> as that can tank a person's entire career trajectory
Plus the act of career suicide by publishing company meeting recordings on social media.
Plus the act of career suicide by publishing company meeting recordings on social media.
Recording and posting company videos is bad in the general sense, but not in this case. There’s nothing sensitive or confidential in the video that was posted. The fact that she posted this specific video doesn’t make me assume that she would go and post other videos that do have confidential information, and if a company is embarrassed by their actions in this situation, that says more about the company than it does this employee.
I doubt this is career suicide. It might even do the opposite by getting this person’s name and situation out there.
I had a niggling suspicion the opposing views on her employability are because the commenters are on opposite ends of the authoritarian axis.
My thesis is people who strongly believe in (power) hierarchies as the natural order of things will see her actions as unacceptable, and an affront to social order itself since she has proven she can't be trusted to submit to the rightful authority regardless of circumstances.
I have no regard at all for corporate rules, but I do for privacy and privacy laws. Brittany may have broken the law by making the recording (Georgia is a one-party state, but she couldn't know where the other people in the meeting were -- New York is also one-party, but California for example is all-party), but either way it was poor judgment to release it without at least redacting names and roles.
As you noted, Rosie's name and title was already public on LinkedIn! So it's just the voice that was possibly non-public, and I don't think that's widely considered to be "confidential information".
As for breaking the law, I consider thr actions to be whistleblowing on a layoff disguised as performance-related firing (as evidenced bu the recording!) Realizing this information is in the public's interest, she showed excellent judgement and robustly defended herself against a sham dismissal that makes a mockery of norms: most companies have the decency to place "poor performers" on PIPs (even when the poor performance is due to stack-ranking rather than failure to do assigned duties). Firing someone for poor performance out of the blue, without giving them feedback about it first is immoral (and hopefully illegal considering employment is at-will. That could have fired her fir any reason, but I suppose they don't want to trigger layoff-provisions)
You'd only be bound by other laws if the recording was done at the location governed by those laws.
Either way, tech is in California, and she's definitely going to lose out on opportunities because of this. The good news for Brittany is that a bunch of companies will try to hire her right now purely for clout, so she'll be fine.
But "disobedient", is quite a word choice.
Salespeople need to face overwhelming failure and keep going. They need to ignore social cues that would cause most people to back off. They need to be aggressive and challenging.
Getting rid of this salesperson seems like a big loss for Cloudflare.
"We fired ~40 sales people out of over 1,500 in our go to market org. That’s a normal quarter. When we’re doing performance management right, we can often tell within 3 months or less of a sales hire, even during the holidays, whether they’re going to be successful or not. Sadly, we don’t hire perfectly. We try to fire perfectly. In this case, clearly we were far from perfect. The video is painful for me to watch. Managers should always be involved. HR should be involved, but it shouldn’t be outsourced to them, No employee should ever actually be surprised they weren’t performing. We don’t always get it right. And sometimes under performing employees don’t actually listen to the feedback they’ve gotten before we let them go. Importantly, just because we fire someone doesn’t mean they’re a bad employee. It doesn’t mean won’t be really, really great somewhere else. Chris Paul was a bad fit for the Suns, but he’s undoubtedly a great basketball player. And, in fact, we think the right thing to do is get people we know are unlikely to succeed off the team as quickly as possible so they can find the right place for them. We definitely weren’t anywhere close to perfect in this case. But any healthy org needs to get the people who aren’t performing off. That wasn’t the mistake here. The mistake was not being more kind and humane as we did. And that’s something @zatlyn and I are focused on improving going forward."
1) This is complete hogwash and absolutely cements that I want nothing to do with Cloudflare.
I've worked in enterprise sales. I've also worked with sales as engineering support. I've also been the senior technical rep that sales had to sell to, too.
3 months on a newbie barely gets you up to the point that you can probably go into a client and shadow a senior and talk about a couple Powerpoint slides without completely embarassing yourself. That's it. It certainly doesn't get you the ability to handle an account or do a close.
