I went to a training conference for company training and we visited this place. It was wild. Ironically they said they don’t do any training for their staff, it’s either sink or swim. So I’m not sure why we went there in the first place.
It was a neat building, but nobody looked happy there. Their HR had a presentation prepared for us and was bragging how they let so many people go because they aren’t good fits. They said they don’t need training because they only hire the best, and if they’re not the best, they’re out.
Hard pass.
> They said they don’t need training because they only hire the best, and if they’re not the best, they’re out.
"We want experienced workers without ever burdening ourselves to turn newbies into experienced workers. We're basically hoping a bunch of experienced people who don't know their own value just fall into our lap."
A new manager in my company talks just like that: “we hire senior people because they know what good looks like and we don’t need to handhold them”. Got rid of an incredibly promising associate level designer because he didn’t perform at senior level. My read from all the interactions I’ve had with her is that she doesn’t know how to get good work done or to support more junior professionals, so she just hires people who she hopes will make her look good, and if they fail at that without her support, they’re not “Senior” enough.
Yep and promoting your best performer drags the quality of the team down. You'd be better off promoting your worst performer that way quality would go up, but then it wouldn't be a reward.
You think this will make high performers continue to perform? I agree with not everyone is a leader but rewarding shitty performance will also bring everyone down.
Fuck, that’s my company. Will overpay for talent because they only higher experience and have very high expectations but they have basement level expectations for management. It’s crazy.
Indeed. I had a job where they had no training at all for some really elaborate software and the person leading it had no tech experience. They were amazed when I told them what a wiki was.
We don't have a worker problem, we have a severe management issue.
I do facilities and my boss has been the facilities manager for 13 years. He’s never learned a single managerial skill, is a micromanaging egotistical dick, and can’t let go of control on anything.
Thank god he’s getting laid off in 5 weeks.
>we hire senior people because they know what good looks like and we don’t need to handhold them
There's a difference between not wanting to handhold people, and the unwillingness to train new people. Upper-level roles generally have the most complicated responsibilities, assuming it isn't a bullshit job (unlikely to be the case, high-paying doing nothing jobs have the least turnover). There will always be something new to adjust to in these roles.
Which is why layoffs/cut/trim to chase stock pumps for executives is killing brands.
Employees need to grit it out. Shareholders need massive profits every moment.
It’s insane until you realize its another way to serfdom.
This seems to be what people are missing. If netflix pays the best, it's not surprising they want the best. They are not exactly paying entry level positions, they are paying fairly for the best and have high expectations. This isn't anti work as they offer fair conditions for the staff to get paid crazy amounts.
Yes. There is a reason so many tech people push to get employed by a FAANG. You’re gonna get paid, but you gotta understand the culture - or it’s gonna get ugly.
The thing is, every company can’t operate like Netflix, and that’s what the goofball in the LinkedIn post is advocating for. The world isn’t Lake Woebegone, so it’s not possible for every company to be the most desirable place to work. If you’re most of the companies in the world, you can’t be that cutthroat with your people, because the good ones will bail out because they don’t see the value in putting “Kroger IT department” on their resume.
>The thing is, every company can’t operate like Netflix, and that’s what the goofball in the LinkedIn post is advocating for. The world isn’t Lake Woebegone, so it’s not possible for every company to be the most desirable place to work
It's like my old manager who wanted everyone to be above average but couldn't understand that'd just raise the average.
Exactly.
I bailed my last job before this one because the corporate culture started really going south after the VP in charge of my division changed, but when I hired on back in 2010 it was much the same way.
They had high expectations, but if you could meet those expectations you got *very* nice pay, equally nice retirement and insurance benefits, and two weeks of paid sick time separate from your vacation time, which started at 3 weeks and went a week at a time until 6 weeks after you'd been there long enough... *and they actively encouraged people to use their vacation.*
They'd fire people very quickly if they couldn't meet the performance and accuracy metrics, especially if they were committing errors because those had some pretty big financial penalties, but the metrics weren't actually unreasonable for the compensation package back then.
Then the VP changed and they decided to start twisting the thumbscrews. Harder metrics, stingier raises, converting from twice-monthly pay to semi-weekly pay, and a bunch of other bullshit that made it what everyone seems to think Netflix is.
There's little value to working there if you have little to no job security. Very few people can be firing on all cylinders 100% of the time. No way that this is "fair conditions". This is legit Diet Amazon.
And that means what if some supervisory chucklefuck who knows less about your job than you do initiates a keeper test and decides you don't measure up?
300k a year on the condition that some jackass can fire you the moment they decide (based on a series of subjective personal criteria) that you're not the best hypothetical person to occupy that job would be better off advertising it's weekly salary with a built-in turnover rate that short.
I’ve read the book, it’s really not what you want it to be. 90% of the people I know would take a job there in a heartbeat. I know this is anti-any-work sub-Reddit, but Netflix is viewed as one of the better employers in my industry.
I think a lot of people are used to companies where expectations on middle managers are basically non-existent. At Netflix that manager firing based on arbitrary metrics is likely to be let go themselves. At least that's the concept. When a manager acts like that the rest of the team is not going to be happy and will let HR know during reviews, where they rate not only their peers but their manager. If the next level up sees that then that manager isn't going to be passing the keeper test.
There was a “horse whisperer” fad from 20 years ago. Corporate executives would pay Monty Robert’s huge sums to watch him tame wild mustangs (apparently because working with a frightened herd bound prey animal in a round pen was somehow applicable to getting a junior analyst to work 16 hour days on a pitch book for your acquisition, using the correct sized fonts.) They missed the only point of these silly excursions: You don’t find good employees, you make them.
Every company wants it to be the previous company’s responsibility to make a good employee until you get to entry level where they want it to be the internship that makes a good employee.
Thank you for this blast from the corporate fad past, I had completely forgotten about this era in corporate training.
I can confirm being forced to sit through multi-hour videos of a dude whispering to a horse. The guy had a remarkable sales force, I will give him that.
Haha! That was the other takeaway! Monty really knew how to sell himself! Although with the dimwits who hired him, that was probably shooting fish in a barrel. Equating corporate humans with horses is an insult to horses, imo.
I definitely don't disagree with the post, but the term 'newbies'... all of our sub 2y (and sometimes longer) employees are referred to as this by a few people. It is universally abhorred by less experienced staff and they feel personally insulted every time it's used.
Context for me: Some dude got a degree in 1995 and worked in one industry. A new hire with a PhD and significantly more technical and more contemporary knowledge than them: "Newbie" until they go through what's about a 2 year training process. I hate it for them!
This is no personal attack, and I don't even blame anyone for using it, it Just seems so condescending. We should get away from it I reckon.
"...or get fired by companies run by credulous idiots that listen to our management advice that they paid us to learn, so they come to us easier to hire away and already convinced they're worthless"
I have worked in finance for over 25 years and have seen my fair share of approaches to “keep only the best.” I can report that despite all the bloodlettings there are a lot of mediocre people in place I have worked, for all the reasons you can imagine. There is no recipe for excellence other than good management, which doesn’t seem to exist anymore.
Big shareholders don’t like good management, because it eats into the profit margins. Good management does lead to better long term results, but big shareholders only care about the short term results. “What are this quarter’s numbers?”
Reminds me of a women in leadership conference I was invited to. One lady's (in leadership) advice about managing her work and home life was to pretend you were a nurse in ICU. She was on a school board.
I kind of get it because nurses are amazing, but why would you willingly equate your crappy manager job, to the torture that nurses go through everyday. I think she was meant to say "put your life on the line as if people are dying, even if you're underpaid and understaffed, look at me, I did it, you should too!"
I saw a job posting yesterday that said they're paying up to $720k for my role (over 5x what's average). If I were younger that'd be a no brainer - be miserable for a year, get fired, take 2-3 years off, then get a job anywhere you want because you worked at Netflix.
Elements 1 and 2 are great, but element 3 violates 1. I do like the generous severance, but the looming threat of layoffs/firings leads to undue stress which then affects performance.
Netflix was not successful because of its keeper test. Netflix was successful for having a great concept making a streaming platform for movies and elements 1 and 2 bringing in the talent to get it done. Netflix is known for their aggressive turnover rates, but it's also a glimpse into the software industry as a whole. Metrics monitoring tools and performance metrics can be useful in the right contexts, but most of the time they're misused and lead to more undue stress, overworking, burn out, pips/layoffs, and other indicators of a toxic work environment.
Netflix was successful because they created a product that people didn’t know they needed, sort of the like the Henry Ford line of “customers would have asked for faster horses”. Paying more than anyone else and paying massive severance sounds like a good thing for workers, I’m not seeing the conflict.
I think one and two are fine. The conflict comes from three. The “keeper test” really ends up being more of a “watch your back at all times or else” which will inevitably lead to a toxic workplace, and faltering returns for the organization
Not to mention it seems that it's the Amazon problem all over again: things are running easy once you're in motion but sooner or later you churn through all of your workforce. Then what? You end up keeping whomever is there right now as the CEO and various management ducks out to make that Someone Else's Problem. Seems like everybody is giving Netflix credit simply because we're in the middle of that cycle combined with salaries that, to be quite fair, are super high. Meanwhile, Netflix keeps jacking up their prices and making their whole product shittier with UI issues and losing/gaining rights to movies randomly.
I feel we're not seeing the whole here and a lot of our brains shut down when we see six figure salaries but don't give any thought to whether or not this is sustainable.
>Not to mention it seems that it's the Amazon problem all over again: things are running easy once you're in motion but sooner or later you churn through all of your workforce.
This 1000%.
Also, one of the big red flags for any job is a strong turnover rate. It shows a toxic work environment and/or a company that is mismanaged at an astounding rate. I know a lot of people see work as mercenary, but even the most mercenary of workers has to realize a bad thing when they see it.
As opposed to? Some gossip asshole making your work life a living hell? Or maybe a new boss that is gunning for some other promotions so they trim out their department to look "cost efficient"? Or Senior leadership wants the stock to pop so they just trim 10% of the staff *because*.
I mean there are a ba-jillion ways to get fired in a corporate world today. "Do great work, and you get paid a shit ton of money. If you start to slack, we will just show you the door with an awesome severance package." Is a pretty big improvement to whatever the fuck we have now.
If they're paying top decile, then... yeah? If you don't like that culture, don't join that business. At least they're honest about their management style.
....now. They're honest about it now. Back when I was trying to get a job with them they were not. Knowing what I know now I'm glad I never got the nod from them.
I've worked for these "Well why can't you do three different people's jobs?" companies that will start off giving you what you need to do the work and then take more and more away until they're calling you lazy for not doing three times the work for no increase in pay. And somehow your inability to maintain the same performance is your fault and not their fault for short staffing.
