7 ms·

Yahoo has over 18,000 employees (and not 14,000). The extra 4,000+ are contractors. This is a scheme that the bureaucrats at Yahoo figured out pretty early: ann

• danso 14y ago
  Was there a culture at Yahoo that indicates that it would do the unusual: fire middle managers before firing the rank-and-file engineers?
  • xyahoo 14y ago
    The managers always survived layoffs; the engineers, not so much. Has that changed now? probably current Yahoos can tell, but I imagine there a bit busy right now to post on HN.
    • fatcutter 14y ago
      it looks like it might have
• spoiledtechie 14y ago
  I completely agree with you. Long time coming. I could see this from a mile away.
• freehunter 14y ago
  During college I worked at a Midwestern regional supermarket, and they were employing similar tactics. No more full-time employees. Full-time implies benefits. Part-time employees will work the same amount for possibly even the same wage, but it costs the company a lot less.
• lambersley 14y ago
  "The only thing we learn from history is that we never learn from history." -Hegel See Research In Motion (RIM).
  • gruseom 14y ago
    That's got to be bogus. How likely is it that Hegel said anything so succinct?
    • aaronharnly 14y ago
      I was curious too, and tracked it down to this. Only slightly more verbose than the quote! But what experience and history teach is this, - that peoples and governments never have learned anything from history, or acted on principles deduced from it. http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/hegel/works/hi/history2.htm#II.2 http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/hegel/works/hi/his...
      • gruseom 14y ago
        Excellent! Thanks. Interestingly, Hegel's argument is opposite to what the other quote says. The other quote implies that we could learn from history if we bothered, but we don't bother, so we never learn. At least that's how I read it. But Hegel's saying that people always try to learn from history and we should stop trying because it's impossible: Rulers, Statesmen, Nations, are wont to be emphatically commended to the teaching which experience offers in history. But what experience and history teach is this, - that peoples and governments never have learned anything from history, or acted on principles deduced from it. Each period is involved in such peculiar circumstances, exhibits a condition of things so strictly idiosyncratic, that its conduct must be regulated by considerations connected with itself, and itself alone. Amid the pressure of great events, a general principle gives no help. It is useless to revert to similar circumstances in the Past.
• MrFoof 14y ago
  >And then there the VPs: at last count Yahoo had over 200 VPs. Really, What do these fuckers do!? These folks simply have goofy titles. I used to have one of the world's largest banks (by AUM) as a client. They had over 200 "Vice Presidents" in one building, as it basically was their preferred title for "manager".
  • jrockway 14y ago
    At Bank of America, VP was one title below most managers. VP basically meant "didn't get completely fucked in the offer negotiation process".
    • jmount 14y ago
      Bank VP is a different situation, most branches can not issues loans without a VP present- so there are many people with such title. There is standard and there no confusion that this is a high title in banking. Other titles like "Executive VP" are used to identify actual officers. That being said- I would still be interested in hearing if everybody at Yahoo is a director and/or a VP.
      • MrFoof 14y ago
        >Bank VP is a different situation Not in investment banks, which have no retail presence at all.
    • joshu 14y ago
      Weird. When were you there? I was at BofA securities via the merger.
• veguss 14y ago
  Microsoft has almost 90k contractors, yes, really.