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Comment by nicksrose7224 | Hacker News Reader

Without any actual implications of them "taking responsibility" too

What would that look like?

I'm no supporter of PR speak. The CEO ranks seem to have no problem in finding their next gig. Some some receive ludicrous compensation even when the company does poorly.

I'm just not sure what is the desired outcome here? And how do we get there?

One possibile way to take personal responsibility could be to add "and therefore I will reduce my compensation by the same percentage we are reducing headcount". (Based on other comments, that would be 6%.)

DoorDash CEO's compensation in 2021 was 413 million https://www.sfgate.com/tech/article/Doordash-highest-paid-CE...

While it's true stock has dropped like a rock since then, it's impacted corporate employee comp as well so I don't agree that stock tanking exclusively impacted the CEO and hence he has paid for the bad decisions.

Don't you think this is pretty childish? When market conditions change companies need to adapt, sometimes that means laying people off. Isn't that the job of the CEO? They are responsible for the health of the company overall. I don't see why they should be punished for making adjustments to make the company competitive.

In general I agree with you, yes, market conditions change, and CEOs need to make sometimes tough choices in response.

However, the specific context here is this quote from the CEO:

> we were not as rigorous as we should have been in managing our team growth. That’s on me.

If the CEO admits they made a mistake that led to the current layoffs then I think it would be admirable to take personal responsibility and accept some personal consequences as a result.

> When market conditions chance, companies need to adapt

I agree with that part ^

Let me frame this more broadly. _How_ and _when_ should companies adapt? There are many ways, across many timescales.

I'll give a made up example, hopefully in a reasonable ballpark. A company needs to save $250M / year. Let's say there are three options under consideration, not mutually exclusive / can be blended:

Option A: Lay off 1% of 10,000 employees, saving $250M/year.

Option B: 15% across the board salary cuts, saving $250M/year.

Option C: Lower executive and VP-level compensation packages (salary, options, stock, deferred pay, etc), saving $250M.

Fairness in service of the company goals means that all viable options are given due consideration.

It is relatively easy for a CEO to do lay offs, even if other options (lowering their own comp) has better effects.

When the company does well they receive exorbitant bonuses. The CEO of Doordash is privy to a $400m bonus hitting some milestones, that more than pays of the jobs laid off today.

To be clear, the $400m "bonus" isn't a bonus at all. It's an incentive package that's based on the price of the stock sustaining over 180 days, and the first milestone of this incentive package starts at $187.50, which is >3x the current price. $DASH was above $187.50 last year but didn't meet the 180 day duration requirement.

In other words, Tony hasn't gotten paid anything from this package, and may never will.

The package is described in the revised s1, and DoorDash is required to report it because they have to account for this package (probabilistically via Monte Carlo simulations) on their books.

https://d18rn0p25nwr6d.cloudfront.net/CIK-0001792789/8e0717f...

Their CEO compensation is mostly equity, which has dropped like a stone in the past year.

That's true for most corporate employees as well, no?

At the minimum, the desired outcome is that they shouldn't talk about "taking personal responsibility" when there's none to be seen.

Implication is that you get a strike against you which is publicly documented. This also serves a purpose of sending a message to middle-management that we should not repeat this strategic mistake of over-hiring when things are hot and then when things slowdown going through this painful process of separation. I am hopeful that this public admission will inculcate a culture of holding everyone accountable rather than "emperor has no clothes" culture where people live in denial.

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