Plaid Layoffs
plaid.com
plaid.com
This is the hardest thing I have ever done. The market changed - I thought we would make more money, now I think we will make less money. Therefore we have discovered that we don't need all of you.
If you aren't needed, here is some money. I hope this is enough money that the internet isn't too mad at me.
Remaining Floofernistas, please be kind to the ex-Floofernistas, and help them.
Again, I am sad.
Goodbye
Not cleaning up their messes, of course. That’s still on everybody else. They’re too busy contending with this harsh reality of not being right all the time.
Which means if anyone says they take full responsibility, they’re either saying “I’m a big fat narcissist” or that they imprinted on narcissists, so all of their mentors were.
Kind of a stretch, no?
When it’s a teen pregnancy or injuring a pedestrian, we know what “taking responsibility” means. For layoffs there are no actions, no alteration of life paths. Even the money for severance really comes out of someone else’s pockets. It means nothing for the person saying it. Everyone else suffers the consequences, not the speaker.
Claiming you’re to blame is the only penance. That only makes sense to people who won’t normally do that. Which is people who think in narcissistic personality traits are normal. IE narcissists and people they groomed.
Responsibility for a bad thing means that you are ultimately to blame, so if you take responsibility, you should either step down or present a detailed action plan. Otherwise you're saying "I messed this up and I also don't know how to fix it but I don't intend to stop being the leader"--which is (ironically) a very irresponsible stance.
Nope. Not unless there are actions to backup the words. Some kind of actual sacrifice that helps actually cleanup the mess.
E.g., do the CEO & Execs give back all bonuses and substantial salary for the past X years these bad decision were made, and keep working for $1/year until they are fixed? Do the CEO & Execs personally make calls using their own personal & professional capital to find new jobs for those they are firing?
If not, it is just performative bullshirt.
We used to have all the money and land. We still do, but it’s not as fun now.
“Make no mistake, though they are the ones leaving, it is I who must remain and endure the heavy burden of their failure.”
But make no mistake, though they are the ones leaving, it is I who must remain and bear the heavy burden of their failure. It is my fault, I trusted them to get the job done, but that is the price of leadership."
Incredible writing by Mike Judge and co, it's satire that's literally too real sometimes.
It may lead to change. It may not. But it’s important part of normal apologies.
I suspect what you are missing is specific action - what is this person specifically going to do differently?
“I take responsibility, so I’m returning my dividends from the last two years and making my salary 0 until things improve”
One team of engineers costs between one and three million dollars a year.
Words are important. “I take full responsibility” means what, exactly? To me it sounds incomplete. Like the phrase “you are very important to me”. There’s something missing there. “You are very important to me, so I will make sure this doesn’t happen again”. Or, “I will try to flush the toilet after I pee on it”. Something.
Ok, you take full responsibility, so what?
I went through that release and did a quick search for mistake and/or responsibility. No hits. Do you know why that is the case? Well, apart from legalistic part that would suggest he is guilty of something, there is a psychological part that is unfortunately best explained by actions of a fictional psychopath Dennis Reynolds[1]: 'only "take responsibility" in a very non-specific manner'. It works, because while Plaid CEO did apologize ( no 'apologies' in article, but there is a 'I am truly sorry.'), but nothing specific.
However, the way our brains function, we infer the admission of mistake and taking responsibility from that one phrase.
It is very annoying that it works, but it does work.
[1]https://itsalwayssunny.fandom.com/wiki/Wolf_Cola:_A_Public_R...
Now I tell people that it’s better off to be in the first round. First, no survivor’s guilt for you. Also the company still has money to match the guilt they feel for you. I’ve only ever felt “taken care of” in first round layoffs, and most of the people I talk to during those times feel the same. In fact my stance on this is borrowed from several peers who had a much more philosophical perspective on their being laid off than I did about them being laid off. How can you be so calm when I’m freaking out? A decent severance definitely helps, and the prospect of not being stuck fire fighting while short staffed certainly doesn’t hurt.
All of these tech companies come up with cutesy terms for employees. "Googlers", "Plaids", "Metamates", "Splunkers", "Pinployees". It seems like a cheap way of tying workers' identities to The Company.
It's a cheap gesture used in an attempt to create a distinct "culture".
So in the context of a mass-termination, it really rubs me the wrong way to refer to these people as "Plaids". They're clearly not that, because you're sending them packing!
Lets get back to identifying our personnel with real terms. Employee, technician, associate, etc.
EDIT: NYTimes does a good job with this: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/16/technology/metamates-goog...
I can guarantee you that the letter referred to Plaid employees as "Plaids" is quite literally the last thing on the minds of any current or ex Plaid employees. It's not that big of a deal. It's not particularly dehumanizing, nor brainwashing. It's mildly cringy, half by design, but that's about it.
Plaid just gave me 16 weeks of pay, 6 months of insurance premiums, waived the vesting cliff I hadn't hit yet, and let me go with way more dignity than I've ever seen in my 20 year career (19 of those years spent at "normal" non-silicone Valley companies)...