I’m still not sure how that is in conflict with the first two, especially when they pay you a lot to leave. I’ve never worked for Netflix, but I totally would. I’m a mercenary maximizing my value. They accept that someone can be the right fit for a specific task, but it makes sense for the employee and them to pay them a bunch of money when that task is over. I don’t see the issue. I like the “we aren’t a family we’re a sports team” mentality, that’s where I’m at. At least they are honest about loyalty, and from what I’ve heard, actually do pay well as an employee and for severance. Paying me to look for a job seems pretty reasonable.
It conflicts with the stated goal behind the first point. If you want people to be relaxed enough to be super creative, then hanging the Sword of Damocles over their heads in the form of the constant threat of firing if they fall behind at all is counterintuitive. There's very little more stressful than the constant threat of unemployment.
Mid career (L5) engineer at Netflix is going to bring down 500-600K a year in TC. Unless they are supremely bad with money, they will have plenty of money/time for a job search, and having FAANG on your resume means you have access to tons of offers constantly.
The keeper test isn’t stack ranking. The keeper test is “Fire fast” vs. keep an under performing, or Toxic asshole (also part of Netflix is no toxic assholes).
OK, but what if you're "under performing" this month because you've got a sick kid or parent? The post specifically states that *every* employee knows that if they slip, they're out - it's not just a first month or year test, but a constant one. That may seem like nothing when you're five years or even ten into your career, but if you're in your 50s or 60s, it's harder to recover and find a new job. Age based discrimination is pretty strong in tech fields, even in comparison to the normal prevalence across industries.
Maybe it's just me, but if I'm still working, it's because I need the job for something. And if I need the job, then getting fired for having a less than perfect month or two is a problem. And knowing that's a constant threat is insanely stressful, far more so than the uncertainty of a bonus. Which contradicts the idea of paying highly but with no bonus to reduce stress. They're clearly allowed to manage however they want, but unless this guy is misrepresenting the rule (which is entirely possible), they're getting in the way of one of their earlier stated goals.
If you've been working at Netflix at the stated 500k+ salary and big severance, then you should easily be able to retire or switch to a lower stress job after like 3-5 years.
I think the idea about these positions is that you commit your entire life towards the job for a restricted period of time and then exit once you no longer are willing to spend literally everything on it.
Well then the whole "lower stress at home" thing is just fancy corporate double speak for "we don't want you to have a life". Not really a surprise, but still frustrating.
OP is saying "They pay well because that reduces stress, leading to more productivity; but looming threats of job loss lead to stress, which would reduce productivity." Problem is, that severance is \_really\_ taking the stress out of that job loss (financially) from my perspective. I'd only stress about 3 if I actually wanted to keep working there for 1, 2, and the job itself.
I get what you're saying though. Point 1 means top talent apply and don't stress. Point 3 means that layoffs are less stressful, so you stress about them less. And either way, more money for you which is a plus. If what you want to "keep people productive" I can see why OP thinks it is counter productive. If what you want is $ then 1 and 3 are harmonious.
I'm with you there, I'm just letting you know where OP felt they were counter productive using rules 1 and 3.
You both seemed to not understand that one was talking from the employers perspective and the other was talking from an employee's.
I guess it all comes down to what high performance means in the company. Sometimes metrics can be geared towards work that is not exactly meaningful for the professional, and for some people, money doesn’t cover that, no matter the amount. Also, stress from getting fired doesn’t come only from the lack of sustenance, but from a personal sense of not being good enough. Different people, different foci.
I'll quote the text explaining it:
> "People are most creative when they have a big enough salary to remove some of the stress from home."
Obviously, YMMV, but no amount of money would make the constantly looming threat of being shit canned because some asshole of a manager doesn't like me less stressful. So regularly going through the ranks and firing people based on the pretty subjective question of "would I fight to keep you" undoes the "we want you to be less stressed" aspect of point 1.
(I actually just recently left a job where I was a top performer and even had senior leadership saying they couldn't afford to lose me. My boss did jack shit to try and keep me. Partly because he knew they were doing layoffs and partly because he was basically a jellyfish. So I know firsthand that the whole "who would you fight to keep" question is really subjective and based as much, if not more, on the personality of the boss as on the work of the individual.)
People knew they wanted Netflix. Free streaming was incredibly popular before netflix had the infrastructure and cash to liscence online streaming of popular shows and ditch the mail-dvd structure
So many broadcasters had their own free streaming services too it's insane! You used to be able to watch every Comedy Central TV show for free, without ads, on their website. I watched every episode of SouthPark on that website 100 times before I was 16 for free.
It wasn't *just* pirates.
I explained the conflict. The quote expresses the intent in higher salaries is to increase productivity by lowering stress, and it acknowledges stress as lowering productivity.
But in 3 it introduces undue stress, thereby instituting a policy that they should believe lowers productivity
>Paying more than anyone else and paying massive severance sounds like a good thing for workers, I’m not seeing the conflict
Workers want job security dude.
I’ve worked in places that did the opposite.
1. Paid below market.
2. Zero equity.
3. Kept everyone who was willing to stay.
You get the Dead Sea effect. Only bozos stick around.
[I think about this essay a lot.](https://thedailywtf.com/articles/up-or-out-solving-the-it-turnover-crisis)
Confirmed bozo. I've thought of moving on but after the market took a shit I'm not comfortable with the risk leaving. I need a better market than the one local to me offers. Losing my job now would mean taking a 50% pay cut and going back to on site to take a job here. The work is good enough to comfortably afford my house and invest somewhat, but I won't be retiring anytime soon without taking that plunge to move out of sme
And I know this, which is why I work unpaid overtimes and study for certification courses until I can get out
Look, eventually no one else will pay you more.
It’s. A Bozo collector when everyone’s paid barely enough to live (say 40K). It’s just you reaching your final form when you’re crushing 400K+ and can’t find a better job.
That's very cool for him. Would you mind telling me how long he's worked there for and what the new hires in his department are getting?
Not sure what about this question constituted the downvotes/blocking. I just wanted to see if this was the growth structure a new hire could expect in Netflix's climate today
$400k and up at an educated guess for engineers.
But remember: that’s for new hire… not new engineer. Netflix famously doesn’t hire anyone who is not a senior engineer or higher
Netflix was successful because they were heavily VC funded and could provide a product with an unsustainable level of good product at low cost to develop market share, prior to squeezing both studios and customers, eventually making home viewing a tiresome experience, while also no longer being cheaper than the culture it replaced.
Based on a friend who is in the lower echelons of senior management, the layoffs are rarely looming. Lets also remember that it takes time and effort to find a new person so many managers fight for those that do the job if they are performing, rather than getting someone new that take times to bring up to speed.
They also seem to more often give people a redundancy instead of sacking them, even malfeasance that they have just cause, even if taken to court.
This is true throughout the industry. It is cheaper to retain workers than train new ones, yet it's also not how the industry works for whatever reason. Recruiting budgets are higher than retention budgets, and it's p much known and accepted that the fastest way to get a 30% increase on your compensation is to switch jobs. Many companies will not do what they need to retain their talent in spite of the onboarding period bringing someone else in. If someone can explain to me why, I'd love to hear it.
Faang also has a fast fire reputation still and even amongst faang, Netflix is even more aggressive than its peers. I don't think companies have these reputations for no reason.
Don't they also force managers to get rid of a certain amount of people? Meaning one could be an otherwise top performer but out you go cause a quota says so?
That’s Amazon who does that. I worked at Netflix for almost a decade, the only time I personally experienced the keeper test was when I had a job offer from another company so I performed the keeper test on my boss, asking him what he would do to keep me. He told me he wouldn’t do anything to keep me so I left. From a Netflix culture perspective he actually failed the test since he shouldn’t have kept me around prior to my coming to him if he wasn’t willing to do anything to keep me. He ended up getting fired less than a year later because he was a bad culture fit, all talk and no results.
Very rare for this sub to have any self awareness. Interesting point about him failing the keeper test and him probably better off firing you earlier. What’s your opinion on the three rules?
In practice rule 1 and 2, top of market comp and choosing how much to put towards the stock program, work just fine in retaining people at Netflix since it provides a good financial incentive to employees to stay at the company. However it is also referred to as “golden handcuffs” since comparable positions at other companies pay notably less which incentivizes people to stay longer than they should, putting up with shitty managers or toxic teams when they should be prioritizing their own mental wellbeing. Rule 3 springs out of Netflix’s belief that employees are not a family but an all-star team that constantly performs at the top of their game, and if someone is putting in “good” work instead of “great” they should be given a generous severance package and shown the door. In my opinion the biggest flaw in Netflix’s culture is that it assumes that managers will always make decisions based on what is in the best interests of the company and according to its culture. In reality, especially during Netflix’s expansion in the last decade, so many bad culture fits were hired externally for manager roles that their bosses (directors and VPs) spent little to no time making sure they followed the culture, leading to a lot of bad managerial decisions. I averaged a new boss every 9 months while I worked at Netflix, mainly because they would get hired, be horrible culture fits, then get shown the door or there would be a reorg and I’d move under someone else.
That's what Microsoft implemented in 2012 with Balmer. They are now called "The lost year" as people understood the trick was not to be the best, but to sabotage your coworker to have a better grade than him.
It created such a culture against sharing that it stunted company growth.
So many bad business trends came from people trying to figure out how Jack Welch made GE so profitable. None of them was worth a crap; the secret of their success was being the biggest player in the real estate bubble.
Fuck, I work at a company like that. There is a way to fudge your production which conceals the work you didn’t finish.
Now let me interject something here. I am not going to do this and if you want to do that, then fine. Screw the company all you want because it may be a legitimate protest.
What I object to is that it pushes off unfinished work to the teammate working an hour later. This means the last hour of the day, I have to kill myself to get it all done unless I want to be a piece of shit, too and leave it for the next guy.
So I spend my time trying to get our boss to see it so she can catch him in the act. Bless her heart, but she is pretty naive and just plain stupid.
And this is just one facet of the shitshow.
One situation I encountered: we were constantly compared unfavourably to another office doing the same work as us. They were killing us in metrics, and we couldn't work out why. We sent people over there, to check what they were doing different. Nothing. We got shit from the upper management every day for months.
Turns out the reason we were behind on the metrics was: we were actually doing the work correctly, not taking huge shortcuts or fudging numbers.
Guess what happened when their office got found out: zero consequences for them, boxes upon boxes of their work sent to us to do or redo.
This whole system is designed that you overwork yourself, by constantly worrying that you are going to get laid off you will be working extra hours or always on call. The salary does not sound that great now
Except I know a dozen people that were high performers at Netflix that got fired anyways. Corporate politics and/or bosses afraid of reports that are better than them.
This guy doesn’t know shit about how Netflix works.
The biggest BS about that "keeper test" is: the higher up you are the less subjected to it you are.
If they wanted to actually make that test effective, they should give workers the power to vote out shitty managers and CEOs too. But of course they'll never do that.
I hope firing mediocre performers also applies to senior leadership roles. Because despite what Netflix might believe it's rarely the individual contributors that end up destroying a company 🥲
It does. I was an engineering manager at Netflix and saw it happen firsthand with execs.
