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Bryan, Adam, and the Oxide Friends talk about the recent spate of layoffs in tech--the good, the bad, and the ugly. We stumbled into a discussion of the acute impact to those on visas with some great contributions from those who joined us live!
Show Notes
Oxide and Friends Twitter Space: November 7th, 2022
Tech Layoffs
We've been holding a Twitter Space weekly on Mondays at 5p for about an hour. Even though it's not (yet?) a feature of Twitter Spaces, we have been recording them all; here is the recording for our Twitter Space for November 7th, 2022.
In addition to Bryan Cantrill and Adam Leventhal, speakers on November 7th included XXX, and YY. (Did we miss your name and/or get it wrong? Drop a PR!)
Creators & Guests
What is Oxide and Friends?
Oxide hosts a weekly Discord show where we discuss a wide range of topics: computer history, startups, Oxide hardware bringup, and other topics du jour. These are the recordings in podcast form.
Join us live (usually Mondays at 5pm PT) https://discord.gg/gcQxNHAKCB
Subscribe to our calendar: https://sesh.fyi/api/calendar/v2/iMdFbuFRupMwuTiwvXswNU.ics
Here's the $1,000,000 question. Do we do we post this link to this space on Mastodon?
Speaker 2:I don't have. Well, that's awesome. No. I did earlier today. I mean, I think that it depends on the instant.
Speaker 2:You're on me. I think there's definitely some lag. But, no, I got some replies on yeah. I definitely I I got a lot of, interest on that stuff. So, and just to, preview it, we are gonna do our space next week.
Speaker 2:We'll be on Mastodon. So we wanna talk about Mastodon and about the Fediverse, A lot to talk about there, obviously. And then, Adam, you and I are trying to figure out where the next spot is for this because it's not gonna be on Twitter.
Speaker 1:We really like Twitter spaces. It's sort of been great. Or or It's been great. But what it but what we mean to say is we like social audio. And so if we can get ourselves out of here and and retain some of the conversation and the folks participating and all that stuff, but but get it out of here, that'd be great.
Speaker 2:Yeah. We're we're gonna try to chart for ourselves out of here. I think at least this next space next week will be here, and then we're gonna try to figure out what's next. So we'd love anyone's help on figuring out, social audio apps in the in the fediverse or not in the fediverse or in the I know, Adam, you acted like I made up the term fediverse a few earlier today. I I I've not.
Speaker 2:It is the fediverse.
Speaker 1:I choose to believe that you have. I choose to believe that somebody has been conning you for, like, years, and this is the biggest payoff.
Speaker 2:You know, I didn't wanna do this, but I am reminded of the first time that I informed you of GitHub.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah. No. Totally. This is totally fair.
Speaker 3:Where I couldn't Were
Speaker 2:you were you like, I'm sorry. Did you say GitHub? GitHub.
Speaker 1:I was like, what words are you saying? You're like, yes. A hub of Git. Like, I still don't
Speaker 2:A hub of git. Yeah. Right. Can you hear yourself say a hub of git? And I'm like, it actually is a thing.
Speaker 2:Other people use it. Like, oh, other people use it now. Are they in a room with you right now? Like, alright. Let's just and and this is I mean, you know, I feel that.
Speaker 2:Other people do use GitHub, hub of Git.
Speaker 1:Yes. I'm all for the hub of Git now.
Speaker 2:I I think that was exactly more or less what you said maybe a month later. You're like, we're moving everything to the hub of Git. So
Speaker 1:I actually still think of that often.
Speaker 4:Ah, yes. The
Speaker 1:hub of Git. Here I am.
Speaker 2:Right. Hub of Git. But so we wanna find something that's gonna be fediverse friendly. That doesn't necessarily mean, we we wanna find something. I would say, actually, our constraints on this are, I love we love the ability for people to drop in that with that that kind of spontaneity, that serendipity where people come into a conversation that they think they're gonna listen to.
Speaker 2:They hear something that is, oh, wow. I I know something about that or I lived through that, and they raise their hand and they speak. I feel like, Adam, we've had some of our most interesting conversations that way.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Absolutely. And and in so far as we can replicate that, just for not here, but that doesn't mean we can't pull in folks from here. You know? That we'll probably cross post it to Twitter and let people come find us that way as well.
Speaker 2:Yeah. I mean, you're being generous to the absolute conflagration that is I mean, I would say the wheels are coming off, but it feels like there's that Feels like that's not quite strong enough from what's happening.
Speaker 1:Yeah. It feels
Speaker 2:like all parts of the vehicle.
Speaker 5:But this
Speaker 1:is all this is all a preview for next week.
Speaker 2:This is all preview
Speaker 5:for next week.
Speaker 2:This week, we are talking I feel like we could do 5 different spaces today. There's got there is. So, I mean, get so this is only, like, we came up with this as our plan for the space only on Saturday and it feels like years ago.
Speaker 1:Yes. Years ago.
Speaker 2:Because so much has happened. So we wanna talk about layoffs in tech. We got a a lot we wanna talk about, wanna ask people about. If if you've been been through a layoff, or if you got something to contribute, definitely, volunteer to speak. We'd love to get your perspective.
Speaker 2:We've got our boss here, Steve Sitak, who, I know, because, Adam, you had asked me, did we go through layoffs at Joyant? Right. And my answer was the answer for the organ for the engineering organization was more or less no, and I basically skirted playoffs. But we definitely have a lot of layoffs to join it and, over the years and through the pivots and so on. And so look forward to Steve speaking to that.
Speaker 2:Also, Adam, is this a you know, you had your earlier intervention with me not providing an adequate intro for how are we doing on the intro?
Speaker 1:I'd say pretty good. Good.
Speaker 2:We're talking we're talking about d minus, d plus. Yeah. Exactly.
Speaker 1:We tend to sort of just ramble our way into
Speaker 2:the cloud, which is fine.
Speaker 1:It's our it's our thing, but, you know, it it's hard as an editor. Sometimes it's a fine word to start and
Speaker 2:stop, but whatever. We're trying to be better about it. Okay. So we we're talking about layoffs and tech today. It is in the I mean, I think what prompted this there were 2 layoffs that prompted this, and then a bunch has happened since then.
Speaker 2:But, 2 layoffs announced more or less on the same day, I think. Right? The the the Stripe layoffs and and the Twitter layoffs were when were the Stripe layoffs?
Speaker 1:You know, the Twitter layoffs were so tricky to pin down about when they happened because I think everyone knew that they were gonna happen. And then they happened, but they won't happen for 60 days or something. I feel like the Twitter layoffs were and are and will always be.
Speaker 2:They're gonna be the stuff of legend for sure. And they have buried the the striped layoffs in terms of the news.
Speaker 6:Yeah. Absolutely.
Speaker 2:Which but, these were studies and contrasts for sure. There are some that, there are some underlying similarities. That's one of the questions we got our mastodon. It was like, hey.
Speaker 4:Could you speak to some
Speaker 2:of the similarities that we're seeing in the companies that are enduring layoffs? I think we can definitely speak to some of that. But these were handled radically differently, opposite ends of the spectrum. Really? Is that fair to say?
Speaker 1:Yeah. Absolutely.
Speaker 2:Because I actually feel that the Stripe layoffs and I, you know, I I I don't wanna minimize at all the, the impact to employees certainly. And I don't wanna lionize the company, but I thought they were well handled.
Speaker 1:Yeah. I thought they were well handled too. And I saw some commentary afterwards sort of saying, you know, sure. These were well handled, but it was also leadership, the same leadership that is executing that layoff that brought the company to that point. So now are we praising these folks who for kind of handling well a situation of their own creation?
Speaker 2:Right. And I think that's tough. Right? Because I because you don't on the one hand, no, you don't wanna overly praise it certainly. On the other hand, like, if you also wanna recognize that there are differences here and, you know, we wanna encourage the Patrick Paulson behavior over the Elon Musk behavior for sure.
Speaker 1:Right? Yeah. No. Absolutely, unequivocally, yes. And there are right ways to do things that are wrong ways to do things.
Speaker 1:And certainly, the the Twitter layoffs, like, I I can't are are sort of unimaginably wrong.
Speaker 2:I mean, short of murdering your place.
Speaker 1:Yeah. You're right. I had not really thought of that as, like, an alternative, I guess, for this kind of dystopic company that you wanna run someday.
Speaker 2:Right. As a it it you know, stopping short of that, it's hard to imagine what you could do that would be worse than than Twitter.
Speaker 1:Well, you you know what they did actually was worse even than I thought. You saw this thing where they said to some Twitter said to someone who plays, whoops, actually, can you come back?
Speaker 7:Oh, yeah.
Speaker 1:Which is actually worse. Right? Like Well, for sure worst. Which which means like not only was this capricious and arbitrary and poorly handled, but actually it was a mistake and some sort of clerical error.
Speaker 2:Right. Which is like, wow. Now what? Where do we start with that?
Speaker 3:I I don't even know I don't even know if it was whoops.
Speaker 2:Can you
Speaker 3:come back? I think it was just more like, hey. Can you come back?
Speaker 1:Right. There was no there was no apology.
Speaker 2:There was no there was definitely error. No. So I don't know if you follow Gurgoli or or the Orash. I'm probably butchering that name. It's Hungarian, so I know I'm getting it wrong.
Speaker 2:Who do do you know I think do you follow him, Adam?
Speaker 1:I don't know.
Speaker 2:This is a terrific follow. So was that Uber, and it were a really interesting blog post about being an Uber, and it's got a lot of insiders, talking to him from bunch of different companies. And what he tweeted, not long ago, just a couple of hours ago, is that the, they got the software engineers who got the call. So several people were let go on Friday. I'm reading from the tweet now.
Speaker 2:Then asked to come back, we're given less than an hour as a deadline. Sovereign engineers who got this call, I know of all said no. Maybe some additional words. And the only ones who could eventually say yes are visas. I wanna talk about that in a second.
Speaker 2:Many people got a phone call with this quote, unquote offer and short deadline. Lots of people stopped answering unknown numbers to avoid this. Inside Twitter, managers managers, I hear, are getting desperate, trying to call back more people. People are saying no, and more senior engineers are quitting. And then just because it's on point, just to this is a tweet thread from his.
Speaker 2:None of this is surprising. As a rule of thumb, after you lay off x percent of people, you get an additional half attrition. Lay off 10%, expect another 5% to quit. Lay off 50%, not unreasonable. Expect another 25% to quit.
Speaker 2:I don't heard that rule of thumb, but, boy, that definitely rings true.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Definitely, I hadn't heard that before, but that's what it felt like certainly with Twitter. And based on, you know, again, not my personal experience. Like, I I asked you about Joyant in Execute Lift. I've never had to execute a layoff.
Speaker 1:I, you know, at Sun, we went through many rounds of layoff during Many, many, many.
Speaker 8:Dark times.
Speaker 6:Yes.
