Spotify CEO Daniel Ek surprised at negative impact of laying off 1,500 Spotify employees
Spotify CEO Daniel Ek surprised at negative impact of laying off 1,500 Spotify employees
Ek said Spotify employees were doing too much "work around the work" as he laid off 17% of the group's workforce in December.
Ek said Spotify employees were doing too much "work around the work" as he laid off 17% of the group's workforce in December.
CEO does not understand who is doing work
surely not the workers
all they do is sit in front of their desks for hours
There's two parts to being successful at a job: successfully accomplishing the work that fits into your role, and successfully messaging to your bosses that you're doing a good job.
So when executives lay people off, it tends to catch people who are bad at that second task (the messaging/perception side), which may or may not include people who are good at the first task (actually doing good shit for the company).
That's why mass layoffs are damaging, and should be avoided if possible.
Layoffs also shake every other employee in an immeasurable way.
Even if you didn't lay someone off they may now change their priorities. Maybe they focus on the people pleaser tasks. Maybe they focus more on what is good for them to keep their job vs what is good for the company.
Layoffs should be a last resort but tech companies are just playing follow the leader right now. In a few years we'll see memoirs and books stating "in hindsight we may have made a mistake, but we made the best decision we could with the information we had at the time", it's all absolutely bullshit. This is all being done for a temporary stock boost.
The CEO can't apparently effectively communicate to his staff what the workflow priorities of the company should be and he's blaming them for basically contributing to that workflow "inefficiently" because he's a bad leader who obviously didn't lay off the right people (middle managers).
Additionally he's promising shareholders a pipedream he's having trouble delivering on because they do not have control over the continued and rising cost of licensing and nobody seems to want to do anything at all about that. The whole industry is over a barrel and they just accept it. And so do we as consumers.
Once Spotify changed their entire UI to focus on engagement instead of a good UX, I switched to another service. I wish the best for those employees that were laid off, and the worst for a CEO driven by profit above all else
May I ask what service you switched to? I'm tired of my music app being cluttered with podcasts and audio books. I use other services for this things and don't need them in Spotify.
Qbittorrent LMAO. Also some Russian music hosting sites that appear as quickly as they get taken down.
Newpipe for when I don't need 320kbps, such as podcasts.
So he's about to rehire all those people he laid off, right? Surely he's not just saying this, but still expecting everyone who's left to cover all the work he's surprised by. Surely he knew these details before he fucked over a bunch of workers, right?
Pizza Party Fridays (5 pm - midnight, hackathon and 1/2 off pizza (plus tax))
Attendance mandatory!
Absolutely not and he’s learned nothing
“It took us some time to find our footing, but more than four months into this transition, I think we’re back on track and I expect to continue improving on our execution throughout the year getting us to an even better place than we’ve ever been.”
Paywalled hard
The full quote if you don't want to read the article.
Another significant challenge was the impact of December workforce reduction. Although there’s no question that it was the right strategic decision, it did disrupt our day-to-day operations more than we anticipated. It took us some time to find our footing, but more than four months into this transition, I think we’re back on track and I expect to continue improving on our execution throughout the year getting us to an even better place than we’ve ever been.
And the full transcript of the earnings call if you want to read the whole thing.
https://seekingalpha.com/article/4685308-spotify-technology-s-spot-q1-2024-earnings-call-transcript
Ah, it's from an earnings call so it is trying to put everything in the best possible light. I wonder how much fan-splattered shit he is glossing over in that statement.
Exactly
I can heae beyond his buzzwords that what he means is that thibgs are awful and morale is low, and that he hopes it is now over but we all know it isn't.
It took us some time to find our footing, but more than four months into this transition, I think we’re back on track
Did they save more money by firing those employees than they lost in the murky transition? It certainly doesn't seem like it.
The full quote if you don't want to read the article.
Or can't afford to.
I ain't giving some random news website more money than I pay monthly for my Internet connection just to read some article about Spotify, they can go screw xD
Well, at least they gave them 5 months severance pay.
Didn't expect that
Might I suggest the Spotify employees unionize or better yet.. US tech workers. That way they can make a fist and punch this guy in the proverbial dick.
They were in the process of unionising in Sweden, when the layoffs dropped. Some months later, Spotify cancelled talks about the proposed collective agreement, insisting a statement that Spotify employees don’t need unions because their working conditions are already exceedingly generous.
(A bit of background: workplace collective agreements are commonplace in Sweden. Spotify, though, seems to have tried to import US union-busting practices, not unlike Tesla.)
I don’t know if I could live with myself knowing how many lives I ruined, maybe that’s why the shit floats to the top. Sane people are not as accomplished because they “don’t make the tough decisions”.