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Comment by enkid | Hacker News Reader

They're the ones that quit when you tell them they have to go hardcore or take a severance package.

right, because by definition the most talented and productive employees have the best prospects at other employers

Also true. But there they will face “the hegemony of the 80%” yet again…

I’m not so sure about that. I think the chance of running a company without the 80% unproductive naysayers has a very strong appeal to the 10%. Also, in bloated “political” organizations they typically run on 10% of mental capacity anyway, so a “hardcore death match” may not have the same meaning to them.

You will find out how much un-sexy but highly important work was done by those underperforming non-hardcore people. Which is usually quite a lot, including keeping the literal lights on.

Yea, I don’t want to exclude the possibility of that outcome. If Elon does run this $44 billion social experiment I will watch very carefully though. It will be very interesting indeed.

(And my feeling is that a lot of the Elon-hate comes from people who fear that the outcome will be more in line with my expectations than yours.)

Imagine the relief of not filling out dozens of useless forms for five layers of management that do not really understand what you do anyway. One could really GSD at that point.

https://medium.com/geekculture/the-dead-sea-effect-d71df1372...

Most people don’t bank on all the “dead weight” being able to jump ship and find a new job. Musk also hasn’t outlined what his actual vision is so you’d be signing up for “hardcore” work without knowing if you agree with the goal

Supposing that the "correct" 80% is getting cut in this exercise - Musk is still essentially promising sweatshop work conditions for those who remain. It's evident that what he wants is for engineers to work early mornings, late nights, weekends, holidays, maximally in the office, under a trigger-happy boss who shit-talks you, your company and your work on social media, and is motivated by pure financial desperation.

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