Speaker 3:From, you know, I
Speaker 1:joined in 2001. You'd had layoffs, I think, prior to that as well. In fact, when I joined, there were folks who I'd gone to school with, who who had joined a year previously, who had been laid off, which made for very awkward conversations.
Speaker 2:Yeah. When so when you joined, it was, we were because we had done layoffs and to his credit, I think McNeely really want to avoid layoffs, and we're just trying everything to avoid them. They became unavoidable. He had we had started laying off folks inside the sun, and, it was very hard to get someone hired when we were doing layoffs. You can Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah. And and I remember, you know, your app like, getting you hired required, you know, basically McNeely level authorization for the offer, which was not not, the norm, needless to say, for Sun. And I remember that the so do you do you remember the OBITS? I was gonna ask you about this.
Speaker 1:I remember we had the OBIT list like looking through the LDAP databases. Is that what you're talking about?
Speaker 2:Yeah. That we had the because I think and and you you heard this a little bit with the the with the absolute chaos inside of Twitter. This is the kind of thing you'd be inching your color on inside of Stripe. But the one of the the the challenges that you've got, everyone when there's a layoff, everyone wants to know who's been impacted. And not just merely from a the the the, you know, the self centric point of view of, like, do I need to go look for a job?
Speaker 2:But, like, I am working with this person or this group on this issue. I'm, like, I need to go to like, I need to do that work today. Right. Are they there?
Speaker 1:That's right. The pragmatic is the, like, non response on Slack because this person no longer works here.
Speaker 2:Right. Right. And that's, like, a very real issue, and I think that, did you see that Twitter had turned off their their their, employee database?
Speaker 1:No. I didn't see that. Wow.
Speaker 2:Yeah. They shut off their employee database, but no one could get access to knowing who's an employee or not. So nobody had the ability to know what was going on, and it's very hard because you want to on the one hand, those who are affected, you really want them to hear it directly from their you know, the people who bear responsibility for this. You know, the ones who got them in got got the company into the pickle and bear responsibility, the executive leadership, you the CEO. You really want them to be able to look these folks in the eye and explain what has happened, but But at a at a large layoff and you need to do that massively in parallel, it's really, really hard to do, and you also need to communicate to everybody else.
Speaker 2:It is, it's a hard problem to solve for sure.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And and there are 2 important parts of what you just said. 1 is that sort of, just doing the right thing, human interaction of saying I aired and I'm going to look you in the eye or, you know, do the digital equivalent and kind of do do as right as I can. But the other part of getting people into the, getting these companies into the pickle, you know, it it feels almost endemic or it feels like perhaps it's been endemic, especially at big tech companies. Like, you know, I asked you the other day, name a big tech company that doesn't feel bloated, that doesn't that feels lean, that feels like it is hired appropriately, and it's hard to come up with 1.
Speaker 2:It is hard to come up with one that you've heard of. Yeah. I mean, I think it they didn't know. I mean, it it I I mean, that not not necessarily glibly. I think that, like, the companies that have stayed lean probably do so with a lower profile, and, yeah, high profile companies.
Speaker 2:It's an and I do wonder I'd be I would love to get you know, we've we've got some serious veterans in the room. We'd love to you know, those of you wanna chime in, definitely volunteer to speak here. But, I you know, Steve, you and I, and Adam too, when we're all children of the dot com bust at some level. And, Adam, I don't know. I mean, when you went to Delphix, did the layoffs that you endured at Sun, did that guide you in terms of the way you hired at Delphix?
Speaker 1:So, definitely. So I I joined Delphix and became CTO. So it's, you know, co running an organization of, like, over a 100, like, a 125 at it, I think, at its peak when I left. And, certainly, I had had this experience at Sun, but then the founder, co founder and CEO, Jed Yuah, had founded a previous company, Avamar, and gone through several rounds of layoffs. And it was awful.
Speaker 1:And in Yeah. You know, I mean, for it's awful for all the reasons. It's awful, and he hated it for all the reasons that one would hate it. And almost to a fault, we were very cash conscious. Like Yeah.
Speaker 1:Like, that felt like some was a pretty cash conscious company. And and, well, by
Speaker 2:the time you joined,
Speaker 1:there was no cash left. Yes.
Speaker 2:It was ridiculous.
Speaker 1:And they were taking away our Wednesday morning donuts. Yes. But, yeah, we were, you know, Jed with every round of VC funding, he wanted to get us to profitability or at least to cash flow positivity. And, sometimes, you know, often not realistically, but did everything in his power to avoid a layoff. And to his credit, he did.
Speaker 1:And, you know, we we Yeah.
Speaker 9:You
Speaker 1:know, sometimes we had to be very lean and and and targeted, but under his tenure, never had to do it, except I would say they brought in a, they brought in a new CEO later who overhired, hired way ahead of revenue, brought and then brought Jed back as CEO. And one of the first things he had to do was allow Oh, brutal.
Speaker 2:Which is
Speaker 1:it's just gotta be gutting for him, a
Speaker 2:person who probably died, who sat
Speaker 1:on the board, watched, you know, this, the spending, which clearly he wouldn't have agreed with, and then need to come in to clean up the mess. Just gotta be tough.
Speaker 2:That's gotta be really tough. And, I mean, certainly, I carried that. I mean, I am like Jed in that. I I mean, we endured. I was gonna go count it, and then I'm like, this is gonna depress me too much to count the number of layoffs that we had at Sun, but it's a large number.
Speaker 2:I mean, we were you know, the it it it is, you know, 15 plus layoffs, over from the course of, say, the first one probably would have been, in 2,000, 2,001. And it no. No. It would have 2,000 would have been 2,001 and then all the way through to to the end, when when we were devoured, in 2,009. But, you know, for me personally, I that definitely affected the way I hired for sure.
Speaker 2:And for years, I in my I always thought about my organization mentally of, like, if I were asked to to do a layoff, what would it look like? Which is a terrible thing to think of. And you don't want to think that way at all. And but when when you've endured this, it really is it's it's it's talking.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah. It's both how you construct an organization, but also the ambition of the organization. Right? The kinds of projects you take on, the ways that you focus, the ways that you say no.
Speaker 1:And and I also get the tension. Right? Like at a place like Stripe or Meta where you think the money's going to be free forever. If we don't rush to cover some particular space, then we might get shut out. And it really erodes that discipline of being able to say no projects.
Speaker 1:And actually, same thing in Sun. Right? That that that's by and large how Sun and maybe I'm replaying history how
Speaker 5:No. No. No. No. Nope.
Speaker 5:Nope.
Speaker 9:Leon is
Speaker 1:in that spot.
Speaker 2:I think you're exactly right. And I because did you I know that you're that that I we had this spontaneous Twitter space, when Yuan took over, Twitter on that Thursday night. And could you and you'd be listening to that. Right?
Speaker 6:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1:It's part of the like, editing and recording it. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah. And did you hear Charity had a really, really, really good point that I on relistening, and I'm like, boy, we we should really expand on that. That well, she said that part of the problem with these companies is that there's a fundamental conflict aversion. So people don't wanna make the hard decisions, and they've got the economic. They they they have such a sufficient economic base to be able to say yes and.
Speaker 2:And so, like, oh, yeah. Instead of doing that or this, we're actually gonna do both of them. Yeah. And it's like but it makes no sense to do both of these things. Like, the you should actually do one or the other.
Speaker 2:Like, why are we doing both of them? And I feel that that was a really good point that I feel and so to your point, I feel we saw that a lot at Sun. And I feel we've seen a lot of these other tech companies, which is part of the reason why the other problem with these layoffs and I've got no idea. I can't speak how it was on Truly and Stripe. But I think one of the things that gets really frustrating when you're in a layoff is I'm I'm not sure if we coin peanut butter layoff, is that a term that exists outside of Sun?
Speaker 2:I mean, maybe it is. Is that an obvious thing?
Speaker 1:Do you know I've I've heard it from other tech companies. Yeah. So so they're actually also like, VMware, which is also, I feel like, in the Sun lexicon, like tree, like family tree, like they say a lot of stuff that we used to say.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So I don't know where that comes from, but you know what I mean in terms of a peanut butter layoff. Yeah. Just like
Speaker 1:a little bit from each group. Right?
Speaker 2:A little bit from each group.
Speaker 5:Right.
Speaker 2:Right. And when you've worked at a company that's a yes and company, that's like, but we've got a bunch of these things that don't make sense. Like, we actually need to stop doing these three things don't make sense and we need to stop doing them. Instead, you're kinda taking something out of everybody, which can and I also and I mean, truthfully, early at Sun, the early layoffs were pretty easy because there, you know, there have been a a lot of reckless growth and the the you know, it was pretty easy to find the things that that we needed to not do. And you so it is kind of like, you know, it's and people were kinda feel happy to be laid off because, you know, the job market was still hot.
Speaker 2:But as, like, you get to the you know, the 2nd layoff, 3rd layoff, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, and you're going into, like, yeah. Now we're getting into muscle and more muscle and, like, oh, bone. That's definitely bone and, like, oh, that was a limb that we just sawed off. You know, you're getting deeper and and and deeper and deeper. I think then then when you're going peanut butter and you're not making hard decisions, that is a that that that's a major, that's a problem.
Speaker 2:It's super frustrating for a mixed morale, I think, even worse than it would be otherwise.
Speaker 1:That's right. No. That that just compounds Cherry's point about the aversion to making these hard decisions. Because because saying we're gonna take 5 or 10 or 15% from everywhere is kicking that can down the road. And it's the opposite of focus.
Speaker 1:Right. I think I learned this quote from you, Brian, where you said focus is what you don't do. Like focus is determining the things you're not going to do. And if that is the root of the problem, then you're just avoiding the root.
Speaker 2:Well and that's not for me. That's from Steve Jobs in his WWDC 1997 keynote. That's him returning to Apple saying, focus is saying no and saying, here are the things we're not gonna do. And, you know, if people haven't seen that keynote, it is mesmerizing. And it's, you know, I have you watched that keynote recently, by the way?
Speaker 1:No. I haven't.
Speaker 2:Have you seen it? I mean, it's it is it's kind of amazing and first of all, you you forget what a kind of a big dude Steve Jobs was. Like, he was you know what I mean? Like, he was not he's big. He's healthy.
Speaker 2:And then you also, I think, forget I I I really actually you know, I feel like we've talked a lot about jobs in this, rightfully so. But we and Steve Jobs is the next big thing, obviously. You know, I think Jobs is a is a complicated figure. There's a great humanity to him that I feel has gotten forgotten by some of those who believe they are proponents of kind of his way of thinking when they're proposed to him is pretty barbaric. I mean, I could not and I'm sorry to just did you see DHH's thing?
Speaker 2:Are we just are we getting Sorry.
Speaker 1:I did and I I but I but I couldn't tell you what it was.
Speaker 2:Comparing Musk's Musk coming to Twitter with Jobs' return to Apple. It's like, are you fucking kidding me?
Speaker 1:No. I didn't see that one. I I think I saw a different, in the in the words of our guest, Steve O'Grady last week or the week before, hustle porn. I think DHH kind of talking about, you know, focus and hard driving and and, that kind of.
