Tim CheadleIf layoffs are about over hiring, why am I seeing so many 15+ year Googler friends let go? They’re the ones who built it into a business with $100 billion in cash.
It’s not about over hiring.
thedoh 🇨🇦@timcheadle Seems like it's about rotating out expensive workers for less expensive ones.
Except, not for the person responsible for "over hiring."
Qwertz 
@timcheadle I know someone who has been at Google for 20 years who just got laid off. 56 weeks severance. It’s not about saving money either.
Really starting to look like a mix of “the market will like it” and “everyone else is doing it.”
Marco Mornati 
@Qwertz @timcheadle it is not like saving money today (not like Twitter anyway). But they are preparing for the worst days coming (supposing to be).
If inflation will be important, when you need money for your family you will cut what ? Normally on the digital services (Netflix,Spotify,Google One,...). Laying off today is easier for companies than could it be tomorrow... That just my opinion!
If inflation will be important, when you need money for your family you will cut what ? Normally on the digital services (Netflix,Spotify,Google One,...). Laying off today is easier for companies than could it be tomorrow... That just my opinion!
Michael JervisPossibly termination of whole projects? Everything except the AI team affected, but maybe taking out entire sub teams regardless of individual performance. Easier to eliminate the whole team than work out who to keep and redeploy. Unless they're big enough reputationally in the org to stand out.
Any projects that have yet to deliver value or are not in the right strategy direction, eliminate them.
Ruthless but effective way of dealing with the scale of the issue
@mmornati @Qwertz @timcheadle large severance payments good for maintaining good will and about longer term cost saving and refocussing on objectives.
Something Netflix CEO talks about in no rules rules, be generous with the severance but be willing to eliminate strong, long serving staff if there is a better hire to make/keep.
@michaeljervis @Qwertz @timcheadle yeah it seems the pattern, at least about what we can see on social networks. The "old generation" staf is removed and may be replaced in the future when the time allows new investments. I think you are removing big salaries and "old ideas" at once. The new generation can bring freshness to the business to prepare for the future.
But it is not so good for an old man like me 😂
But it is not so good for an old man like me 😂
Some of it could be that a manager somewhere is under performing so you can't process their team to work out who to keep without involving them and you know you need to remove them. So drop the entire team is seen as the only option given the time.
Too big an org to do an all tiers review in a sensible way and handle that many lay-offs of various mode levels in the org and redeploy/restructure around those nodes you remove. So drop the branch.
@michaeljervis @Qwertz @timcheadle Maybe, it was the Amazon strategy. It is just crazy, for an European at least, to read that the layoff is nothing more than an email during the night! Years of good results and dedication killed by a simple email. 😱
Did you see about the New York office? The way they found out was to queue at the building and try and swipe in. If it went green they went in. If it went red they had been fired.
No access to anything.
The total lack of any employee rights and protection in the states is horrifying.
Glad I'm in the UK, though increasingly worries as I see our current government moving to increasingly remove those rights.
@michaeljervis @Qwertz @timcheadle 😱 In Europe we have the opposite problem: if you want to fire someone (never mind the reason) this takes too much longer than nobody wants to get time for this except when is really necessary. For this reason, the hiring process is "careful"
It's currently the same here. Over 2 years service you have to show you have been through extensive performance management processes to try and support/resolve and that dismissal is the last option.
Under that you can more easily remove, but it is still much better to hire right and manage right.
Also worth bearing in mind that even with a big severance, the way corporate accounting works, that's a one off lump sum removing ongoing cost for the business.
So it can still easily be about cost saving. May well have short term tax relief benefits etc and on the whole be better for share holder dividends.
Ian McLean@mmornati @michaeljervis @Qwertz @timcheadle European employers would do the same if your laws let them.
Unfortunately, the US has very few worker protections, and companies routinely ignore even the few we do have without consequence.
Unfortunately, the US has very few worker protections, and companies routinely ignore even the few we do have without consequence.
@mrthewalrus @michaeljervis @Qwertz @timcheadle yes you are maybe right. But I think this is really insane.
@mrthewalrus @mmornati @Qwertz @timcheadle
Some of them absolutely would, without doubt. So we make it illegal and that then means they have to manage businesses better. In theory!
Miles@michaeljervis @mmornati @Qwertz @timcheadle I’ve been through something like that. Just before the pandemic, Williams Sonoma hired me to work on transitioning their e-commerce site to a new frontend technology. A week into lockdown, they got spooked and canned the whole project. I was working with people who had been with the company for 15 years who got laid off with no notice. 6 months later, they tried to hire me back
Caeden Kane, Councilor@mmornati @Qwertz @timcheadle yes, hopefully these are strategic moves. All this outrage over short term moves (understandably) but these companies should be looking farther out and structuring their workforce and org structure accordingly.
@Qwertz it saves money by driving down wages.
Миша@timcheadle Pichai is going to destroy Google. He is not the right kind of leader for a company like Google. Just my opinion.
Scott 🇮🇱🇺🇦 WILL NOT COMPLY@timcheadle Of course you’re right: it’s about age. It’s always about age.
kira :3@timcheadle that's wild letting go of people that far in. You have to wonder how this will affect their hiring prospects in the future, the pedigree ensures it won't run close to dry but i can't help but feel a lot more people (/some of that Top Talent faang types tend to prefer) will feel dodgy about wanting to work there
Jonathan Demaeyer@timcheadle Honest question: In addition to the other possible answers, could it not be seen as a way for companies to drive wages down in tech ? I mean industry-wide.
anubis2814@timcheadle No matter how secure and free you may think you are in your job, we own your ass and can dispose of you as we see fit.
Gen X-Wing@timcheadle It’s about showing us that we are rented and replaceable and that they don’t want to pay us.
Toxic 
@timcheadle The ones who've been vested for the longest are often the ones in the best position to raise internal ethical complaints/etc.
As G moves into AI with both feet, they're jumping into murky, if not downright muddy waters that make up the difference between "can we do this?" and "should we do this?"
G's layoff profile looked a little different from the others. I suspect if you looked for union support and/or history of internal dissent, that some interesting patterns may emerge.
@toxic interesting take!