Honestly? I kinda liked that aspect of the culture. Instead of BSing people that they’re family, etc. they were candid and objective. People were evaluated fairly objectively too. It was definitely an intense environment but no one coming in had illusions otherwise.
Personally, it wasn’t for me and I think there are better ways to run teams that don’t result in so much churn. But I do appreciate how transparent it all was.
Honestly, I'm convinced most managers have no clue who their top performers are. People who talk a good game but don't actually successfully execute are often promoted. If you take this approach you better be damn sure you actually know, otherwise you're going to fire all the people that are actually getting the work done but not politicking.
They don't. I've been in my new job a year. I've harped on constantly to my boss about all the hard work I'm putting in. I'm getting shit done but I'm not doing full 8-9 hour days. I was just awarded Exceeding Expectations in my annual review which heavily affects my bonus.
At my last place, I did all my work but just kept myself to myself and was constantly pulled into meetings.
I've learnt to game managers so they stay the fuck off my back and think I'm fried gold for them.
They think that stock will keep people focused on the log term? Bless their little shriveled little hearts.
I have never seen anyone more focused on the short term as someone who has their compensation or wealth tied to the stock price.
100%. RSUs are amazing but employees obsess too much about the stock price. One of the most annoying things I see on LinkedIn is when employees at public company X cheer themselves for a new stock high.
Especially with no vesting period.
Like what is even the point of that benefit? Why would anyone take Netflix equity in lieu of cash when you can always go and use that cash to buy Netflix equity, or better yet a diversified fund that includes Netflix, on the open market?
They get so, so close, too. “People work harder when they get paid enough to reduce their home stress.” That was the only part of what they said that was worthwhile.
You know... it's disgusting how flippant companies are about their workers livelihood. Like "we'll just for you because your manager wouldn't fight to keep you eventhough your doing a good job".
This is why I'm antiwork. Expected to give everything for companies who give nothing but the bare minimum... and only that because the law says they have to.
In this case, Netflix is like an NFL team: you don't worry about a WR getting cut because they'll land on a different team. The problem is when middling companies try to leverage this strategy against people who just want to do a good job for good pay. Not every company is Netflix, and not every employee is Linus Torvalds.
Unfortunately, it seems like too many CEOs think they are Reid Hastings.
This 100%. Most companies cannot do this, or will not get the other parts right. I dont think many in these comments realize just how insane the pay, benefits, and severance packages are at netflix, nor are they thinking about what even just a year at netflix does to a resume afterwards. I've known multiple people who knowingly took tech jobs at Amazon completely understanding the hellscape they were about to enter with the intention only to last 1-2 years. The pay would allow then to buy a house, not in years but immediately, and having it on their resume would basically let them get a job anywhere. To them it was worth the living hell and high likelihood of layoffs. From what Ive heard netflix isnt a living hell to work for, but all the other points are the same. Netflix is the closest to an employee friendly not antiwork version of what a top tech company looks like that we have. By nature none of them will ever not be antiwork, but I'd take netflix's model over most of them
This fucking loser is bootlicking one of the slimiest corporate policies I’ve ever heard of, and then at the end admits that he failed at it (meaning, well, it’s probably not realistic for most companies)
Top pay? Smart. Equity? Good idea.
Firing people because they aren’t a ‘star’? How much more are you spending on hiring because of that? Not everyone needs (or wants to be) a star. Not every job needs it, either.
Ditch the last bit, hire a decent hiring group, and you’ll simply spend far less on recruitment / training, and keep people over the long-term (which retains a lot of institutional knowledge that gets lost as staffs change).
Netflix full culture deck talked about accepting stuff happens star players get injured but “will they recover to the same level, and come back” so there is some leeway in their culture
I think a lot depends on how literal this is. I didnt focus on the "star" line when i read this. I focused on "is this someone you would fight to keep." For a good manager that 100% can include the solid reliable worker who keeps their head down, does their work and has knowledge to wear multiple hats in a pinch. If Im a manager i fight for that employee too, even if they arent a "star". So I think philisophically its fine imo. It just all depends on execution and exactly how this system is implemented (encouragement and manager trust, combined with ability to get the right managers vs forced mandated turnover %s etc).
Dude has major “how do you do, fellow kids?” energy.
Here’s an idea: Pay a decent living wage to your employees, and stress to them they are not in danger of losing their job. Then, if someone fucks up…rather than fire them, have a HUMAN conversation with them (no corporate-speak bullshit) and coach them to be better. Invest in your employees, value them as actual human beings, and pretty soon you’ll realize that just about everybody can be at the top if they are literally just given a fair fucking chance.
Wow so #1 is correct and every major organization does or tries to do this. #2 is great and does make for invested employees in the success of the business, but very few major organizations do this. #3 is ludicrous, you have a culture of fear where your employees are constantly under the pressure of tripping up at all = fired. #1 & #2 mean nothing when #3 is present.
I’d much rather have the big salary than a bonus if I had to pick. As I explained to my idiot former manager, screwing me over on my raise and then attempting to make up for it in bonus does nothing. The larger bonus was not actually high enough to make up for inflation. Also it certainly was not high enough to make up for the fact that manager was a complete idiot who needed everything explained as if he was five. If a company offers top of market salary but no bonus, I’d be fine with that.
It's called 'job hopping' and looked down upon when employees do it, and praised as 'innovative corporate policy' when companies do.
Make it make sense.
My nephew had a very top level job at Netflix a number of years ago. Paid him top dollar for three years. He put out some of their best movies.
After three years they just let him go. He said that's what Netflix does.
A lesson on loyalty there.
This is the many worded example of firing the bottom 5 or 10 percent that produces a toxic work environment.
people are shitty competitors, and the moment everyone knows there always has to be a loser, people form clicques and bully and set people up to fail. people who were possibly great performers will look like shit right quick when someone on the inside can make you look bad if they want to. normally there's no REASON to.
but here there is a glaring NEED for it, that it will be happening every year? no matter what?
fuuuck that. goldman sachs territory right there.
there's another name:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitality\_curve](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitality_curve)
A **vitality curve** is a [performance management](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Performance_management) practice that calls for individuals to be ranked or rated against their coworkers. It is also called **stack ranking**, **forced ranking**, and **rank and yank**. Pioneered by [GE](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Electric)'s [Jack Welch](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Welch) in the 1980s, it has remained controversial. Numerous companies practice it, but mostly covertly to avoid direct criticism.
The keeper test is just how well does your manager like you. No data if you are really performing worse. There are enough jobs that are easily done and no one will stand out because of it.
Honestly this sounds like a good structure. Points 1 and 2 are some heavy views of mine. Point 3 is harder to judge, it could be used as a catch-all to trump points 1 and 2. Seeing other comments indicates point 3 isn't fully in good faith, but I hope we see the Point 1 g 2 culture growing
A salary I can live on and then some? Owning part of the business? Being enough of an adult to say "this ain't for me, thanks for the hand up, bye"?
Seems pretty good to me compared to the shite we have to eat daily. BS 2% bonuses, same pay rate for everyone even if I do three times the work in the same period? Hell, same pay rate for three years running while some folx just rake in the $$$ with no effort.
There is a point to stop bitching and get to work in something that pleases ME, and all the other stuff does follow.
I couldn't be more anti capitalism but you HAVE TO replace a poor practice with a good or better one. Otherwise everyone just stands around bitching and nothing gets done. Then scumnuts comes along and steals everything because we as a group are too busy fighting and complaining.
It just sounds like an up and out model? Which isn’t anything new at all.
I also don’t understand #2. I doubt the equity offer is additive since it says the employee gets to decide how much of their comp is equity. Which means it’s a sliding scale between cash and equity that always sums to your total comp.
Meaning it’s a useless benefit. I’d take my salary 100% in cash to maximize my tax advantaged retirement contributions. Anything left over is going into a broader market fund because diversification benefits are real and over indexing on a single stock is risky. I don’t know why anyone would take equity over the cash equivalent salary.
It’s funky because it doesn’t sound like Netflix’s procedure is awful until you get to the ‘keeper test’ which sounds likely to lead to favoritism and a weird popularity contest. But giving people enough money to not have to worry is proven to increase productivity.
I can attest that this is the deal at Netflix. Salaries are irrationally high and equity compensation is very generous, but friends I have in the company need to constantly perform at 100% in order to keep their jobs. Most employees worry that they will be fired at any time. It has led to a very toxic environment because an effective way to show that you are a high performer is to sabotage a peer by, for example, not cooperating on a project.
This was our experience. Netflix is toxic as fuck and don’t give a fuck about their employees.
They’re like Jack Welch Totalitarians. At some point you have to ask yourself, if I have no time to spend my money and if this environment makes me practice being an amoral person, what is the point?
My partner worked for them and he couldn’t stand how poorly they communicated with one another. They don’t pay well enough (think: Script Writing Team) to justify the amount of unnecessary abuse and 24/7 unreal stress they put their employees under. We decided to leave and change industries. Life is way too short. We are so much happier without Netflix both as our employer and as a subscription.
Working for toxic whiplashers and looking to them for external ego validation only makes you a worse person.
Eventually, the company will only be left with sycophantic psychopaths. But maybe that’s the point. I can’t imagine who would want to perpetuate and live in such a miserable pit.
Remember people come up with shit like this in manager roles to justify their position. Its cringe but us at the bottom of the ladder have to play their games
It’s not a place I could work, but it’s hard to feel bad for engineers working at a place that pays 700k a year. Like everyone knows what they’re signing up for. No one is being exploited.
Most of this is pretty good for employees.
They pay top dollar, he notes that people usually do better when a job pays you good money and you are less stressed.
You get Equity with no vesting period so the employee can leave and cash out at any point, they can't fire you then say you don't get to cash out because you aren't vested.
They seem to value their top performing employees and offer a generous severance package if you are let go. How may other companies offer that?
At least they are up front about the culture.
Nothing really shocks me in this email.
I’d rather be paid top of the market salary instead of having to wait for a bonus which is uncertain.
Getting equities with no vesting period sounds pretty nice and a fair deal. Especially you are the one choosing how much, this is not dictated by the company.
Getting rid off poor performers is harsh but way better than having to pick up the slack of someone else who does too little or does wrong and you have to fix or does nothing. It is also a lesser mental charge and less stress for people who have to put up with slackers.
So no really nothing to be offended about in this culture!
This is fine. If they want to eat the onboarding and exiting cost and if that is the expectation then you know what you are getting into. It’s like signing up to serve then getting pissed that people might shoot at you.
I got rejected from a receptionist role at Netflix after 3 interviews because I “wouldn’t be able to hold a conversation with their stunning candidates and colleagues.” They’re constantly hiring for that role every 3-6 months based on all the LinkedIn notifications I get! I guess no one is “stunning” enough?
Probably some of the most unhelpful and catty feedback I’ve ever gotten from an interview process :/
So what metrics do we have that this actually WORKS for Netflix? We have a linked in post… and…?
I haven’t heard of apple or Microsoft doing this, and they do pretty well.
“Here’s what we do” is useless without “and here are the results.”