Speaker 4:You know
Speaker 2:the term that I love for that? Have you heard?
Speaker 1:That's great.
Speaker 2:I think is a great one. But the, yeah. No. That was just totally nauseating. And that keynote is worth watching because Jobs is talking about doing some really tough things, but he's not letting go of his fundamental humanity of, like, this is like I get like, people are, you know, we we've kind of done a disservice to do this group by not being direct with them.
Speaker 2:And, yeah, like, you know, the fact that and I wasn't conducting a layoff in that keynote, but more talking about things that they weren't gonna go do. But I think you cannot lose track of the fact that you've got a human being on the other side of this. Someone with kids and potentially with a with a family or with a spouse or with with responsibilities and a meal. Someone who's gonna be who's gonna gonna have a lot of anxiety about what's next. And I do feel that that and it's hard, but you you cannot lose track of that humanity.
Speaker 2:We've seen some people lose track of that humanity. Certainly, at at, the Twitter layoffs could not have been more inhumane.
Speaker 5:Yeah. I mean, to that point, I
Speaker 1:mean, I assume you feel the same way, Brian, but when one of the reasons I wanted to always avoid a layoff and be be cautious of that was that I didn't just feel like I had a commitment to the person, but that they had made a commitment to me that there was this bilateral relationship between employer and employee. And this is not like the libertarian Ayn Rand view of the world. This is kind of a softer, I think more empathetic view. But, to just like say we're trimming folks, we're cutting folks is so dehumanizing for these folks who believed in you, believed in the vision, believed in the company and in many cases took risks or made sacrifices to do that.
Speaker 2:Totally. And I I totally agree with you but you like it's it's a struggle to find actually the a euphemism that's not demeaning. I mean, clearly, like, trimming is you there are lots of, like, demeaning. I mean and I feel like, you know, right sizing was something that was kinda I don't know if you remember that one from, like, the nineties. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Oh, god. I mean oh, god. Just nauseating. I mean, it's hard to find any kind of tone more demeaning than what what Twitter took. I so on that note, something I liked that I don't think I've seen before again.
Speaker 2:I'm not trying to lionize them, but something I liked about what Stripe had done is that the establishing an alumni email address, I thought that was really interesting. Did you see that? What'd you think of that?
Speaker 1:I I I think that's great. I think having, like I mean and it also speaks to, sort of every ex Stripe person I've ever met. It's sort of like they they do have this almost collegiate kind of, feelings towards Stripe. I'm sure, like, lots of folks leave on bad terms, but I don't know that I've ever met them. Like, most of the x stripe folks I've met sort of want that association.
Speaker 2:Yeah. And I think I mean, on the one hand, you know, alumni, there's a bit of a euphemism there too. It's like, hey, pal. I didn't graduate. You fucking fired me, bro.
Speaker 2:Like, I I sorry. Where's my cap and gown? Could someone you know? The, so I the one hand, you know, but the other it's like, it is saying that, hey. Like, you are you for a portion of your career, you were a part of this effort, and you should be able to have your your head held high for your role in this effort.
Speaker 2:And I wanna support the fact that that you that you were a part of this, and I can't do it economically. I mean, it's where,
Speaker 5:you know, people, I think, can rightfully
Speaker 2:criticize Stripe for, hey. Did is this something that they actually had to do? Will they act economically, did they have any alternative? Because for me personally, I will say that, like and and this would be the thing that would be kind of interesting to know. I mean, for me, personally, I will avoid a layoff.
Speaker 2:I mean, I will try I mean, we will I I will do in my career whatever I can possibly do to avoid a layoff. And I know probably to a fault, which is part of the reason why I end up being very Depression era about the way I hire, the way we hire. I should say, Steve, I I think I'm gonna I think I can safely speak on behalf of you when
Speaker 6:I say that, that
Speaker 2:you and I have the same disposition of that. But, Steve, you you do actually weigh a bunch of folks off at Joant. Do you wanna speak to that a little bit?
Speaker 3:Yeah. That that was, that was not fun. We had a couple of rounds of layoffs at Joyant, and, they kinda tracked to a couple different areas in the company. So, the the first that we had, that stemmed from, you know, kind of a similar behavior to what we've seen in, certainly, the cloud SaaS space, but, you know, in in most every industry when money was free and the incentive structure from investors was growth at any cost. So you almost it it wasn't even that there was, that it made sense to grow companies quickly.
Speaker 3:I think you could also argue that the investors in these companies would punish companies that were not growing fast enough. Even or that were not growing
Speaker 2:too fast. Yeah.
Speaker 3:And that's to take nothing. I mean, that's to to to excuse away none of how we got here in in a bunch of places. But in, in that in the first couple of years while we were at Joyant, the there there was a a a push to grow the company internationally. And, suffice it to
Speaker 2:say,
Speaker 3:I think one
Speaker 5:of the
Speaker 3:biggest one of the one of the the big flaws in in in hindsight there was also kinda felt in real time, but was that there was not real product market fit for the product. And there was a bunch of organizational building to go sell the product that was going to be a fit for this this market. And so that meant yeah. And there's, you know, there's also probably good ways and bad ways you can do that, and I think probably demonstrated more on the latter, which, involved, you know, setting up beachheads and kind of major parts of the world and getting glistening offices and, and and kinda staffing up with a lot of sales and go to market folks, all kind of readying for, for for this enterprise software product. And And
Speaker 2:to be clear, we were not founders of joint. So that's the question. So I I guess I'll be very, very, very clear. You were not founders of these are not decisions that Steve and I made.
Speaker 6:We were
Speaker 2:Yeah. The ones left to
Speaker 5:clean it up. Yeah. Steve, especially.
Speaker 2:So the the, the
Speaker 3:the first layoff was was particular I mean, they're all I mean, it's just it's it's it's really tough, always. And I was just even less prepared for the first one because, a, I'd never laid anyone off before. Never never been part of the process of of that happening. And it was just kind of a directive from on high of, like, you know, here here's the packet, and you kinda need to go travel around the world and and kinda let these teams know that they're gonna be let go.
Speaker 2:And did we have a CEO at this time, or was this were you reporting to the chair
Speaker 3:at this point? This was reported to the chair. This is the office
Speaker 9:of the
Speaker 3:CEO that we were reporting to. And, so chair, chair gave a a couple of folders to, to to to march off with, and I was sick to my stomach. I mean, it was such an awful feeling, kind of being the harbinger of what was to come and, you know, having to go out there and, you know, sit down. These folks, of course, are already twitchy because things had not been going well in the company, and having to kinda go through conversation after conversation. And was pretty ill prepared for it because I had not gone through it before and probably did a bunch of things.
Speaker 3:It certainly could have done things better, but just was, you know, it was it was really hard. It was really, really hard, and and it affected a bunch of folks. And then we kind of got through that period. The new CEO came in, and we you know, company got kind of back on a a growth trajectory.
Speaker 2:New CEO came in after a 6 month protracted search where you and I learned where we we learned the type of CEOs that are attracted to a company that doesn't have a CEO, which is to say not great CEOs. We have creditors. Yes. We got very lucky, actually. Ultimately, the CEO we got actually was was because he's very good for the company and very very earnest, heartfelt guy.
Speaker 2:And, But it was a protracted period where there was no charge.
Speaker 3:But I think, like, the because we even you were talking earlier about the these things that sometimes kind of get they get kinda pulled together, which is, how you ended up in a position where you had to lay people off and then how you actually how you go through and and deal with, the the the the the layoffs themselves. And I think it is helpful to kinda pull those apart. And over time, I began to appreciate that, like, regardless of why you're here, you know, the the focusing first and foremost on how you go about it and, is is so important. And also, you know, I think we're seeing some of this now where you've got companies that are saying, like, hey. Sorry.
Speaker 3:Business was inefficient. We had to move quickly. Made a you know, unlike others, we can make clear cut decisions and move fast. And, you know, what you kind of begin to appreciate is that, like, being decent, like, not only is it the right thing to do, but it's, like, not expensive. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Like, it it it really isn't costly in time. And in the in the grand scheme of things, when you're having to doubt when the business has to kind of change in shape and size to be able to accommodate whatever got you there, whether it was economic downturn, a bunch of customers going away, overhiring too fast in a period in which, you know, you thought, like, the the the something was never gonna end. Like, actually being thoughtful about how you are communicating and engaging with folks and then how you're going to compensate people, but also, I I I really you know, like, you all did appreciated sort of the Stripe approach of making sure that, you know, folks understood. Like, where do I go when I have questions? And and are are there people that can help me as I'm trying to figure out what the transition looks like?
Speaker 3:And, you know, again, kind of honoring folks for their contribution and being part of Stripe long after they've left. But it's it it is, you know, you and and it's funny because if you actually are decent and you, you know, got, god forbid, generous. But, you know, if you're just decent with folks, if you did have to call folks and say, like, hey. Things have changed a bit, and we might actually be able to add some folks back to the organization, which, again, totally atrocious just how bungled this whole Twitter situation was. But if you're decent with folks on the way out, there is a chance folks might be interested in, like, coming back to your organization, whether it's in a day, a week, a month, month, you know, it doesn't take too many turns in in business to appreciate that it's just like a small world.
Speaker 1:Yeah. I think that's right, Steve. And and the and the people to whom you're being decent, I think that that fulfills one obligation, but it also shows the people who you're trying to retain the character of the company.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And and to to kinda minimize that extra 52% that would self select, you know, after the intended however much.
Speaker 2:Yeah. You know, have you read the the hard thing about hard things? Not not that I'm a I'm not obviously Yeah. No.
Speaker 1:I actually read it years ago. Yeah.
Speaker 2:You know, I the Hebrew account so it's Ben Horowitz's book. I'm not I I'm not a fan at all of their of the VC firm a 16 c, but I do the the book is actually it's it's pretty interesting. You know, there are there are interesting passages in it. And one of which I that I definitely admire is when they need to do a, I mean, a gutting series of layoffs at LoudCloud. This is a company that needed to IPO in order to make a payroll.
Speaker 2:So, I mean, you can only imagine the anxiety involved in that, and they they definitely needed to do multiple layoffs. And I I don't think I'm imagining it on my copy in front me, but he describes actually helping people pack their things up and walking them out to the parking lot with them. And and he's, you know, like, tears all around. And I feel that, like, Steve, this is what you're talking about. Like, that's not an expensive act to have the CEO help you pack.
Speaker 2:That does not cost anything. But that is a you know, there there's a sense of of of decency there and responsibility of, like, I recognize the magnitude of what's just happened to you, and I am I'm gonna walk with you. I I can't continue to employ you, but I I recognize what's happened here, and I recognize the humanity of it.