Some of our later best salespeople looked completely useless at 3 months.
2) This is the kind of shitty "we're sorry you're offended" apology that dribbles out of every shitty CEO's mouth.
The fact that Cloudflare is STILL trying to stick with "fired for cause" after being put on blast is a gigantic red klaxon.
How many people did they treat like this before they finally got their chain yanked over it? What's the punishment for the people who did this? And how do they plan to make this right?
I don't see any of that, thanks. Hopefully some of the Cloudflare competitors are ready to make hay over this.
I imagine with 1500 employees + ~160 a year, over the course of several years, you get a good feeling for which ones are going to make it. CloudFlare is a relatively technical product, I'm sure they are looking for the type of sales people who are going to more than come up to speed in those 3 months. Probably someone who already has had highly technical sales jobs. Maybe she slipped through their own hiring process. That is on CF, but I wouldn't hold them to the fire for that.
I worked in the IT department for a large porn company. It was literally part of the interview process that you would be exposed to porn in the workplace. We would filter people based on their reaction to that... most of the time, it was people who were actually too excited by the prospect. The point being that is that we made the working environment clear from the start, even though it was obvious.
After a long enough period of time of being in business, CF probably has a great collection of sales people. I've dealt with some of them myself and been extremely impressed. If I were them, wouldn't want to dilute the pool. But, for someone to go into an environment like that not knowing that was the case, and then being surprised at the end... something is wrong with that, which again, he admits to above. Either that, or we have to question her motivations. Given the obvious high bar that CloudFlare exhibits in their sales teams, I'd say both are on the table for consideration.
At the end of the day, we won't ever know all of the details in this story, which makes me less motivated to take either side. It is really just a story to make you emotional and get clicks, than it is about right or wrong.
Sales is a profession that anyone can do, because it's a ubiquitous life skill. If it's so easy for them to tell at three months the employee isn't working out, why can't they figure that out in three interviews? What critical info comes out in 90 days of work that can't be extracted during a 2 month long interview process? It's far more likely that they have no idea who will and won't turn out to be a good fit, and that these kinds of 'for cause' firings are meant to 'positively' motivate the remaining workforce, or are due to internal budgeting that is in no way related to the salesperson.
Zero sales in 4.5 months.
2% total was laid off.
This isn't really a sign of "churn and burn".
"She closed zero sales 4.5 months into a 3 month ramp."
She had 1 month, after 3 months of ramp, to close something. Based on that, alone... I'd still stick by my comments above. If she has even a single peer closing even a single tiny deal in that 1 month, then she's already at the bottom of the list.
3 months ramp.
1 months sales.
2 weeks holiday.
-----
4.5 months
Initially. But then they respond by saying that they are willing to follow up with her separately with the answers to her questions, but they don't have them there and then. Not having them there and then is a failing on their part, absolutely. But she won't let go. "How was my performance bad?" repeatedly. At some point in the video it goes from someone having a legitimate grievance to someone just trying to make a point and not listening to feedback or responses.
(I literally had a PIP where my manager 100% ghosted me through the entire PIP, and I created all the work products requested in the PIP, and had documentary evidence that he did not once look at a single one of them. And then when he sat there in the last meeting with HR, and openly, repeatedly lied that he'd reviewed it all and that it was of an unsatisfactory level and that I could have been retained if it had been to a higher level, and I shared my screen filled with "Shared with X. Last Viewed: Never" on GDocs... he turned off his camera and just said the decision was made.
Which it was. I didn't expect it to be changed, nor did I particularly want it to be changed. But I did want his "openly lied to both employees and to HR over personnel issues" on the record. And it was. There was no point to keep repeating it twenty times over. It vented her frustration on a personal level but I'm not sure it shows good business judgment on her part (realize that's not mutually exclusive to CF not showing good business judgment either).
Maybe that would change if more people refused to move on?
1) in the video is clear she was not a closer, so bad saleswoman.
2) posting the video with your face and name exposed?!?! Unless all this is fake, she is done.
