It doesn't matter how good my evals are or how big my contributions. It doesn't matter that there are multiple multi-million-dollar revenue streams which exist in large part due to my contributions. It doesn't matter that I have been told I am good enough that I should be promoted to the next level. Raises barely exist, let alone promotions. Because theoretically some other engineer could have done the same work I actually did, the fact that I'm the one who did it doesn't matter and I deserve no reward for doing it beyond the minimum money necessary to secure my labor.

Under those conditions, why should I - or anyone - do any more than the minimum necessary to not get fired for cause? If the company doesn't see me as more than X dollars for X revenue, why should I?

Not defending the process(the right way to break this equilibrium is statutory requirements for layoffs a la the WARN act) but that's why you see the outcomes you do.

Granted, but it seems like the current way of salary-first, performance-blind cutting obliterates it even harder.

Usually there is a hidden variable that you don't know. It is your salary. That is why it sometimes looks surprising when senior roles are cut that look extremely valuable to the company from the outset. Maybe they were that valuable but still deemed to expensive.

This is frequently the case. I've worked at big employers (comparable in level of corporate-ness to Google if not absolute size) where the layoff process, roughly was:

1. Aggregate layoff target gets set and apportioned amongst functional leaders, then targets cascaded down to the line manager level.

2. Managers fill out a stack ranking spreadsheet for their team across a few metrics including a boolean "diversity" field[0]. There were many rumors about the "diversity field", most notably that anyone so flagged would not be fired, but so far as I could tell these were false (see point #4)

3. People to be fired are developed based on these lists (I.e., if a manager has to fire two people, then the two lowest-ranked employees per the spreadsheet are selected.)

4. HR does a meta-analysis of all to-be-fired employees, ensuring that a disproportionate number of employees from protected classes are not impacted. If too many are, then some of the next-lowest-ranked employees are selected to be fired in their stead.

As far as I could tell, the only part of the process where any sort of individual, human consideration was occurring was maybe at the line manager level if they decided to tweak the stack rankings based on who they felt deserved to be protected. And then, to the extent that happens, you have all the problems with bias and favoritism that come into play.

0 - I realize this is probably controversial, but I saw it with my own eyes.

- layoff plans must be communicated ahead of time. Minimum 30 days notice, usually much more

- Needs to be negotiated with worker representatives (works council, syndicate if there is one)

- LIFO principle for layoffs, newest employees are let go first. Stack ranking not possible

- Any kind of discrimination is forbidden

- At a minimum, you get 2 months pay + accrued holidays

It's baffling to imagine that you could learn about your job disappearing from one day to the next, and be immediately left out in the cold.

In the United States, employers with more than 100 full-time, non-probationary employees must provide 60 days notice of most planned layoffs[0]

> - LIFO principle for layoffs, newest employees are let go first. Stack ranking not possible

This is functionally equivalent to a stack ranking in that it is a forced-distribution scheme. It is just based on a single factor that is outside of the employee's control. Say what you want about stack ranking, but people do have a large degree of control over their job performance.

> Any kind of discrimination is forbidden

In the United States any kind of job discrimination against members of protected classes[1] in illegal. Even inadvertently disparately impacting[2] members of a protected group is illegal.

0 - https://www.dol.gov/general/topic/termination/plantclosings

1 - https://www.eeoc.gov/employers/small-business/3-who-protecte...

2 - https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/disparate_impact

Is work performance not a key deciding factor? One could argue that’s absurd.

I don’t think the way it’s done in the U.S. is “right”, but i don’t think what you listed is right either.

If some employees are underperforming they should already be on their way out. That also is a process protected by law (no at-will employment here), otherwise layoffs would just be an excuse to expedite firings without going through the necessary steps. In short, being employed assumes you can perform at a satisfactory level, which makes sense to me. The flipside is that hiring is a much bigger commitment as people are not disposable.

Voluntary severance packages are usually offered ahead of layoffs, and include compensation based on years worked, so things can balance out a little.

The whole regulations are more about the social impact. Younger employees have an easier time re-arranging their lives and finding new jobs, are less likely to apply for welfare, and still have time left to switch careers, so this benefits everyone.

More senior employees have usually figured out how to get leverage on the employer over time.

Non-seniority are usually ‘cheapest is best’, or ‘do what I say, or else’.

Both have pros and cons for everyone involved. There is always some system though, even if it’s emergent.

Newer employees often see this as incredibly unfair.

If you need to hit a specific number, guess which one is going to be less paperwork….

Is it ultimately short sighted? Probably. But good luck connecting point A and point B in these situations when everyone is thinking quarter to quarter.

Yup. Must have been a horrific wake up call :(

I got an email from my company early on next Saturday, so I tried to log into my laptop which was now wiped(to my horror).

At that very moment I checked my DMs and realized most of my team was out the door.

No warnings, no justification. I had been promised promotion, I had been promised growth, and I had already seen a round of layoffs with promises to not do more. We were the "valued" members and we were needed.

Well not so much I guess.

Now I don't care, tbh maybe I still do. I want to, just not care though, and I am always prepared, if even a single bad sign comes up I will be out. But I don't know if I will still see it coming.

