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Darkstar_k t1_j8fol8g wrote

I wouldn’t want to work let alone run a company that’s cutting costs either.

Actual efficiency comes from investing. Outcomes that look like efficiency are achieved by firing thousands of workers or paying politicians.

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skytomorrownow t1_j8gctdf wrote

> Outcomes that look like efficiency are achieved by

... reclassifying your toxic chemical train as non-toxic to save money–it probably won't derail and poison several counties.

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Champagne_of_piss t1_j8go2ji wrote

Isn't it weird how people keep doing crimes in order to achieve greater profit?

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smarmageddon t1_j8gpt5l wrote

It's almost like it's more acceptable these days.

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tictaxtoe t1_j8hs0or wrote

Have you heard of Enron, or any of the wild west shit that used to happen? It's still acceptable these days, not more acceptable.

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Ok-Welder-4816 t1_j8h0w9q wrote

It was much more of a free-for-all in the early 1900's, probably all the way up until the 80's. Like not even close.

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andytronic t1_j8huk1z wrote

We shouldn't strive for better if it was worse in the past?

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garlicroastedpotato t1_j8gesjc wrote

I don't think this is correct. There's a lot you can do by shifting people around and tightening up efficiency... but ultimately you can have multiple jobs that could be combined into one. In large corporate culture a lot of people survive by hiding and acting as though they have more work than they actually do.

There's only so much efficiency you can purchase and it has a cost. If you can purchase a 30% efficiency by updating a software... it means you would need 30% less people to do the same job.

We're about to hit a lull in tech where it won't be expanding largely due to a lack of investable opportunities. A lot of these tech companies have been trying to recreate the wheel on a number of products and basically about a thousand of them are all market losers all at once. Tightening up their operations will mean shelving a lot of projects that are going nowhere.

Could you imagine how much money Google could have saved if they shelved Stadia right away? Or how much money Facebook would be ahead if they never engaged in the Metaverse? There's all sorts of large projects you can just shelf in these companies that have no real value. Those employees can be reassigned to other tasks... but more likely getting rid of them and making them reapply is simpler.

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yesbillyitsme t1_j8gr0cm wrote

Here’s the thing that gets me though, so many of these places have cash. Apple can’t just tell me they can’t eat salary for 2,000 employees for 5 years while weathering until the next cycle.

Like I respect your view, but realize you’re parroting corporate defined normalcy; “This is just how things work”.

But why. Apple has trillions in cash. Trillions. Payroll and OM costs for a decade of 2,000 employees isn’t going to make a dent into a trillion dollars.

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dantheman91 t1_j8grdej wrote

https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/AAPL/apple/cash-on-hand#:~:text=Apple%20cash%20on%20hand%20for,a%2022.89%25%20decline%20from%202021.

Apple doesn't have trillions

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yesbillyitsme t1_j8gthfb wrote

Microsoft’s had 10,000 layoffs

I did an intuit calc that was generous, and ended with a cost of $387k/employee as a hypothetical.

That’s $3.87 billion for a company with $99b in the bank, that just bought activistion for $70m.

So you can’t float $3.87b for a year or two, freeze hiring and move people around?

To put it into perspective, would you find it selfish if a local Small business had $1m in cash, and it cost them $40,000 to keep 10,000 people employed?

Yeah people would riot.

When you scale it to working class numbers, you can see it’s a slap in the face of corporate propaganda

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systemfrown t1_j8h4lf8 wrote

And it’s not like you don’t get something for that $3.87B (or whatever it is)…send them off to innovate or optimize existing products. Every one of these large companies has neglected technical or operational debt that they’re ignoring and need to catch up on.

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srram t1_j8h4ejm wrote

Think activision was 70B not 70M

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dantheman91 t1_j8gu1aj wrote

I was literally only pointing out that your numbers weren't accurate.

At the end of the day, the company has a duty to it's shareholders. If they could complete the same work with 90% of the workforce, shouldn't they?

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yesbillyitsme t1_j8gunrj wrote

It doesn’t have a duty to shareholders… shareholders choose the company and accept risk.

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cbr777 t1_j8hcbjb wrote

The shareholders own the company and the company has whatever duty its owners decide for it and I'm fairly sure none of them think being a charity for tech workers is one of them.

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dantheman91 t1_j8gw6ns wrote

>It doesn’t have a duty to shareholders

Legally it does

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yesbillyitsme t1_j8gxd2y wrote

#FALSE: There is a common belief that corporate directors have a legal duty to maximize corporate profits and “shareholder value” — even if this means skirting ethical rules, damaging the environment or harming employees. But this belief is utterly false. To quote the U.S. Supreme Court opinion in the recent Hobby Lobby case: “Modern corporate law does not require for-profit corporations to pursue profit at the expense of everything else, and many do not.”

Emphasis because people need to wake the fuck up and learn the truth instead of perpetuating corporate propaganda

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dantheman91 t1_j8irzsb wrote

That is not what I said. I said they have a duty to their shareholders, to act in their best interest, not to maximize profits. You're incorrectly putting words in my mouth.