Speaker 3:Yeah. And I can't, I mean, I can't speak to massive organizations where I understand this is not scalable and perhaps not feasible, but, I was in the room talking to the person every single time with everyone affected over the course of Joyant. And, you know, I think, if that can't be the case because and next big part of the organization that is actually in the room and and and, you know, looking the person in the eye and making sure to be clear about, you know, how you got here and what's happening and answering questions. And, and then, you know, then you can take it all the way down to the absolute worst possible way, which is an unnamed email that goes out to, you know, 10,000 folks or whatever the case may be.
Speaker 2:Not even signed with a name in the Twitter mailbox.
Speaker 1:So gross.
Speaker 2:So it I mean, just despicable, cowardly. I mean, there I I run out of words to describe how thoroughly disgusting it is to have a mass layoff that signs it I mean, sincerely, Twitter? Sorry. It's like Twitter is actually sorry. It's actually not a thing.
Speaker 2:Like, who are put your name next to it, you coward. And that was, I mean, so gross. So gross. And, you know, I I think that just, Steve, to your point of, like, make damn sure that you got somebody who is really taking responsibility for it. And then also, like, not just you know, we talk about you know, I I take responsibility for, you know, I for the mistakes that were made.
Speaker 2:Like, alright. Great. Like, what does that actually mean? Be be ready to make that concrete.
Speaker 1:Even showing what the work was. You know, we thought because, you know, we thought that these deals were gonna come in, but they didn't, or the macroeconomic conditions affected us in these ways. But at least give people something to not just feel like they wasted. Exactly.
Speaker 2:Exactly.
Speaker 3:Sentences can mean so much to somebody who is grappling for, like, you know, trying to understand how much of it was about them, how much of it was about things, but so often, these things are completely opaque.
Speaker 2:Totally.
Speaker 3:And you've got an HR person that is sitting in a room just kind of, like, okay. So, you know, here's where your your your check is going to show up, and you can call this hotline if you have questions on this. And
Speaker 1:Here's your COBRA forms. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Here's your COBRA form, and, you know, just let us know if you need anything. And and, again, I I I it's it is not expensive to add, like you said, Adam, just a little bit of context. And you do that, and now it just gives that person and, I mean, not in all cases, but it is just it it can be very, very helpful mentally and then, you know, go farther than that. But but that kind of candor and transparency, just just is is is really, really helpful.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Tom, you're here. You've been a veteran of so much in Silicon Valley. You've seen so much. I'm sure you've been at, I know you left Sun before the before the layoff started, but I'm sure you've seen it play in your career.
Speaker 2:What are your thoughts?
Speaker 9:Well, they, I've been involved 2 ways. So at at small startups, you know, I've had to being a founder, I had to kinda jointly lay off with the CEO, lots of people. But, you know, if you're open and transparent and everybody knows it's all coming anyways and no one's surprised. And, I'm pretty pretty sure at DriveScale, we had no hard feelings as we gradually shrank from 30 people at peak to 10 people. But that it was very, difficult anyway.
Speaker 9:But my real horror story is with the very large company that I was employed with when the dotcom bubble crashed. And it was it was getting ugly, and we were asked to do stack rankings. You know? So that's all always fun trying to decide, you know, who you know, the the lifeboat exercise.
Speaker 1:It wasn't just the number of lines of code written?
Speaker 9:No. Amazingly. But and, I
Speaker 2:Let history reflect that I was making a Twitter reference that Adam does not believe this himself. There are Yes. Yeah. That's right.
Speaker 9:But but then there was an important off-site meeting, which on on which I missed because of a family problem. And there was no communication after before, after, whatever about the meeting or what went on. And a few days later, I get a call from a guy who reported to me. I I only had a handful of reports any anyway. And he says, Tom, why did you fire me?
Speaker 9:I was like, what? I had no clue that they were actually going to fire the guy. Wow. And he reported directly to me.
Speaker 2:Oh my god.
Speaker 9:So I was I was so hopping mad. I couldn't even go into work for 3 3 days.
Speaker 2:And so and, Tom, how did they I mean, you clearly confronted the I mean, I this I mean, you're a member, presumably, of the the leadership team and the I mean, because the you couldn't make this off-site with their I mean, when you confronted the other members of the leadership team, what did they say? What was their reaction?
Speaker 9:Oh, everyone sort of pointed fingers at everyone else for not communicating properly. And, I my direct boss, you know, had lost a lot of points with me because of that.
Speaker 2:Was this this is an important point too. I think, Tom, that, like, you know, as as you know for sure, but I feel I know too. Out of those 2, like, careers are long and careers last much longer than companies. And it it the the the people that you do the work with, those connections are really, really important even if you need to economically part ways, you're saying, the drive scale case, Tom, where it's like, look. We everyone kinda knows that we're having a hard time.
Speaker 2:We're not hitting revenue targets. We need to you want to, like assume that you're gonna wanna be able to to crawl its paths cross paths with one another. At least look one another in the eye, you know, in 10 years when you're at a
Speaker 5:Right.
Speaker 2:But I but I feel like there's so many of these conditions where, you know, you see a side of people that you didn't know existed and it becomes, you know, that rift becomes something that you can't actually bridge. That that relationships are permanently damaged. I mean, I dare say you I mean, I don't know. Maybe you have, but I dare say that that had a a pretty lasting impact on your relationship with the person who made that decision at that company.
Speaker 9:Yeah. If I could figure out who that was. Yeah. That's yep. You know, it's the big company thing, and there's, like, some edict on high that gets filtered through, like, 7 levels of managers and HR departments.
Speaker 2:Oh, man. Gotcha. So another point that I that I I wanted to to definitely make sure we hit on because I think that the in the the Stripe email that you talk about this, if you've got folks at your company in the US who are on a visa, they're in a very different situation because when when they are no longer employed by you, they can no longer be in the US on most cases. And, so you are actually not just changing their employer. You are potentially changing everything about their lives, where their kids go to school, you're changing the language they speak, you're they're you mean, you could be it could be so I I I feel that you've really got it.
Speaker 2:And I thought it was interesting. An immigrant, although, like, Elon Musk's an immigrant too. So I guess that tells you nothing. But the fact that Carlson does I feel that most lay layoffs have not called out Visa holders in particular because Visa holders are in a different category. They should be thought of that way.
Speaker 2:And I don't know. Adam, did you It's
Speaker 1:it's so rough. I don't know if you've had this experience, Brian, much. I I think you maybe have it, Oxnard, but, like, even hiring folks for whom you need to make these, H1B applications, I found extremely tense. Just because you're like, if I fuck this up or if the paperwork doesn't come through, if the application doesn't come through, like, it's not like these people get to find a new job. It means they have to leave the country.
Speaker 1:Like, they have to leave their home to go back to the country of their citizenship, which, you know, is not necessarily the place they call home.
Speaker 2:Right. And they they may have lived only a fraction of their lives there, frankly.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. And and, you know, have have, you know, apartments and friends and and commitments and and communities, spouses potentially even, but, you know, still necessitating that kind of move. Anyway, I find that very tense on the hiring side just to make sure I don't mess it up. So I can't, I mean, just, it's kind of caused just so much pain and it's gotta be such a source of constant, fear. I mean, no other way to describe it.
Speaker 1:And and it creates such an asymmetric relationship
Speaker 2:Totally.
Speaker 1:With the employer.
Speaker 2:Totally. And I think I mean, you see this in general when you have I mean, certainly, I've been in organizations where it's like, you know, someone might may think something was actually actually, I don't wanna speak up because I'm actually here on a visa. And if they if they lay me off, they at least the WARN Act requires that I at least be employed because generally the way companies comply with the WARN Act is that they lay you off, but they continue to employ you for the duration of the warrant act, generally 60 days in California. This is not legal advice. Adam is the one that gives you legal advice.
Speaker 2:And Adam will give you the defendant legal advice there, But the but if whereas if you're fired, like, you gotta get on a plane tonight. And as a result, it is Adam, this is what you say. It's it's this asymmetry in the relationship that I think, you know, you know, we I I my my wife's an immigrant. I feel very strongly about the about immigration. I feel very strongly about people being able to economically pursue their dreams.
Speaker 2:And I think that we as employers have a a responsibility to employ that, but then, yes. But but recognize that asymmetry in relationship and recognize if you're laying off someone on a Visa, you've got a special different responsibility to that person.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Absolutely.
Speaker 2:Oh, looks like we got some some, some folks have joined us as speakers. As Kelsey Hightower is fond of saying, unmute yourself, introduce yourself.
Speaker 6:Hey. I'm Justin. I was just wanted to chime in on this. Like, I've had a lot of people pretty close to me who are on h one b visas, and it's really, really, really stressful. And I guess, like, a lot of the time when I'm talking to them, it's you don't really think about it as, like, getting fired.
Speaker 6:You think about it as getting deported.
Speaker 9:Yep. Right.
Speaker 2:It is. And, like Yep.
Speaker 6:Some of these people, like like, some of my friends, like, they moved here when they were 1. So they don't really have a life outside of being in the US. They've just they don't have a green card. Right? And it's a it's a long and arduous process.
Speaker 6:So, like, if they were to get deported, they would be going back to a place that they've never had even been before because they can't travel internationally. Otherwise, they forfeit their green card application.
Speaker 2:Man.
Speaker 6:So it's a really rough position to be in. And, like, there it reminds me of a story about someone at Meta a couple years ago who ended up committing suicide because, like, he
Speaker 2:he was always being
Speaker 6:pushed harder because he was, like, on a on a visa. So I think management felt like they could push him harder because they knew he couldn't leave.
Speaker 2:That I mean, that is just I mean, that's sadistic. That is there there there there's no other word for that. I mean, that is that's the and I would say that, like, that if if you you are someone in an organization that sees someone else engaging in that behavior, that's something that, like, that is not okay ever. And that's something that people should feel empowered to like, put a stop to that. And if you can't put a stop to it, like, you you you find a way to, like, to get attention on that issue because that is, you know, we you know, if you are not someone who is here on Aviso and don't suffer from that anxiety, you've got the luxury of of knowing that, like, well, if they fire me, I'll I'll find another job.
Speaker 2:At least, you know, I I I won't have to be deported. And I I feel that you've got
Speaker 1:like, Vote tomorrow if you haven't voted
Speaker 2:already. Alright. Please vote.
Speaker 1:Just mention that for no particular reason right now.
Speaker 2:No particular reason. Yeah. I well, you know what? It's actually it's funny. So I was, Bridget, my Bridget, my wife turned home to her mom is ailing.
Speaker 2:So she, I was driving her to the airport last night, to go back to Australia to be with her mom and to kind of some sort them some things out. And, you know, she's in the car, and she's, like, you know, filling out her ballot because I'm dropping off her ballot tomorrow. And, you know, I I was just like, you know, we've got all of this chaos of her. You know, I've got the 3 kids solo, so if you hear anything, if you hear me run away, it's because the house has begun to burn down. The, but, you know, got all these things that are required, and, you know, it was great as she was just, like, grinding through all these, like, district judge.
