"Hiya.
It was a harsh response, I agree (there's actually more, but we're pulling our punches, if you can believe it), and in fact all day yesterday I didn't want to post a reply, hoping his AMA wouldn't get too much traction or he wouldn't spout too many misconceptions and we could all just continue going our separate ways.
Problem is, this was starting to really irritate a number of employees who'd worked with him, and he's the kind of guy who enjoys the attention he can get by saying "I used to be a reddit admin" even though he'll just post spurious stuff he doesn't know about, and left unchecked the positive attention encourages him to do it more.
In running reddit, there's an interesting balance between the normal standards of professionalism (which we try very hard to uphold even when someone is being unreasonable) and the fact that we're a huge internet forum where a higher degree of openness is expected. I'm actually really focused on building competent, professional management precisely because the spotlight is always on us - and also because I've been at other Silicon Valley companies where that hasn't always been the case - but it also means that because of that spotlight, any tiny deviation can be hugely magnified."
Without knowing any of the sides here, all I can say for sure is that the ex-Reddit employee is showing a baffling amount of bad judgment here, even when benchmarked against other young-techie-implosions. Maybe he thought, "Oh no biggie, I can always delete this thread later and my real name isn't on it"...yes, until the thread explodes and now one of the many tech-news blogs jumps on it...the "no doxx allowed" rule doesn't exist outside of Reddit. And now your Google results will, for the rest of your life or until you invent the cure for cancer, have this dumb fiasco tied to your name.
And for what? I would think a Reddit insider, of all people, would know how transient karma and internet fame is. Some employers are going to reject him because he now has a history of spectacularly ripping on his own company. But I have a negative opinion of him because at best, he's someone who shoots his mouth of when it's just not worth it, and at worst, he's a chronic attention seeker.
Rebels are fun. But this isn't Jimmy McNulty complaining about unpunished murders in Baltimore. This is an engineer complaining about business strategy above his pay grade...even worse, he takes the side against the (purportedly unwise) do-gooders at Reddit, so he doesn't even young-headed idealism to blame.
And this isn't even taking into account whether the CEO was speaking truth, in which case, if you were fired for alleged incompetence and you try to play it off publicly as if you were fired for taking a stand...that's just a whole different level of shortsighted stupidity.
That said, the CEO should've taken a few deep breaths before posting what he did. Wrestling with a pig in mud and all...it's not his job to be part of the sideshow and I'm having a hard time imagining that employees feel satisfied about this resolution...other than the fun of water cooler gossip.
edit: The worst part of the CEO's comment..."we're pulling our punches, if you can believe it"...no, I can't believe it, nor did I really care. But now you've shown that you'll play the stupid innuendo game, a rhetorical maneuver that has no upside to the company at all. Christ.
> Some employers are going to reject him because he now has a history of spectacularly ripping on his own company
The worst part for him is that his actions are being flagrantly exaggerated, like you've done right here. He very lightly criticized his employer and speculated in a mild-mannered way on why he might have been fired. The fact that he was fired wasn't even ever intended to be the topic of the thread; he was just willing to respond to a few questions about it. Compared to how most people talk about former employers who have fired them, this guy was downright courteous.
Was it irresponsible for him to start the thread in the first place? Yes. Did he "spectacularly rip" on his own company? Definitely not. His former employer did spectacularly rip on him, though.
It is the part of the CEO that really gets me. Was the employee in the wrong? Certainly. But the way the CEO handled this is just god awful.
When you see a pissed of shopper going off on a sales person, the sales person knows they have to stay calm and must not reply with the same kind of attitude that they are met with. Because whatever they say may reflect negatively on the company.
You would think a CEO would also know how to do that. So now I know that the CEO of reddit is a bad example of a CEO. No professionalism to speak of and has no problem getting petty in public just cause he is personally pissed of. With all that money he recently received he should think about taking some PR or general management classes in order to learn how to handle things like this cause he is clearly as incompetent in that area as he accuses this ex employee to be in the area he was hired in.
People who take the "moral high ground" always have to deal with the same criticism. Edward Snowden? Doing it for attention. Assange? Total attention whore
At some level its true. People take principled stands in the hope that somebody pays attention. That doesn't mean their criticisms or opinions are invalid.
>And now your Google results will, for the rest of your life or until you invent the cure for cancer, have this dumb fiasco tied to your name.
I'm not sure how much harm that will do. Reddit has essentially zero credibility, and yishan even less. If someone told me "the guy you are interviewing was badmouthed by the reddit CEO" it would probably make me view him more favorably.
What bothers me is that they couldn't give him a reason why he was fired out of respect, but had no problem doing so when it was out of spite.
Firing someone, that is giving up cash to not sign your agreement, isn't "going our separate ways". And standards which doesn't apply when it matters aren't very good standards.
> In running reddit, there's an interesting balance between the normal standards of professionalism (which we try very hard to uphold even when someone is being unreasonable) and the fact that we're a huge internet forum where a higher degree of openness is expected.
Odd. I see no evidence in his comments that he's even slightly familiar with the "normal standards of professionalism" in a situation like this. I'm not being snotty: it would be interesting to know what he thinks he is balancing "openness" against.
> In running reddit, there's an interesting balance between the normal standards of professionalism...
Professionalism? The CEO originally wrote:
> When an employee is dismissed from employment at a company, the policy of almost every company (including reddit) is not to comment, either publicly or internally. This is because companies have no desire to ruin someone's future employment prospects by broadcasting to the world that they were fired. In return, the polite expectation is that the employee will not go shooting their mouth off about the company especially (as in your case) through irresponsibly unfounded speculation. Signing a non-disparagement indicates that you have no intention to do this, so the company can then say "Ok, if anyone comes asking for a reference on this guy, we needn't say he was fired, just give a mildly positive reference."
The CEO is effectively stating that Reddit was willing to provide a "mildly positive reference" for an ex-employee the CEO now claims was totally incompetent and "did not even come close" to getting his work done. Further, he states that Reddit was willing to omit the fact that the ex-employee was terminated for cause (fired). This is horribly unprofessional and, in my opinion, completely dishonest. Based on the CEO's incredulous statement, I don't see how anybody can trust a reference from Reddit.
Note that this is not common policy as the CEO implies. Non-disparagement clauses are typically negotiated for monetary compensation (severance pay), not for the promise of a dishonest reference.
Companies don't comment on employee terminations because of the legal risks associated with doing so. In fact, one of the ways some companies address these risks is by adopting a no reference policy. They will simply verify employment and dates of employment when asked, and offer nothing more.
Anyone who places any confidence in references from former employers is kidding themselves in the first place. Most employers wont give a negative reference on any employee, the liability risks are simply too high in our litigous age.
Not sure why Reddit's CEO thought it was cool to put one on the Internet for the entire planet to see.
This really sounds more like a simple personality clash to me.
The funny thing is that had the CEO really just kept his mouth shut like he originally intended, the thing would probably have blown over. The employee wasn't really making any claims that could seriously harm an organization[1]. Instead, it's just a petty squabble over an issue the employee probably wouldn't have gotten much support from opposing anyway.
Umm. It was pretty clearly not done for vindictive reasons.
The guy lied about why he was let go and put Reddit in the awkward position of either saying nothing and letting people believe they're a shitty workplace that fires people for disagreeing with management, or telling the truth about why the guy was fired (not laid off.)
Frankly, he brought this on himself by forcing Reddit into choosing between two sucky options.
The choice is not between saying nothing, and completely devastating that person. Surely there is a third (or even fourth, fifth) alternative.
Also, saying nothing doesn't lead to the belief it is a shitty workplace. Just because someone posting in a forum that he's been fired from Company X for a reason he doesn't understand, that doesn't automatically mean that Company X is wrong and shitty; not everyone jumps to this conclusion, and certainly not based on the absence of any response from Company X.
