It’s interesting to me that an email from the new management asking people to justify their jobs that wouldn’t even make the news if it happened in corporate America is somehow newsworthy when it happens in a government bureaucracy, and people are now “shaking in their boots”
Like, I get how this might be terrifying if you’ve been coasting for a while but (disclaimer) as a person who tends to work at startups, I have zero sympathy
Do you have any examples of this happening in corporate America outside of the Twitter takeover?
I have never heard of this approach. I’ve heard of new management coming in with a strong opinion and firing people, or new management spending some time understanding the situation up close.
Also: Corporations don’t have a mandate to serve the public writ large. A corporation imploding itself through dramatic reinvention every 4 years is perfectly fine. A government doing this type of purge every 4 years is obviously fucking insane, though I assume you’re operating under the assumption that the other side can’t/won’t/shouldn’t conduct ideological purges when they get into power?
Most administrations know there are people with varying levels of ideological commitment to their causes and they accept this friction because relative operational stability is a feature of a democratic government, not a bug.
You should watch office space, specifically the 2 Bobs. Now replace them with a fraternity bro or an "AI system".
How would you feel if your startup got bought by a new PE firm and they decided if you stayed or went based on "justify your existence in a text message no longer than 200 characters"?
It would be far more humane to do this how corporations do it, which is tell departments "you need to cut by X% - go do it". I've never seen or heard of the new CEO deciding on an individual case-by-case basis, depending on what each person puts into a status update email"
The "AI system" is not making the hiring and firing decisions.
It is likely being used as a filter to identify possible candidates to look into further.
> How would you feel if your startup got bought by a new PE firm and they decided if you stayed or went based on "justify your existence in a text message no longer than 200 characters"?
Who cares how I feel? I wouldn't feel great about it, but it frankly wouldn't shock me. People make questionable decisions all the time based on poor data. Ironically, I might use an AI to help squeeze my response into 200 characters...
> I've never seen or heard of the new CEO deciding on an individual case-by-case basis, depending on what each person puts into a status update email
I wouldn't be surprised if Steve Jobs pulled something like this at some point, based on the anecdotes about him randomly quizzing employees about what they do
> The "AI system" is not making the hiring and firing decisions.
How do you know? Do you think past decisions to halt contracts based on simple keyword searches or fire people only to ask them to come back hours later supports the theory that they’ll just “look further”?
That’s because you know the people you work with and trust them (hopefully well placed) to have the same incentives you do.
If you had more experience in large organizations with political dynamics other than the success of your as-of-yet unproven business (things change when people aren’t worried about going out of business if they play hardball with some other part of the organization - most startup people know they can’t afford to shoot holes in the boat), you’d understand the traction: for example, if you worked at a Fortune 500 and some McKinsey consultant sent out an email demanding you explain what you work on, most people would correctly interpret that as “senior management wants to fire as many of you as possible”.
An email like that in any organization is unacceptable. It shows complete disrespect for the individual and is a clear demonstration of toxic leadership.
You likely work in startups for the opportunity to work on exciting new things, have a high salary with potential for a big pay day which as part of that you accept the stress and the risk.
A lot of people work in government jobs for the stability and consistency of the work, as part of that they accept lower pay than the private sector.
Their work I would argue is far more valuable to society than any startup and should not be devalued by people who have contributed virtually nothing to society by asking them to justify their jobs.
> A lot of people work in government jobs for the stability and consistency of the work, as part of that they accept lower pay than the private sector.
Speaking as a new dad currently looking for a "lower key" job due to the extreme stress of raising my toddler, I completely get that. I mean, that's the whole stereotype of "government work". But it also smacks of... a lack of initiative.
> devalued by people who have contributed virtually nothing to society
Who exactly are we speaking of, here? The guy who started 3 successful world-changing companies, or...?
People should be able to live/have a job even if they 'lack initiative'. Not everyone is a silicon valley perfect work unit. And not every job (especially not bureaucratic ones) require that.
> Who exactly are we speaking of, here? The guy who started 3 successful world-changing companies, or...?
The sycophants attracted to the chance to work for the guy who started 3 successful world-changing companies no matter what he's asking them to do.
Doing this on the scale of a couple of million people, with incredibly diverse roles is very different to a startup. That said as someone who spent a bunch of time working in companies and startups this isn't a technique any new management has ever thought appropriate in my experience, especially coupled with an ultimatum.
If you never ask you will end up thinking highly productive employees are the same as those not doing any work at all. It means the productive ones should quit asap.
> an email from the new management asking people to justify their jobs that wouldn’t even make the news if it happened in corporate America
This exact crap made the news repeatedly when Musk was pulling it at Twitter. It was considered heavy-handed, authoritarian, and intentionally traumatizing.
Like, I get how this might be terrifying if you’ve been coasting for a while but (disclaimer) as a person who tends to work at startups, I have zero sympathy