from the fire-you-and-hire-you-back-at-lower-pay dept.
Uber has not branded the cuts as "layoffs":
Uber is reportedly pursuing an unorthodox approach to performance reviews at the ride-share company. While Uber says it has no plans for broad layoffs, so to speak, it does have plans for upcoming performance reviews to include potential cuts to the company's workforce.
As detailed by Insider, the cuts are not layoffs, and Uber is echoing CEO Dara Khosrowshahi's comments at Davos 2023 where he claimed that the company had no plans for layoffs. An Uber spokesperson told Gizmodo that those comments are still true, as upcoming cuts to Uber's workforce will be a part of performance reviews, and that the company plans to backfill any positions that are left empty after the reviews.
"This year, we've taken an even more rigorous approach to our performance review process to ensure our talent bar remains very high," an Uber spokesperson said to Gizmodo in an email. "We plan to backfill these positions and will continue to invest in attracting and retaining top talent at Uber."
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 26, @10:05PM (3 children)
...regardless of how well you performed; and then we will back-fill your position with less experienced people, and do the whole thing again.
If the horse bolts out of the barn, you don't punish the horse, you punish the person who left the barn door open. Or put differently: are you starting your cull at HR, you know, the ones that are supposed to be the gatekeeper of that preciously high talent bar you claim to have, but have now admitted you didn't have?
What was it again that POTUS 33 had on his desk again, "The buck stops here"? Someone did make a mistake for letting the whole recruiting operation go to shambles, I say start by firing them to kill it at the root: the CEO and what the call the CPO (Chief People Officer) these days. Fuck it, fire them for cause, namely incompetence, and claw back salary and bonuses. Start by setting an example at the top.
For alls yalls at uber: forced stack-ranking is "great"; just make sure you never join a "team of rockstars", because you'll be at the bottom of them, no matter what; instead, look for teams that are filled with slackers, and you'll be top dog there!
(Score: 4, Touché) by krishnoid on Sunday February 26, @10:37PM
No, no, go ahead and punish the horse. Only after that, just make sure you don't make any sudden noises ("performance review time!") around it, or you might spook it. There's only so much you can get away with from someone that works for you.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday February 26, @11:54PM
>Start by setting an example at the top.
Great idea, except: most boards of directors are toothless wonders and decisions like this are made by the "people at the top" who I'm sure have a different perspective on who wins the blame game this go around.
I actually quit somewhere a few weeks before the CEO and CFO showed themselves the door, ostensibly over stock options grant issues, but don't cry for them, they still took multi million dollar golden parachutes on their way out
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 27, @01:16AM
Needless to say, management has the very HIGHEST standards and the tightest hoops that you need to jump thru to impress them. If you don't impress them, they will be unimpressed. There will be additional restrictions and rules and fiddly, time-consuming steps that ONLY the most dedicated will succeed at. Be Best, temp drivers.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Sunday February 26, @11:48PM (5 children)
We have a friend/acquaintance we made when our children were toddlers. We reconnected and had her come visit (yes, bold move) when her daughter who used to play with our sons died and she was in "a bad place." Fun time overall, but we certainly got to know her much better than when our kids were toddlers...
Relevant article tie in: she's an Uber / Door Dash / whatever she can make a quick buck on driver.
Also relevant: when available, she starts most days off with a joint and or a small drink of alcohol to "take the edge off" and has a pretty solid nicotine addiction currently fed by gum that she gets from various convenience stores. Of course she's also alcoholic, but actually pretty functional most of the time except for mood swings when she's not getting enough to feed that addiction.
Is she a danger to her passengers? Probably not as much as some other stone cold sober taxi drivers I have ridden with.
Is she unusual in the Uber / Lyft workforce?
I honestly don't know, what do you think?
I will say: we are regular Instacart users and the quality of shopping/delivery service we receive through Instacart varies wildly from one driver to the next, and we rarely get the same driver twice.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Frosty Piss on Monday February 27, @01:41AM (4 children)
Interesting story, but this non-layoff layoff probably doesn't involve the drivers, who rotate in and out fairly regularly anyway. This cull will be the various office staff and middle management, possibly IT, though that has probably already been outsourced to some foreign sweat shop, or H1B's.
(Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 27, @02:07AM (2 children)
We really are becoming factory farms. Humans are the soft fleshy things that get pushed around on conveyor belts, corralled by rigid structures and given the mathematically optimized quantity of mealy slop sufficient to perform 8 hours of dreary labor. Nobody wants the labor, it's the infliction of cruelty on others and the feeling of superiority that is the product.
(Score: 3, Informative) by JoeMerchant on Monday February 27, @03:06AM (1 child)
Netflix recommendation just for you: sorry to bother you, only available until Feb 28th.
Warning for everyone else, the movie is intentionally disturbing.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 27, @03:36AM
Seen it, quite liked it +1
But I think the journey is to the heart of darkness. No fiction required, the real apocalypse now shit that exists in our sick psyches.
(Score: 2, Touché) by JoeMerchant on Monday February 27, @03:04AM
Oh, you mean the people who make sure that front line contractors for the company are upstanding representatives of the brand? I'm (s) sure they will be upholding their high standards. /s
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 3, Insightful) by legont on Monday February 27, @03:35AM (1 child)
Say Goldman Sucks fires 10% after each annual review. Very orthodox indeed.
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 27, @03:40AM
It's basically a hazing ritual for the plebs. If you need that job, it makes it even more fun to watch. Dance monkey boy!