True in theory, but in practice, even HN is full of comments like "Google is evil because [link to a random unfounded speculation/whining of ex-Googler]" and people believe them uncritically.
So tell me which part of this statement (true or not) deserved for him to be publicly drawn and quartered by somebody in a significantly more powerful position than him?
Officially: no reason. And I get this; I vaguely know how CA employment law works and that you limit your liability by not stating a reason. It's also really hard to work through in your mind.
The best theory I have is that, two weeks earlier, I raised concerns about donating 10% of ad revenue to charity. Some management likes getting feedback, some doesn't.
The reason I had concerns was that this was revenue, not income. That means you need ~10% margins to break even. This can be hard to do; Yahoo and Twitter don't. Salesforce does something similar, but it's more all-around, and in a way that promotes the product without risking the company's financials.
It's far more likely that this is the first time he's ever been given clear reasons for why he was fired. I've never been fired, but when other employees I've known have been fired they've never been given reasons this clear. It's always a variant of "it just wasn't working out." This can lead to very genuine confusion, and so I think it's really jumping the gun to assume that he was deliberately lying about the situation.
Most cases you're probably thinking about are of CEOs of big companies issuing CYA-statements that minimize legal attack surface. Here, the guy just exposed himself completely. Also Reddit is not Goldman Sachs; it's value is directly proportional to how much people like the company, and Reddit finds itself in the middle of another funding round.
I do see a great potential for bad consequences here.
I doubt the unemployed guy would have the resources to mount a legal attack anyway. As for bad PR, take a look at this thread (or the reddit thread): the majority of people are reflexively siding with the CEO.
You are spot on. Perhaps a better way to have handled was to private message the guy with the reasons, update the thread that the private message was sent with the reasons and then let the guy divulge anything.
Not only was it an overreaction, but it really has the stank of pettiness attached to it.
I think the issue is that we are all trying to figure out who is in the right in this situation based on a handful of reddit comments. At the end of the day we don't have enough information to understand what truly happened.
I don't trust either of them. At all. What I do know, though, is that one of them wrote a comment which is tremendously meaner than those of the other person.
Because the CEO just exposed himself for a serious lawsuit if even an iota of this statement is not true, not to mention a media shitstorm and total loss of faith of his subordinates. This is strong evidence in favour of believing him over the other guy.
Emotions can make people do extremely irrational things. Regardless, there's still the more fundamental point that I can't find anything this guy wrote that justified that sort of extremely intense response from the CEO. His criticisms were incredibly light for someone who was fired and his speculation about his own firing was very mild-mannered.
That sort of response strikes me as crazily vindictive and the sheer anger of it makes it pretty hard for me to trust its author.
Considering the level of professionalism by the CEO in just posting this kind of strong vindictive statement against an ex-employee who has little to no recourse (who should know better) it's strong evidence not to believe him at all.
Well, "vindictive" doesn't mean "liar". Someone vindictive could nevertheless be honest to a fault; in fact, their honesty could stem from the same source as the vindictiveness against someone who had been dishonest.
It's a kind of guilt-by-association reasoning: if someone has X bad quality, they likely have Y bad quality also. The boy who stole the loaf of bread from the baker must be the one who assaulted the farmer's daughter.
Yes, but the CEO did it in response to a guy being stupid enough to lie about his termination on his former employer's web page. And the guy is still just a random ex-Redditor, so he can lie low for a bit - get a job in a softwarehouse that won't bother figuring out his Reddit handle, build positive references. This guy can step out of the spotlight anytime he wants.
Lie about his termination? I think that is taking it a bit far. Confused? Upset? Angry? Wrong even? Sure. Lying? Probably not.
A lot of companies are very vague when they fire an employee. I've been let go twice, once for "poor performance" and once for "not the right fit". In both cases when I pressed for more detail I was not given anything concrete.
In the poor performance case I would say things like "but I had all my code reviewed and the reviewers said my code was fine...". And get responses like "we just didn't feel like your performance was up to scratch".
I was upset and angry at the time because they never provided me with any real evidence or gave me a chance to fix it. I kept coming up with all sorts of reasons (like the fact that I was 20 years older than the next oldest developer). OTOH, I am not stupid enough to air my grievances on a public forum.
> being stupid enough to lie about his termination
You might want to reevaluate that position. You're reflexively siding with the CEO. You don't know that he's lying and saying "I think was fired because I did this" is not lying either way anyways.
I'm not saying you have to side with the ex-employee either, doing an AMA like that was pretty stupid as well. But the CEO's level of basic professionalism here leaves anything he's saying as pretty suspect as well.
> You might want to reevaluate that position. You're reflexively siding with the CEO. You don't know that he's lying and saying "I think was fired because I did this" is not lying either way anyways.
This is because (as I think you implied) HN, in a show of consistency with other online forums, is fond of reaching conclusions that are contrary to (any) conventional wisdom. This is a source of bias: I'm a current Googler who thinks Google is great, but this opinion doesn't change anyone's mind.
But this bias is a good thing. It causes internal disagreement, hindering solidarity, but it increases the rate at which we learn new things.
Not everyone does, but many do. Also, if he had left it at, "I don't understand why" then he would have successfully maintained the fog of possibilities and both parties could continue playing the vague game. Instead he posited a theory about management disliking his charity ideas. Though the CEO's response was a bit much.
Sure it would be nice to have other options, but the reality of social media and group-think means they could really only say nothing or say everything. I don't like it, but to deny that is a dangerous gamble for any company.
Uh, no. Social psychology is a complicated subject and there is no way to distill 'social media and group-think' into a single set of choices for all situations. Most companies say nothing, but if they do say something, it certainly isn't a good idea to seem vindictive when you do so, and is an especially bad idea to do it on a public forum. Luckily they know their audience well and being a jackass is applauded, so their position wins - as long as he can't convince people their response isn't genuine. Group dynamics and public opinion can get as complex as chess.
this is not how I read it at all. This seems very vindictive to me. The employee's comment was not as bad as the response from the CEO. He was just guessing as to why he was laid off. For the CEO to jump in and respond himself shows a very thin skin. Also, the tone of the response is a little too angry. This could've have been handled by the employee's direct manager, not the CEO.
IMHO you and the parent post are both right: this is all around bad behavior by all parties involved.
I was let go once. I've told the story, but I have never mentioned the name of the company and I won't tell you if asked. I also had a horrible experience with a co-founder in my first startup to the point that I consider the guy a con man, but likewise I will only tell the story with all names and identifying details omitted. Calling people out in a public forum -- even if you are in the right -- just makes you look like an asshole.
But this response is also a terrible response from a CEO. He descends rapidly into the same muck as the original "AMA" poster. I agree that he was presented with two sucky options, but he should have taken the high road with his response and simply said something like "all I can say is that this individual was terminated for different reasons than the ones he states." In public at least, leave it at that.
Reddit in general is an increasingly toxic community. There was a great writeup a while back theorizing about various reasons that social networks select for snark, cynicism, and obnoxiousness over deeper and more thought-out content. If someone recalled it I'd love a link.
Agreed the response is too much. As a CEO getting involved in a dispute like this seems to be all downside with very little upside. If I had to draft a response in his position It'd go something like this:
> Reddit is not laying anyone off, you were fired.
> Your comments about our revenue had no effect on this decision. This type of criticism is welcome and even encouraged at our company.
> I don't believe it is in good taste to publicly discuss the reasoning for any termination unless it is absolutely necessary.
> If you'd like some additional clarification on our decision to fire you please contact me or (Someone in HR) directly.
