Quote:
Originally Posted by Wolfram
I think I read something similar about amazon's workculture. It seems so paradoxical. Companies cry and cry about how hard it is to hire quality engineers, then they have this culture of firing at the drop of a hat, instead of actively working with people to improve.
I don’t think it’s paradoxical at all that companies that have a hard time hiring quality engineers have a culture of firing people. It makes complete sense.
If you’re having problems hiring, why wouldn’t you take some chances and then fire the chances that don’t work out?
Most people that get fired aren’t just because they’re not up to standard. It’s almost always that they’re not up to standard and aren’t showing much potential for improving.
And, there’s the very real fact that if you want to have a high quality engineering team you have to be willing to fire people that don’t work out. Otherwise you’ll end up paying for it in lower retention rates and a reputation that makes it harder to hire.
It’s also likely that the companies growing and recruiting fast are going to fire people more often because they have many more opportunities to make a hiring mistake than companies that are a static size.
I might have a different background than many of you but I’ve always worked at places that fire people. It’s not a crazy Netflix like situation but people that aren’t working out generally don’t stick around all that long.