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Comment by datalopers | Hacker News Reader

Biggest mark of utter management failure is making too small a layoff in April (9%) and needing to do another round today.

Combined that’s a 30% headcount reduction since Q1-2022

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Please say more. Is the idea to get the blood-letting over with all at once?

Yes, it’s much better to cut fast and deep one time.

Why? Let the proles panic and leave on their own accord, it will cost you much less in severance.

This works short term. Long term people will remember it and you'll have problems attracting anyone to work for you.

You get very little from your employees in the meantime, the ones you are still paying, as they have a much harder time concentrating, and also don't know that they have any reason to care about the company's future. The first week or two after a layoff is very glum and unproductive.

All other things equal, sure.

However, proper reasoning while taking into account uncertainty is not so simple.

Let's do a thought experiment. Let's say you are the CEO and your estimate for the necessary layoff ranges between 2% and 11%. What to do? One and only one round of X% layoffs? What should X be? Or perhaps start with a round of 5% layoffs. The hope would be that the uncertainty decreases. Time passes. You might not need an additional round. Or if you do, it can be done more accurately.

If you combine layoffs the reduction in burn can be pretty significant. The exact numbers vary per company but for a startup delaying layoffs by one month can be the difference between having one year of runway remaining or one month once all is said and done.

This is not the exact link I was looking for but goes into it somewhat https://www.ycombinator.com/library/3Z-advice-for-companies-...

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