Most importantly, none of these statements should be made in public. The company stands to gain much more with a dignified silence and a personal explanation to the hapless individual, than by wringing the dirty laundry out in public. That an individual employee is immature / causes a stink, happens every second of every day. That a company CEO does the same is unacceptably poor management, and poor PR.
I disagree. "Dignified silence" is effectively what doomed Brendon Eich as Mozilla's CEO. If you say nothing, you let other people define the narrative. I agree with uncoder0, a single simple dignified response would have easily deflated this whole thing.
yes I can see the need to manage the narrative. But this is bad management of the narrative, because a clearly emotional CEO is letting his anger show, instead of, as you clearly point out, being dignified and making a concise statement of the facts. The statement is not concise (in itself showing a tendency towards a rant), nor does it display the necessary humility towards an employee, who, no matter his faults, no longer has a job (unlike the CEO).
I disagree, when statements like that are made in such a public area it will possibly negatively affect who decides to apply for a position at reddit. A dignified response on the reddit blog would have been the right move imo
I came started reading this thread with the thought that the CEO was in the right. After reading many of the comments, I have to believe that both were in the wrong and this is the right way to go.
It's hard to stay completely rational when you're angry. I'm not perfect, and occasionally say inflammatory things.
But at the same time I realize this is something you need to try to do, especially when you're dealing in the realm of personal business relationships where it matters most.
He wasn't laid off - he was fired. This is the first point the CEO makes and it's an important distinction that the poster seemed to not own up to at all. Not knowing the difference between being fired and being laid off is bad - there's a pretty remote possibility that the poster's direct manager didn't own the message well and told the guy "we're letting you go" and he didn't understand he was being fired, but even if that's the case, most organizations of any reasonable size should have someone in HR handling the exit interview who makes things like this super clear.
I have no insight into what happened here, but I definitely have had experience working with and processing the termination of underperformers who don't recognize or accept that they are not meeting the bar and this sounds a bit like one of those cases.
There are probably some aspects of this separation that were imperfectly handled on both sides, but given the context of "guy is fired from company chooses to be interviewed on company site and say the company didn't give him any reason why he was fired" and the company says "you weren't doing your job" - I tend to trust the company.
You are taking the CEOs words as fact when the reality of the situation is, we don't know what the truth is right now. Judging from the fact that the CEO responded in such a childish manner I really have no reason to believe anyone in this situation. What if the CEO just posted what he thought was the reason why this employee was fired. What if there is no documentation backing up the CEOs statements.
First of all, I wouldn't call CEO's response childish, I'd call it exactly right. Honest, clear and straight talking is what we need to have more, and not some corporate contentless PR fluffs.
Secondly, CEO just exposed himself to a potential lawsuit and a total loss of respect from his subordinates if he lied even a little bit in that statement. That is kind of a whole lot of evidence favouring trusting him over the other guy.
How do you know its clear and straight talking? It could be complete bs, and same for employee. When your angry/hateful towards someone, all logic falls out the window.
It was over the top, and against the general grain of "don't talk about your employees' work histories publicly".
And admin didn't clarify things that would make judgment easier like: Did you tell the employee they were fired? Are you calling him a liar? That isn't clear to me... too many employers hide firings behind other, less obvious reasons.
Laid off? Fired? I'm not sure we even know which it was.
Both the CEO or the employee can be misrepresenting things, or (more likely) be simply misinformed about the technical nature of the separation. In any case, I see no special reason to take the CEO's word over that of the employee in this situation.
> I was laid off.
> > What was the reason?...
> > > Officially: no reason...
This basically reads like he was trying to dance around saying he was fired, but he was saying he got fired. You don't get laid off by yourself, and you definitely don't get a "reason".
You're positing competence and or ethics when neither can be presumed. I can only wish they were safe assumptions. In fact in every layoff I've participated in (on either side) a reason for the layoff has been offered.
In one case where I and others were laid off we were told it was a layoff, our severance paperwork said it was a layoff, and the government was informed (for each of us individually) that it was for cause. The motivation was to get around the legal restrictions for layoffs and avoid an increase in their unemployment insurance contribution. In another case I was the only person laid off (from a small team), it was explicitly a layoff & my severance was paid out, and I later found out that it was part of a deliberate attempt to spread fear, uncertainty, and doubt in the dev team. The company officer in question was later abruptly terminated and may have faced criminal charges.
In both of those cases you could argue by the standard you're using that I was fired instead, but I've got the legal documentation and if needed the witnesses to prove otherwise.
It reads to me like when he was let go, he might not have been given the clearest of communication as to the nature termination. I've been fired before, and I've been laid off. It was unambiguous in both cases.
That's not to say he wasn't clearly fired, and isn't dancing around that fact, but based on the available information, the broader internet bystander community doesn't have sufficient information to tell which story is true.
If he wanted to dance around, when asked "Why did you quit?", he could have given a generally vague answer like "I was let go." This could mean fired or laid-off. But he chose the specific "laid-off" answer. This means something very different than "fired." I don't think he was dancing around as much as just in denial about getting fired.
Replying to public statements about yourself or your company isn't "vindictive".
Things like this have a real business impact. I've cancelled interviewing at companies based on conversations with former employees that the company didn't have a satisfactory answer for.
If I saw this in a public forum and Reddit failed to point out that the former employee was fired (and was aware he was fired) in a public setting (which would make them liable for being sued, if Reddit lied) holds alot more weight than "Oh, ya, that guy. He was full of shit" told to me privately would.
Indeed, why would you go interviewing at companies that don't have satisfactory answers for he-said-she-said, when you can go interviewing at companies whose CEO's "call out" former employees.
Because the last time I encountered that, it turned out to be an awful, toxic situation that ended up in court?
Maybe I just have bad experiences in life but generally people who can't say "Hey, we don't fire people in retaliation" without getting sued are people to avoid.
sure, but did the CEO have to do it? And if the CEO was to respond, shouldn't "not true, you were fired" be enough? No need to call him incompetent and lazy (even if he is). That's the part that rubbed me the wrong way, especially since the guy didn't actually trash reddit as bad as they did to him.
This is an ugly affair, like firings always are. Perhaps an "official" response was necessary to "manage the narrative" as someone above commented, but I can't help but agree that the mud is rubbing off on the CEO here, mainly because of the tone. Badly handled.
If I saw this in a public forum and Reddit failed to point out that the former employee was fired (and was aware he was fired) in a public setting (which would make them liable for being sued, if Reddit lied) holds alot more weight than "Oh, ya, that guy. He was full of shit" told to me privately would.
Every large company has fired at least one person, and every large company has at least one "full of shit" disgruntled ex.
Most companies haven't had a CEO Mushroom Stamp Heard 'round The World, though.
It may have not been done for vindictive reasons, but it was definitely done for the wrong reason. This shows a clear lack of leadership abilities on the part of Yishan. I know people love a Jobsian dick in charge of tech companies (I use that loosely with reddit; they're an entertainment company), but that era is over. Show some professionalism even if someone is unprofessional toward you and your company.
In the spirit of non-disparagement, it seems like Yishan could have sent a private message to the employee which reiterated why he had been fired, and asked him to stop posting about it. If Yishan felt that it was necessary to comment, he could have still posted something without Reddit losing face – something like, "We're sorry that you feel our decision to let you go was unclear. I've sent you a private message, and would be happy to go over things again with you personally."
I don't think that is the case. I certainly would respect the CEO stating clearly that the employee was fired, that it had nothing to do with criticizing the lack of charity, and the reasoning has been clarified in private.
More like "Reddit to lay off an employee over feedback on charity spending"
Don't forget that just before Reddit's CEO commented, this guy was a hero of the thread; his comments could have started a completely different discussion.