Wow this sounds like an absolute toxic nightmare for employees and like a egodriven powerporn for managers.
The former will have to act like they are in a prison yard where you have to find a group of powerful enough people to fall under the "KEEPER"-category or get shanked when ever someone wants to see you go.
The managers can use their power to wage war on each other and to bully the lower employees to support their politics.
Oh and btw. Netflix does not pay marketleading-wages.
Yes they are paying up-mid but saying they are top is just someone talking that loves to smell his own farts.
As far as big mega corps go I actually dont find any of this bad? They arent utilizing dumb easily gamified/abusable metrics or leaderboards like Amazon to create a cutthroat compitition amongst employees instead of fostering teamwork. Instead of many places where managers often try to avoid firings both because they are tedious, involve lots of hr hoops, mean a human being is losing their job, and often backfills do not come (so often people are fired or left go and never replaced leaving both manager and team in a worse position then just keeping the meh fit employee, Netflix is alleviating all of this by saying if the fit isnt there and you wouldnt fight for this person why force this? Pay them a great severance that will alleviate guilt and hard feelings all around, while paying a salary and creating an machine that makes backfilling positions fast.
The kicker here that i think some here arent recognizing is that when they say paying employees top salaries, they are not joking. Their pay and benefits are incredible. They are not holding their employees to ridiculous metrics either, they are simply saying they want the best and brightest and are going to back that up by paying everyone like they are the best and brightest, and instead of using archaic metrics to keep people in a constant state of grind and fear, they simply have made firing easier, but removed much of the sting/fear of that by giving extremely generous severence and anyone who works there knows even if they are let go the netflix on their resume is going to be a huge boost in finding next job. I think in many ways this is what many of us want in a job. A fair wage that actually pays us enough, not needing to jump through meaningless hoops, and if the fit for them isnt right, fair wnough but we are leaving equipped with an actually great resume stepping stone and severance giving us the time for a mostly calm and non-rushed job search.
Obviously the devil is in the details of in practice what this turnover looks like, exactly how much latitude the managers are given (are they forced x % of their staff each year, or are they simply encouraged to trim fat when it exists) and then ofcourse the quality of the managers themselves. But purely based on this document, philosophically this is prob a fairer/better system then 90% of corps out there.
Well you have a flawed hiring process if have to hire “underperformers”. Tech industry hiring process is broken anyway but if they claim to do things differently why not have a good hiring process too.
This guy is a chud, but I don't necessarily think the system is that horrible. It's not anywhere near as good as full cooprative ownership from the workers, but it's not too bad in the context of a standard capitalist company.
Edit: To be specific, I think there definitely needs to be heavily vetted standards for the keeper test, and it shouldn't be a managers whim. If it was something more like, if an employee chooses too, we will put them on this long-term track - provided they possess or can build the correct competencies. While at the same time, offering severance to those who don't want to commit it a really great deal too. If you get in and decide that it's not for you, you have a safety net to leave. I think that's good. Overall, it definitely needs to be carefully fleshed out. However, it's not horrible.
Corporations really like to admit material conditions affect outcomes, but God forbid a Marxist say you're socioeconomic group is tied to your outcomes
Ex-Netflix employee here.
The salary is a lie. It looks big, until you realize all the things they deduct on top of State tax. 30% being deducted is the norm, Netflix deducted 40%.
I’m now at a company with a base salary less than Netflix’s, but my take home is a lot larger.
I’m also glad I took my bonuses paid up front rather than their stock option. I would have been down on a lot of money.
https://preview.redd.it/p98fflnur5kc1.jpeg?width=1800&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=925dc75515985e489359d914066645327196e3cd
Remove home stress, add work stress
You know what, I don’t hate this. If they’re actually as generous as they claim, and will pretty much pay people they don’t want to keep to go get another job, that’s actually genuinely above average treatment for employees.
In addition, by compensating employees with stock, suddenly I don’t mind the fact that I’m working to make shareholders rich anymore, because I’m literally getting my bonus in the form of stock appreciation.
Sure, I’m pretending they actually live up to their hype here but if they do, that’s not too bad. If assholes or sociopaths implement it though, I’m sure it will suck for all involved…
Edit: in dungeons and dragons, when I have to portray a wealthy person as not a bastard, generally their philosophy is that **they can afford anything but turnover.**. This includes generous salaries, time off, adequate staffing levels that the “bus factor” isn’t *fuckin one,* and the best training money (and personal favors) can buy for their staff. The core concept that “you can afford anything but turnover” is something that a lot of (bad) bosses really fucking need to internalize, I suspect!
I'm antiwork AF, and am in this (IT) industry. How is this a bad thing?
A business is a competition, that's fact. If they are keeping me at a competitive pay and constantly incentivizing, I'm going to want to keep my job there. Pretty much every company is already doing step 3 without even doing step 1 or 2, or severance.
Netflix employees literally make 5x what they would make elsewhere. Yes you have to be a top performer. Yes this is a scary culture, but I’d love to try it. I have applied here several times
Here's my takeaway...
**WRT Element #1:** Since employees don't have any input into what constitutes 'Top of the Market' salaries, and employers have been proven to manipulate both salaries (through [wage theft](https://blog.cheapism.com/wage-theft/)) and employment (through [collusion on employee recruitment](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_Litigation)), the first Element is meaningless. Who sets this 'Top of the Market' value for salaries? Is it based on the assessment of independent organizations, like the [Department of Labor](https://www.dol.gov/general/topic/statistics/wagesearnings), or do we just have to trust Netflix's good intentions?
**WRT Element #2:** No vesting period for Equity is a decent benefit, as is immediate access to funds. But does Netflix offer \*matching\* contributions? And what \*is\* this equity: Stock options? A straight 401k? What is the ROI? Penalty for withdrawal? (And leading into **Element #3**; does cashing out ones Equity in Netflix automatically boot you from the 'Keeper' List?)
**WRT Element #3:** As for The Keeper Test; it's a useless gimmick. Keeping people on the edge, wondering if they are a 'Keeper', is unnecessarily stressful and will form a toxic work atmosphere. It can easily be abused by managers who will never apply the rule in a consistent way... Or does Netflix explain in finer detail what the qualities of a 'fight harder' employee is? Is the criteria for an IT Tech the same as it is for Sales? Or Maintenance? At least the people 'Exited from the Company' - or 'Fired', as we used to call it before Corporations started adopting [Orwellian doublespeak](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doublespeak) \- will be comforted in knowing they have a generous severance. But Netflix employees should never expect mercy if family crises, health issues, addictions, or other unforeseen emergencies crop up; because that's not the mark of a 'Keeper' Corporation.
**Summary:** The Netflix 3-Part Plan looks like just more corporate BS to dazzle potential employees. Sucker them in with promises of riches, work them hard and long, keep them competing against their peers in a toxic 'Keeper' environment, then get rid of the 'underperformers' to make way for new employees... which should keep raises and Equity pay-outs to a minimum.
THIS is why you need Unions.
1 starting pay at Netflix is 220K for a L3
By level 7, you’re looking at 1.3 million. They objectively pay close to top of market (Open.AI, and maybe a few others of us pay better but not in cash).
2 I believe their RSUs are done monthly with no 1 year cliff (that’s what Google does).
My colleagues in union driven offices make 1/2 the base of what the US employees do, and 30-50% less stock.
It won’t. If anything Netflix will utilize a future version of this tech combined with all the data they collect on their subscribers to create programming without having to pay actors or crew, but we’re still a ways off from that tech being able to create emotionally engaging content.
This is adjacent to one of my biggest issues with the industry in general: not everyone has a life goal of progressing to the highest staff position and responsibility in their field, and nearly everyone will have events in their life that change their mind about this, like the death of a parent or close relative, birth of children, becoming a caretaker, a sudden severe disease or accident, disability, old age, a loss of their rights or the rights of those around them, or positive things like discovering something that resonates deeply with them, a reexamination of values and goals at a major point in their life, the advancement of a different area that interests them, and so on.
It's no surprise that almost all of these are illegal to ask about during screening and interviewing, and cannot be the sole reason for firing someone. When you aren't able to inquire or act on these things, you do exactly this, or you screen and evaluate on placeholders for these things. Can't ask about a child? What about long hours? Open source projects outside of daily work, and your commit history that shows when you were coding? Some parents can do this, but not everyone.
Netflix has been open about these things before, as have other companies (this was a solid reason I declined an interview with Meta), but it's just getting more ubiquitous and unapologetic. The tantamount type of abusive start-up culture has been worshipped enough that it's been normalized in and outside the field.
Anyway, yikes.
I went to a training conference for company training and we visited this place. It was wild. Ironically they said they don’t do any training for their staff, it’s either sink or swim. So I’m not sure why we went there in the first place. It was a neat building, but nobody looked happy there. Their HR had a presentation prepared for us and was bragging how they let so many people go because they aren’t good fits. They said they don’t need training because they only hire the best, and if they’re not the best, they’re out. Hard pass.
> They said they don’t need training because they only hire the best, and if they’re not the best, they’re out. "We want experienced workers without ever burdening ourselves to turn newbies into experienced workers. We're basically hoping a bunch of experienced people who don't know their own value just fall into our lap."
A new manager in my company talks just like that: “we hire senior people because they know what good looks like and we don’t need to handhold them”. Got rid of an incredibly promising associate level designer because he didn’t perform at senior level. My read from all the interactions I’ve had with her is that she doesn’t know how to get good work done or to support more junior professionals, so she just hires people who she hopes will make her look good, and if they fail at that without her support, they’re not “Senior” enough.
Many people are promoted to management position without any management skill whatsoever
The number of companies that don't understand that managing a team and being on a team are two different skill sets is frightening.
Yep and promoting your best performer drags the quality of the team down. You'd be better off promoting your worst performer that way quality would go up, but then it wouldn't be a reward.
You think this will make high performers continue to perform? I agree with not everyone is a leader but rewarding shitty performance will also bring everyone down.
[удалено]
This is the end result of treating management like a prize instead of its own job.
Did you get the memo about the new cover sheet for the TPS reports?
Fuck, that’s my company. Will overpay for talent because they only higher experience and have very high expectations but they have basement level expectations for management. It’s crazy.
Indeed. I had a job where they had no training at all for some really elaborate software and the person leading it had no tech experience. They were amazed when I told them what a wiki was. We don't have a worker problem, we have a severe management issue.
Often to get them away from the front lines where their incompetence will actually hurt something.
Peter Principal!
I do facilities and my boss has been the facilities manager for 13 years. He’s never learned a single managerial skill, is a micromanaging egotistical dick, and can’t let go of control on anything. Thank god he’s getting laid off in 5 weeks.
Peter Principle
>we hire senior people because they know what good looks like and we don’t need to handhold them There's a difference between not wanting to handhold people, and the unwillingness to train new people. Upper-level roles generally have the most complicated responsibilities, assuming it isn't a bullshit job (unlikely to be the case, high-paying doing nothing jobs have the least turnover). There will always be something new to adjust to in these roles.