Speaker 2:She's like Adam, by the way, if you wanna know, predictive on the on the various, like, BART commissioner. She's gonna you know, she's like, all of these things that are, like, down ballot for us. And, you know, it was just a reminder about how you know, for her, who's she's a naturalized citizen, and, you know, her goal was to become a citizen in time to vote in the 2008 presidential election. For her, the I mean, voting is is something in our our our 18 year old is gonna vote for the first time tomorrow. It is really, really important to vote.
Speaker 2:I I just I thank you, Adam, for reminding us how important that is. And I think for her getting agency over her own fate by being able to cast that ballot. And this is a good reminder to me. Do not forget to drop off Bridget's ballot. Do not not would you just remind me tomorrow, Adam, please?
Speaker 2:Yes. I will, actually. I was, like, a little terrified. She's like, alright. I'm leaving this thing with you.
Speaker 2:I'm like, I got this oh, okay. Do not forget to do do not forget to drop off Bridget's ballot. But, yeah, it's a great reminder.
Speaker 1:We had another person Yeah.
Speaker 2:Matthew. It looks like.
Speaker 6:Hey, everyone. Yeah. My name is, Matthew Sanabrio. Sorry. I joined a little little late.
Speaker 6:I was in the middle of, coding some stuff, and I got distracted. But, yeah, y'all bring up a good good points with, like, layoffs and visas and all of that. And remind me of the story with my my first layoff. Like, the point I I like to to tell everyone is, like, treat your employees like like people. Right?
Speaker 6:Remind remember that everyone
Speaker 2:you work with
Speaker 1:Just like people.
Speaker 2:Just like people. People.
Speaker 6:Right? They're humans. They are people. They have lives. Right?
Speaker 6:You have to take that into consideration. And it reminds me of the time when I was working for a startup called Wicker. It was like a, secure messaging app. And it was my first time I've ever working for. And then we were about 70 employees, and they told us, hey.
Speaker 6:We're gonna have this this all hands meeting, and we don't have the space to to have everyone in 1 conference room. So we're gonna split you off the 2 different conference rooms. No. And I was like, okay. No problem.
Speaker 6:Like, let's let's all split up.
Speaker 2:No. I go into
Speaker 6:this conference room, and I'm like, wait a minute. Why do they
Speaker 2:have the nicer conference room
Speaker 6:there with the TV? What's going on? Where's when's the meeting going to start? And they're like, oh, yeah, you know, you've all everyone in this room, you no longer have a job here. Stay around, and we'll give you a packet of information of what you can do next.
Speaker 6:And you can't go back to your desks to get your things, we'll collect them for you and bring you outside. Have a great day. And it was just this line of people, myself included, just getting handed an envelope and just, like, walked out the door.
Speaker 2:Oh my god.
Speaker 6:Like, it was so devastating. I was, like, a fresh college graduate at that point, and I was, like, what do I do now? Yeah. You do. I'm not using this anymore.
Speaker 6:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So so, Matthew, first of all, I've got many questions. 1, how many of the vowels were stripped out of Wicker? Because I assume as it okay. Yeah. Right.
Speaker 2:That that there's no way that it has actually all the vowels. Right? So that good. Asked an answer on that one. But how old were you if you don't mind me asking?
Speaker 2:So this is early in your career this happened, it sounds like.
Speaker 6:Yeah. Yeah. So this was about, I think, 2015 ish or 7 years ago. So, yeah, it was about 22, 23, I think. Oh my god.
Speaker 6:Yeah. That realm.
Speaker 2:And so yeah. The
Speaker 6:You know, big boy job, I guess, you can
Speaker 2:say. Oh my god. And you are thinking, like, hey. I've only I mean, so you probably hadn't been working there for very long, obviously. I mean Yeah.
Speaker 2:Been there for maybe a year or 2.
Speaker 6:Months, maybe. 11 months or something like that. Right? You know, the start up life. And I I had no idea, like, you know, hey.
Speaker 6:Start can run out of money. Start ups can are are pretty risky. I was just happy to be in this hip new office with a with a beer keg. Right? Like
Speaker 2:right. Right. Right. In hindsight. You know, some of the discussion.
Speaker 2:Right. Right. Right. And okay. So did that.
Speaker 2:Now that is I I think also in 2015, that is, you know, this bubble has gone on for so long that is I mean, presumably, you were able to find what especially if you're technical. I'm sure you're able to find work pretty quickly. But I had
Speaker 6:the benefit of being, very close to New York City, which had, like, a very large tech industry at the time too. So I was able to find work pretty quickly, but the shock was was pretty interesting. I went I remember going home to my dad and my my parents, like, like, only one of them graduated high school, so no college degree or nothing. And I was just like Right. Hey, dad.
Speaker 6:So I don't have a job anymore. And he and he just looked at me like like, that's life, buddy. Right? He just gave me the look like, hey.
Speaker 1:You know? I
Speaker 6:know how you feel. You know, it's all weekend, and go go go hunting next week. You know? And it was just, like, the normalcy kind of shocked me. Right?
Speaker 6:It's, like, it was normal almost to him in in that sense. You know what I mean?
Speaker 2:That's interesting. And did that I mean, that probably helped actually that you that you felt like, alright. I guess, I you know, I I don't need to, like, I don't need to let this erode my own self worth. I can actually get back on the horse and and go look for for work.
Speaker 6:Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. It does help from that perspective. It's like, hey.
Speaker 6:You know, you you don't suck. It's just the nature of business, and things hap you know, things happen. So go don't let it push you back more than it needs to. Right? That's kind of what what he gave me.
Speaker 2:That and so the other question I've got for you is did that affect your has that affected your career in terms of the way you do think about organizations that are kinda growing in a slipshod manner? Do you think to yourself, like, hey. Look. Let's not create a situation where we have 2 conference rooms for the all hands, please.
Speaker 6:Yeah. Yeah. I mean, from an employee perspective, I definitely try to encourage, like, my team and whatnot to remember that, like, treat each other like we're human beings. You know? Give them the the respect they deserve.
Speaker 6:And from a job hunting perspective, I'm I'm definitely careful of of companies that I go to. Right? Like, it's always it's nice to be able to work for a flashy start up that's doing really cool things, but I'm the only, like, I'm the primary source of income for our household right now. My wife's, you know, starting her own business and trying to get her her chocolate business going. And, like, I need to be careful.
Speaker 6:I can't just go to a to a start up somewhere that even if they have really good work, I need to think about these things because I've been I've been in this position before, and I don't wanna have to, like, be forced to look for a job because I've been laid off or something. You know?
Speaker 2:So that that's and and has that affected the kind of job that you take within a company?
Speaker 6:I can't say specifically. I definitely, try to focus on, you know, things that I have enough skills to to meet the demand of the job. Right? Like, sometimes when you're looking for a job, you might stretch a little bit and take a job that you're maybe not so qualified for, but you can grow into. I would say that's the effect that it had on me.
Speaker 6:I don't I don't I'm careful not to really take a job that I have to stretch too much for because just in case you're not able to meet that, that can be a problem. Right? Like,
Speaker 2:it
Speaker 6:should be something that it's something that stays in the back of my head. Right? Like, when I'm when I'm looking.
Speaker 2:Well, it's a good I'll tell you the the impact it had on me when I was early in my career, and I was kind of remarking about the the and, actually, in particular, I think this was talking about, about deck and a colleague of ours who've worked with deck, we've talked to deck before, and, you know, his line about deck, which he said had way too many people, and he said he would open up a closet, and there would be, like, 30 people huddled inside the closet all saying, shh. And, and I remember talking about that at the time, super young, and talking about that with Kevin Clark, who was the one engineers I was working with at Sun. And Kevin gave me some he's like, let me give you some advice. Don't get too far away from the revenue. Stay close to the revenue, kid.
Speaker 2:And that was interesting advice, you know, that that you and not that you know, I I I don't think you want to adhere to that at all times, but I do think I don't know. What do you I don't know. You probably haven't heard that. I I I because I don't know if I've recalled that to you before.
Speaker 1:Nope. You know what?
Speaker 2:I I
Speaker 1:think I had a different kind of advice, like through my folks and in particular looking at. I remember looking at it through the lens of a company like Pixar, which was some, some things sort of in my job prospects, at least at some point, you know, kind of junior year thinking about it and thinking about, because there are lots of great technologists at Pixar, but ultimately they don't sell technology. They sell movies. Right. And so it, it, you, you know, I definitely was instilled with that kind of lens of looking for the place where you are at the intersection I mean, I guess, probably Yeah.
Speaker 1:Selected to do with revenue. So maybe maybe even No.
Speaker 2:No. I I I thought we were taking a huge risk. I mean, I felt like I mean, I I kind of look back just the things of this just recently that when Greg Papadopoulos gave us the green light, I remember saying, I'm taking the biggest risk of my career right now. And I kinda think back that in behind side, I kinda rolled my eyes. Like, seriously, kid, that was the the biggest risk of your career was, like, a different assignment within a company.
Speaker 2:Like, woah, boy. Risky career there. But, there was a big risk. It did feel like a big risk because we were do I was getting off the revenue effectively, and I did feel like, hey. I mean, it was a risk in that.
Speaker 2:Like, this is you know, we started that in 2006. There were plenty of layoffs still going around. And I was always cognizant of the fact that we may wake up one morning, and it's like, yeah. We're not doing this anymore. Sorry.
Speaker 2:It's like, we got too many mouths to feed.
Speaker 7:Yeah. And that's
Speaker 1:a very good advice,
Speaker 9:by the way.
Speaker 2:I'm sorry. Yeah. Go ahead, Anthony.
Speaker 6:The the the advice that you said about staying close to revenue is is actually really good and something that my coworker who's she has, like, a a she's been in the career longer than I have, and she told me the same thing. She's like, hey. You know, stay on the teams that make money. Yep. Those are the teams that businesses don't really cut, as quickly as the other teams.
Speaker 6:And she's reminded me of that a few times actually now in my current role, and I I think about that when I'm also looking at transfer or maybe looking for another role. I think about that as well. So if you'd like,
Speaker 9:I guess, you brought that up.
Speaker 1:But before we get to Harish, just one comment on that because we talked about bloated tech companies. You know, I'm one that I always think about in this context is Google where, you know, we were looking the other day in the office at a, at a breakdown of their revenue and their revenue is so there's a lot of stuff they do that's really far from the revenue. I'm sure is ancillary supporting it or whatever, but, you know, that's a company that always has felt like you've got the revenue stream and then you've got a lot of speculative bets. Not that speculative bets are bad, but easy to wander away from the revenue there.
Speaker 2:Well and I think that and I and I think one of the challenges that probably Google's gonna come to grips with is the the folks that are on those ads teams. I mean, because we've got a colleague who's on the ad team. And I remember being like, wow. You must have you got probably got whatever you wanted inside the company. Well, you think so, but really don't.
Speaker 2:It was we were really not thought of very highly. We were not I mean, it's like it was only responsible for all the revenue. And so, you know, I think inside of a company too, you wanna when you do have those groups that are responsible for the revenue, you wanna be sure that those groups are uplifted, that they understand their importance. And, I mean, obviously, it's, you know, shared endeavor. We're all working together.