As far as looking at all sides goes, how do you know he didn't do that already? I'm not sure what the culture around letting people go is at Reddit, but I'm inclined to think he knows perfectly well that he was fired, and why, and is at best shading the truth in his favor to make himself look better.
The best thing to have said? Really, nothing at all. There was no reason that anyone in the company needed to chime in and acknowledge (let alone contradict) what this guy was saying.
Why should he say anything? Do you think that a bank CEO would interrupt his day to comment on the termination of an analyst?
If you need to deny it, you can say, "This isn't an accurate account of events" and leave it at that. But even that's unnecessary.
Sure, this guy was phenomenally stupid to start a pissing contest with his own employer on a forum said employer controls but that whole pig/mud thing is really true.
This isn't my own insight (borrowed from a coworker), but he points out that Reddit is doing another round of funding and here this schmuck is implying that they're careless with revenue/profits... that could raise a big stink anywhere.
Except if the CEO knowingly made a false and damaging statement about an employee in public, he could be sued for libel. It's unlikely that a CEO would be stupid enough to do that.
Unlikely. There's a clear distinction between being fired and being laid off and so the disagreement is about a matter of fact, not opinion. More likely the guy started an AMA without thinking it through, then lied to save face when someone asked why he was let go.
I agree with you that it was done for not vindictive reasons, but I think it could have been handled better. Consider following response: instead of airing everything immediately, instead a statement is made that reddit takes all the feedback seriously and firing had nothing to do with that. Make a specific point that if an employee wants full accounting of all the reasoning, he can respond to that statement and full reasoning will be explained. This way former employee clearly soliciting for feedback and reddit has extremely solid moral ground.
TL:DR While employee definitely had this coming, I think that reddit should have held onto higher moral ground and settled for milder action then the one was taken. I do not know full context, as I only read two posts, but official reddit reply does leave a bit of snide and petty aftertaste.
Theory, n. a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world that is acquired through the scientific method and repeatedly tested and confirmed through observation and experimentation.
I think you are referring to philosophical theories. In science a theory can be a "fact". Ex: Theory of general and theory of special relativity, Theory of evolution by natural selection, Quantum theory, etc.
Theoretically (excuse the pun) they could all be disproved some day but most people know they will not be.
To cite wikipedia for lack of a better source:
"Scientific theories are the most reliable, rigorous, and comprehensive form of scientific knowledge, in contrast to more common uses of the word "theory" that imply that something is unproven or speculative (which is better characterized by the word 'hypothesis'"
Good lord, I hope the $50M investors in reddit are beating down the doors to get a PR person at the company so the CEO stops making crazy moves like this. There's no way a good developer would want to go work for Reddit when the CEO slaps people around in public (whether they deserve it or not). Sometimes you need to be the bigger man and move on instead of quarreling in public.
Maybe it's not "professional", where that word has the common meaning of avoiding saying hard truths on the grounds that someone's feelings and/or political position might be hurt.
This significantly elevates Reddit, IMO. Their CEO acts like a fucking human being instead of a politicized, sanitized, pretentious, weasel-wording sock puppet like so many other CEOs.
You have no idea how much respect I have for this.
A CEO's job isn't to be "a fucking human being". It's to be the public face of the company, and represent its interests in all of his/her professional (and often personal) interactions.
To get stroppy like this abrogates that responsibility in such a way, and to such a degree, that it may well be actionable.
Disagree. Nipping the rumor in the bud that Reddit management fires for dissenting opinion has tangible value to hiring and retention, so a case could be made that Yishan was compelled to provide this response as part of his fiduciary duty. Reddit is a special case that is very pitchfork-happy when it comes to online drama, and even a mere offhand rumor will grow legs.
This specific response with that level of harshness is definitely worth discussing, but if you're going to make the abrogation of fiduciary duty argument I think I'd side on him doing the right thing here (with respect to that).
I didn't say no response was warranted. I said a stroppy response wasn't warranted.
Absolutely, letting the rumor mill run with this guy's allegations is a net negative for Reddit, so Yishan (or, preferably, his PR folks) needed to respond somehow.
My quibble is with the form and content of the response, not with there having been one.
Tech companies fire people for dissenting opinions. I'm not sure that it's news, or even especially wrong. That's an unwritten rule of the workplace: don't question or embarrass your boss or his boss. Ever.
This kid had very little credibility. Oddly enough, though his situation is overall worse now that Yishan responded, he has more.
What we now have is a factual event, not speculation, and it's far more damaging than a rumor that someone might have been fired over a dissenting opinion (which is not unusual).
It is absolutely unusual, and undoubtedly wrong, to be fired because you disagree. I disagree to the fullest extent with the project I am currently on and its overall direction and I have made that clear to my management. We've identified that opportunity to scope it better and, amazingly, my badge still works.
That you think you were "pushed out" of Google because you disagreed with the direction of G+, and that they were headed for certain failure unless they dropped everything and pivoted due to your boundless German card game experience, is not evidence that Google regularly fires those that disagree. How you disagree also matters, and your little charade on eng-misc is a legend to this day. I have no love for Google but even I am the first to acknowledge that they have created an environment wherein dissent is encouraged and welcomed and, in my brief tenure, was given ample opportunities to have my voice be heard and considered.
I will disagree wholeheartedly with you taking your experience (as flawed as your interpretation of events is) and attempting to justify firing over disagreement as a normal practice. I disagree with my boss, and his boss, and his boss all the time. I've disagreed with my director in front of people, and called him out on bullshit in front of his boss. You just don't know how to do so effectively, mchurch, which leads to embarrassing situations like the one you've been trying to pin on Google for a few years.
Agreed. It doesn't help that his post was clearly made during working hours, on company time and with his official account. This is now the Reddit's official and definitive response to this employee's termination. You can go against the grain as a CEO and be more involved and approachable but, at the end of the day it is your ultimate responsibility to uphold the best interests of the company and it's investors. I'd be very concerned about this behavior if I was an investor or employee of Reddit.
You mean he realized that the PR-speak version (which judging by the comments in this thread, people want for some reason) went over like a turd in a punch bowl, and then he reverted to plain English?
Am I supposed to see that as a negative or something?
Your posts reek of intellectual dishonesty. It is not logical to conclude that he decided to be one kind of an asshole about one thing because being a different kind of asshole about a different thing wasn't popular. His response is based on his relation with the subject, not time or learning a lesson.
Both instances he is being an asshole. His response varies purely on how he feels about the subject. He did not "learn a lesson". I'm not sure how to make it any clearer for you.
Why should anybody believe either the CEO or the ex-employee based only on their word? You're assuming the CEO has all the actual facts and is being honest about them. I can envision many scenarios where he may actually have cause to believe he has the actual facts, when he doesn't (e.g. colleagues lying about the employee's resistance to change, performance, etc.).
Nonsense. For starters the employee's actual identity is apparently known and there are comments in one of the threads indicating hiring managers at other companies have taken note of him (negatively). Secondly, being the CEO of a YC company means he's "in the club." Short of explicitly defrauding investors, the limit to this guy's personal risk is very lilely that he may be forced out of his CEO role. Unless he's a very stupid person he has put enough untouchable wealth aside to be just fine should this occur. Even if he hasn't I would suggest his chances of securing funding for another company is not impacted by this drama negatively (in fact, it may have a positive effect).
Besides that, even if he did have more at stake personally that is insufficient reason to take his word over the employee's, because there's nothing even close to any objective evidence in such a determination: it's purely subjective based on your own biases.
> You have no idea how much respect I have for this.
Same here. A CEO doesn't have to be a "soulless robot like David Simms" type... showing some passion, fire and enthusiasm and being - as you said - "a fucking human being" is a Good Thing in some eyes.
