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I was at Yahoo when Carol Bartz came in and did exactly that. And guess what? Morale plummeted.

"The beatings will continue until the morale improves" .... ever heard of that?

Do you have a reference to that? I can't find any evidence that Carlo Bartz engaged in any retraining of employees.

Again, I'm not suggesting cost cutting. I'm suggesting a move from frivolous expenses, to those which help make the employees more successful.

As I commented before, Deming was all about training employees over firing them.

https://www.deming.org/theman/theories/fourteenpoints

Perks in SV companies are absolutely not frivolous expenses! They are a necessary expense to attract and keep the right talent, in competition with other SV companies that also offer generous perks. If you cut it, morale plummets and you will lose a lot of good employees.

The link you posted contains great tips for assembly-line factories filled with replaceable hourly workers. SV is.. not that.

I was there when she cancelled the year-end party.

She had the same effect at Autodesk by applying the same philosophy.

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