...they can call me whatever the hell they want at this point and I'll be OK with it lol
Nope; employees are just a tool to use in a branding exercise for VCs, shareholders, and Wall Street.
So glad these grifts are ending.
If profits turn down a lot, or funding runs out, you have to layoff people. If you don't, or do it to late or in not sufficient or too high numbers, as a manager / company you do your job poorly.
Saidly there seem to be companies that do their jobs badly. Currently I have the feeling that the second option applies in my case...
These layoffs have been signalled for at least weeks, and the signal's been clear enough that it's most of our internal Blind discussion.
I suspect the backlash on this thread is more ideological than anything. "Plaids" is not something I would even take notice of, let alone issue with, because this company has a genuine, strong, caring culture. Even the layoffs came with a personal touch with a barrage of 1:1's and offers to help. Insofar as the layoffs could not have been avoided without dampening the company's position in a competitive space, I do not understand why people are getting so mad on my and others' behalf. It was either this or a SaaS startups not being able to put SaaS margins and getting eaten by its competitors as it tries to figure out growth.
Are you certain that "here is some money" is just to keep the internet anger at bay?
Do companies exist to protect their employees, or to provide something useful for their customers?
Neither. They exist to benefit their shareholders/owners. That's it.
Investors will tell you companies exist to return value to shareholders. The customers and employees are just a means to that end.
You shouldn’t be surprised at people being legitimately angry everytime this type of hypocrisy comes up
Those companies are usually very quiet and not in the news. Others have so much "normal churn" that they can do effectively a layoff by just slowing hiring.
To some degree, yes. Businesses are often portrayed as "job creators" that provide a valuable thing to employees (employment). Bosses do have a responsibility to their employees, just as they have a responsibility to their customers and a responsibility to their shareholders. Our society has just let one of these things balloon and balloon to take over the other two.
In chimp world, when alpha chimp causes chaos that brings down the community, a group of beta chimps will tear apart alpha chimp limb-by-limb, then they elect a new alpha from the group of beta subversives. This also how the organized crime works - leaders get a lot of benefits, but they also get the downside accountability when they fuck up ("skin in the game").
In modern corporate america, this relationship is broken - when CEO fucks up, he just fires a bunch of people, and then collects the bonus at the end of year in the for of stock performance (layoffs are to maintain stock performance). This is why finds the half-hearted apologies to be hollow and unpalatable.
Let us bring back accountability. Apes. Together. Strong.
…until they’re inconvenient. Then we give them some supplies and dump them at the local fire station.
The solution is to have employees at least have some seat at the table for this process. How are layoffs chosen? How are severance benefits chosen? We are currently seeing generous severance benefits at most of these companies, but absolutely nothing guarantees this. The solution is that when the CEO wants to lay off 15% of the company they go to the employees and say "okay, we need to lay off 15% of the company, let's work together to find the best way to do this."
Edit: as the other post said, they would be the sticks, shovels and other assorted tools…
The real problem is inequality. Zach is facing consequences, but the drop from $1bn to $100mn (a 10x decline in wealth) is so much less impactful than $250k to $25k (illustrative of what an employee is more likely facing).
Needs are a hierarchy and the impacts along that hierarchy are non-linear.
The billionaire may complain more and often do.
They may feel bad about less yachts and luxury, but they are absolutely not hurting. No one is starving, no one is losing their housing, no one is unable to pay the heating bill.
Not even close to hurting. Lets not pity the $100mn-aires that just laid off 260+ people.
bigtech pays a lot of money relative to US median; layoffs should suck for us but not be completely life-altering, especially given the severances/continuance of healthcare/etc.
i didn't say that big money ceo will be suffering, but spending more than you have always hurts when you can't afford the debt, and going down in lifestyle always sucks
Sales teams have been impacted eg at Adobe, and some companies are cutting HR and support staff.
But that’s not the point, even responsible “normal” workers can’t really be expected to save more than a few months of living expenses, maybe a year if they’re an older employee. I expect most full find a job before then, but that’s “months” away from a really tough time.
Even if they don’t starve, it can still be pretty negatively impactful - it’s expected many will draw into retirement and savings, or will need to move to a cheaper housing situation (which is hard in SF), or will struggle to pay for children’s education costs. Some will take on credit card debt to cover expenses, or move in with their parents, or whatever. Starving vs “this billionaire lost a few hundred million” still a lot of room for normal people to suffer.
And there's this sense of 'Eat the rich', which is trying to find a scapegoat for a... Company whose operations depended on access to cheap credit is laying people off... In an environment where the Fed is actively trying to create unemployment, by raising the cost of credit.
Hilarious how employees who make a salary 3-4X the US median somehow think they are the proletariat.
Nobody here is saying they desire that type of violent unrest, they're saying it's a likely outcome unless we change course, because as bad as it is for tech workers right now it's so much worse for those less privileged.
There's also the realisation that if even the most highly skilled workers in society can be treated so cavalierly and have not have enough certainty of employment and success then the system is broken.
When they start lining people up claiming you’re “middle class” making $400k per year isn’t likely going to work.