Speaker 2:But, boy, the ones that are really close to the revenue are really close to the customer, are really, really important. And it's yet another kind of, access of malpractice here with Twitter is the fact that Musk seems to be, really dismissive of the folks that are on the revenue, and the which is to say advertiser revenue and has really botched those relationships, which is part of the reason why we're beyond the the Verizon there.
Speaker 1:Just I mean, another side, but botched is putting it so costly. Like, if you if you were, like, a terrorist trying to get you could not have been more effective.
Speaker 2:Modeled? Detonated? I mean, English, I'm running out of words. I'm running out of words. I know it's hard.
Speaker 2:Horace, what what what's what are your thoughts?
Speaker 5:Yeah. Hey, everyone. Can you hear me okay?
Speaker 2:Yep. We can hear you.
Speaker 5:Awesome. Yeah. We're managing to get back to the Google. I wanna talk about the Google thing a little bit, but I really came up here to kinda just give my give my perspective as an immigrant who's on a visa and kinda just give my perspective of, like, what it really feels like on firsthand because it's it can be nerve wracking, like, to say the least. So there are many different types of visas.
Speaker 5:We talk about h one a lot. But for example, in my case, I came to I was on a on a student visa initially. And so with the student visa, it allows you to work for a specific amount of time, and then you either need to transfer to another visa, at h one b, which is a lottery, or do something else. And I well, most persons I remember, leaving college and stuff like that, They can focus on doing what it is they love or going to to an industry they like. They're like, like, a lot of my friends, they went into game development and stuff like that.
Speaker 5:And I remember, like, for for me and for people like me, top of mind is always gonna be like, alright. Who who supports who does visa sponsorships? Who, offers a path to, like, say, green cards or a path to who who will apply for my h one b and that kind of thing. And it makes it forever a pretty big difference because I remember, for example, I had an I had an offer at a start up that, that did health tech. And I was, like, pretty excited about that.
Speaker 5:But then, by the time, that was this was 4 years ago. Then Microsoft came along, and I'm like, well, Microsoft is the one I know will at least apply for my h one b and stuff like that. And so, at that point, it comes at no contest. It doesn't matter if I'll do more boring work or anything like that. It's my future that I'm trying to secure.
Speaker 5:And then it was the same thing again when I switched over, because Microsoft started dragging their feet with my green card process. And I was like, okay. I heard I heard that Google's process was really streamlined and pretty fast. And so I I hopped out with a October without hesitation. And I was I was fortunate fortunate enough that I was able to get my green card this year before the market, like, started this nosedive.
Speaker 5:But I can tell you if I if I hadn't gotten my permanent residency, I would be first. And even though, like, Google hasn't done any, like, as there's no, like, speculation about layoffs right now at Google. But just even even when there isn't speculation, there's always that consideration. If I hear that I'm fired today, I have 60 days to figure out my life.
Speaker 2:Yeah. If you're laid off, you've got 60 days. Right? Yeah. Right.
Speaker 2:Totally. Oh my gosh. Wow. Well, first of all, congratulations on the green card. That is such a Yeah.
Speaker 2:That is such
Speaker 8:a That
Speaker 1:is a huge relief. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Huge relief. I mean and I think it is again, it is really hard for people who have not gone through this to understand the difference between, and I Horace, I don't know if it was your experience as well. Certainly with my wife's experience, it's like the the, immigration treats you like a total asshole the entire time you're going through this process, And then you get this fucking letter. They have the audacity to send you this letter, like, welcome immigrants to this great country of immigrants. It's like, fuck you, pal.
Speaker 2:You have been, like, damn, drop the fucking Statue of Liberty bullshit. Like, I you put me through the ringer for the last, you know, 2 years, 3 years, 5 years, 10 years. So, but I
Speaker 5:Yeah. For for me, David, it was it was a nice litter, but the basically, they said, remember to sign up for a select service, system.
Speaker 1:And I was like, wait. What?
Speaker 5:That's not a compliment, man.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah. Did we not
Speaker 5:tell you
Speaker 2:about that? Right.
Speaker 5:I was like, oh, great. Right. Okay. I guess this is what I signed up for. But yeah.
Speaker 5:No. And people also forget that sometimes depending on the visa you're on, you're trapped in the US or that your your work situation, you can't leave the country, for extended periods of time. So I wasn't able to leave the country for, like, a few years, until I got my my green card was fully processed. And so yeah. So it's it's a, it's a large, it's a huge relief all around.
Speaker 5:And I can't imagine what so I even saw the pinned tweet up here that says that only persons considered going back to Twitter are the ones who are in age, are on pieces. And, like yeah. No. I I get it. It's one of those things that would be a noob.
Speaker 5:It it it even if I would hate to go back, but I definitely would. I I know if I was in that position, I definitely would. If it was between that or or not having a job right now, I'd go back and start looking immediately.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Printing those resumes.
Speaker 5:Yeah. Totally. Yeah. Honestly. And then, read the Google thing that, it was it was very interesting what what you're talking about with that.
Speaker 5:So I'm in cloud. And so cloud has the, of course, has this interesting reputation internally where, where it's not it's not profitable as yet. And so before I was like, oh, when is cloud gonna be profitable? And it's like, is everyone in cloud worried? And then, the 3rd quarter results came out, and cloud is the only thing that's really growing a lot because ad sales basically flat.
Speaker 5:And then the sentiment kinda changed, and everyone is like, are there any rules in cloud? Because that's what it because because the people are worried about where where revenue is being is growing. But in terms of being away from the money, the good thing about Google is that, there's a way to calculate the cost and impact of almost everything because, we have like, internally, even if you are on, say, like, an internal engineering prod team that just deals with, like, some of the internal systems, if you work on something that's, it's easy enough to calculate cost savings. Let's say, you work on something that saves some CPU cycles, saves some computer, saves some memory, that Google has a very nice way to translate that to real dollars in terms of operational cost save and stuff like that. So
Speaker 9:Oh, interesting.
Speaker 5:So that way, you still are able to attach yourself to the revenue in a certain sense. So I think that's one of the good things about the way in which Google has made all to their internal models. Because, of course, you know, there's there's so many people working on just internal engineering, tooling. And, there had yeah. Because they still also need to be promoted and recognized, Google has invested over the years into in ways offer of, assigning dollar values to that essentially.
Speaker 2:Yeah. That's great, which is great. I think that they'll I'll let give people also that kind of confidence. Hey. What I'm doing is at least important to have one in a meeting of directors.
Speaker 2:I have my director prevailed over other directors and put a large number next to what I'm doing. But, yeah, that's, that that's a very good point in terms of finding ways to stay close to the revenue even when what you're doing, it there's a longer term investment. It's kind of like some of these we've we've talked about in previous spaces. Yeah. Horace, that's, incredible.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much for, for sharing that and again, congratulations again on on on the green card. Harry, you would ask speaker.
Speaker 7:Yep. Yeah. I just, I can totally relate to what the very recent story is. I'm also an immigrant. I grew up in India and then moved to Australia, became a citizen there.
Speaker 7:Now I live in in in Scotland. So, yeah, totally totally understand how that that sword I had been listening to the whole discussion. I think there's a, there's a part that I feel is missing. Like it's, it's, it's good that we have, that we should treat each other as humans. We should respect.
Speaker 7:But that just puts all the pressure on what on the other side is, who is running the company. Yeah. I think there is there is another aspect that we are kinda missing in this discussion is having a legal framework that does not allow. So you, you know, it's it's one thing to don't work for assholes. But other thing is don't let people become assholes.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 7:You know, it like if what Elon is doing in in Twitter, like, firing people on the spot and and not like you you can't change with with the legal framework. You cannot change the human aspect. How you you can't force somebody to be nice. But what you can do is that they have to do the bare minimum. They have to give people enough time.
Speaker 7:They have to give the, you know, the minimum pay that when people leave. I think that that is also important when we, when we talking about like, you know, employee rights or or or layoffs.
Speaker 2:I think it's totally right.
Speaker 6:To raise that point.
Speaker 2:Yeah. It's a very good point. And I do think it's important. It's actually maybe it'd be fun to do it, that we should do it at a future space on the WARN Act, which is a California law. New York has got similar to law that dictates once a company is in a certain size and it is doing a layoff of a certain size, there are certain constraints.
Speaker 2:And in particular, it has to give 60 days notice. And now as a practical matter, as you at least in the kind of work that that for certainly for software and training IT work, you no one is very comfortable giving people 60 days notice and having to continue to work for our company. So that the this is part of the reason why when those Twitter folks got 3 months of severance, 2 months of that is actually mandated by statute in California. And then Alon is acting like he's very generous by giving a 3rd month, which is just ridiculous. So there are some I I mean, to hear your point, and I and I think it's, you know, it's always interesting that, people kind of decry regulatory regime.
Speaker 2:I think it's interesting that the states that have got tremendous economic engines are the ones that often have those regimes. And the fact that that California is an incredibly dynamic economy, big, diverse, deep economy with a lot of job creation and also has this kind of regulatory, the regulation in place to to prevent to give to give people at least time. So I I think it's a it's a very, very good point for sure. Let's see. Who's next?
Speaker 2:I think, Maybe Francois, were you next?
Speaker 4:I I have no idea, but I'm happy I'm happy talking if somebody else is next.
Speaker 2:Yeah. No. Do it. Do it. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Good good to hear from you. I'm not
Speaker 4:gonna beat the immigration dead horse. Though I will say that as an, you know, as an immigrant myself, I was on a visa from the age of 16 to the to the age of 30. And so I have a lot of empathy for all these folks, and I'll say to if any tech leaders are listening here, that you have a responsibility to to these people. I had to make many decisions in my career that I that were not optimal in order to kind of deal with the anxiety. But two two points I wanted to make.
Speaker 4:The first one is, you know, as an engineer and also someone who thinks about budgets and headcounts and and potentially, you know, in the future maybe or maybe not hopefully layoffs, I think about how we should treat them as an incidence. And I I I wish we didn't just see the letter that explains that it's happening, but I wish we saw more postmortems, Because because there's clearly something that went wrong when you exit when you when you did a layoff and and and there should be a step taken to avoid making the same mistake again. And and, you know, make them blameless. Right? Like, you don't necessarily have to name names, but do a postmortem.
Speaker 4:Figure out what organizational failure got you there. Because ultimately, when you're running a company, you're you're operating on a forecast. You have to be a little bit optimistic that your nature as an entrepreneur. And so sometimes your forecast will will meet the will meet a a harsh reality, and and the layoff will be inevitable. But but you have to you have to figure out how you're gonna adjust your forecast moving forward.
Speaker 4:And I think, you know, I think about that a lot because I make forecasts and I make hiring decisions based on those forecasts. And and and the only thing that I have is hope that I'm right. Yeah. The other thing that I you were gonna enter into this Well,
Speaker 2:I I just wanna add first of all, I kinda love this. This is such an interesting idea. In my experience, those post forums are always done as, like, business school case studies. Those are always done as I mean Yeah. But 10 years later.