Ok, I don't get it. So everyone here says that CEO's statement was childish, and yet next time when another company issues a professional statement, people will be calling it content-less cover-your-ass PR fluff, and crying for more honesty and straight talk. Make up your mind.
As for me, personally, I think CEO's response was exactly what it should be. Honest, clear, straight to the point. Reddit just earned my respect as a workplace.
Thank you -- I wish this was at the top. The fact that people are clamoring for this type of optimistic political correctness is completely mind-boggling, especially when the only arguments presented are 1) It was unprofessional (how? below comment) and 2) It's not backed by facts (unproven)
Ideas of professionalism relate to professions and as far as I'm concerned, if reddit is this man's profession, well, that's just par for the course, isn't it?
I might have the same demeanor in this regard as yishan and if that means people think I'm not CEO material, so be it -- but I believe there are many people out there who value this down-to-Earth, human-driven approach (Hard to find the right words for it; You know what I mean).
To be fair, "honesty and straight talk" from Linus Torvalds received mixed responses from the HN crowd too, as seen in another thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8415729.
Of course, these two situations aren't the same. I still find their respective rhetorics interesting.
I agree. When we get nonsense, unbelievable fluff answers, we complain that companies should give it to us straight; here, we've gotten a straight answer from the CEO and all we hear is grief? It's a bit odd. I personally thought the CEO's answer was appropriate, given the former employee began the provocation.
I think the general issue is that people don't believe it's acceptable for a company to talk about HR issues like this publicly unless both parties have explicitly agreed to it. When people complain about a company issuing a content-less CYA fluff statement, it will probably not be about an HR issue like this.
Maybe your confusion will be reduced if you meditate on a few concepts:
* "Childish" and "unprofessional" are not synonyms.
* Neither are "adult" and "professional".
* Neither are "childish" and "honest".
* Neither are "adult" and "dishonest".
* PR fluff is not the same as the general concept of public relations.
* "We will not discuss this." is honest and straightforward, as are a number of alternative statements people have suggested.
* A statement made by an individual with limited power and resources may have very different implications and be perceived very differently than the same statement made by one with great power and resources.
* HN is composed of many individuals with nuanced opinions and worldviews.
* Individuals with diametrically opposed viewpoints in some areas may have very similar viewpoints in others, and sometimes the reasons for that may be subtle.
* No particular comment thread will necessarily have a representative sample of individuals participating.
Nope, not reduced a bit. Only your last 6 bullets were even semi-relevant (but still snarky) as the rest were mostly semantic nitpicking.
FWIW, "Childish" and "unprofessional" can arguably be used interchangeably in this case since they both present the concept of acting in contrast to the social norm of the group (adults & professionals), though their dictionary definitions are far from synonyms.
To me, "unprofessional" means "human", "professional" means "dishonest sociopath".
These are not semantic nitpicks. They have much deeper meaning. I cannot stop you from dismissing them, but I hope you will consider them more than you have.
I actually upvoted you, because all your bullets are technically true and are worth meditating on.
But I guess in this case, the most relevant conclusion would be that people whining about unprofessionalism and people whining about professionalism are two different groups; usually one speaks up and the other stays silent.
I did consider them -- It just seemed to take the original statement very literally (not actually confusing, but shocking) which seems condescending or snarky at best. But if you were being sincere, then I apologize for the comment.
You try going and running an "AMA" on your former employer's platform - if that time ever comes. Frankly, you mess with the bull, you get the horns.
Let's not kid ourselves, this guy knew why he was let go. If he didn't, then that is an even stronger case for why he was let go.
He made the conscious decision to do an AMA on reddit's platform fully knowing his position on his employment. I think reddit's CEO was completely on target with his post. It was concise and professional - and stated the facts.
If you want to throw rocks at a hornets nest, be prepared to get stung.
The former employee is not the issue here. While reading through most of his AMA he seems pretty fair, respectful and thoughtful in his answers and he's entitled to his opinion, it doesn't discount him from having been a terrible employee. I'm not defending him in any way shape or form, but you'll notice he was very careful with how he worded his statements.
The problem is that as a CEO you never do this. There's a lot of very good reasons why. At the start of that list is "it's unprofessional and bad form", at the bottom is "you'll get your company sued for libel" and in the middle are a whole long list of reasons like "damages current employee morale".
As much fun as it is seeing what appears to be an ungrateful shiftless employee get his comeuppance, airing dirty laundry like that as the CEO of a company is an absolute and very basic no no.
We, as the public, don't even know if what the CEO was claiming is true. If it's not, he just opened his company, now fat with cash, up to a very nice libel lawsuit. If it is true, he may have just irreparably harmed the career of a young tech worker at little consequence to himself, that's just bullying and really bad form.
If what the ex-employee said is true, he was fired for questioning a company policy, I'm sure there's a lot more to the story than that. He could have become disruptive over his questioning and the decision was made to terminate his employment. I don't think most people would have any issue with that, lesson learned on all sides, move on. If it's not true, it's not really all that big a deal, I'm not buying stocks based on his say-so anyways. People make all kinds of claims about their own employment all the time.
The CEO shouldn't have said anything at all. If he felt he really needed to, a simple "Yes, we terminated his employment, those are not the reasons, the reasons are not public" and leave it at that.
Sounds like a toxic environment. Whatever the employee may have done to deserve separation, it is profoundly weird and troubling (and also, implicitly threatening to all employees, whatever their rank or standing) to see a CEO discuss those reasons in public.
I don't know. When the employee publicly disparages the business, I feel like a swift and decisive rebuttal might be a good idea.
I'm not saying I definitely disagree with you, but I can't really see why what reddit's CEO did was bad. Risky, sure, but it strikes me as a justified and effective response.
Any time someone 'attacks' you in public, the wisest move is either to say nothing, or address it, depending on what the probability is that action or inaction will incur a good (or the best) outcome.
In this case, they probably did not need to respond, since the 'attack' was merely an insinuation that disagreeing with management led to termination, which isn't the strangest idea in the world, nor defamatory. But if they did have to respond, this is one of the worst possible ways to do it: negatively, by senior management, in public, on a forum, discussing personal private details about an ex-employee. If there is a textbook somewhere on "How to deal with employee firing", this is the example of what not to do.
The proper response is to address the main point in contention without emotion or judgment and point out the business's policies and values. Short, sweet and impartial.
No. If you make accusations in a public forum (as that employee did) the company is going to respond. That is a given and perfectly normal.
The guy basically said he was "laid off" followed by "because I pissed off management with my feedback". Claiming it was a retaliatory firing forces a response.
The company should have had a long discussion with legal and posted a public statement. The CEO shouldn't have gone on his website and posted a comment as a response that sounds like a 5 year old having a temper tantrum.
I never said I was happy with the quality of yishan's response. I just disagree with:
"Whatever the employee may have done to deserve separation, it is profoundly weird and troubling (and also, implicitly threatening to all employees, whatever their rank or standing) to see a CEO discuss those reasons in public."
Going through legal and posting a public statement is still discussing those reasons in public under the psuedonym of the CEO with the words benig ghostwritten by legal.
Ok, I agree with you then that the company should have released a response. I think what the root comment was discussing was not the fact that they released a response but how they released it and the content of that response.
Management being averse to criticism is not unusual, nor is it unusual for someone to believe that is why they were fired, nor is it unusual for someone to say that is why they were fired even if they know otherwise.
Until the CEO responded, this was just an ex-employee with limited credibility saying pretty mild and unremarkable things few people would ever see. Now it's a CEO obviously feeling threatened and bringing wide attention to it.
If an ex-employee publicly posts/publishes in a visible way that would be obvious to the previous employer...and the previous employer says nothing, that speaks volumes more. Generally corporate silence is a sign they can't refute the statement without opening themselves up to libel/being sued.