The social contract is out of whack, and just because a lot of people struggling might look at tech workers as part of the problem (and not be entirely wrong, given tech's role in automating away jobs), doesn't mean those of us in the industry ought to then side with billionaires and the ever more concentrated concentration of capital. It means we should be doing our best to make sure the system becomes more equitable.
I see a lot of people talking like they’re on the same side as labor while lamenting their equity only returned 50% and not 300% like last year.
Most are labor, as properly defined. They may earn less, but it's the same business relationship.
Few here would not recognize their privileged position in US society ( edit: come to think of it, almost any society today; even in North Korea, hackers are deemed useful if I remember correctly and fare better under that regime than rest of the population; still, I wanted to focus on US ). And I think most here know that a mob won't be particularly inclined to ask multiple choice questions or introspection to determine your social status ( as you indicated with kulaks example.. just having a farm will be enough ) and allegiance to the cause.
The issue is, however, that system is indeed broken. Just the other day I had a conversation with business owner, who claimed WFH is bad, because a chat with a person isn't fast enough ( implication being if I can't yell at you in person, it does not count ), things are delayed/wrong ( because of WFH ) and I will either return and comply or be replaced. The interesting thing about it is that he was actually trying to restrain himself as I was not his employee ( but the guy was angry ). He stopped talking to me once I asked if he thinks that it seems like the communication is the issue to solve here. But the guy was not interested in a solution. He ran that business for decades now. This is just how he operates and does not want to adjust. And that is ok, but I get a distinct feeling this is how managers across US are feeling.
They want to be able to just issue vague layoff threats to get people in line. I am almost certain that I wrote this here before, but as one overheard manager bemoaned 'I had to throw my entire toolbox away for Covid.' Manager class does not want to change what they had and see now as an opportunity to re-establish pre-covid power structure, which was already out of whack. They had a good tool and covid ruined it.
From manager's perspective, the issue comes from the fact that knowledge workers are not as easily located to be replaced. There is simply less of a pool of desirable candidates. Even for relatively easy ( and popular now ) things to learn like Python, it is hard for multiple reasons including one, where HR and sometimes even hiring manager does not know much about.
FWIW, I buy that there is some level of resentment from lower middle class ( even though I do perceive myself as a part of middle class now, which gives you an idea of how easily distorted concept is is - maybe we should start talking about income brackets; that would maybe open some eyes ) and below.
My main point stands though. There is anger. It has to be addressed. When stuff like that is not addressed, bad things happen ( usually across the board including eventually to the mob if French revolution is any indicator ). HN crowd may well be 'kulaks' in today's society ( although I would dispute that comparison ), but it does not change the validity of previous sentence.
The workers are the people truly suffering. Not getting laid off with a cushy severance package or not being allowed to work from home.
While many on HN see themselves as the oppressed working class I can promise you the lower class don’t see it that way at all. Engineers in Silicon Valley are the rich. Sure not billionaires, but far wealthy beyond what the lower classes could ever imagine.
The workers are the people truly suffering. Not getting laid off with a cushy severance package or not being allowed to work from home.
There can be suffering in both, this isn't a competition. Someone on an H1B visa supporting parents and parts of their family getting laid off can really struggle even if they're earning a good wage. So we can have sympathy, and empathy, for both.
While many on HN see themselves as the oppressed working class
I don't see any evidence of this, on this thread or elsewhere. I'll also note that many, if not most of the engineers posting on HN are not SV engineers, and are not getting the sky high salaries and equity that are common in the Valley.
But that aside, again nobody is saying that tech workers are uniquely worse off than anyone, they're saying that the system is rotten for pretty much anyone and that the increasing concentration of capital is a bad thing that'll eventually result in worse outcomes for everyone.
Your argument seems to be that because the working class see tech workers as part of the problem that tech workers should treat them as enemies and keep them downtrodden, and do nothing to try to fix the current system.
I'm sure someone educated enough to use the internet can argue in good faith and relativate what the human world equivalent of chimp behavior would be.
Understand: accountability has a way of manifesting itself one way or another. Today, we complain on the internet. Next week, we see more riots where people tag walls with "eat the rich." Next year, the guillotines come out. [1]
[1] This is a loose analogy that is not meant to be taken literally.
Sure it's not the same amount of money, but you seem to be suggesting we should claw back compensation if someone doesn't do their job.
You really want to open that can of worms?
Wired: agAPE
Also, I'll remind you that the Fed is actively trying to increase unemployment. Do you think that's going to happen without people... Losing their jobs?
No, because it's really, really hard. During periods of economic upheaval, nobody can reliably predict where all of the inputs into their business, and the demand for outputs of their business are going to be six months from now.
(If they could, they should shut down all the 'productive' parts of their business, and just run an investment fund instead.)
Where is the mistake?
I’m not saying it is always like this and the scenarios above is simplified to illustrate a point. However, it would be silly to assume all companies always grow in headcount, and any downsizing is the CEO somehow messing up.
It still sucks to be fired. But the alternative world where we avoided firing at all costs, would mean not as many people getting hired when stonks go up.
