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One thing where the Netflix system breaks down is for some reason managers are never found to be useless or relevant. It becomes a small number of individual c

One thing where the Netflix system breaks down is for some reason managers are never found to be useless or relevant. It becomes a small number of individual contributors trying to support a larger and larger management base. The real reason is political. The people at the top fear people rising through the ranks so they execute people like a dictatorship. At my previous job everyone with more than 15 years of experience was pushed out and people with no experience at all were brought in. Now, no one can make the case that people with no experience were not useless. They had no skills. If it were a pro sports team, it would be like bringing in little league players. The idea is the little league-ers are so excited about being in the big leagues they don't complain about the inept coaches. It makes perfect political sense to have high turnover. What managers will typically do is turn over the workforce, but also scale down the thing they are trying to accomplish to meet the capabilities of their little league-ers. All they want is to be able to claim a 'success' so they can get promoted. They cut the workforce down, cut the work down, but when they build the n-millionth + 1 music service or chat app they claim it is a revolution. Executive management says, "wow you created a music service, here have $500k" and the process starts again. No one has the cojones to point out that the company has inadvertently started to play little league because the executives are trying to ride successes as well.

enraged_camel 11y ago
>>The real reason is political. The people at the top fear people rising through the ranks so they execute people like a dictatorship. At my previous job everyone with more than 15 years of experience was pushed out and people with no experience at all were brought in. Actually, the real reason is usually financial. People with 15 years of experience tend to cost a lot more than new hires fresh out of college.
- 6d0debc071 11y ago
  Assuming that both groups are competent for their level of experience: If you can't make more profit out of someone with 15 years experience than you can out of someone who is fresh out of college, then I really question how good you are at running a team. Sure, they're more expensive, but they can get a lot more done a lot faster.
  - seanmcdirmid 11y ago
    Many companies are inefficient at evaluating people right. Someone could be very experienced, but in very wrong ways (e.g. playing politics); not all, or maybe even most, ICs aspire to get better and better at their craft over time. There is plenty of dead weight. So in a sense you are right; it's just management is not very sure which experienced persons are worth it or not. Whereas that new grad is all potential: it's an opportunity to start over again and do it right this time (but they never do of course....).
    - 6d0debc071 11y ago
      I think we'd mostly agree. Though, I'd note that it's not just a consequence of some people having limited aspirations. If you're interested in working with good people, you should be coaching your staff to develop their skills. That process makes it fairly apparent to you who's a good performer and who isn't, and who wants to improve and who doesn't. If someone's getting to fifteen years, for example, and only then discovering that they've got to make cuts and don't know who to keep. Jesus Christ. That almost implies that they've made no investment, beyond money, in that relationship whatsoever. Which, considering people are expensive, is a bit like saying they've spent fifteen years burning the company's money.
      - seanmcdirmid 11y ago
        Most big corps are exactly like that though: they don't really invest in their people beyond the paycheck, they sort of go with the flow until something traumatic happens and they need to cut people. What is even worse is that the high performers get tired of the flow and will simply leave, leaving behind what is more likely to be dead weight. Much of the performance management regimes that come from HR are to avoid these problems, but it really takes good people managers with continuous clear goals from above...and good luck with that! Frankly, it's amazing that the system works at all.

enraged_camel 11y ago

>>The real reason is political. The people at the top fear people rising through the ranks so they execute people like a dictatorship. At my previous job everyone with more than 15 years of experience was pushed out and people with no experience at all were brought in. Actually, the real reason is usually financial. People with 15 years of experience tend to cost a lot more than new hires fresh out of college.

6d0debc071 11y ago
Assuming that both groups are competent for their level of experience: If you can't make more profit out of someone with 15 years experience than you can out of someone who is fresh out of college, then I really question how good you are at running a team. Sure, they're more expensive, but they can get a lot more done a lot faster.
- seanmcdirmid 11y ago
  Many companies are inefficient at evaluating people right. Someone could be very experienced, but in very wrong ways (e.g. playing politics); not all, or maybe even most, ICs aspire to get better and better at their craft over time. There is plenty of dead weight. So in a sense you are right; it's just management is not very sure which experienced persons are worth it or not. Whereas that new grad is all potential: it's an opportunity to start over again and do it right this time (but they never do of course....).
  - 6d0debc071 11y ago
    I think we'd mostly agree. Though, I'd note that it's not just a consequence of some people having limited aspirations. If you're interested in working with good people, you should be coaching your staff to develop their skills. That process makes it fairly apparent to you who's a good performer and who isn't, and who wants to improve and who doesn't. If someone's getting to fifteen years, for example, and only then discovering that they've got to make cuts and don't know who to keep. Jesus Christ. That almost implies that they've made no investment, beyond money, in that relationship whatsoever. Which, considering people are expensive, is a bit like saying they've spent fifteen years burning the company's money.
    - seanmcdirmid 11y ago
      Most big corps are exactly like that though: they don't really invest in their people beyond the paycheck, they sort of go with the flow until something traumatic happens and they need to cut people. What is even worse is that the high performers get tired of the flow and will simply leave, leaving behind what is more likely to be dead weight. Much of the performance management regimes that come from HR are to avoid these problems, but it really takes good people managers with continuous clear goals from above...and good luck with that! Frankly, it's amazing that the system works at all.