly stated goal here. But I can't trust anyone to make ML models that themselves are metric hackers. The part that got me though is that I've always been told by industry people that if I added value to the company and made products better that the work (and thus I) would be valued. I did in an uncontestable manner, and I did not in an uncontestable way. I just thought we could make cool products AND make money at the same time. Didn't realize there was far more weight to the latter than the former. I know, I'm naive.

[chipdart]

> I'll be you ten bucks they got rid of people who bring up bad news and kept the yes-men. A company that doesn’t know what’s broken is doomed to mediocrity.

I used to have that attitude, but since then I've grown to learn that people who bring back news are also creating the problems without providing any solution whereas the "yes-men" excuse is a coping mechanism to rationalize why those who try to actually tackle problems and are smart enough to not raise them before they actually exist ir have solutions are indeed an asset to the team.

No one wants to deal with a pain-in-the-ass who creates problems for everyone out of thin air. That's what gets you fired. Everyone has to deal with real problems, and they don't need the distraction of having to deal with artificial ones.

[vkou]

Unless they are given meaningful equity, it's not their ship, and regardless of whether it is or isn't, unlike the shareholders and creditors, they won't be sinking with it.

If you want worker interests to be even a little aligned with owner interests, the correct corporate structure is not an S corp, or a C corp, it is some flavor of worker co-op.

And even then, it can't grow too big.

[cyanydeez]

Peoplw conceptualize businesses likr some super organism that should try to maximize the quality of its products.

In reality, it most.often maximizes its executives lives while minimizing all other forms of frictions.

Everyone whose worked with small businesses will rscognize this pattern easily. Uts only when you get a few e?tra executives that the equation itself gets comolicated, but its still typically about maximizing the executives livlihood.

[hankchinaski]

I have been doing this for years and I think it's the best output per hour worked strategy if you have a clear exit plan outside scaling the so-called ladder

[toomuchtodo]

> if you have a clear exit plan outside scaling the so-called ladder

Exit plan is FIRE. Everything else is circus and performance art. Others can play status games, I prefer wealth games: wealth is options and options are freedom.

Pragmatic, smart, skilled people are extracted from unless lucky and in a position to see outsized returns from their effort. Better to know what enough is, collect enough freedom coins, and enjoy the one go you get at life.

(n=1, ymmv, "show me the incentives, and I'll show you the outcome")

[folsom]

That is why I work like I get paid, a little bit on Fridays.

[twojobsoneboss]

Boss makes a dollar, I make a dime. That's why I poop, on company time.

[sojournerc]

I was layed off after being burnt out on exactly what you're describing. The organization lost 5 years of deep institutional knowledge into their systems that I designed because i couldn't get buy in on what I thought was important.

[dakiol]

> Just give me some JIRA ticket and let me read books while I get my job done in 1-2 hours a day.

Aren't we all (normal and decent people) doing this already?

[Seb-C]

As someone who cares about his work, has strong professional ethics and wisely chooses his employers to not end-up in such environments, no I don't.

The worst places for me are precisely those where you can get by with 1~2h of work a day because no one cares and the company's culture does not value the time and skills of his workers.

[switchbak]

No. Many of us are working hard, trying to get real work done. And spending 20-40 mins a day checking Hacker News :)

Seriously though, don’t you feel bad by not pulling your weight? Someone has to get your work done.

[WalterBright]

> Aren't we all (normal and decent people) doing this already?

I've known many such in my career. They weren't fooling anybody. Everybody knew who they were. When they'd get laid off or were passed over for a raise they were always baffled and outraged.

[therealdrag0]

No. I feel ownership and collaboration over what my team does. We prioritize, design, review, and build together (not endorsing a methodology, just a culture). It has been this way since I was a junior engineer. I want to understand and solve problems. I want to learn and build bigger and better tithings.

Punching in premade tickets for 2 hours a day sounds like you’re already dead.

[heurist]

I've never felt secure enough to check out like this, even when my position was effectively locked in. I always want to improve and attain something bigger, so I look for problems beyond my scope when the work isn't coming to me. I feel comfort thinking I know how to take an idea through the full execution cycle due to my practice in seeking and solving problems. But it is hard for me to relax and let go.

[creesch]

Ignoring the amount of time spend working for a moment. I would be miserable if all I got to do during that time was work on Jira tickets others created.

[twojobsoneboss]

If you’re in a team lead or staff (most places) kind of position you can’t…

[mlhpdx]

No, definitely not.

[giantg2]

Sounds similar to me. I didn't get laid off though, and my climb was only one actual promotion even though I was filling a tech lead position. I managed to switch teams right before the layoff/outsourcing. I tried hard on the next team and again achieved a great reputation in the department. But it meant nothing and I got nowhere. I even had a few people in the department ask why I was taking a demotion out of the group - I wasn't, they all just thought I was a higher level than I actually was... fuck the system.