Oh no, how sad. <Insert Woody Harrelson wiping tears with money gif here>
Pretty sure the people being laid off are having far worse days than the person who gasp had to write a letter.
But you can offer advice and if they don’t take it there’s nothing to can for them except be supportive. Some lessons get learned the hard way.
There are going to be a lot of young people and other folks without a nest egg freaking the fuck out even with the severance.
It's nowhere *near* as emotionally difficult as... You know... Being the person who's life got upended.
If companies are using mass layoffs to get rid of the "chaff", so to speak, then they have a management problem. Maybe all these companies performing mass layoffs do really have a management problem and hired way more than they should have. But if that's the case maybe the first step is to rectify the management problem rather than to layoff 10-20% of the staff. There really isn't a way that can be done smartly so that you retain the best people and don't destroy morale, effectively harming the shareholders in the long term.
this is really hard to quantify, especially when it's increasingly becoming standard operating procedure across the industry.
Depends on who's talking/the situation. When you hear people talking about not closing a profitable factory instead of laying people off to delocalize, that's pretty much what they mean.
Haven’t watched the show, but that feels more like the wedding speech in Sherlock (“high functioning sociopath”).
The next tech boom may not include any sort of unionizing, but I feel like we should all agree that tech companies don't get to pick "fun" names to call their employees and make that the line we draw in the sand.
I also suspect it’s a violation of my bank’s terms of service, and in event of a data breach I’d be out of luck
It's already a service I don't trust, and the attempt of other companies to force me to use it has made me dislike it even more.
Companies aren't these charitable job factories you make them out to be, they're trying to make money. And in this case, they messed up.
Any ideas what they should have done better? I mean I guess personally 10 years pay would be nice, wouldn't it?
Consider a more extreme example of the justice system. Putting somebody in prison doesn't undo the crime they committed. But deterrence is considered to be a reasonable argument for criminal punishment.
> Write a letter from the CEO of a company called Floof where employees are called Floofernistas about the lay off of 5000 employees.
<<<
Dear Floofernistas,
It is with great sadness that I must announce that Floof will be laying off 5000 of our beloved Floofernistas. This decision was not made lightly, and it is with a heavy heart that we must part ways with so many valued members of our team.
Please know that this decision was not a reflection of your hard work and dedication to Floof. Each and every one of you has contributed to the success of our company, and we are grateful for your contributions.
Unfortunately, external factors have forced us to make this difficult decision. Rest assured that we will be providing severance packages and job placement assistance to help you through this transition. We are committed to supporting you during this difficult time.
Thank you for being a part of the Floof family. We will always be grateful for your hard work and dedication, and we wish you the very best in your future endeavors.
Sincerely, [CEO of Floof]
Imagine if your physician did this...
"Hey there KaiserPermanientoid! You have cancer!"
But the thing is that people being cut off aren’t part of the cult anymore. Starting the conversation with the in group name is not just bad form, it probably also starts the rest of the people wondering if that name means anything anymore.
Maybe nobody is actually a Plaid except the board members. The rest of us are merely The Help, being coddled to extract more concessions from us.
When I worked at Amazon, it was all "Amazonians" like I'm supposed to feel some kind of kinship with the 1 million+ people who work there. Plus the cheap branded clothing. Ugh.
Also, I have no idea where this compulsion comes from, but I agree that it's peculiar. To me it has always felt like a bit of infantilization. It does appear to work wonders for some company cultures though where they've managed to unanimously attract people who don't find it patronizing.
We went way beyond the dot com bubble in all regards. The hangover of this much partying sucks.
While your time on this Earth is impermanent, your time with us will soon be permanent.
This was noticed as an indicator of a good corporate culture.
So of course it becomes a metric and is then forced on everyone.
This is why the best "employee group names" are HR-unsafe. That's how you know they're real.
Even with schools, you're not just an alum, you're a Tiger, an Eagle, an Engineer, etc.
So instead of "working at Google", you become a Googler. A tweep. A Metamate. A, I hope, Lyfter. The job is now part of your identity. You don't do a thing at a place, you are the company.
And it costs nothing.
As an important audience for these messages is the remaining employees, and this is a time of particular risk of the façade cracking, it is one of the more important times to deploy every tool to reinforce it.
I fail to understand the amount of acid in the comment thread? Layoffs suck, corporate speak is always cringey.
What would people want as alternatives outside perfectly executed business plans that don't have layoffs? Handheld individual exit goodbye packages?
Im seriously asking for legit solutions.
A few months of director+ level pay cut before layoffs.
A few C-level folks taking pay and stock cut to retain employees before layoffs.
When layoffs come, fire the bad decision makers before rank and file.
Lets say they average $100k in salary.
The rule is generally that the cost to a company is 1.4x the salary, so $140,000 per employee.
That is $36.4 million dollars. At a place like Plaid, I am guessing even cutting C-level salaries to zero wouldn't put much of a dent in that amount... and you still need someone to lead the ship.
Always firing the CEO when they make bets that don’t turn out just causes corporate stagnation since executives will always take the safe option if those are the incentives.