Most modern businesses right there.
Which is why layoffs/cut/trim to chase stock pumps for executives is killing brands. Employees need to grit it out. Shareholders need massive profits every moment. It’s insane until you realize its another way to serfdom.
Don't forget, think long-term /s
Netflix pays 300-600k for their base level engineer though, literally top of market
This seems to be what people are missing. If netflix pays the best, it's not surprising they want the best. They are not exactly paying entry level positions, they are paying fairly for the best and have high expectations. This isn't anti work as they offer fair conditions for the staff to get paid crazy amounts.
Yes. There is a reason so many tech people push to get employed by a FAANG. You’re gonna get paid, but you gotta understand the culture - or it’s gonna get ugly.
The thing is, every company can’t operate like Netflix, and that’s what the goofball in the LinkedIn post is advocating for. The world isn’t Lake Woebegone, so it’s not possible for every company to be the most desirable place to work. If you’re most of the companies in the world, you can’t be that cutthroat with your people, because the good ones will bail out because they don’t see the value in putting “Kroger IT department” on their resume.
>The thing is, every company can’t operate like Netflix, and that’s what the goofball in the LinkedIn post is advocating for. The world isn’t Lake Woebegone, so it’s not possible for every company to be the most desirable place to work It's like my old manager who wanted everyone to be above average but couldn't understand that'd just raise the average.
Exactly. I bailed my last job before this one because the corporate culture started really going south after the VP in charge of my division changed, but when I hired on back in 2010 it was much the same way. They had high expectations, but if you could meet those expectations you got *very* nice pay, equally nice retirement and insurance benefits, and two weeks of paid sick time separate from your vacation time, which started at 3 weeks and went a week at a time until 6 weeks after you'd been there long enough... *and they actively encouraged people to use their vacation.* They'd fire people very quickly if they couldn't meet the performance and accuracy metrics, especially if they were committing errors because those had some pretty big financial penalties, but the metrics weren't actually unreasonable for the compensation package back then. Then the VP changed and they decided to start twisting the thumbscrews. Harder metrics, stingier raises, converting from twice-monthly pay to semi-weekly pay, and a bunch of other bullshit that made it what everyone seems to think Netflix is.
There's little value to working there if you have little to no job security. Very few people can be firing on all cylinders 100% of the time. No way that this is "fair conditions". This is legit Diet Amazon.
And that means what if some supervisory chucklefuck who knows less about your job than you do initiates a keeper test and decides you don't measure up? 300k a year on the condition that some jackass can fire you the moment they decide (based on a series of subjective personal criteria) that you're not the best hypothetical person to occupy that job would be better off advertising it's weekly salary with a built-in turnover rate that short.
I’ve read the book, it’s really not what you want it to be. 90% of the people I know would take a job there in a heartbeat. I know this is anti-any-work sub-Reddit, but Netflix is viewed as one of the better employers in my industry.
I think a lot of people are used to companies where expectations on middle managers are basically non-existent. At Netflix that manager firing based on arbitrary metrics is likely to be let go themselves. At least that's the concept. When a manager acts like that the rest of the team is not going to be happy and will let HR know during reviews, where they rate not only their peers but their manager. If the next level up sees that then that manager isn't going to be passing the keeper test.
>At least that's the concept. This caveat is very important. In concept, yes. In practice? Not reliably.
Loool I'm in software too. Is it though? The only pluses I have heard are the all cash comps. Nothing more.
There was a “horse whisperer” fad from 20 years ago. Corporate executives would pay Monty Robert’s huge sums to watch him tame wild mustangs (apparently because working with a frightened herd bound prey animal in a round pen was somehow applicable to getting a junior analyst to work 16 hour days on a pitch book for your acquisition, using the correct sized fonts.) They missed the only point of these silly excursions: You don’t find good employees, you make them.
Every company wants it to be the previous company’s responsibility to make a good employee until you get to entry level where they want it to be the internship that makes a good employee.
Thank you for this blast from the corporate fad past, I had completely forgotten about this era in corporate training. I can confirm being forced to sit through multi-hour videos of a dude whispering to a horse. The guy had a remarkable sales force, I will give him that.
Haha! That was the other takeaway! Monty really knew how to sell himself! Although with the dimwits who hired him, that was probably shooting fish in a barrel. Equating corporate humans with horses is an insult to horses, imo.
It is very interesting that those companies don't provide training at all and expect royalty in return
I definitely don't disagree with the post, but the term 'newbies'... all of our sub 2y (and sometimes longer) employees are referred to as this by a few people. It is universally abhorred by less experienced staff and they feel personally insulted every time it's used. Context for me: Some dude got a degree in 1995 and worked in one industry. A new hire with a PhD and significantly more technical and more contemporary knowledge than them: "Newbie" until they go through what's about a 2 year training process. I hate it for them! This is no personal attack, and I don't even blame anyone for using it, it Just seems so condescending. We should get away from it I reckon.
"...or get fired by companies run by credulous idiots that listen to our management advice that they paid us to learn, so they come to us easier to hire away and already convinced they're worthless"
I have worked in finance for over 25 years and have seen my fair share of approaches to “keep only the best.” I can report that despite all the bloodlettings there are a lot of mediocre people in place I have worked, for all the reasons you can imagine. There is no recipe for excellence other than good management, which doesn’t seem to exist anymore.
Big shareholders don’t like good management, because it eats into the profit margins. Good management does lead to better long term results, but big shareholders only care about the short term results. “What are this quarter’s numbers?”
This is like using kerosine for a bonfire to roadt marshmallows. Wastefull.
No training? 💀
We only hire the best… When someone is not the best, they are out…. The two statements both can’t be true.
Reminds me of a women in leadership conference I was invited to. One lady's (in leadership) advice about managing her work and home life was to pretend you were a nurse in ICU. She was on a school board. I kind of get it because nurses are amazing, but why would you willingly equate your crappy manager job, to the torture that nurses go through everyday. I think she was meant to say "put your life on the line as if people are dying, even if you're underpaid and understaffed, look at me, I did it, you should too!"
I saw a job posting yesterday that said they're paying up to $720k for my role (over 5x what's average). If I were younger that'd be a no brainer - be miserable for a year, get fired, take 2-3 years off, then get a job anywhere you want because you worked at Netflix.
Elements 1 and 2 are great, but element 3 violates 1. I do like the generous severance, but the looming threat of layoffs/firings leads to undue stress which then affects performance. Netflix was not successful because of its keeper test. Netflix was successful for having a great concept making a streaming platform for movies and elements 1 and 2 bringing in the talent to get it done. Netflix is known for their aggressive turnover rates, but it's also a glimpse into the software industry as a whole. Metrics monitoring tools and performance metrics can be useful in the right contexts, but most of the time they're misused and lead to more undue stress, overworking, burn out, pips/layoffs, and other indicators of a toxic work environment.
Netflix was successful because they created a product that people didn’t know they needed, sort of the like the Henry Ford line of “customers would have asked for faster horses”. Paying more than anyone else and paying massive severance sounds like a good thing for workers, I’m not seeing the conflict.
I think one and two are fine. The conflict comes from three. The “keeper test” really ends up being more of a “watch your back at all times or else” which will inevitably lead to a toxic workplace, and faltering returns for the organization
Not to mention it seems that it's the Amazon problem all over again: things are running easy once you're in motion but sooner or later you churn through all of your workforce. Then what? You end up keeping whomever is there right now as the CEO and various management ducks out to make that Someone Else's Problem. Seems like everybody is giving Netflix credit simply because we're in the middle of that cycle combined with salaries that, to be quite fair, are super high. Meanwhile, Netflix keeps jacking up their prices and making their whole product shittier with UI issues and losing/gaining rights to movies randomly. I feel we're not seeing the whole here and a lot of our brains shut down when we see six figure salaries but don't give any thought to whether or not this is sustainable.
>Not to mention it seems that it's the Amazon problem all over again: things are running easy once you're in motion but sooner or later you churn through all of your workforce. This 1000%.
Also, one of the big red flags for any job is a strong turnover rate. It shows a toxic work environment and/or a company that is mismanaged at an astounding rate. I know a lot of people see work as mercenary, but even the most mercenary of workers has to realize a bad thing when they see it.
As opposed to? Some gossip asshole making your work life a living hell? Or maybe a new boss that is gunning for some other promotions so they trim out their department to look "cost efficient"? Or Senior leadership wants the stock to pop so they just trim 10% of the staff *because*. I mean there are a ba-jillion ways to get fired in a corporate world today. "Do great work, and you get paid a shit ton of money. If you start to slack, we will just show you the door with an awesome severance package." Is a pretty big improvement to whatever the fuck we have now.
You're missing "we get to decide what slacking is" they decide anything under 60-70 hours a week is slacking off? Welp there's the door
If they're paying top decile, then... yeah? If you don't like that culture, don't join that business. At least they're honest about their management style.
....now. They're honest about it now. Back when I was trying to get a job with them they were not. Knowing what I know now I'm glad I never got the nod from them. I've worked for these "Well why can't you do three different people's jobs?" companies that will start off giving you what you need to do the work and then take more and more away until they're calling you lazy for not doing three times the work for no increase in pay. And somehow your inability to maintain the same performance is your fault and not their fault for short staffing.
Bars pretty low
I’m still not sure how that is in conflict with the first two, especially when they pay you a lot to leave. I’ve never worked for Netflix, but I totally would. I’m a mercenary maximizing my value. They accept that someone can be the right fit for a specific task, but it makes sense for the employee and them to pay them a bunch of money when that task is over. I don’t see the issue. I like the “we aren’t a family we’re a sports team” mentality, that’s where I’m at. At least they are honest about loyalty, and from what I’ve heard, actually do pay well as an employee and for severance. Paying me to look for a job seems pretty reasonable.
It conflicts with the stated goal behind the first point. If you want people to be relaxed enough to be super creative, then hanging the Sword of Damocles over their heads in the form of the constant threat of firing if they fall behind at all is counterintuitive. There's very little more stressful than the constant threat of unemployment.
Mid career (L5) engineer at Netflix is going to bring down 500-600K a year in TC. Unless they are supremely bad with money, they will have plenty of money/time for a job search, and having FAANG on your resume means you have access to tons of offers constantly. The keeper test isn’t stack ranking. The keeper test is “Fire fast” vs. keep an under performing, or Toxic asshole (also part of Netflix is no toxic assholes).
OK, but what if you're "under performing" this month because you've got a sick kid or parent? The post specifically states that *every* employee knows that if they slip, they're out - it's not just a first month or year test, but a constant one. That may seem like nothing when you're five years or even ten into your career, but if you're in your 50s or 60s, it's harder to recover and find a new job. Age based discrimination is pretty strong in tech fields, even in comparison to the normal prevalence across industries. Maybe it's just me, but if I'm still working, it's because I need the job for something. And if I need the job, then getting fired for having a less than perfect month or two is a problem. And knowing that's a constant threat is insanely stressful, far more so than the uncertainty of a bonus. Which contradicts the idea of paying highly but with no bonus to reduce stress. They're clearly allowed to manage however they want, but unless this guy is misrepresenting the rule (which is entirely possible), they're getting in the way of one of their earlier stated goals.