[sneak]

To assume all organizations reward or value expertise the same way is to cap your maximum lifetime earnings, methinks.

[sevagh]

I'm in this trap right now a little bit. After a particularly egregious instance of feeling passed over for a promo, how can I trust that the next jerkoff won't do the same thing?

[zer00eyz]

Did you get cut cause "we need a number" and you're expensive?

Were you the growth guy when they need run the busies blood and guts people?

Did they save 2 people in some other department who matter more with some horse trading?

You can go and be a clock puncher. It's perfectly fine to do so. I know plenty of them, some got laid off recently and cant seem to find jobs. The high achiever's the go the extra mile types who are LIKED (dont be an asshole) are all working already.

Down vote me all you want. I was here for the first (2000) tech flop. The people who went the extra mile and some safe and secure corporates were the ones who made it. Coming out the other side (the ad tech, Web 2.0 boom) there were a lot of talented, ambitious, hard working people around. Any one who wasnt that ended up in another field that made them happy.

[diob]

Might want to think a bit about survivorship bias and see how it might apply.

[creesch]

It's all well and good to include a disclaimer about downvotes. But, it is somewhat irrelevant, as the reason you are most likely to be downvoted is not because you are touching on a sensitive subject. They are downvoting you because your argument makes it very clear you actually haven't read the article.

[sevagh]

Manager propaganda to make us go the extra mile, don't listen.

[mavelikara]

If it so happens that that company was wrong in what they did, you run the risk of optimizing for the wrong things based on one bad observation. The company doesn’t care. The negatives only affect your career.

[swader999]

You'd do better to go work hard for their competitors or create one.

[adra]

And in the end, the terrible people won. Because you stopped caring seeming about anything, you're likely living a worse more jaded life, and your next company isn't getting a good employee.

Learning an important lesson isn't about flushing your aspirations down the toilet. That's just cementing your destiny as someone who will never achieve moderate success. If that's your goal, shrugs?

[6th]

No. Terrible people won because terrible people were in positions of power, as is the case often.

Good jobs, great jobs even, can and do turn to shit overnight. It's often the management itself.

People don't leave bad jobs they leave bad people.

The job is something in their life workers, in a non-slave market, can take control of.

There's no good reason for a person to stay working for nutters.

There's no good|sane reason to reward bad behavior.

They have ZERO obligation to fix a toxic workplace and culture.

That is management's failing entirely.

>your next company isn't getting a good employee.

Your next employee|team member isn't getting a good boss|colleague.

[interroboink]

> the terrible people won ... you're likely living a worse more jaded life

Respectfully, I think this is rather judgemental (I realize the irony that I am judging you, too :)

It doesn't have to be a battle, there doesn't have to be a winner. Everybody is free to explore their limits and boundaries, and put energy into the areas of life that they find most fruitful.

Maybe OP really does want a kick-in-the-pants "get back in there and fight!" pep talk — in which case, ignore me. But maybe they just decided that it was not their particular hill to die on. It takes all kinds.

[voxl]

Life is more than your job.

[roenxi]

> the terrible people won...

When that dynamic takes hold, it is more that the good people failed. There is an extremely real subset of the population that gets a thrill out of telling other people what to do and damn the technical consequences of their orders. If people who are uncomfortable being in charge don't figure out a way to get over their own reservations; then guess who will hold all the positions of power? People who really want to. And not necessarily because they are nice or capable people, but because they'll say or do anything.

The part that frustrates me is that technically competent people often get brutally attacked because they lack charisma. It is wildly counterproductive.

[globalnode]

> flushing your aspirations down the toilet

hmm, i seem to have made this a hobby of mine.

[agumonkey]

My life exactly. I used to dream of a kind of high drive team, did more than I should, on obvious metrics (velocity, onboarding, performance, ..) .. but the average politics in all human groups makes it too rare and you end up suffering too much absurdities. It's a lesson in statistics and relativism.

[szundi]

What about not fucking up your life and find a good comany to work for?

[redserk]

How is this “fucking up [their] life”?

Some people don’t care about the grindset or putting in 50hr weeks. As long as work gets done and you’re reasonably keeping your skills up to date, what does it matter?

If anything it’s more of a win by gaining hours of your life back that would’ve been spent people-pleasing.

[serf]

That's a hard pill to swallow after years and years of the same routine 'unsuccesses' , and it relies on the personal belief that A decent life cannot be lead without success in finance and business; I believe that's simply not the case.

[lazide]

Since this is always relative, that’s like ‘why not just be rich?’ isn’t it?

The devil is in the details and the ‘how’.

[throwawaysleep]

Yep. After being laid off, I decided that I am best working with the diligence of a Boeing QA engineer. Do the bare minimum and use overemployment to flee the work world as fast as possible.