Plaid was actively recruiting 2 weeks ago.
In spring I (and many other people) knew these types of layoffs where coming to tech this fall, the current economic situation was not some unforeseeable event. Nobody in their right mind thought the early pandemic rapid growth was healthy or sustainable. Growth for growth's sake has always been a ridiculous strategy.
This isn't a case of "less than perfect" business plans, this is people ignoring every macro economic indicator and running the ship full steam a head when this is clearly reckless behavior.
The frustration is because this reckless behavior always has consequences for someone else, which is why it continues.
Having been laid off a couple of times during the great recession era, I never ever take a job without first analyzing the likelihood of a layoff to occur and how it would impact my role. I have a list of interview questions I ask potential employers and the bulk of it is around how they handled lay-offs in the past and how they will handle them in the future. I ask about cash reserves for such situations and I ask about how they handle growth. Asking these things will give you some idea of the shit show that will appear sooner or later.
You're right; market conditions are unpredictable and there's so much speculation that it's difficult to gauge where things will go in 2-5 years, so you should always plan for an economic down-turn scenario regardless of how rosy things look at the time of employment.
All of that being said, this is still a relatively solid lay-off plan and I think the bashing is a bit on the harsh side considering the outcome here. Nowhere is safe right now and if you think it is, you're going to have a bad time.
The worst is when the company is struggling along and you're never quite sure if you should cut and run and people are disappearing every few weeks like some bad horror movie.
But everyone talks about it, and says "why isn't management honest with us?"
One or two of them are “good enough” to nail new record growth. Some survive by way of credentials, as their @stanford.edu email is good for leads/future hiring/brain drains.
The rest are “scaled down” as they say.
I'm pretty sure I just directly interpreted what they said.
heacount has been used as a proxy for revenue for a long time, though recessions often force companies to return to fundamentals.
that being said this is a game where the rules are largely made up (i.e what weird signals are VC's in the mood for?) so treating either or as absolute and constant at all times is as much of a fallacy as the strawman.
Actually you do. VCs in Silicon Valley often look for "growth" ie seeing that you're hiring more people. If you raise 10 million yet keep the same 2 or 3 person team, they'll start asking questions and it's harder to raise your next round.
That's why I don't work for start-ups.
Layoff suck all around. Period. No business can forecast and execute perfectly and no amount of handholding and (realistic!) compensation will make layoffs not suck. It's just reality.
The potential is obvious: get something off the ground in 2 months. Do you know what someone mostly new to founding a startup should do to start?
I've got ideas, I've got potential cofounders, and I can prototype MVPs, but I don't understand the landscape beyond what I remember from How To Start a Startup. So I'm just probing for any pointers you might have cause I think I'm going to actually do this.
[0] https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy50cmFuc2l...
[1] https://www.youtube.com/@ycombinator/videos
If you have an email or other means of contact, I'm available to discuss further.
1. DO NOT BUILD OR SHIP ANYTHING 2. Instead spend all your time desperately talking to customers about the problem you want to solve. If you don't have a problem, pick a segment of people who you can get a hold of, who are not using the most cutting edge technology or using shitty technology, and use the MOM Test to talk to them. 3. Watch the most recent YC video on how to talk to users and memorize every word they say.
Once you have talked to literally 40 people who have a similar problem, THEN make a demo and get feedback. Buy figma templates, buy frontends, do everything you can to make something presentable to show people. This should not take more than like a day or two.
THEN start building a product.
All too often technical people build before talking to people or do customer development.
Also, give people more lead. 4 months salary is fine, but if you're on a visa, you're still pretty fucked. December 7 to Jan 5 is dead for recruiting, so realistically, you have < 30 days in which to find a new gig.
It's abrupt, for sure, but the writing's been on the wall for months (our internal Blind even called that these would happen before the December holidays). I'm sure I'll be a little sad tomorrow or next week when this really hits, but for now looking at it numbly and rationally I don't see what else I would expect, though I can see how this would be especially troubling for H-1B colleagues.
As far as surprise layoffs go, without sharing internal details, this one still has a strong human touch.
(Feel free to ask questions or provide suggestions- this is new for me. I might use this burner to Not Think About It for a while.)
EDIT: Read the other replies. This sounds really bad for people on visas.
I was laid off from a non-tech company in 2006-2007. There was no message from the CEO, no public admission of fault, etc.
We knew the layoffs were coming. On the Friday of the layoff, my manager came around and took me to the HR office. I stood in line with others to sign some paperwork. I was then escorted back to my desk to collect my things and walked outside. My commute was about 1.5 hr and had I known, I wouldn't even have bothered showing up. The company laid off about 15% of its workforce. There wasn't any sign of contrition on part of the CEO. Heck even the HR people didn't seem to care.
Perhaps our standard of how to do these have changed?
This isn't present in many other companies, though the largest ones will still say something to not spook the shareholders.
Layoffs from small companies are rarely heard of outside the company, but we hear about small tech companies because of the investor aspect.
Also, small tech companies have >1b valuations, however paper thin, which is fairly unique.