Speaker 2:Yeah. And but 10 years later. Exactly. Have you known and by the way, there is a there is an absolute gold mine in business school case studies that not enough people read or pay attention to. Have you known any company that's done anything approaching this?
Speaker 2:It's a it's a really intriguing idea. I think that
Speaker 4:I've never seen it. I I've never seen it. And I I, you know, thankfully, I've never had to do a layoff myself. So at the moment, in my life, it's at the stage of theory. And I frankly, I hope it will stay there.
Speaker 4:But maybe perhaps other people have seen it, like, a true accounts of what went wrong and what steps taken moving forward to not make the mistake again. I think that'd be fascinating.
Speaker 2:It'd be fascinating if few folks have seen them. I'd love to read them. Where I have seen them, it has been in business school case studies. And, actually, when we started Oxide, I as, you know, I know Adam has heard me say more than once. I feel like the best $8 that I ever spent in my life was the Stanford Graduate School of Business, had did a case study on Nebula, which is a a company that had a kind of similar mission outside, but shut down very abruptly.
Speaker 2:And it was a kind of that it was it was an organizational postmortem. I mean, it was it was really interesting reading. It also gave us a lot of confidence because they had made a lot of execution mistakes that we were confident we weren't gonna make. So I do think that you that's the only place I've seen anything kind of approaching that. And things like losing the signal and, you know, cue our conversation a couple weeks ago.
Speaker 2:But I would be I would love to hear any company that does that. That would be amazing.
Speaker 4:The the other point that I was going to make is the point on transparency. I think, it's, you know, it's easy when when a business encounter some headwinds. It's easy to think that oh my god. If I tell the team what's really happening, they're all going to quits. They they can't handle the truth.
Speaker 4:And and my experience actually is that people are quite resilient. They can handle the truth. And if you tell them the truth, you let them make the decisions that are best for them and and their family. I think it was really stark for me at Pebble because there came a time where we stopped getting any sales data at the company. And so nobody knew all of a sudden how things were going.
Speaker 4:And that went on for several months, and and we didn't think anything of it because frankly, we were young and naive. And it was, you know, in my case my second job ever and and, you know, I was 24 years old. And, and then one day, you know, we had a round of layoffs and everybody woke up and realized that things weren't going well. And that was really a shock. And and alongside that, you know, there was a, I think a lot of blowback on that surprise and on the shock that came with that.
Speaker 4:And so they changed it, and we we end up having a monthly finance and sales updates from the CFO internally with all the numbers unedited. And we saw how things were going and, because I was on a visa at some point, I decided to leave because it got way too close to 0. Right. But but but the maj the vast majority of people stayed until the bitter end knowing full well that it was not, you know, that the ship was was taking serious water. And the takeaway from for me is that first, like, I'm glad that I got to make the decision for myself.
Speaker 4:And 2, you know, I saw the majority of my colleagues stay until the very, very end. And, and and I think that the company was better for it. And so, you know, in these times, if you don't know what the revenue of your business is and how that compares to the forecast,
Speaker 2:so good. I because, I mean, there's so much in there. I mean and I also think the way you kind of call back to the the the immigrants plight and that transparency allowing everyone to kind of make a, like, a heads up decision of, like, look. The business is struggling, and you're gonna have a bunch of people who are like, yep. The business is struggling.
Speaker 2:It's a start up. I am, you know, I I am secure right now, or I economically, I I am heads up of this decision. I wanna stay to the better end. And allowing other people to be like, actually, you know, my spouse is going back to school or I'm an immigrant. Right?
Speaker 2:You have got I've got something where I've actually got more anxiety of giving that person that kind of the freedom to make a heads up economic decision. I think that's amazing to me, first of all. One question I definitely so we are very transparent inside of Oxide. And, actually, actually, Adam, I'd love to get your perspective on this because we've been very transparent about raising money. And I always worry that the and I'll be I shouldn't.
Speaker 2:But I I I always worry that we are being transparent with to a fault and that we are because it it can feel very, anxiety producing to raise. And are we giving all these other people giving the whole company anxiety that we should be but, I mean, I think, obviously, I've come out on the side that, like, we should be very transparent about it. But have we been transparent to a fault
Speaker 1:on that? I don't so no. I think the only place where folks can get confused is, you know, there are ups and downs and ups and downs that are natural. And as Francois saying, like even ups and downs in the sales cycle, and we actually had something very similar at Delphix where we'd be very transparent about it. We got some very exciting quarters and I think in all of these cases, the thing, the risk you take is, is really about a lack of context or experience.
Speaker 1:Right? If it's your Q1 and you're sitting there on day 85 and you haven't and you're at 50% of the number, it's very reasonable to think, are we gonna get there? In the same way that if you're raising money and you've been at other companies and it's just that the founders show up one day and say, there's a new $12,000,000 in the bank and let's pop the champagne to see the process, the ugly process Oxide to ask their peers, or ask you, or ask Steve to say, Hey, is this normal or is this weird? Are things fine, or are things That's
Speaker 2:a good point. That's actually good. You see, in terms of, like, you are yes. On the one hand, you are broadcasting this anxiety to the entire company. And so you're not kind of, like, taking a tax in the entire company.
Speaker 2:On the other hand, you're also allowing the company to communicate with itself and allowing people to ask, you know, hey. Like, should I you know, I've not seen this before. I'm not been a startup. And allowing other people who've been in startups before to say, like, yeah. Look.
Speaker 2:This is normal or, yeah, this is that's interesting. I mean, I
Speaker 6:I And
Speaker 1:actually, we like, we I mean, I'm I'm sure it will not surprise you. I get a bunch of those DMs from time to time.
Speaker 2:Yeah. For sure.
Speaker 1:Because folks, you know, have have known that I've seen a thing or 2 and say, you know, is this normal? Is this weird? What's your take on x, y, or z or double and I'm sure that that happens for lots of folks within the company. And I think that's healthy, and I think that's that's that's, the kind of conversation that leadership can encourage, should encourage, but at a minimum shouldn't discourage. And I think the kinds and I think transparency produces more transparency and candor produces candor.
Speaker 2:Yeah. That's interesting. And I assume, by the way, when you're being hit up in DM's asking if this is weird. You're like, this is the weirdest fucking thing
Speaker 1:I've ever seen. It's so fucked up.
Speaker 2:Like, what is this? I cannot tell you how weird.
Speaker 1:It's it's top to bottom. Never seen anything like this before.
Speaker 2:That's right. Good. Thank you for doing your service. No. That that that's the that's very that's that's really interesting.
Speaker 2:And, so alright. So, CSAM, I I think it it looks like you were at Sun back in the day?
Speaker 8:So so I was near Sun, actually. So I was, Chris is my is my name. So I was in the Bay Area for the the dotcomboomandbust. Started out there in 97, worked for some consulting companies, you know, pets.com and all of that fun stuff.
Speaker 2:Oh, yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 8:The
Speaker 2:the the traffic getting better in in 2000?
Speaker 8:Yeah. Yeah. There's so much easier commute. I remember being a company trying to hire me with some options and explaining that I think it was a 7.50 50 price to earnings ratio. It was actually not that bad.
Speaker 8:And
Speaker 5:I somebody
Speaker 8:see some money on that. I was I was somewhere else fortunately. Although, you know, and and it didn't really do me much good. I I hired in in a company where I was, I think, employee 100. We went up to about a1000 and then back down to, I think, 40 by the time I actually left.
Speaker 8:And, you know, I moved to Chicago and and and things like that and took a different, journey. Still still intact.
Speaker 2:So if you want me asking, what was the time from a100 to a1000 to 40? What was the time balance for the the 100 to 40?
Speaker 8:12 months, 18 months.
Speaker 2:I know. It's okay. Yeah. No. No.
Speaker 2:I that that's part of the reason I is because and I do feel like that was typical of the time of you went from, like, nothing unbelievably large, completely dead in the span of, like, 9 months. Check with them. Okay. Woah. Make your head spin.
Speaker 2:Wow.
Speaker 8:It was really bizarre. You know, the project I was on, you know, we're a consulting company. We were busy. So people were coming and going, and I I never got a chance to meet them, to know them, anything like that. I do remember though, and this kind of kinda is is the question I wanna wanna get to here is, hearing about Hudson include this in because as as people were would, you know, companies would fail that were our customers, you know, someone would get assigned to other projects or maybe people would move to other, places.
Speaker 8:And it started to look a little grim. You know? There were layoffs, and and I was like, well, how bad is it gonna get? And I remember looking for to kinda reassure myself, looking at Sun's website and looking hey. They're still hiring job, engineers.
Speaker 8:I'm gonna be fine. Right? I've been doing this for a couple of years as long as anybody else. Okay. Great.
Speaker 8:And then at one point, they weren't any longer. And I was like, well, shit. This is gonna be a tough one. Right? And I think I kind of making I don't know if there's any, you know, there's made I'm sure some comparisons to that era and today, and kind of especially the changes in the valuations that we've seen in the last year.
Speaker 2:I Oh, for sure. Yeah. I I I the first. Yeah.
Speaker 8:I'm kinda wondering, you know, what would you think is kind of your son or where are you kinda looking and saying, well, is it what sectors in tech is it is it confined to? So, you know, okay, may you know, there's a a gentleman who spoke about Google. Hey. Ad ad revenue looks a little off, but this cloud stuff's doing okay. So I'm feeling pretty good when I wake up in the morning.
Speaker 8:And, you know, where are you kinda looking to see? Is that is that base of solidity under, tech, revenues eroding? Or what kind of lines do you see getting either crossed or we're okay? Or what what do you got your eye on?
Speaker 2:Oh, well, that's a great question. And I gotta tell you, I mean, I don't think I'd be the only one to give this answer that among certainly kind of established late series startups, Stripe would be right up there With a company that I would say is, like, this company that is, broadly speaking, has got a great business model. We know they've got a lot of revenue. They've done very well. I mean, they they've made a lot of right decisions.
Speaker 2:And I kind of like you were with Stripe, I may have I do was with Sun. I may have been with Stripe a week ago saying, like, well, you know, the do they still have open positions? So the fact that they did a deep cut, that I think and I I again, I don't think I'm the only one who who thought that. I think that's why a lot of people felt like, oh, shit. Stripe took a 14% haircut.
Speaker 2:Like, Stripe feels like a company that is you know, I think a lot there are aspects that I think a lot of companies aspire to. Right? We saw, in Stripe. And so I think that that one is a bit chilling. I think, you know, Google is gonna be one to watch.
Speaker 2:We have a big meta announcement apparently coming, that that and and, you know, I think that there's one of the, I think, very and I actually thought this was gonna happen, I should say, a long time ago, like, kind of 5 years ago. But I one thing I definitely wonder is around the efficacy of some of this online advertising. And so much is built on it. And if advertisers are coming and I had tweeted out I actually got terrific piece that I read on Musk and Twitter, describing him as going full tilt as a poker player and part of that challenge that which I thought was an amazingly relevant piece, but and then that piece talk referenced to a a book that looks really, really interesting, Wondering if the likening the current spend on advertising to the subprime, mortgage subprime mortgages in 2008, which is, like that is real I mean, that's that's intriguing. Right?