The fact yishan is willing to say this (no matter how poor the delivery) basically means he is comfortable that he won't be sued successfully over it. That means the former employee (at best) failed to understand why he was let go.
"It is company policy not to comment on personnel matters." is the standard, expected response, no matter the guilt or innocence of either party.
Is it satisfying? No. But it avoids exactly this situation.
And by the way, even that response is only expected when the company is directly asked. The correct response until then is to simply pretend nobody (or at least nobody in management) is aware of the issue.
His allegations were a mix of the implausible and the cliché. It would take a remarkably naïve candidate to both take these allegations at face value, and think Reddit is somehow unusual in being on the wrong end of them. If not having this stain is the criteria by which they judge potential employers, they will find no employment.
Now, however, potential experienced employees who actually live in the real world will be avoiding Reddit. Why put your career at the mercy of an obviously angry, irrational CEO? There are all sorts of companies big and small where the CEO is either rational or at least kept on a short leash by a competent board of directors.
Going into ordinary damage control mode whenever somebody says something negative about your company is worse than the original damage. Any statement at all draws attention to the issue and risks making you look defensive.
But this isn't even ordinary damage control mode, this is a CEO personally attacking an ex-employee. It may even make mainstream news now (...and so it begins[0]). And worse, he's doing this right after getting another $50 million to play with and announcing a new anti-worker policy.
Before seeing the CEO's response, I would have said that responding to the thread at all was the worst possible choice. But I would have been expecting the response to at least be of a remotely responsible form. If the comment hadn't already been two hours old when I saw it, I would have thought it more plausible that the account had somehow been compromised than that anyone would actually think to respond in such a manner.
And now he's doubled down, but vaguely[1], "there's actually more, but we're pulling our punches, if you can believe it". If the original comment wasn't legally actionable, that one might be. The CEO has created a PR and potentially legal nightmare where there was originally nothing but some guy howling at the moon.
I'm reminded of the OMGPOP/Dan Porter/Shay Pierce fiasco. Troubling that the CEO of "the front page of the internet" wouldn't have learned from that...
> Now, however, potential experienced employees who actually live in the real world will be avoiding Reddit.
I've worked for a certain popular online gaming service and have been threatened in my personal email by people who've had their accounts banned. Being in any position of authority (public facing or otherwise) on a site that caters to gamers and/or people who spend all their time on the internet is something I would recommend against.
e:
www.reddit.com/r/yishansucks
yup. You don't want to be in a situation where you're always under fire from these guys.
> His allegations were a mix of the implausible and the cliché. It would take a remarkably naïve candidate to both take these allegations at face value, and think Reddit is somehow unusual in being on the wrong end of them. If not having this stain is the criteria by which they judge potential employers, they will find no employment.
1) Well, that is demonstrably false. I'm employed just fine.
2) I've encountered a similar situation before that was a real toxic mess where I took the view you espouse and I regret it. So I think you are the one who is naive.
But hey, whatever. I must be lying since your absolutist view is 100% correct to you.
> In a thread where you are defending a CEO being criticized as, amongst other things, childish, do you not see the irony of this?
Given you are making absolute statements that are demonstrably false, I was hoping being childish would get the point across that I consider the validity of your argument on par with childish behavior.
Let me make user I understand this. Because in the course of a long conversation I made statements you disagreed with without equivocating enough for your tastes, you thought the appropriate response was to be childish?
Deliberately childish behavior engaged in to be manipulative makes it easy to conclude someone lacks integrity.
Is it your intent to be dismissed as lacking integrity?
"because I pissed off management with my feedback"
Umm -- did he say that, in the words you are using (and took the trouble to put in quotes)? If so, where? It doesn't seem to appear anywhere in the comment thread.
I was paraphrasing:
"Officially: no reason. And I get this; I vaguely know how CA employment law works and that you limit your liability by not stating a reason. It's also really hard to work through in your mind.
The best theory I have is that, two weeks earlier, I raised concerns about donating 10% of ad revenue to charity. Some management likes getting feedback, some doesn't.
..."
When you make a statement like "Some management likes getting feedback, some doesn't." in relation to being laid off, you are implying it was retaliatory. I'm pretty sure Yishan saw it as that hence his reply.
It's not being called out, it's the tone. The tone sounds almost like a playground spat. Which hints at it being personality conflict, rather than a performance thing.
> It's not being called out, it's the tone. The tone sounds almost like a playground spat. Which hints at it being personality conflict, rather than a performance thing.
I've taken that tone with people in this thread to point out how stupid I consider there demonstrably false absolute statements.
So...I think the issue here is some people are bothered by Yishan (obviously) and some people are not.
Tbh, given the only way a CEO can safely say "you failed to perform" in regards to an employee is if they have documented missed deadlines by that employee...I don't think your point of view is likely grounded in reality.
Most (sane & rational) people don't open themselves up to a lawsuit without being pretty sure they evidence to support their statements.
I have to agree with you. The fact that the CEO himself was so riled up about this is pretty strong evidence that there was a lot more to this story than a lack of productivity.
> "The best theory I have is that, two weeks earlier, I raised concerns about donating 10% of ad revenue to charity. Some management likes getting feedback, some doesn't."
How else could you possibly interpret this rationally in a conversation about being laid off?
>How else could you possibly interpret this rationally in a conversation about being laid off?
The way his comment actually reads is: "I really can't work out why I was let go. The only thing I have done out of the ordinary in the last few weeks was ..."
He was actually pretty clear that he didn't really know why he was fired. He surmised the feedback might have been a factor, but certainly wasn't as confident about it as you paint him to have been.
This is hardly some horrible accusation against reddit. If anything, as far as fired employees talking about former employers goes, this is downright tame and respectful.
Moreover, he actually didn't bring it up first -- he was asked about it and simply answered the question.
If anything, he should have someone else respond. The fact it irked the CEO enough to stop whatever important things he was doing to log in and craft a fairly long rebuttal is telling.
I know plenty of people in PR and most would look at this and say this situation was completely mishandled. The CEO's comments actually makes him look worse than the whining ex-employee.
It's really not. It's business and this is potentially very bad for the business. Rather than an ex employees AMA being discussed the discussion has turned roundly onto the response of the CEO. Rather than talking about the $50 million in investment or what they plan to do with it everyone is busy talking about Yishan and his response to this thread, how he mishandled the relocation mandate to their employees and other things he's mishandled recently. Honestly if I were an investor in Reddit I'd be concerned about who's steering the ship.
I've had jobs where I've performed poorly and jobs where I've performed excellently. I've also had years I was "on" and years I was a little "off."
Businesses are not charities. They need to get things done. If you can't do the things, then they don't have to continue to pay you. Like it or not, that's how it works.
That's because performance is easily gamed. A manager could make someones performance look bad, or good regardless of reality. That's why you can suddenly be a good performer or bad performer just by changing companies. It doesn't even have to be a conscious thing. Everybody is subconsciously biased.
If you like don't like someone, you performance managament them out by like giving them lots of terrible tasks or stupidly high targets. This is a well known technique, recommend by most HR people.
Anyone who's been work for a decent amount of time, knows this. Workplaces can be more like high school playground the with popular kids and the outcasts, then a merit based thing.
In my first job out of college, 2 years in or so, the amount of web work was slumping (it was the first web bust). My boss and lead developer all went on vacation the same week and my boss gave me a fairly impossible job to do without the both of them helping out in some fashion.
I was not successful. So I'm quite familiar with the technique.
Basically, if you get the vibe that you're not well-liked, you should just leave or figure out how to.