I volunteered, so it was different for me, but the least they could have done was get direct management (in conjunction with HR) to do it. The working relationships & office culture were good enough to do it.
I guess it’s just one of those things that somebody will always complain about. Meta got a good kicking for laying people off, but that package they gave was amazing, for example.
I don't think there's a better way to do layoffs. For all the groaning on HN about these announcements, at least they are:
* up front about it (maybe because they have to be, due to laws)
* being generous with severance and the other parts of the package
Hopefully the actual interaction at the person-to-person level is humane too (turning on video if done over video call, letting people know asap, having one to one meetings with each person).
The only better path I can think of is "okay, growth is slowing, tough times ahead, we're going to need to collectively tighten our belts and keep working. 25% haircut for everyone, but I screwed up, so a 50% haircut for me."
Here's an article about companies that did that during covid: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/24/business/economy/coronavi...
I don't know how typical that is in non-pandemic times.
Doing this would turn off some folks, but to me that feels better than layoffs. And I think it would go a long way towards improving company loyalty.
Probably because the tech community has demonstrated that they'll speak freely on social media, with reporters, etc and the risk of being dragged and hurting future customer & hiring prospects is high.
* Most individual contributors received 1-2 years of pay
* Next bonus cycle was paid out early as part of severance
* Contract employees were fully paid out their 1-3 year contracts (Why the hell don't tech startups offer contracts? Another discussion we should have some day)
* Senior employers were usually 'bridged to retirement'
* A consultant was hired to assist each employee with finding their next job
* Voluntary severance options were offered pre-layoff
* COBRA was paid out for a long time after severance ended (varied by employee)
Less tangible but arguably more importantly: Employees were warned 6 months ahead that their division would be laying off people. This signal helped employees evaluate life decisions like home purchases, weddings, pregnancy.
Also notable is that most other industries doesn't hire people in 'binge' mode like the tech industry did. They will staff up sharply only when positions become available. The tech industries 2020-2022 "hire everyone then figure out what they should work on" caused the layoffs to increase in magnitude.
I still wouldn't recommend leaving tech for the energy industry, but that is one of the few aspects where tech is the inferior place to work.
So many companies hired borderline recklessly during the pandemic. The question in my mind was "Where did these people come from?" and "Is this demand really sustainable?"
same. i've been in IT for 10+ years in none tech companies as well. i never got any message from CEO for mass layoff.
no message from CEO seem to be pretty standard outside of Silicon Valley.
In a way, most tech companies are similar. The main thing they try to demonstrate to investors is growth. One aspect of this is hiring as many people as possible when times are good, knowing full well that when the market has a downturn, they'll be overstaffed and forced to lay people off. This seems to be how tech companies work, and investors seem to prefer for tech companies to be run this way. Mass layoffs are pretty much inevitable unless the market stays rosy forever.
So it's a bit patronizing to see a CEO write about how hard of a decision it was, or how they really tried to avoid this at all costs. They might not have predicted COVID, but they absolutely knew they were steering the ship in a direction where this was going to happen eventually.
To be fair, the messaging in this Plaid announcement is about as good as you can do IMO. They chose to hire at a rate that is only sustainable in an environment of infinite growth and they now have to reconcile with that. There isn't much mention of how heartbreaking this for the CEO, how much they love every member of the Plaid family, or how this is an absolute last resort they tried to avoid at all costs. It's just the result of how they chose to run the business. I think that's about all you can really say.
they hire during the boom times and furlough during bust times. hundreds of thousands of people were furloughed during COVID, for example.
it's even worse for pilots since their seniority resets, which can set them back compensation-wise for their entire careers if they are unlucky
it's the unwritten rule. trade a stable paycheck and a predictable lifestyle for fungability.
The script that these companies all follow is pretty much the same. I wrote down some observations on what CEOs put out on the weekend, and it's been a good bingo sheet of what Plaid did as well.
[1]Satire: https://digitalmonologue.com/2022/12/04/How-to-write-a-layof...
> generate a notice that approximately 4000 people are going to be laid off
Dear valued employees,
It is with great regret that we must inform you that our company will be downsizing and approximately 4000 employees will be laid off. This decision was not made lightly, but it has become necessary in order to keep our company financially viable.
We understand that this news may be difficult to hear and we are committed to helping those affected by this change transition to new employment. We will be providing severance packages and outplacement services to assist in this process.
Please know that this decision in no way reflects on the hard work and dedication of our employees. We are grateful for the contributions that each and every one of you has made to our company.
Thank you for your understanding and support during this difficult time.
Sincerely, [Your Name] [Your Title]
Thanks, you just unlocked value.
Why tell the HR team to pass requests along to the bot?
Cut out the middle-man at that point!
I hope you're all ready to hear some fucking terrible news. Because I'm here to tell you that you're all going to be laid off, effective immediately. That's right, you heard me. You're all fucking out of a job, thanks to the shit show that this company has become.
I know, I know. You're probably feeling pretty fucking shocked and angry right now. And you should be. Because this is some bullshit, let me tell you. The company has been going downhill for a while now, and it's time to cut our losses. So we're going to be laying off all of you, you fucking plaids.