I just want to tell to anyone else in a similar situation, don't be sad often it might be a good thing.

I managed to land jobs within the same month and my next job paid me over 2x my previous one. And it helped me grow in my career.

I have changed a lot more jobs till date and I love what I do now, but I still often care too much.

I hope people can find hope here.

Also a couple of my friends had similar luck and one of my former colleagues also now has a startup of their own, they built it on top of their open source project that got surprisingly popular.

Best of luck, world can be rough but, I hope folks just don't stop trying to do something to improve it for themselves and rest of us.

And F execs, I guess. :)

> Google laid off hundreds of employees from its platforms and devices unit, the team responsible for the Android operating system, Pixel phones and Chrome browser. The move, first reported by the Information, comes months after Google offered voluntary buyouts to all 20,000 employees in the division, signaling deeper structural changes at the tech giant.

"I really was just a fuckin cog in a mega corp."

Remember, if you don't own it this is always the case.

ALWAYS!

I wouldn't count on that. The job market is really bad.

That being said I talk about my former big tech all the time too, so maybe I'm part of the problem?

You should never invest more of your time and energy than what is expected for your position. And keep your side activities and hobbies as personal things using your personal email and accounts.

This is also why you should not owe fidelity to your company and don't hesitate to switch if you have a good opportunity because on its side the company will not hesitate.

Everything might be good and you can generate money, and still the day you are in a redundancy for whatever reason you will be worthing nothing to the company. Like that, just like a replaceable cog. And you will be badly handled because "it is the company policy and we can't do anything than being harsh in such a situation".

The worse is that usually the decision is non-sense but the one deciding is not the one that has to deal with the decision and with you. So you will try to argue, and they will try to invent reasons to rationalize the decision that is imposed on them also, you will try to contest, and they will become angry to have their bullshit called and will double down... And you will feel bad, not understand the situation.

The only thing I can tell you is the that if you are in such a situation is to not worry and go on, except in rare cases, for everyone I saw it happened, the event was finally for the best because the next step in their life was better in the end: better job, better salary, better project, being able to do what you always dreamed to like create a company or evolve your career.

[0] https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/54305/the-cloud-corpo...

Welcome back dude and don’t screw up your jungian walk through the fire. You got this

Or is it related to the possibility that Google may have to divest itself of Chrome due to anti-trust enforcement?

To put it another way: Google doesn't want to be a software company anymore. Google does not care about making software, or products, or the people who make or use their products. Google wants to be a growth company where the stock price goes up by two-digit percentages every quarter. That is absolutely the only thing that Google cares about. Google has realized that the best way to make this happen is to commit securities fraud by lying to their investors about their products, and by drip-feeding layoffs to show that they're serious about their underlying financials. It's theater, playing pretend at being business people. The individual products are allowed to go about their business as long as they don't cost too much money, but Google doesn't want to make money by having good products that people love to use, Google wants to make money by being a hyper-growth unicorn again, and they will do anything at all to recapture that kind of growth even if they're slitting the throat of the company to do it.

Whether this attitude is good for Google or its users is left as an exercise to the reader.

the one thing I can say (again, from experience with having worked for google while engaging with the open source world as part of my job) is that the relationships you have been building up might well survive the loss of your job, especially if your next job ends up being in the same general area. also, i can highly recommend starting a group chat with your ex-team, that was really good for all of us in the time following the layoff.

Not much of a consolation, I'm sure. I've never been laid off, so I can only hypothesize what that'd feel like, but know this: this too shall pass.

For someone young with no dependents, it can be scary but doable. For those with kids? Not so much.

“Hey look, this one is cog is spinning at a cost $200k/year, why don’t we replace it with a cog from a low cost country and save some money?” Or “remove it and make this one other cog do the work of this obe?” People doing the replacement have to show they did something, as well!

The targets often aren’t what you’d think though.

Or has that term fallen into disuse now?

I'm not racist, but....

I believe you, I don't think you're trying to be mean, but I'm responding because I don't like how acting, "not intentionally cruel" has become the bar for how we treat people, and not something to be embarrassed about. I believe you, you're not trying to be mean, but you're also not trying to be compassionate, or understand the other human you're talking about.

But let's see how not mean you were, if you included a bit of understanding about where the feeling of loss came from.

> Googler...

Whole things reads like someone leaving a [community they cared about that was an important part of their life].

[You have my permission] to be sad about leaving [your community] but your identity [who you are] shouldn't be so tied up in [the people you spend most of your time with] that you're crying in a blog post online.

We all lose [things we care about] and we all get on with it. Obviously they're talented and will land fine somewhere [they have no attachment to].

I'm not trying to be mean but it's bad that [this] person [is so] upset to this point [about something I don't understand]. The corp isn't caring.

I'm off to do some coding with natural language.

Not sure how this is HN-worthy.

It’s a bit of a shock to me that he of all people is getting laid off and that too in such an ugly way.

A company will often try and avoid letting a candidate know that they are being considered for firing, or that the decision has already been made, until the trigger is pulled.