1) The employee made a poor choice posting meeting recording publicly. 2) The company did an appallingly poor job terminating her.
Certainly this video makes me believe that cloudflare is likely a poorly managed company that treats its employees badly. As for Ms. Pietsch, she may be a low performing employee who made a bad choice to post this video.
She seems like a good hire: -smells bullshit -calls it out -articulate throughout -keeps cool, even while being fired, and while clearly (successfully) fighting back her emotions -defends her position, and doesn't back down when weak and unsatisfactory answers are provided
I can't comment on the quality of her work, but she seems tenacious and put together. She'd have done very well in the bank I worked at last. I hope she's swamped with offers from better companies.
I'm very much older than the TikTok generation and I APPLAUD this kind of thing.
Companies have been getting away with too much garbage for way too long by hiding it. Forcing every dumbass minion to realize that they may be on blast at any moment means that both the company and individuals have to start thinking about not being complete shits.
Either this is a layoff and they're doing something legally shady or this is a stack-ranking termination and we all know how to regard companies doing that.
No matter what the reason is: Cloudflare comes out of this looking completely terrible.
As well after Covid things are different like people don't and don't want to work as hard as they use to. We value our own time more then our employers time. A very small dataset where I experienced this is going to fast or casual food restaurants 15 to 30 minutes before they close. Some will cuss you out in a nice way for you making them do their job close to closing hours.
I do not at all believe this is unique to the Tik-Tok generation.
> As well after Covid things are different like people don't and don't want to work as hard as they use to.
Do you have any evidence beyond anecdata for this assertion? My understanding is the "great resignation" was people upping their salary requirements, basically the willingness to break your body and soul for pennies is significantly lessened. In other words, minimum wage labor became more scarce and/or just more expensive. Are you willing to work for half of your current pay? If you were, would you work less hard?
For the knowledge that we do have, per the person being fired, they were a diligent worker. Seemingly to have done pretty well after a short ramp-up period even. This is why the firing is an even bigger kick in the nuts, she worked hard, was praised for that hard work by her manager, and then HR comes in and says she was not doing well at all. I would turn this around a bit, perhaps the older generation feels entitled that they can treat people like this.
Also to me it makes sense that this change has occurred and or I and others are experiencing the same thing. If there's a worker shortage band it's hard to retain workers the rule change as an owner so you can keep your business going especially where there's huge demand (jersey mikes for example)for what your selling.
If you do this you're a jerk. They've already started the process of cleaning the kitchen because they want to leave at close like you want to leave at 5. Do you start something new at 4:45 or do you pack up? If you do this and really believe it's "making people do their jobs" you've graduated to asshole and they're treating you in kind. I understand that HN is full of people who either don't grok cultural norms or who balk at them saying "well if they don't want to serve you half an hour before close they should close a half hour early then." I'm not gonna tell you can't live your life that way but you can't be surprised when you eventually find yourself disrespecting someone by ignoring those norms and people getting angry at you for it.
"Closing time" is external-facing, and customers shouldn't be expected to know that it actually means "4:45 so the staff can go home at 5".
It's not a cultural thing, it's about clearly setting expectations. If you publicly state that closing time is 5, and you're not okay with someone coming in to order at 4:45, that's on you, not them. Trying to justify "you can't order a half hour before closing" as a "cultural norm" is just making excuses for poor communication, imo.
Besides, isn't expecting everyone to understand your specific cultural norms fairly... Exclusionary?
We all know by now that low paying jobs don't just pay poorly, but take everything they can from their employees. Closing at 5PM means clocking out, then locking the door at 5PM. If a customer came in at 4:45PM and you had to stop cleanup, start cooking, then cleanup again after 5PM that's a shame. Maybe you need to be better at your job. And you're a part time employee, so you don't qualify for overtime. Do better next time.
Service workers are treated like garbage, by their employers and by customers.