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KingRBPII t1_j8hu01p wrote

Combining multiple jobs into one may lead to burnout

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garlicroastedpotato t1_j8iotrq wrote

I'm not talking about combining a bunch of random jobs. I'm talking about combining like-jobs for people who have free time while working.

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Agreeable_Company372 t1_j8g7auv wrote

Efficiency comes from people caring about being better each day. Most people don't they just want the paycheck.

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Darkstar_k t1_j8i21pi wrote

MOST people working at cutthroat FAANG jobs don’t work hard? where’d you pull that from

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Gold_Sky3617 t1_j8ivo6m wrote

That’s not what that post says. It’s not about working hard. You can work hard to do what you’re asked to do even if what you’re asked to do is not efficient.

Developer gets asked to create something stupid. They know it’s stupid but they get paid for it being built so they do it and move on because they don’t really care about the end product.

Versus

Developer gets asked to create something stupid and they turn that request into something more useful.

In both cases the person is working hard and earning their paycheck but one actually cares and one doesn’t. It’s very common for people in tech to work hard at delivering what they are asked to deliver but providing truly good solutions usually requires that workers actually care enough to fight for the best possible end product.

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aws2gcp t1_j8jabep wrote

I'll agree but with the added comment that even someone working 50-60 hours a week will never have the time they'd like to make a high quality end product. Even with good tools and a knowledgeable employee, software is extremely complex and time-consuming.

So, you have to chose your battles. It's not always a matter of "caring" - sometimes, it's just a matter of time management.

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Gold_Sky3617 t1_j8jcfn6 wrote

Yeah totally agree. My example was not nuanced. Just to demonstrate that hard working does not necessarily mean that a person cares.

Because systems are so complex this really has become a huge problem. Major disconnects exist between what companies ask for, what devs build, and what end users actually care about. I totally get why a dev wouldn’t want to fight every battle but it’s become increasingly common for nobody to fight any battles and the end product just ends up sucking even though everyone on the project worked hard and did what they were supposed to do.

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Agreeable_Company372 t1_j8kjkwh wrote

I don't work at FAANG but does seem there is a lot of people who don't really have to do much to keep their jobs. Massive companies make it easy to hide.

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WinterStar38655 t1_j8hmcn9 wrote

Reddit moment.

Meta has been practically disneyland for employees the last few years. The employee benefits alone prob cost as much as the median wage + benefits in many other companies. They def have a lot of leeway to improve on efficiency.

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WinterStar38655 t1_j8hmygc wrote

Not to mention, outside of the very expensive benefits that FB offers, they have very high salaries. The median salary at FB including non tech roles is $240,000. No one complains when they get offered omega bucks ("I know my worth") but it is haram for the company to want more efficiency? 🤔

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Darkstar_k t1_j8i32p6 wrote

You think 240,000k is a lot, but obviously the employees don’t. They are adept enough to understand profit margins. They negotiated for their position - you should realize that they are at the top of their field, globally.

Don’t take my word for it - look at the article. She abandoned ship. She was likely banking 1m total comp yearly.

Can you see the whole picture now? Do you see the pattern? Company is successful, company sells out to shareholders, product tanks, company finds niche or sells. The only ones who win long term are the shareholders.

Apply game theory and stop parroting corporate-speak and you might find your own path to wealth.

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MakingMoves2022 t1_j8i88h6 wrote

1m TC would be whatever level is above director, not a C-suite. She made even more than that. Maybe 1m base.

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WinterStar38655 t1_j8ic8dv wrote

I am not "parroting corporate speak", I am denouncing your generic nonsense.

This lady made $26.5 million last year and there is no indication she is leaving because of pay.

FB is literally at the top when it comes to pay or investment.

You are just repeating nonsense about investing instead of cutting costs. While FB is investing and trying to get back to their pre pandemic efficiency levels.

A company with 72 K employees has a median salary of 240K usd (not including similarly highly paid contractors) but it is too much of a request to be as efficient as they were before they bloated during the pandemic? This is not a dickward "we are all family" company that pays its employees 40K/year while the ceo pays himself 100 million that is cutting costs so that the ceo and his buddies get an additional yatch this year.

Also btw, FB employees def don't think it is "not enough". That is literally the top reason they are there. Remember how I said that is median income. Most software engineers get paid a lot more.

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WinterStar38655 t1_j8icxlk wrote

I was wrong they had 87,000 employees before layoffs. And now have laid off 11,000.

Company is even more massive than I thought.

2019- 44,942 employees
2020- 58,604 employees
2021- 71,970 employees
2022- 87,314 employees

So they doubled over the pandemic

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GearhedMG t1_j8j2qst wrote

Generally what focusing on efficiency means getting rid of low performing (not necessarily people not doing work, its just the lowest numbers) workers, and dumping that responsibility on those that are left, thus eventually creating burn out in those left which become the next group of low performing workers, and the cycle continues.

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