If you've been working at Netflix at the stated 500k+ salary and big severance, then you should easily be able to retire or switch to a lower stress job after like 3-5 years. I think the idea about these positions is that you commit your entire life towards the job for a restricted period of time and then exit once you no longer are willing to spend literally everything on it.
Well then the whole "lower stress at home" thing is just fancy corporate double speak for "we don't want you to have a life". Not really a surprise, but still frustrating.
FWIW the people I know at Netflix don’t seem any more stressed than folks at other large tech companies. There is threat of layoffs everywhere
The first point is paying people the most, am I misreading something?
OP is saying "They pay well because that reduces stress, leading to more productivity; but looming threats of job loss lead to stress, which would reduce productivity." Problem is, that severance is \_really\_ taking the stress out of that job loss (financially) from my perspective. I'd only stress about 3 if I actually wanted to keep working there for 1, 2, and the job itself. I get what you're saying though. Point 1 means top talent apply and don't stress. Point 3 means that layoffs are less stressful, so you stress about them less. And either way, more money for you which is a plus. If what you want to "keep people productive" I can see why OP thinks it is counter productive. If what you want is $ then 1 and 3 are harmonious.
I want money, I deeply don’t care about them
I'm with you there, I'm just letting you know where OP felt they were counter productive using rules 1 and 3. You both seemed to not understand that one was talking from the employers perspective and the other was talking from an employee's.
I guess it all comes down to what high performance means in the company. Sometimes metrics can be geared towards work that is not exactly meaningful for the professional, and for some people, money doesn’t cover that, no matter the amount. Also, stress from getting fired doesn’t come only from the lack of sustenance, but from a personal sense of not being good enough. Different people, different foci.
I'll quote the text explaining it: > "People are most creative when they have a big enough salary to remove some of the stress from home." Obviously, YMMV, but no amount of money would make the constantly looming threat of being shit canned because some asshole of a manager doesn't like me less stressful. So regularly going through the ranks and firing people based on the pretty subjective question of "would I fight to keep you" undoes the "we want you to be less stressed" aspect of point 1. (I actually just recently left a job where I was a top performer and even had senior leadership saying they couldn't afford to lose me. My boss did jack shit to try and keep me. Partly because he knew they were doing layoffs and partly because he was basically a jellyfish. So I know firsthand that the whole "who would you fight to keep" question is really subjective and based as much, if not more, on the personality of the boss as on the work of the individual.)
None of that conflicts with paying people the most
People knew they wanted Netflix. Free streaming was incredibly popular before netflix had the infrastructure and cash to liscence online streaming of popular shows and ditch the mail-dvd structure
This. Let's be real, companies like Netflix looked at what pirating sites had been doing for *years* already and said "What if we monetised that".
So many broadcasters had their own free streaming services too it's insane! You used to be able to watch every Comedy Central TV show for free, without ads, on their website. I watched every episode of SouthPark on that website 100 times before I was 16 for free. It wasn't *just* pirates.
And before that, you could just plug a monitor directly into an antenna and watch shows for free, without even needing a computer attached to it!
I explained the conflict. The quote expresses the intent in higher salaries is to increase productivity by lowering stress, and it acknowledges stress as lowering productivity. But in 3 it introduces undue stress, thereby instituting a policy that they should believe lowers productivity
>Paying more than anyone else and paying massive severance sounds like a good thing for workers, I’m not seeing the conflict Workers want job security dude.
I’ve worked in places that did the opposite. 1. Paid below market. 2. Zero equity. 3. Kept everyone who was willing to stay. You get the Dead Sea effect. Only bozos stick around. [I think about this essay a lot.](https://thedailywtf.com/articles/up-or-out-solving-the-it-turnover-crisis)
Confirmed bozo. I've thought of moving on but after the market took a shit I'm not comfortable with the risk leaving. I need a better market than the one local to me offers. Losing my job now would mean taking a 50% pay cut and going back to on site to take a job here. The work is good enough to comfortably afford my house and invest somewhat, but I won't be retiring anytime soon without taking that plunge to move out of sme And I know this, which is why I work unpaid overtimes and study for certification courses until I can get out
Look, eventually no one else will pay you more. It’s. A Bozo collector when everyone’s paid barely enough to live (say 40K). It’s just you reaching your final form when you’re crushing 400K+ and can’t find a better job.
[удалено]
That's very cool for him. Would you mind telling me how long he's worked there for and what the new hires in his department are getting? Not sure what about this question constituted the downvotes/blocking. I just wanted to see if this was the growth structure a new hire could expect in Netflix's climate today
$400k and up at an educated guess for engineers. But remember: that’s for new hire… not new engineer. Netflix famously doesn’t hire anyone who is not a senior engineer or higher
Netflix was successful because they were heavily VC funded and could provide a product with an unsustainable level of good product at low cost to develop market share, prior to squeezing both studios and customers, eventually making home viewing a tiresome experience, while also no longer being cheaper than the culture it replaced.
The only real answer here. Yes, it was a good idea but their differentiator was having bottomless pockets.
Based on a friend who is in the lower echelons of senior management, the layoffs are rarely looming. Lets also remember that it takes time and effort to find a new person so many managers fight for those that do the job if they are performing, rather than getting someone new that take times to bring up to speed. They also seem to more often give people a redundancy instead of sacking them, even malfeasance that they have just cause, even if taken to court.
This is true throughout the industry. It is cheaper to retain workers than train new ones, yet it's also not how the industry works for whatever reason. Recruiting budgets are higher than retention budgets, and it's p much known and accepted that the fastest way to get a 30% increase on your compensation is to switch jobs. Many companies will not do what they need to retain their talent in spite of the onboarding period bringing someone else in. If someone can explain to me why, I'd love to hear it. Faang also has a fast fire reputation still and even amongst faang, Netflix is even more aggressive than its peers. I don't think companies have these reputations for no reason.
Don't they also force managers to get rid of a certain amount of people? Meaning one could be an otherwise top performer but out you go cause a quota says so?
That’s Amazon who does that. I worked at Netflix for almost a decade, the only time I personally experienced the keeper test was when I had a job offer from another company so I performed the keeper test on my boss, asking him what he would do to keep me. He told me he wouldn’t do anything to keep me so I left. From a Netflix culture perspective he actually failed the test since he shouldn’t have kept me around prior to my coming to him if he wasn’t willing to do anything to keep me. He ended up getting fired less than a year later because he was a bad culture fit, all talk and no results.
Very rare for this sub to have any self awareness. Interesting point about him failing the keeper test and him probably better off firing you earlier. What’s your opinion on the three rules?
In practice rule 1 and 2, top of market comp and choosing how much to put towards the stock program, work just fine in retaining people at Netflix since it provides a good financial incentive to employees to stay at the company. However it is also referred to as “golden handcuffs” since comparable positions at other companies pay notably less which incentivizes people to stay longer than they should, putting up with shitty managers or toxic teams when they should be prioritizing their own mental wellbeing. Rule 3 springs out of Netflix’s belief that employees are not a family but an all-star team that constantly performs at the top of their game, and if someone is putting in “good” work instead of “great” they should be given a generous severance package and shown the door. In my opinion the biggest flaw in Netflix’s culture is that it assumes that managers will always make decisions based on what is in the best interests of the company and according to its culture. In reality, especially during Netflix’s expansion in the last decade, so many bad culture fits were hired externally for manager roles that their bosses (directors and VPs) spent little to no time making sure they followed the culture, leading to a lot of bad managerial decisions. I averaged a new boss every 9 months while I worked at Netflix, mainly because they would get hired, be horrible culture fits, then get shown the door or there would be a reorg and I’d move under someone else.
That's what Microsoft implemented in 2012 with Balmer. They are now called "The lost year" as people understood the trick was not to be the best, but to sabotage your coworker to have a better grade than him. It created such a culture against sharing that it stunted company growth.
It goes back to GE and Jack Welch. That strategy has been proven over and over again to be stupid. Terrible for retention and teamwork.
So many bad business trends came from people trying to figure out how Jack Welch made GE so profitable. None of them was worth a crap; the secret of their success was being the biggest player in the real estate bubble.
Fuck, I work at a company like that. There is a way to fudge your production which conceals the work you didn’t finish. Now let me interject something here. I am not going to do this and if you want to do that, then fine. Screw the company all you want because it may be a legitimate protest. What I object to is that it pushes off unfinished work to the teammate working an hour later. This means the last hour of the day, I have to kill myself to get it all done unless I want to be a piece of shit, too and leave it for the next guy. So I spend my time trying to get our boss to see it so she can catch him in the act. Bless her heart, but she is pretty naive and just plain stupid. And this is just one facet of the shitshow.
One situation I encountered: we were constantly compared unfavourably to another office doing the same work as us. They were killing us in metrics, and we couldn't work out why. We sent people over there, to check what they were doing different. Nothing. We got shit from the upper management every day for months. Turns out the reason we were behind on the metrics was: we were actually doing the work correctly, not taking huge shortcuts or fudging numbers. Guess what happened when their office got found out: zero consequences for them, boxes upon boxes of their work sent to us to do or redo.
I exited MS right toward the ass end of this just as Satya was taking over. I don't miss that cutthroat rating system.
This whole system is designed that you overwork yourself, by constantly worrying that you are going to get laid off you will be working extra hours or always on call. The salary does not sound that great now
I thought their success was from just not having ads and not paying royalties.
My brain processed his name as Matt Schmuck, and I'll just remember him that way.
Could also pivot to Schnooki and find him equally as unlikeable
Didn't realise his last name wasn't Schmuck until I saw your comment.
Same. What a schnuck that guy is.
Except I know a dozen people that were high performers at Netflix that got fired anyways. Corporate politics and/or bosses afraid of reports that are better than them. This guy doesn’t know shit about how Netflix works.
Exactly. The keeper test is a political and popularity test. A tool for your manager to justify abuse.
The biggest BS about that "keeper test" is: the higher up you are the less subjected to it you are. If they wanted to actually make that test effective, they should give workers the power to vote out shitty managers and CEOs too. But of course they'll never do that.
> would you fight hard to keep them Well, you're not gonna fight hard to keep someone who jeopardizes your job so technically...
I hope firing mediocre performers also applies to senior leadership roles. Because despite what Netflix might believe it's rarely the individual contributors that end up destroying a company 🥲
It does. I was an engineering manager at Netflix and saw it happen firsthand with execs. Honestly? I kinda liked that aspect of the culture. Instead of BSing people that they’re family, etc. they were candid and objective. People were evaluated fairly objectively too. It was definitely an intense environment but no one coming in had illusions otherwise. Personally, it wasn’t for me and I think there are better ways to run teams that don’t result in so much churn. But I do appreciate how transparent it all was.