The response went into far too much detail. Wrongful termination lawsuits happen all of the time, defamation can be found when any term you use can not be evidenced.
A pro would have either ignored this AMA or issued blanket, definable statements, such as "You were fired for performance related reasons."
No. If anything it's up to the company leadership to be tactful, level-headed, and importantly, magnanimous in the face of petty slights and provocations -- like those of the severed employee, in this case.
And that's what's so tragically stupid about this whole thing -- what happened at the outset (the employee's remarks in a public forum) was a very little thing. And what did Yishan do? He want out of his way to make it a big thing. It's like he sees a fire in the wastebasket, and his natural instinct is to throw more oil on it.
I read over the employee's comments. I agree with your position but also, they seemed calm and composed. Unless he deleted his "bad" ones, I didn't get why the CEO was out there + harsh.
In a vacuum, it could seem that way. But according to another of his posts, linked in another comment here, there was supposedly a demand by other employees who felt wronged by this guy's statements for him to state their truth, on the record. If we take that at its word, then it's more like a CEO that is willing to put his own reputation and professionalism on the line to defend the quality of his employees.
I feel like it's relevant to point out that Yishan, Reddit's CEO, has written some of the most thoughtful advice on engineering management. I have personally benefited a lot from his thoughts on this:
In these situations, the outcome is almost always bad for everyone involved, but these types of things happen from time to time. The git pull jokes, harassment accusations, and firings. Personally, I don't know if we are helping by giving more attention to it. We look on, face palm, etc, but the effects on these people is real and lasting. Personally, I have flagged this, because if this were me, I would hate to have a spotlight on it. We have a brief sliver of what is going on, speculation going wild, and this is basically on the public record now. We're all human, do dumb shit from time to time, and it's on the world stage. Hindsight sight is 20/20 and I'm sure they wish this never happened now. Yada, yada, yada.
I really don't like this. The problem is that Yishan never explicitly states that there was an exit interview, and the reason for the termination was clearly explained.
He could have a half assed HR person that gave some bullshit reason like "you are not a good fit", and the ex-employee is legitimately confused about why he was terminated.
The other potential issue is that employees go into shock when they are told they are terminated, and are highly unlikely to remember the rest of the conversation correctly. People that get fired, generally aren't good at digesting feedback in the first place.
In California, a termination conversation usually begins and ends like this: "Thank you for your time, your services are no longer required. Please collect your belongings."
"yishan 27 points 15 minutes ago
Hiya.
It was a harsh response, I agree (there's actually more, but we're pulling our punches, if you can believe it), and in fact all day yesterday I didn't want to post a reply, hoping his AMA wouldn't get too much traction or he wouldn't spout too many misconceptions and we could all just continue going our separate ways.
Problem is, this was starting to really irritate a number of employees who'd worked with him, and he's the kind of guy who enjoys the attention he can get by saying "I used to be a reddit admin" even though he'll just post spurious stuff he doesn't know about, and left unchecked the positive attention encourages him to do it more.
In running reddit, there's an interesting balance between the normal standards of professionalism (which we try very hard to uphold even when someone is being unreasonable) and the fact that we're a huge internet forum where a higher degree of openness is expected. I'm actually really focused on building competent, professional management precisely because the spotlight is always on us - and also because I've been at other Silicon Valley companies where that hasn't always been the case - but it also means that because of that spotlight, any tiny deviation can be hugely magnified."[1]
Main arguments are a matter of interpretation, so your second sentence opposes, rather than supporting, the first.
Summarizing is interpretation, since it is relaying the important points of the source, and determining what is important is a matter of interpretation.
Nope. Selecting which main argument to repeat is a matter of interpretation. But once you've selected it, repeating it requires little interpretation. Adding your own commentary requires interpretation in both selection and writing.
We might have different definitions of the word "interpret". According to Google, interpret: 1) explain the meaning of (information, words, or actions). 2) understand (an action, mood, or way of behaving) as having a particular meaning or significance.
Seeing some of the back & forth among HN'ers about "laid off" vs "fired" as a lie vs truth, I think it's worth clearning up a particular point.
Yes, being "laid off" is different from "fired" but the ex-employee (dehrmann) actually did say he was fired. He just said it in a very roundabout way. He wasn't using "laid off" in its most obvious definition.
dehrmann said: "I was laid off...no reason...some management doesn't like feedback..." which is his euphemism for saying "fired".
(sidebar: If one is a high profile employee such as an NFL coach or big shot CEO, he/she can simply and directly tell journalists, friends, etc that "I was fired"[2]. For some psychological reason, every one else from middle management down to line workers have a defensive mechanism to avoid the word "fired" and use softer language.)
TheOsiris[1] was of the few readers that picked up on the poster's roundabout language. Many others did not parse it correctly. Unfortunately, the Reddit CEO also didn't interpret it correctly and so he thought he had to correct dehrmann by saying "you were FIRED for the following reasons..." So, a misunderstanding by yishan for not recognizing his ex-employee's strung out phrasing of "yes I was fired" unfortunately lead to the (unnecessary) boldface of "fired" in his response.
Anyways, we can set aside the "laid off vs fired" and recognize that the real disagreement is whether the ex-employee and the the company parted ways because of management retaliation about charity strategy, or because a lack of work productivity.
Yes, it's legal (and I just looked this up to confirm). Many companies will avoid commenting on these things because if they are not 100% accurate they raise the risk of a slander/libel case against them. For instance, if it turns out that Yishan here misspoke about something he could land the company in a bit of trouble.
Whether legal or not, it's certainly childish. The fact is anyone could have seen that this was a disgruntled former employee so there wasn't a need to say anything at all. If they had to comment then keep it brief. However, getting into a flame war on reddit (even if you are the CEO of the site) just makes the whole company look bad. Heads of companies simple do not get involved in pissing matches with former employees like this without a hit to their own reputation.
> For instance, if it turns out that Yishan here misspoke about something he could land the company in a bit of trouble.
This is where the post goes horribly wrong, too much detail. If the former employee wants to start a lawsuit, any detail that can not be defined, was not measured, or is not written down is a liability. For example "not getting much work done"
Precisely. It's a hugely, and highly subjective detail. Is he a lazy slacker? Or was his idea of a full-time job not in line with management's (possibly onerous) vision of the same?
"When an employee is dismissed from employment at a company, the policy of almost every company (including reddit) is not to comment, either publicly or internally. This is because companies have no desire to ruin someone's future employment prospects by broadcasting to the world that they were fired. In return, the polite expectation is that the employee will not go shooting their mouth off about the company especially (as in your case) through irresponsibly unfounded speculation. Signing a non-disparagement indicates that you have no intention to do this, so the company can then say "Ok, if anyone comes asking for a reference on this guy, we needn't say he was fired, just give a mildly positive reference." Even if you don't sign the non-disparagement, the company will give you the benefit of the doubt and not disparage you or make any negative statements first. Unfortunately, you have just forfeited this arrangement." -Yishan to former employee
If nothing else the Streisand effect insures Reddit is going to get about a million times more bad exposure, now that its going viral, than they would have when it was just a thread from a disgruntled ex employee.
People were starting to question whether Reddit had a good CEO and corprate culture already, now its certain to gain momentum.
I came away from this with more respect for Reddit and it's CEO than I had before, so painting this as bad publicity for them isn't just something that can be assumed here. What the CEO said didn't seem inflammatory or over the top at all, it was just the facts with little or no vindictiveness. I'm not sure where anyone's sympathy for the former employee is coming from, or how anyone reading what the CEO wrote could parse it as the childish, unprofessional flame that it's being described as.
A lot of people have a natural tendency to always side with the underdog regardless of the facts of the situation, especially when it's one guy vs. any sort of institution (a company, school, whatever). That probably says something nice about humanity, but it doesn't make it any truthier.