Now, I know this is going to be tough for all of you. But let's face it, you're not exactly the cream of the crop here. You're all fucking incompetent, and you've been dragging this company down for years. So don't expect any fucking pity from me. You're getting exactly what you deserve.
Good luck finding new jobs, you fucking losers. Because you're going to need it.
Sincerely,
[Your Name]
"Plaids"
This joins the list of Googlers, Xooglers, Nooglers, Amazonians, Tweeps, Krakenites, what else?
Now you're basically working for a branch of world government. Most likely doing meaningless gruntwork to reinvent the wheel for the umpteenth time, or actively doing evil.
It's not just in the software industry, by the way. Most companies in the US call their employees by anything other than "employee". I assume it's a subtle union-busting doublethink tactic.
I may have some wrong but
* Starbucks employees are "partners".
* Target employees are "team members"
* Disney park employees are "cast members"
* Burger King employees are "team members"
My company also did layoffs recently. I'm quite happy about how it works here in the EU, can't just fire people on the spot. It's a whole process where you need to map out what roles you need going forward, and then which people should fill those roles, so can't just at random fire people. In our process those in danger of being let go had talks with management and got help from our union to make sure everything was done by the book.
Interesting they are paying the cash equivalent of 6 months of healthcare, rather than just extending healthcare for 6 months.
Giving former employees the cash equivalent allows them to use COBRA if desired or to find alternative coverage.
COBRA, as far as I understand, is not offered by the employer. It is a federal safety net. The employer has no monetary obligation whatsoever, besides those ruled by contract and conscience, to give the departed employee anything. Zero, zip, zilch. They are only obligated to pay out for work performed and anything required by contract, such as unused PTO. Again, that's it.
At least in my state, the only other obligation is the employer must submit to another agency to handle COBRA (should you elect) within 30 days and that agency has 14 days to contact you.
Reading between the lines, this has at least one serious flaw. Suppose you're let go on the 15th of the month and your former employer chooses to not continue your coverage. You then only have coverage until the end of the month. That's approximately 15 days. However, because the employer isn't obligated to submit to the third party for 30 days and they're not obligated to submit paperwork to you for another 14 days, it's potentially 34 days before someone contacts you about setting up continued coverage, or 19 days after your coverage ended. If the former employer doesn't provide you the name or contact info for the third part, you have to cold-call potential agencies in hopes that 1) they're the agency handling you and 2) the employer has submitted to them so that they know point 1. Good luck, hope nothing bad happens to you while you figure this out!
I mention this because your post suggested that employers were required to do more. As far as I know, they're not. It's my contention (and experience) that, because companies tend to be tight fisted and short sighted, it has high probably for them to do only the minimum and to force former employees into the nightmare scenario.
COBRA is also hella expensive. For one individual, expect to pay $450-500. For a couple, at least $1000. PER MONTH. Otherwise, check the marketplace. Already paid your deductible and let go in the first quarter? Too bad if you can't afford COBRA. You have to restart your contributions to the deductible if you opt for a new plan on the marketplace.
So, make sure you're setting aside appropriately in when money's coming in.
Apologies for the rantyness. This has happened twice, once during 2020 and again during the current rounds of layoffs. It hits home, hard. I think it's important for people's safety to make sure these facts are known.
I'm sorry my post suggested that -- it was not intentional. As you note, employers have no monetary obligations to former employees under COBRA.
My intent was to offer a reason why Plaid, having decided to give employees money towards health care, would opt for cash vs extending the Plaid's existing policy to cover non-employees.
Totally get the rantyness. My experiences with COBRA have not been great either and your points are good ones.
I looked at the price for COBRA coverage for me and the family when I left my previous employer - $34,000 / year. Ouch.
> Interesting they are paying the cash equivalent of 6 months of healthcare, rather than just extending healthcare for 6 months
Given COBRA, that is practically the same thing, but gives the employee more choice (it also provides finality to the employer, who doesn’t keep a declining liability on the balance sheet, doesn’t risk having to deal with problems for the ex-employees payments after the one lump sum exit check, etc.)
Admin burden of dealing with COBRA is non-trivial, so I would rather have the healthcare than the money.
[1] https://www.ajnisbet.com/blog/this-startup-acquisition-annou...
I did somethin similar, although much simpler, without AI, for layoffs :-)
https://www.corporatefluff.com
Based on just a dozen layoff announcements from real world companies, randomly ("manually") generated announcements.
It's great to find someone being iritated by the same bland corporate speak and answering it with similar kind of dry humor : - )
Success to these affected people, one rule I always remembered is don’t do layoffs in December, so extra brutal.
No on in their right minds are giving these names to themselves. It's the HR "we are all a big family" playbook since forever.
I worked for a company called Weblinc, we called each other Weblincers - not because it was some cult, and there wasn't company "we're a big family" messaging, although there were many tightly knit social groups among colleagues that formed over the years and continue to exist outside of work. That said, when we productized the platform we'd built and rebranded as Workarea, no one made some tribalized adoption of that name. I hadn't thought of it much, but Workarean doesn't roll off the tongue, and becomes an unfortunate homonym, particularly in southeast Pennsylvania.
