pablobaxter
Katie Sylor-MillerWelp, I got laid off today along with 40% of Block. I’m still totally in shock an have no idea what comes next, but if you have need for a Principal Frontend Engineer hit me up!
Sarah E Bourne@ksylor Oh no!
@sbourne yeah, it’s a total shock. We just had layoffs 2 weeks ago where ~300 engineers were let go. So this massive cut was just totally unexpected
Drew Pickard@ksylor
That is insane.
Layoffs is one thing but doung a small one before a big one means someone in leadership massively fucked up.
That is insane.
Layoffs is one thing but doung a small one before a big one means someone in leadership massively fucked up.
@drewpickard yeah the “small” one was because they suddenly instituted minimum PR count numbers *during calibration* and increased the required percentage of “below meets” to be like, 15%% instead of 7%, and then fired everyone in below because they were a “low performer”. So we all thought we were done & safe for a bit, but nope.
Revin Guillen@ksylor @drewpickard omg! simple-minded metrics suuuuuck. I got dinged once at a gig years ago because my PR count was “low”, without even considering that maybe I didn’t need to follow every feature up with 3–5 bug fix PRs because I actually created quality stuff the first time around…?
alice, software-defined human@ksylor @drewpickard has this just been happening everywhere? we also had minimum PR count quotas instituted a few weeks ago in the middle of reviews and basically everyone was downgraded because of it...
@alavie I'm not an engineer, so I don’t know, but as a [former] design manager involved in calibrations at previous companies they're *always* looking for arbitrary reasons to cut a higher percentage of people, especially if the 'reasons' theoretically make people work harder (to hit the arbitrary metric)
@alavie @drewpickard all the tech CEOs are in the same group chats
Daniel Barber@alavie @ksylor @drewpickard This sounds like the age old mistake of trying to measure developer productivity by the number of lines of code they write https://www.folklore.org/Negative_2000_Lines_Of_Code.html?sort=date
@db @alavie @drewpickard can’t help but wonder if I put a target on my back for the second round of layoffs by vocally pushing back against throwing away decades of research by using numbers that have been debunked. I pushed to use research backed methods for measuring productivity instead. But, who knows
@ksylor @alavie @drewpickard Yeah, that certainly sounds possible. I put a target on my back once by bringing up something that bothered me at a retro. Y’know, that meeting that’s supposed be a safe space for that sort of thing.
Annika Backstrom@ksylor That is 
Really seems like Block is circling the drain.
Very sorry that you got laid off 
Daniel
karolina
Jan Lehnardt 
@ksylor fuck I’m so sorry!
oisin
Ethan Marcotte@ksylor Katie, this is horrible. I’m so, so sorry.
Matt Massicotte@ksylor ugh so sorry to hear
Alex Russell
ppk 🇪🇺
Kevin RussellNeeds hashtags, no algorthm s here. If youre asking everyone send it widely with hashtags
#getfediHired #fedihire #frontend ??? Others?
@kevinrns thanks! I’m frankly still in shock and not quite ready to get into the interview slog just yet. When I’m ready I’ll post a real one with hashtags, etc.
Christo. London, England
Michael Santaly@ksylor I’m very sorry wishing you the best
Kris Arnold@ksylor sorry to hear that
Vitaliy@ksylor :( sorry to hear. We are looking for a frontend/web performance engineer at embrace.io (and SpeedCurve) - if sounds interesting email my [email protected] and I'll make sure the right person sees you. PS. I'm a fellow geek and not a recruiter :)
sufian
Pam C
Tyler Sticka@ksylor I’m so sorry, Katie 😔💜
Sena@ksylor I’m so sorry, that sucks! Might be below your pay/title grade, but there’s an amazing group of FE folks at the Frame.io unit of Adobe and they’re hiring if it helps! https://careers.adobe.com/us/en/job/R165316/Senior-Frontend-Engineer
Jaye 🍊
Kartik Krishnanand@ksylor Where are you based? eBay is hiring in Toronto!
@kkrishnanand aw thanks, I’m in the Boston area, appreciate the thought though!
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦@ksylor I am so sorry, this is really horrible.
I saw that the official "reason" given for the mass layoffs was "AI is replacing people"…
I wonder how much of this is just lipstick on a pig – as in, they were doing layoffs anyway, say because BTC is not doing great and Dorsey needed more profit margins or whatever, but they used the "AI" excuse for this not to look as bad for the investors?..
Scott Grimmett@ScottGrimmett @rysiek yeah, I think it’s both? He is an AI true believer AND needed to do something drastic about financials. Telling tho that none of the c-suite who caused the mess is out.
Jonathan Snyder@ksylor Sorry that happened to you. Hang in there.
Legit_Spaghetti@ksylor I was laid off last summer during one of Microsoft's big "Let's lay off ALL the people!" days. What I learned is this:
- Take time for yourself. The feels are going to hit hard and unexpectedly. Use your free time to do things just for yourself.
- When you start looking for work, be EXTREMELY picky about where you apply. This is a crazy competitive market, and if you're not a 100% fit, there will be dozens of other applicants who are.
- Don't take rejection personally. It's NOT you.
- Adopt a stance of "Every no is one step closer to yes." Maybe you'll be crazy lucky and will find work immediately. Odds are, you won't. Keep going.
- That said, you can't speedrun this. The interviewing process is long, convoluted, and exhausting. Even if they like you, it can take months to go from first interview to eventual offer.
- Your network is super important. Use LinkedIn to see which of your connections work where. Get in touch with old colleagues.
- Everybody likes to help; nobody likes to ask for help. It's okay to ask. Don't try to be a superhero. If you need help, ask.
- Have people look over your resume and provide feedback. Take what they say with a grain of salt, but do listen.
- Apply for unemployment.
- The thing that's going to get you through this is your friends, your chosen family, and whatever faith you may have. This is basically a trust fall exercise.
You'll be okay. Breathe. You can do this.
raylu@ksylor are you still looking? valdera (my employer, 7-person dev team) is hiring! [email protected]