No one is making excuses for poor communication either. Don't you think that the kid mopping the floor would like to explicitly articulate in every way he knows how that it's only a real asshole who comes in asking for a french dip 5 minutes before closing? Or should he maybe a make a sign to put on the door underneath the business hours describing how, though he can't make you, it'd make his life a lot better if you didn't order food during the last half our of the day? How long would he have a job?
The thing about "cultural norms" (why not "norms?") is that expecting everyone to understand them is precisely what makes them "norms" in the first place.
It's "cultural norms" because it only extends to the scope of some population of people. These tend to break down when outsiders become involved, because one population's norms aren't always the same as another's.
This is why I have preference towards being explicit. If you don't want to make food after 4:30pm, put up a sign that says the kitchen closes at 4:30pm. Then it's explicit, and you don't have to rely on the implicit understanding of "cultural norms" in order to effectively communicate that you don't want to be making food later than 4:30pm.
It removes potential sources of ambiguity in favor of explicitly stating your preferences. This generally works better for all parties involved.
But we don't have the ideal. We have employers calling the shots about what "we close at 5pm" means, and employees who would love to explicitly, in very clear language, explain why coming in within minutes of closing ruins their day. But if they did that, they'd lose their jobs.
I'm not saying we shouldn't fix what's broken. I'm saying because it's broken and that while it's broken, don't be an asshole to people stuck in the broken system.
Overall and again I'm confused as to When is the appropriate time to go and get food from a place when their hours say 10am to 10pm?
Anything else makes zero logical sense when a business explicitly states business hours are 10am to 10pm. Throughout my posts here I've noted 15 minutes before closing I'm empathetic to and even explicitly asked the worker at the sub shop is it too late which should could've said I've cleaned up could you come tomorrow. Yet 30 minutes ..isn't cause then what's next 45 minutes.. 60 minutes..whenever they feel like it and business hours that are posted have no meaning!
This was never a thing before Covid ..15 minutes possibly but 30 minutes never and that's the gist of my argument! People are lazier and value their time more then their employers and or their employers no longer pay them beyond closing hours (something changed)! As well could be a mix of both.
I think that’s the best solution to be honest, but it’s not done everywhere.
Think we've been talking about two different types of places to eat :-)
So someone who comes in during that time and insists on ordering food means they have to clean then kitchen again and stay even longer after close. So while it's praiseworthy to keep your composure when you're not being shown respect I won't fault them for begrudgingly doing what they ask and conveying that.
What time is the right time to go in and get a sub or a burger when their hours clearly say 10 to 10?
Just noting my experiences this never happened before Covid..u work the shift you are scheduled and serve food til then. Now if the owner of the business is isn't paying them beyond their shift yet their employees are getting blamed that's not right.
Try asking a Swiss man in his late 50s/early 60s at a Swiss bank to do a medium-sized but achievable task at 15:00 on a Friday and see what kind of response you get. I had several under me, so I know firsthand that you'll likely get grumbling and pushback. You'll probably get the work product, but it will come with critical commentary.
I can semi understand 15 minutes at the sub shop and even asked the worker is it too late to make me a sub? She said no then proceeded to slam the meat, bread, etc on the counter, huff/puff and roll her eyes at me while her co-worker says we are closing soon. This same worker does this to many in the town as a handful of others complained about her in a FB group thread. She is still working there giving the same attitude. They are paid $20 an hour plus tips. After Coivd the employee is always right cause i guess they are hard to find now and retain.
As well when i pitched the idea of sharing battery power between two phones to Intel and Mark Burnett (producer of the Voice, Survivor, etc) on his inventor reality show in 2015 ... in 2019 Samsung added this feature into their phones (Wireless Powershare). As well created an idea in Feb 2013 (long ago lol) that turned multiple phones into one synced speaker via a web app..in March 2013 Samsung announced they were putting this same tech into their phones and in April 2013 Google invited me to discuss putting our tech into the Moto X. My take here per my experiences /intuition is that ppl do not work as hard and care as much in low level to even some high level jobs due to worker shortages and or their companies aren't paying them beyond their shift.
I know this will be donwvoted too :)