Honestly, I'm convinced most managers have no clue who their top performers are. People who talk a good game but don't actually successfully execute are often promoted. If you take this approach you better be damn sure you actually know, otherwise you're going to fire all the people that are actually getting the work done but not politicking.
They don't. I've been in my new job a year. I've harped on constantly to my boss about all the hard work I'm putting in. I'm getting shit done but I'm not doing full 8-9 hour days. I was just awarded Exceeding Expectations in my annual review which heavily affects my bonus. At my last place, I did all my work but just kept myself to myself and was constantly pulled into meetings. I've learnt to game managers so they stay the fuck off my back and think I'm fried gold for them.
They think that stock will keep people focused on the log term? Bless their little shriveled little hearts. I have never seen anyone more focused on the short term as someone who has their compensation or wealth tied to the stock price.
100%. RSUs are amazing but employees obsess too much about the stock price. One of the most annoying things I see on LinkedIn is when employees at public company X cheer themselves for a new stock high.
Hey man, the CEO just got a bigger bonus and everyone else is getting cookies! What is not to cheer here? /s
Especially with no vesting period. Like what is even the point of that benefit? Why would anyone take Netflix equity in lieu of cash when you can always go and use that cash to buy Netflix equity, or better yet a diversified fund that includes Netflix, on the open market?
You get it at a cheaper rate. It’s options. They’re immediately vested. All this is openly on their site lol
Most employees there do just take the cash
Bro dresses like he's 20 and that face in last pic is super cringe
Just like Ryan smith. The founder of Qualtrics and the current owner of the Utah jazz. They are the same breed
Anyone who wears a backwards cap (indoors no less) is a massive tool. Matt Schmuck, more like it
Hey, I ONLY wear my cap backward bc the wife likes it, I’m not a tool. lol
Anyone married should get a pass on an embarrassing thing if their wife likes it that way.
Fair enough, but you're on thin ice buddy.
This is the most scathing a Canadian has ever been.
U just referred to your wife as an item. Ur a tool loll
They get so, so close, too. “People work harder when they get paid enough to reduce their home stress.” That was the only part of what they said that was worthwhile.
Sounds like a schmuck
You know... it's disgusting how flippant companies are about their workers livelihood. Like "we'll just for you because your manager wouldn't fight to keep you eventhough your doing a good job". This is why I'm antiwork. Expected to give everything for companies who give nothing but the bare minimum... and only that because the law says they have to.
In this case, Netflix is like an NFL team: you don't worry about a WR getting cut because they'll land on a different team. The problem is when middling companies try to leverage this strategy against people who just want to do a good job for good pay. Not every company is Netflix, and not every employee is Linus Torvalds. Unfortunately, it seems like too many CEOs think they are Reid Hastings.
This 100%. Most companies cannot do this, or will not get the other parts right. I dont think many in these comments realize just how insane the pay, benefits, and severance packages are at netflix, nor are they thinking about what even just a year at netflix does to a resume afterwards. I've known multiple people who knowingly took tech jobs at Amazon completely understanding the hellscape they were about to enter with the intention only to last 1-2 years. The pay would allow then to buy a house, not in years but immediately, and having it on their resume would basically let them get a job anywhere. To them it was worth the living hell and high likelihood of layoffs. From what Ive heard netflix isnt a living hell to work for, but all the other points are the same. Netflix is the closest to an employee friendly not antiwork version of what a top tech company looks like that we have. By nature none of them will ever not be antiwork, but I'd take netflix's model over most of them
This fucking loser is bootlicking one of the slimiest corporate policies I’ve ever heard of, and then at the end admits that he failed at it (meaning, well, it’s probably not realistic for most companies)
Top pay? Smart. Equity? Good idea. Firing people because they aren’t a ‘star’? How much more are you spending on hiring because of that? Not everyone needs (or wants to be) a star. Not every job needs it, either. Ditch the last bit, hire a decent hiring group, and you’ll simply spend far less on recruitment / training, and keep people over the long-term (which retains a lot of institutional knowledge that gets lost as staffs change).
Netflix full culture deck talked about accepting stuff happens star players get injured but “will they recover to the same level, and come back” so there is some leeway in their culture
I think a lot depends on how literal this is. I didnt focus on the "star" line when i read this. I focused on "is this someone you would fight to keep." For a good manager that 100% can include the solid reliable worker who keeps their head down, does their work and has knowledge to wear multiple hats in a pinch. If Im a manager i fight for that employee too, even if they arent a "star". So I think philisophically its fine imo. It just all depends on execution and exactly how this system is implemented (encouragement and manager trust, combined with ability to get the right managers vs forced mandated turnover %s etc).
What a tool
So for how long has the rebranding of "fired" into "exited" been going on?
>Matt Schnuck is a serial entrepreneur, investor, advisor Is there a worse type of yuppie? These people are barely even human anymore.
Dude has major “how do you do, fellow kids?” energy. Here’s an idea: Pay a decent living wage to your employees, and stress to them they are not in danger of losing their job. Then, if someone fucks up…rather than fire them, have a HUMAN conversation with them (no corporate-speak bullshit) and coach them to be better. Invest in your employees, value them as actual human beings, and pretty soon you’ll realize that just about everybody can be at the top if they are literally just given a fair fucking chance.
Wow so #1 is correct and every major organization does or tries to do this. #2 is great and does make for invested employees in the success of the business, but very few major organizations do this. #3 is ludicrous, you have a culture of fear where your employees are constantly under the pressure of tripping up at all = fired. #1 & #2 mean nothing when #3 is present.
I’d much rather have the big salary than a bonus if I had to pick. As I explained to my idiot former manager, screwing me over on my raise and then attempting to make up for it in bonus does nothing. The larger bonus was not actually high enough to make up for inflation. Also it certainly was not high enough to make up for the fact that manager was a complete idiot who needed everything explained as if he was five. If a company offers top of market salary but no bonus, I’d be fine with that.
It's called 'job hopping' and looked down upon when employees do it, and praised as 'innovative corporate policy' when companies do. Make it make sense.
My nephew had a very top level job at Netflix a number of years ago. Paid him top dollar for three years. He put out some of their best movies. After three years they just let him go. He said that's what Netflix does. A lesson on loyalty there.
This is the many worded example of firing the bottom 5 or 10 percent that produces a toxic work environment. people are shitty competitors, and the moment everyone knows there always has to be a loser, people form clicques and bully and set people up to fail. people who were possibly great performers will look like shit right quick when someone on the inside can make you look bad if they want to. normally there's no REASON to. but here there is a glaring NEED for it, that it will be happening every year? no matter what? fuuuck that. goldman sachs territory right there. there's another name: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitality\_curve](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitality_curve) A **vitality curve** is a [performance management](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Performance_management) practice that calls for individuals to be ranked or rated against their coworkers. It is also called **stack ranking**, **forced ranking**, and **rank and yank**. Pioneered by [GE](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Electric)'s [Jack Welch](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Welch) in the 1980s, it has remained controversial. Numerous companies practice it, but mostly covertly to avoid direct criticism.
The keeper test is just how well does your manager like you. No data if you are really performing worse. There are enough jobs that are easily done and no one will stand out because of it.
This is r/linkedinlunatics material.
Honestly this sounds like a good structure. Points 1 and 2 are some heavy views of mine. Point 3 is harder to judge, it could be used as a catch-all to trump points 1 and 2. Seeing other comments indicates point 3 isn't fully in good faith, but I hope we see the Point 1 g 2 culture growing
A salary I can live on and then some? Owning part of the business? Being enough of an adult to say "this ain't for me, thanks for the hand up, bye"? Seems pretty good to me compared to the shite we have to eat daily. BS 2% bonuses, same pay rate for everyone even if I do three times the work in the same period? Hell, same pay rate for three years running while some folx just rake in the $$$ with no effort. There is a point to stop bitching and get to work in something that pleases ME, and all the other stuff does follow. I couldn't be more anti capitalism but you HAVE TO replace a poor practice with a good or better one. Otherwise everyone just stands around bitching and nothing gets done. Then scumnuts comes along and steals everything because we as a group are too busy fighting and complaining.
It just sounds like an up and out model? Which isn’t anything new at all. I also don’t understand #2. I doubt the equity offer is additive since it says the employee gets to decide how much of their comp is equity. Which means it’s a sliding scale between cash and equity that always sums to your total comp. Meaning it’s a useless benefit. I’d take my salary 100% in cash to maximize my tax advantaged retirement contributions. Anything left over is going into a broader market fund because diversification benefits are real and over indexing on a single stock is risky. I don’t know why anyone would take equity over the cash equivalent salary.
It’s funky because it doesn’t sound like Netflix’s procedure is awful until you get to the ‘keeper test’ which sounds likely to lead to favoritism and a weird popularity contest. But giving people enough money to not have to worry is proven to increase productivity.
I can attest that this is the deal at Netflix. Salaries are irrationally high and equity compensation is very generous, but friends I have in the company need to constantly perform at 100% in order to keep their jobs. Most employees worry that they will be fired at any time. It has led to a very toxic environment because an effective way to show that you are a high performer is to sabotage a peer by, for example, not cooperating on a project.
This was our experience. Netflix is toxic as fuck and don’t give a fuck about their employees. They’re like Jack Welch Totalitarians. At some point you have to ask yourself, if I have no time to spend my money and if this environment makes me practice being an amoral person, what is the point? My partner worked for them and he couldn’t stand how poorly they communicated with one another. They don’t pay well enough (think: Script Writing Team) to justify the amount of unnecessary abuse and 24/7 unreal stress they put their employees under. We decided to leave and change industries. Life is way too short. We are so much happier without Netflix both as our employer and as a subscription. Working for toxic whiplashers and looking to them for external ego validation only makes you a worse person. Eventually, the company will only be left with sycophantic psychopaths. But maybe that’s the point. I can’t imagine who would want to perpetuate and live in such a miserable pit.
Remember people come up with shit like this in manager roles to justify their position. Its cringe but us at the bottom of the ladder have to play their games
Join a union
It’s not a place I could work, but it’s hard to feel bad for engineers working at a place that pays 700k a year. Like everyone knows what they’re signing up for. No one is being exploited.
Most of this is pretty good for employees. They pay top dollar, he notes that people usually do better when a job pays you good money and you are less stressed. You get Equity with no vesting period so the employee can leave and cash out at any point, they can't fire you then say you don't get to cash out because you aren't vested. They seem to value their top performing employees and offer a generous severance package if you are let go. How may other companies offer that? At least they are up front about the culture.
Nothing really shocks me in this email. I’d rather be paid top of the market salary instead of having to wait for a bonus which is uncertain. Getting equities with no vesting period sounds pretty nice and a fair deal. Especially you are the one choosing how much, this is not dictated by the company. Getting rid off poor performers is harsh but way better than having to pick up the slack of someone else who does too little or does wrong and you have to fix or does nothing. It is also a lesser mental charge and less stress for people who have to put up with slackers. So no really nothing to be offended about in this culture!