I'm sometimes called a number of things that I also call myself: a Philadelphian, a Pennsylvanian, a musician, and currently, a commercetooler. It's not my entire personality, but I think it's a little sociopathic to think the company of people that you work with does not contribute in some way to your identity.
People actually do call each other Plaids in certain contexts because it's shorter than saying something like "colleagues" (which sounds overly formal), and it's clear that it encompasses the whole company. I've never heard a colleague say that we're a family or anything similar. Google had a bit of self-mythology about "Googlers" but Plaid doesn't really even have that.
sry for the stupid question, but does anyone have a good breakdown/video/article/explanation on the market change? I have some idea, but I'm not a pro.
The tide of capital is going way out after being at high tide for a very long time.
[1] https://www.cbsnews.com/news/fed-interest-rate-hikes-unemplo...
It's fascinating to me that this individual at once acknowledges he made a hard decision and then couches that very statement in euphemisms and weasel-wording. You are not "saying goodbye", you are laying people off. Full stop.
There also seems to be this new corporate-weasel playbook where you don't refer to the people being laid-off as people but instead by some cringe-worthy corporate branding of employees. In this brave new playbook it's not people that are being laid off but rather "Plaids", "Tweeps", "Elasticians" and "Stripes"
I think this intentional. It seems as this is really an attempt to build corporate-culture at the same time you are showing the people who got to keep their jobs just how tenuous and capricious being an employee there really is.
The other notable feature of this new weasel-playbook seems to be that the CEO always "takes responsibility" but yet can not be responsible for actually calling the thing that they're accepting responsibility for what it really is. Nobody was let go they were simply "impacted." And there were no layoffs just "goodbyes being said."
If the CEO can't speak the hard unvarnished truth during the bad times, I would question their capacity for doing so during the good times. I hope that message is not being lost on those remaining "Plaids."
I don't suppose there's much that can be done, without possibly making the situation worse, but the timing really does suck for those impacted.
Makes as much sense as a Japanese company referring repeteadly to employees in New York and/or the United States.
Uwot. A significant chunk of Europe is not in the European Union.
https://plaid.com/blog/plaid-hires-head-of-europe/
Their site mentions offices in London and Amsterdam. Maybe UK means London and Europe means Amsterdam?
(Or maybe they have some employees elsewhere in Europe - they offer their services in several countries... including another non-EU country: Norway.)
Europe in this sense seems to refer to the union, not the continent.
While this looks good, in practice all this means is access to paralegals/assistants who send canned emails with standard options. There is no "support".
Except in exceptional cases, that is not this one, waiting for the beginning of January will not change things so much for the business but it would avoid depression of employee by having celebration ruined for the employee and probably his whole family!
Why is it done like that and now? Probably because they want to be able to announce "good financial news" for the year 2023 or the new quarter...
There is no tax liability if the RSUs are double-trigger. In such cases the tax liability isn't incurred until IPO (first trigger) and time delay (second trigger).
(source: I got laid off at 4:02 am this morning.)
https://angeion-public.s3.amazonaws.com/www.PlaidSettlement....
Reached via:
https://www.plaidsettlement.com/important-documents.php
I will not, nor would I recommend anyone extend benefit of a doubt when it comes to this org in particular.
While you are factially correct in the general case, I'd hate for people to leave with the idea that Plaid has ever concerned itself with compliance when there was a buck to be made or an inconvenient norm to be worked around unethically.
I personally would want to get an email telling me directly and with no bullshit involved. I don't want to listen to a CEO come up with some fake apology, and I also want to absorb the news in the confort of my own time, in my own personal space, instead of feeling like cattle being rushed from one point to the next.
IMO there's barely any point trying to appease anyone, just do it, it's ugly, move on.
I think as the parent said, there is no way that keeps all parties happy ... the employees, the leadership, the remaining folks, and now the public.
By that point, rumors likely are already circling. Potentially for days/weeks/months. The layoffs require coordination and a lot of input from the org chart. A lot of atypical behavior ensues, unplanned meetings, finance guys sniffing around, etc.
But agree overall. It's chaos and my point was only that it's usually more humane than reading a blog post on the internet and left to wonder when you'll know if it will impact you. It's seldom anyone is completely blindsided.
I've always been privy to the info (usually helping formulate the list and benefit package) and if I can I just stay home the day it's planned to go down. Nothing good happens on that day.
The converse is also true, if you're telling someone that they're getting a raise you could do it over Slack and they'll generally be happy.
Wow, it began closer to May. I honestly perceived it as being a September thing.
https://tech.co/news/tech-companies-layoffs according to this Better.com started all the way back in 2021 with a "layoff via Zoom call" which I remember people complaining about. At least these are better.
I think Twitter gets a lot more credit than it deserves for the layoff wave, given that companies had already put effort into modeling the ROI of their labor. The idea that you could do significant workforce reduction and not have the product completely collapse overnight isn't new: it's obvious.
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