因客户流失,Flock 向员工提供买断方案
Flock Offers Employees Buyouts as Customers Flee

原始链接: https://www.wired.com/story/flock-is-offering-voluntary-buyouts-to-employees/

监控技术公司 Flock Safety 近日向其 1,500 名员工推出了一项自愿离职计划,补偿方案约为标准水平的两倍。员工须在 10 月 2 日前提交申请,预计多数申请者将于 10 月下旬获准离职。 此举是在该公司面临严峻挑战的背景下做出的,包括合同续签率下降、因摄像头遭蓄意破坏导致运营成本上升,以及日益高涨的公众抵制。Flock 庞大的车牌识别网络在被曝出执法部门滥用隐私、未经授权共享数据以及设备制造相关争议后,正面临严厉审查。 尽管公司将此次买断方案描述为给予员工“选择”和“自主权”,但知情人士认为,这是为避免因未达营收目标而被迫裁员所采取的先发制人措施。由于承受巨大的舆论压力,公司内部士气低落,部分员工推测此次离职计划可能是未来重组或出售业务的前奏。首席执行官 Garrett Langley 曾公开表达对舆论抵制影响公司文化的担忧,但他坚称公司的使命依然是专注于公共安全。

《连线》杂志近期报道称,Flock Safety 公司在面临客户流失之际正向员工提供买断方案。在 Hacker News 上,讨论将这些买断行为解读为一种战略举措,旨在通过“经济驱动的自我筛选”来排挤潜在的举报者。 评论者对该公司的动机表示怀疑,尤其是其关于优先考虑公共安全的说法。讨论很快扩大为一场关于监视文化的激烈辩论,一些用户将当前美国社会的现状比作监狱般的环境。另一些人则推测,Flock 的困境可能预示着 Palantir 等其他数据密集型公司也将面临类似的不稳定性,而部分参与者则将社会对侵入性技术的广泛接受归咎于被消费主义和加工食品分散了注意力的公众。
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原文

Flock Safety announced a voluntary employee separation program on Friday, offering a “generous” severance package to those who want to leave amid growing backlash against the surveillance technology company, according to an internal email shared with WIRED.

Applications for Flock’s voluntary severance program opened Friday, and employees have until October 2 to decide whether to leave the company. Flock expects to grant buyouts to the majority of workers who apply, according to the email. People familiar with the program but not authorized to discuss it publicly say they believe that a significant number of the startup’s roughly 1,500 employees may try to depart.

Flock is making the severance offers as it continues to lose customers amid growing frustration across the US about its sprawling network of license plate readers, which have raised concerns about privacy and misuse. In the last month, WIRED has documented officers allegedly abusing Flock to track former romantic partners and colleagues, exposed how widely some agencies share access to the system, shown how little is known about the manufacturing of the devices, and revealed in new detail how much information Flock’s cameras collect based on data from a dismantled Flock device.

Founded in 2017, Flock raised money at a valuation of more than $8 billion in a funding round that closed in April. The company has had many of its contracts either not extended or dropped this year, which could leave it short of revenue goals, according to two of the people. A wave of vandalism targeting its cameras has unexpectedly increased expenses. Without buyouts, Flock almost certainly would have to lay off some staff, one of the people believes.

In an internal announcement, Flock said the separation program provides “greater agency” for its workers and “treats employees with transparency, respect, and choice.” It also described the package as the “most generous” ever offered by the company, roughly double its previous severance offers.

Flock did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Some Flock employees have said they have received buyout offers in the range of tens of thousands of dollars, one of the people said. The package also gives employees several months of health care coverage and the ability to exercise stock options within two years after separation, a longer period than the company typically offers resigning employees, according to the email and people familiar with the offer.

Flock employees are expected to learn whether their applications were accepted on October 9, according to the email. Most accepted employees would leave the company by October 29, though in some cases Flock may ask employees to remain for another one to three months.

People familiar with Flock’s severance plan tell WIRED that some employees may take the offer amid speculation that the company, which has raised about $1.2 billion in venture capital, might resort to selling off parts or all of its business to stay afloat. “When you see enough of the vandalism” targeting Flock cameras this year, one of the people says, “you know the writing is the wall” that something has to change.

Flock CEO Garrett Langley said on the All-In podcast last month that “the biggest damage” caused by the backlash against the company had been “internal morale.”

“Because you go on to X or you go on to Reddit and you go, why are people so mad at us when we've been doing the same thing for nine years?” Langley said. “And why are they so mad at us for things we don't do? And we just want people to be safe.”

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