Speaker 8:I really wanna go read the
Speaker 6:book. Yeah.
Speaker 8:I saw a similar thing that, someone on on Twitter here just in the last couple days is worried about, hey. All the all my information that's that Twitter knows about me, all the ad tracking related data, it's gonna be leaked. And people are gonna have that, and they're gonna do something nefarious with it. And I I saw a very good follow-up comment to that was everybody already knows all of this stuff about you anyway. You know, 10 years ago, maybe the answer was different.
Speaker 8:But now that's that's all out there. And so it actually has not much differentiated value any longer. Right?
Speaker 2:Because it's not Yeah.
Speaker 8:It's not monetizable. Right? So that's a big concern that this this kind of all this ad tech funded stuff could kind of deflate. Where might you think some of that money would would go? It's sure.
Speaker 8:Some of it's gonna be destroyed. I think, obviously Oh,
Speaker 2:absolutely. Yes.
Speaker 8:And and
Speaker 2:her. Yes.
Speaker 8:But it's also gonna flow to other places.
Speaker 5:Do you have any thoughts
Speaker 2:about that? I do not know because I think that, you know, we had a lot of money flowing into Silicon Valley because of the interest rate environment. I think we were we had a we total dependency on the fact that if people had a hard time getting returns that weren't in Silicon Valley, so we had a lot of cash coming here. As a company, like, raising around right now, it is, you know, and we've we're in we feel like we're in good shape. But, just based on the things we've seen out there, it's grim.
Speaker 2:And it's really unclear, I think, to everybody. I mean, you are you were here for the bust, and, you, I mean, remember so much value was just just evaporated and never came back. Cisco, I believe, has still not hit its high from 2,000. Tom maybe I thought if there's a weeping emoji, Tom maybe doing it now. But the, so I I think there's gonna be plenty of value that may just simply never return.
Speaker 2:You know, I don't know when you look a part of the reason that you know, when I first came into tech, I I thought that, we were immune from booms and busts. And I'd grown up in Colorado, and Colorado had a really grinding bust in 1987, an oil bust. And, had, you know my friends whose parents were geologists or petroleum engineers were all, like, lives thrown totally in disarray. And I remember thinking, like, oh, I'm a software engineer. Like, this is great.
Speaker 2:I'm immune from booms and busts. It's like Right. No. You're definitely not, my friend. You are in it's a different kind of boom and bust, but we definitely have booms and busts in our and I a part of the reason I get uncomfortable with booms is because I know what the bust looks like.
Speaker 2:And
Speaker 8:It feels too good. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah. And the busts are grim. I mean and and, you know, I someone who I looked up to a lot from the investment perspective, said, you know, enjoy the party, but dance close to the door. And, boy, I certainly did after the, you know, after the .com bust, which I think casts such a shadow. Mhmm.
Speaker 2:So the the book, by the way, I wanted to get the book. So the book is by Tim Huang. I've not read it. I I just learned of it in reading this piece earlier today. The Subprime Advertising and the Time Bomb at the Heart of the Internet, which I think is I'm gonna be really interested to read this in part because I was having this argument with my kids over the weekend.
Speaker 2:They're not arguments. It's too strong. But we were talking about advertising, and, you know, my kids were I wrote this blog entry over the weekend and talking about part of one of the things I was saying is that I'm realizing that there is I'm looking for what the replacement for Twitter is, and it's not gonna be one thing. It's gonna be several. Mhmm.
Speaker 2:And I pointed out that, like, I I I got confidence in this because my kids think it's obviously that's so obvious that it's stupid, and no one should even bother saying it because it's so obvious. Like, okay. But talking with them about advertising and my kids are like, I have never clicked on an ad ever. And I'm like, ever? Like, I have never clicked on an ad.
Speaker 2:And you it's mesmerizing to be with a kid on the Internet. Like, they are ad immune. And you do wonder it's like
Speaker 8:They're blind to them. Yes.
Speaker 2:Yeah. It's just like, is this coming home to roost at all anywhere? I mean, clearly ads work at some level, but I think that would be a big big shooter drop. And you know, that could be real deep. If if we decide that advertising that advertisers decide that, you know, Main Street America decides that and I I mean, I imagine you must feel the same way because we saw so much discretionary budget disappear in the the the that if if we have a a broad recession where mainstream you know, where Coca Cola decides, like, actually, we just need to spend less on our online ads.
Speaker 2:Like, that's not the right you know? Or, you know, The Washington Post. I'm not sure, you know, they did come to these big advertisers. It could be really, really deep around here. Yeah.
Speaker 2:I don't know if I
Speaker 8:I think it I think it really could. I think, like like we saw that everyone thought if I sell x on the Internet, like pet food, nevermind that it costs $50 to ship a bag of dog food to my door. Yeah. They're gonna be worth 1,000,000 or or 1,000,000,000. Some of that is definitely returning around this.
Speaker 8:So I kinda wanna wrap up on on maybe a more boring note and and think about some of the listeners here because, I had some personal strife in that time and it was laid off for for a bit, but I ended up finding work as a software engineer for a, small company in Chicago that was like 10 years behind where everyone else was in, in Silicon valley. And, you know, they they paid well and kept learning. I kept, I stayed in the field. I'm still, you know, here and, and working now. Now I'm in data set data center tech, Kubernetes, things like that.
Speaker 8:And working with these large customers, these industrial customers, they are so far behind on
Speaker 2:They are. Yeah. They everybody else. Yeah.
Speaker 5:Yeah. I
Speaker 8:mean, the folks on this call with some transition could be working there for decades. And, yes, maybe, you know, they don't the lunches they cater are nowhere near as good. I'll I'll tell you that much. But, they they pay the bills, their jobs to have, and and then, you know, you you you see another day.
Speaker 2:And I such good words of wisdom, I think. And I you're you're so right. I do feel certainly, I felt that the, in the bust I mean, the the well, put it this way. I did the most innovative work in my career. I did more innovative work in the bus than the boom, is the most concise way to phrase it.
Speaker 2:That the when you when the the economy turns and it's not easy straight, it's hard. And as you said, they're like the catered lunches aren't always good. There's no catered lunches. That that that really that changes you, but that can be in good ways. Like, you can actually get, those constraints can be actually really helpful.
Speaker 2:I don't know. Horace, what do you, what do you think?
Speaker 5:Kinda just wanted to comment on, what you're saying about what the conversation about the ad, ad dollars. And because the especially read the story on, you're saying the kids have never clicked on an ad. And it's kind of the same for me where ad ad targeting has not been that great for me. And I think there it's kinda like 2 questions I have or 2 things. One, it's gonna be a battle of who can get better at targeting because it's and so a lot of times, a person will look at Meta.
Speaker 5:They'll look at Google, and they're it it seems like YouTube is standing still. Search is standing still. But it's so much effort, being put into trying to get better targeted ad, better, return on the dollar for advertisers. And so the question now becomes, if advertisers just get up on the end and say, hey. This online ad thing doesn't seem to be working out for us.
Speaker 5:What are they gonna do? Because they do need to market their products to consumers. There's only so much billboard space in Times Square. Like, the the question is if they decide not to continue, or continue bolstering this kind of, like, web 2 ad, ad ad targeting, will they do instead? Because Coca Cola will still need to sell those their sodas.
Speaker 2:Yeah. No. That's a that's a good point. And I think that it also that kind of brings to mind something that I felt like I've had to learn. When things do begin to turn, when a company begins to turn, when you do need to kinda when layoffs are happening and you keep thinking of, like, how do I get back to the way it was?
Speaker 2:There's a danger in that because often, like, the way it was is not coming back. And we're not like, we're gone forever from that world. That was a period of time. And now and just to your point, Horace, about, like, the we may have much more targeted ads. By the way, that may mean much less revenue for some of these tech companies.
Speaker 2:That may mean lower earnings as tech. These tech companies may be they may have found you know, it's kind of like when the newspapers went online where, yes, there is a business to be made in an online newspaper. It's much smaller, by the way, than the newspaper business where you have a monopoly on information in the city. And that's gonna have to there's an adjustment that has to be made there. I I do think getting back to kind of Francoise earlier earlier point, the it's really important to be transparent with people as these economic conditions change, as the as the climate changes.
Speaker 2:Because I think that, you know, Francois, I feel like one of the points that that you really had that resonated with me is is just to, like, you know, you've got people who are adults. Like, they can hear it. They can hear the challenges. And especially in our domain, it's like people are really creative, and they wanna help out. And you can unlock some of that esprit de corps.
Speaker 2:You're so worried about kind of worrying people when you actually can can engage them. Of course, you have to do it at the right time and in the right way. And that's certainly, you know, far too late, I'm I'm afraid, at at at Twitter, which I think the the dice very much cast there. One, actually, on the topic of the the the dotcom busting the boom busting, one of the, I think, the the harpenters of perhaps things to come, there are way too many tech billboards right now. I felt like billboards on the 101 was, like, a big thing back in the day, and I noticed just dropping my wife off the airport last night, like, it's, like, way too many billboards between SFO and San Francisco that are just tech companies.
Speaker 2:And so I I think that it's it we got rockier times ahead. For sure, I think we've got more there are gonna be more companies that are gonna gonna be going through, reductions in force. And, I I really, really hope that we see more of the stripe the stripes acting as models, rather than certainly the the Twitters. I it is important to me that we not normalize this barbaric behavior that we've seen out of Twitter. This is this is atrocious behavior.
Speaker 2:Harry, you mentioned a point earlier about the importance of regulation economically. Like, you need to allow companies to expand and contract. But what Twitter has done is so deeply wrong here, and, I I I really, I there there I there really need to be consequences here. And if there are not gonna be consequences, it kind of not gonna be consequences from a regulatory body. There need to be consequences from us as as technologists.
Speaker 2:We cannot walk past this, and we really can't forgive it because the way those folks were laid off is just absolutely wrong. So people haven't already inferred it. I know Adam has stepped away because he's got a, he's got a toddler that he needs to get to get dinner to. I've got a I I gotta get dinner on for my brood as well. I don't know if there are any other closing thoughts from folks, but I, really wanted to to thank people for joining us.
Speaker 2:This is a, you know, this is a thorny topic, but it's something that I think we need to talk about directly. I think a lot of the problem here is that we are just kinda hoping these things don't happen, and when they do happen, we're dealing with them poorly. We need to know that, we've got a responsibility to our employees as we said earlier, especially to our employees who are here on a visa. And we've got a a responsibility both as we grow a company and then especially as we contract. We have a responsibility to really take responsibility for that.
Speaker 2:So thank you very much for everyone. Great to see you, everyone. And we will we're gonna be at your spaces for at least a little while here until we find something else. So, we'll see you next time and we'll be talking massive. Thanks everybody.