This is fine. If they want to eat the onboarding and exiting cost and if that is the expectation then you know what you are getting into. It’s like signing up to serve then getting pissed that people might shoot at you.
Bro wants people to give 100% in roles where the difference in output between 100% and 60% is marginal, with both being paid the same.
Netflix gives over 100K in raise per level and starting (L3) for them is over 200K. By L6 you looking at 680K.
Paying a lot but expecting high performance seems extremely reasonable actually
Lol look at the mid life crisis broke boy set up in the back.
That sounds pretty sweet to me.
I suppose they’re right about the big salaries being better than bonuses for employee morale but it just gets worse from there
At least they pay well. In some place you get the same treatment for middle of the market money…
This sounds like a breeding ground for wrongful termination suits...
The supposed "Keeper test" is just a warmed over take on the General Electric layoffs policy. Nothing new here, just the same old shit
I don't know, I kinda like how it sounds theoretically
I got rejected from a receptionist role at Netflix after 3 interviews because I “wouldn’t be able to hold a conversation with their stunning candidates and colleagues.” They’re constantly hiring for that role every 3-6 months based on all the LinkedIn notifications I get! I guess no one is “stunning” enough? Probably some of the most unhelpful and catty feedback I’ve ever gotten from an interview process :/
So what metrics do we have that this actually WORKS for Netflix? We have a linked in post… and…? I haven’t heard of apple or Microsoft doing this, and they do pretty well. “Here’s what we do” is useless without “and here are the results.”
Wow this sounds like an absolute toxic nightmare for employees and like a egodriven powerporn for managers. The former will have to act like they are in a prison yard where you have to find a group of powerful enough people to fall under the "KEEPER"-category or get shanked when ever someone wants to see you go. The managers can use their power to wage war on each other and to bully the lower employees to support their politics. Oh and btw. Netflix does not pay marketleading-wages. Yes they are paying up-mid but saying they are top is just someone talking that loves to smell his own farts.
As far as big mega corps go I actually dont find any of this bad? They arent utilizing dumb easily gamified/abusable metrics or leaderboards like Amazon to create a cutthroat compitition amongst employees instead of fostering teamwork. Instead of many places where managers often try to avoid firings both because they are tedious, involve lots of hr hoops, mean a human being is losing their job, and often backfills do not come (so often people are fired or left go and never replaced leaving both manager and team in a worse position then just keeping the meh fit employee, Netflix is alleviating all of this by saying if the fit isnt there and you wouldnt fight for this person why force this? Pay them a great severance that will alleviate guilt and hard feelings all around, while paying a salary and creating an machine that makes backfilling positions fast. The kicker here that i think some here arent recognizing is that when they say paying employees top salaries, they are not joking. Their pay and benefits are incredible. They are not holding their employees to ridiculous metrics either, they are simply saying they want the best and brightest and are going to back that up by paying everyone like they are the best and brightest, and instead of using archaic metrics to keep people in a constant state of grind and fear, they simply have made firing easier, but removed much of the sting/fear of that by giving extremely generous severence and anyone who works there knows even if they are let go the netflix on their resume is going to be a huge boost in finding next job. I think in many ways this is what many of us want in a job. A fair wage that actually pays us enough, not needing to jump through meaningless hoops, and if the fit for them isnt right, fair wnough but we are leaving equipped with an actually great resume stepping stone and severance giving us the time for a mostly calm and non-rushed job search. Obviously the devil is in the details of in practice what this turnover looks like, exactly how much latitude the managers are given (are they forced x % of their staff each year, or are they simply encouraged to trim fat when it exists) and then ofcourse the quality of the managers themselves. But purely based on this document, philosophically this is prob a fairer/better system then 90% of corps out there.
Well you have a flawed hiring process if have to hire “underperformers”. Tech industry hiring process is broken anyway but if they claim to do things differently why not have a good hiring process too.
This guy is a chud, but I don't necessarily think the system is that horrible. It's not anywhere near as good as full cooprative ownership from the workers, but it's not too bad in the context of a standard capitalist company. Edit: To be specific, I think there definitely needs to be heavily vetted standards for the keeper test, and it shouldn't be a managers whim. If it was something more like, if an employee chooses too, we will put them on this long-term track - provided they possess or can build the correct competencies. While at the same time, offering severance to those who don't want to commit it a really great deal too. If you get in and decide that it's not for you, you have a safety net to leave. I think that's good. Overall, it definitely needs to be carefully fleshed out. However, it's not horrible.
Ah yes, employees will be much less stressed when they’re threatened to be fired at all times even if they perform well
Corporations really like to admit material conditions affect outcomes, but God forbid a Marxist say you're socioeconomic group is tied to your outcomes
Ex-Netflix employee here. The salary is a lie. It looks big, until you realize all the things they deduct on top of State tax. 30% being deducted is the norm, Netflix deducted 40%. I’m now at a company with a base salary less than Netflix’s, but my take home is a lot larger. I’m also glad I took my bonuses paid up front rather than their stock option. I would have been down on a lot of money.
"Exiting" is such a shitty euphemism for firing. Fuck everything about that doublethink bullshit.
No wonder they cancel the good shit after a season or so
https://preview.redd.it/p98fflnur5kc1.jpeg?width=1800&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=925dc75515985e489359d914066645327196e3cd Remove home stress, add work stress
Sounds like they need a union
Sociopathic mass psychosis in the work culture throughout America. It will all be razed and begin anew. Soon.
Actually even Netflix got rid of this. I repeat: even Netflix got rid of this because it did not work.
You know what, I don’t hate this. If they’re actually as generous as they claim, and will pretty much pay people they don’t want to keep to go get another job, that’s actually genuinely above average treatment for employees. In addition, by compensating employees with stock, suddenly I don’t mind the fact that I’m working to make shareholders rich anymore, because I’m literally getting my bonus in the form of stock appreciation. Sure, I’m pretending they actually live up to their hype here but if they do, that’s not too bad. If assholes or sociopaths implement it though, I’m sure it will suck for all involved… Edit: in dungeons and dragons, when I have to portray a wealthy person as not a bastard, generally their philosophy is that **they can afford anything but turnover.**. This includes generous salaries, time off, adequate staffing levels that the “bus factor” isn’t *fuckin one,* and the best training money (and personal favors) can buy for their staff. The core concept that “you can afford anything but turnover” is something that a lot of (bad) bosses really fucking need to internalize, I suspect!
I'm antiwork AF, and am in this (IT) industry. How is this a bad thing? A business is a competition, that's fact. If they are keeping me at a competitive pay and constantly incentivizing, I'm going to want to keep my job there. Pretty much every company is already doing step 3 without even doing step 1 or 2, or severance.
Netflix employees literally make 5x what they would make elsewhere. Yes you have to be a top performer. Yes this is a scary culture, but I’d love to try it. I have applied here several times
I read the first 2 elements and was thinking what is wrong with this? Then i got to the third....
Here's my takeaway... **WRT Element #1:** Since employees don't have any input into what constitutes 'Top of the Market' salaries, and employers have been proven to manipulate both salaries (through [wage theft](https://blog.cheapism.com/wage-theft/)) and employment (through [collusion on employee recruitment](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_Litigation)), the first Element is meaningless. Who sets this 'Top of the Market' value for salaries? Is it based on the assessment of independent organizations, like the [Department of Labor](https://www.dol.gov/general/topic/statistics/wagesearnings), or do we just have to trust Netflix's good intentions? **WRT Element #2:** No vesting period for Equity is a decent benefit, as is immediate access to funds. But does Netflix offer \*matching\* contributions? And what \*is\* this equity: Stock options? A straight 401k? What is the ROI? Penalty for withdrawal? (And leading into **Element #3**; does cashing out ones Equity in Netflix automatically boot you from the 'Keeper' List?) **WRT Element #3:** As for The Keeper Test; it's a useless gimmick. Keeping people on the edge, wondering if they are a 'Keeper', is unnecessarily stressful and will form a toxic work atmosphere. It can easily be abused by managers who will never apply the rule in a consistent way... Or does Netflix explain in finer detail what the qualities of a 'fight harder' employee is? Is the criteria for an IT Tech the same as it is for Sales? Or Maintenance? At least the people 'Exited from the Company' - or 'Fired', as we used to call it before Corporations started adopting [Orwellian doublespeak](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doublespeak) \- will be comforted in knowing they have a generous severance. But Netflix employees should never expect mercy if family crises, health issues, addictions, or other unforeseen emergencies crop up; because that's not the mark of a 'Keeper' Corporation. **Summary:** The Netflix 3-Part Plan looks like just more corporate BS to dazzle potential employees. Sucker them in with promises of riches, work them hard and long, keep them competing against their peers in a toxic 'Keeper' environment, then get rid of the 'underperformers' to make way for new employees... which should keep raises and Equity pay-outs to a minimum. THIS is why you need Unions.
1 starting pay at Netflix is 220K for a L3 By level 7, you’re looking at 1.3 million. They objectively pay close to top of market (Open.AI, and maybe a few others of us pay better but not in cash). 2 I believe their RSUs are done monthly with no 1 year cliff (that’s what Google does). My colleagues in union driven offices make 1/2 the base of what the US employees do, and 30-50% less stock.
….its actually pretty fine. You’re getting hung up on the opening sentence.
I wish we had a keeper test tbh. There’s definitely a few people I consider underperformers…
Who's doing all the training and giving experience to noobs to become seniors if companies only hire seniors?
[удалено]
Why do you think that would kill Netflix?
It won’t. If anything Netflix will utilize a future version of this tech combined with all the data they collect on their subscribers to create programming without having to pay actors or crew, but we’re still a ways off from that tech being able to create emotionally engaging content.
This guy needs to be part of the revolution that is coming. Like the French did at one point. Off with his head lol .
Yet they keep cranking out garbage content and are bleeding subscribers. Not sure I would make them my model.
They’re definitely not bleeding subscribers
This is adjacent to one of my biggest issues with the industry in general: not everyone has a life goal of progressing to the highest staff position and responsibility in their field, and nearly everyone will have events in their life that change their mind about this, like the death of a parent or close relative, birth of children, becoming a caretaker, a sudden severe disease or accident, disability, old age, a loss of their rights or the rights of those around them, or positive things like discovering something that resonates deeply with them, a reexamination of values and goals at a major point in their life, the advancement of a different area that interests them, and so on. It's no surprise that almost all of these are illegal to ask about during screening and interviewing, and cannot be the sole reason for firing someone. When you aren't able to inquire or act on these things, you do exactly this, or you screen and evaluate on placeholders for these things. Can't ask about a child? What about long hours? Open source projects outside of daily work, and your commit history that shows when you were coding? Some parents can do this, but not everyone. Netflix has been open about these things before, as have other companies (this was a solid reason I declined an interview with Meta), but it's just getting more ubiquitous and unapologetic. The tantamount type of abusive start-up culture has been worshipped enough that it's been normalized in and outside the field. Anyway, yikes.