You seem to have a natural tendency to side with the authority figure which is just as bad if not worse :)
How did you jump to the conclusion the CEO's version "was just the facts"? You seem to be saying because he is the boss that he is being factual and the employee inherently was not.
The CEO's spin might be the facts but it would be impossible for anyone who wasn't there to know. That's why an employer wouldn't normally air stuff like this in public, its one person's word against another, and the liability risks are steep.
I'm not basing my comments on which one of the two parties was being truthful, they might both think they are. You would have to do an indepth analysis of the employees performance, and the circumstances of his termination to know for sure.
I'm saying it was really poor judgement for a powerful employer to unload on a relateively powerless former employee, and air what should have been confidential HR information in public like that. If I were applying for a job with the guy I would think twice about working for someone willing to savage an employee in public like that. If I was on his board I'd sure think twice about whether he is the right person for a CEO job.
I live in Alberta, Canada. The Personal Information Protection Act governs the use of personal information by the private sector. Companies are allowed to give references when asked, but I believe public posts such as these would be illegal under the act.
Even giving references can be an issue. The law states that the company must make an effort to make sure the information is accurate and complete. For subjective measurements, there may be argument over what is accurate. When my father was working, their lawyers recommended they not give any information other than confirming employment dates and duties for references.
Its perfectly legal given that the former employee aired the laundry publicly. Once you do that, people have the right to defend themselves, yadda yadda.
No comments here on HN yet along the lines of all PR is good PR?
Lets face it, this is Reddit. He didn't get fired from the local railroad yard. They're getting excellent traffic off this story. Even the guy who got fired is at least getting "internet famous" for a day.
The whole story boils down to "reddit AMA's, something interesting to look at and talk about". Not seeing a problem here.
A real conspiracy theory would be playing this game to get some traffic was part of his severance package (In exchange for a faux argument in a AMA with our CEO, you'll get an extra 6 months salary as a severance bonus plus an extra month if the HN story gets over 100 comments, etc)
I read a lot of comments on HN about his response being unprofessional and harsh, and on the latter of those counts, I do agree, it definitely had a negative tone. What I want to know, though, is _why_ so many consider it unprofessional. To me, and I'm making the assumption that Yishan isn't lying, any pleasantries owed this man ended the moment he decided to not only publicly broadcast his employment, but also falsify details regarding his termination.
Regardless of what I think, what actually makes this whole exchange unprofessional to others? Why should these details be protected, and why should companies and individual remain silent on these issues? I'm lumping this into the "political correctness" category until someone tells me it's about something more than someone having their feelings hurt (that they may have been asking for, even). Putting on my future-employment-perspective goggles, I can kinda-sorta see why this wouldn't be good, but I'd also be the type of person to argue that the current state of PR is particularly dismal when employers can't give any kind of factual details about a former employee's work record beyond whether or not they were fired. Why not just report details of employment and follow-up with the employee on any questionable/negative remarks? My guess is that a bad apple ruins the bunch when companies didn't/don't investigate those details with the employee and just pass them up altogether, creating an unfair situation for the prospective employee.
I do not know much about laws. After working some years at an organization, asked to leave without stating any reason can be painful, traumatic to the employee. Employee can be alone with dependents and all of a sudden his/her world can be crashed.
Basic human courtesy can be to let the employee clearly know why he/she is asked to leave. At least, after knowing the reasons, he/she may change his behavior in future employment. If reasons are not known, employee can never know in reality what mistake is made/highlighted/led to this drastic decision and some times that act may be accidental or any politics by some other person ...etc. Since the employee says " by not stating a reason. It's also really hard to work through in your mind." i.e. he/she is still clueless on what exactly happened.
1. Is it not fair/humane to give employee a chance to hear charges and to tell his/her side of story so that independent body can decide fairly?
2. Reasons given by CEO such as incompetence,inappropriate comments,not taking feedback by managers may or may not be true in reality since proofs are not provided. Software development is a team work. So some times, mistakes of others can create burden on other and management may not aware of real culprit. Feedback is tricky aspect. I noticed management sometimes can be highly opinionated without real understanding of complexity of work/problems/issues, solutions tried ...etc. Managers just for their bonuses/promotions or to appear good in front of their bosses, act as intelligent or knowledgeable, though in reality they can be novices in many aspects. So if feedback is irrelevant or if feedback lacks common sense or lacks domain knowledge ...etc, then how employee can accept it?
We do not know many specifics about the incident and we do not have proofs So we clearly cannot point out who is wrong but employee should have been given a hearing by independent group on the charges so that he can defend and if that independent group do not agree, then they can ask him/her to leave.
Even in courts, where death sentence can be given, charges will be told and accused can provide his story/point of view on what happened and then court passes judgment. Then why similar facility cannot be provided to employee rather than throwing out like used tissue paper? It does not sound humane at all.
> Is it not fair/humane to give employee a chance to hear charges and to tell his/her side of story so that independent body can decide fairly?
The employee does have a chance at redress by an independent body. At least in California, they can sew their past employer for wrongful termination. It will probably cost them a lot of money, especially if they were rightfully fired, but who were you hoping to pay for the 'independent body' to defend? The employer can't, it would be a conflict of interest.
>> How many years has this person worked at reddit?
I do not know. It can be some days/weeks/months ...etc. You can read it as "after working some time" but integrity of the message/comment won't change.
>> The employee does have a chance at redress by an independent body.
What I mean is, independent body inside the organization, taking employees from different other groups so that they can judge fairly. It should not be difficult for any one since it takes just few hours occasionally but at the end of the exercise, everyone can have a feeling of fairness, justice and there will be no rumors/ill-feelings ...etc. After all, we are mere mortals.
Giving the benefit of the doubt I'd guess things that were just off script, even more guessing, either silly stuff or trying to make the candidate feel uncomfortable/inferior. Those are the most common I've seen at least.
This is an unfortunate display of bad judgement by all parties concerned.
The disgruntled employee, even if he had not signed an NDA, did something fairly stupid and verboten -- namely, he bad-mouthed a former employer and ex-colleagues. The (tech) world is small and such public displays of indiscretions always come back to bite you.
Yishan Wong had a lot more to lose IMHO by engaging in this manner with the ex-employee in a public forum. He risks the reputation of his company and his own personal brand. Based on Yishan's writings that I've read, I found him to be a thoughtful manager who seemed ready to make the jump to executive cadre. I'd have expected a more mature reaction and ideally not a public one. No matter, we all have lapses of judgement -- hope that Yishan is getting appropriate counsel from more experienced executives and is able to defuse the situation without more damage -- reputational or otherwise.
Sure the guy did some stupid things but who knows what his life is like and we're all human and do stupid things. The CEO's reaction was simply insensitive. Here's what the CEO should have done: have their lawyers draft a polite letter showing that they're serious about having him shut up. When he doesn't, ask your lawyers to take the next step.
His comments were temporarily mildly irritating to the company at best and would be forgotten within a few weeks (same goes for his reply). There's too many memes going around for anyone to remember stupid AMA posts.
My takeaway? If hiring this guy, then I'd judge him on his own merits. Otherwise, I'll avoid applying to Reddit for some time. I just hate those hard-ass get your shit done kinds of environments.
No CEO worth his salt ever turns negatively disparaging remarks about an ex-employee into a soapbox. He just opened Reddit up to legal ramifications.
And with all the remarks here about how its "politically correct" to put on the HR spin about never going this low, i'm just shocked and amazed. I can see why its hard for these companies to find staff for HR.
"When an employee is dismissed from employment at a company, the policy of almost every company (including reddit) is not to comment, either publicly or internally. This is because companies have no desire to ruin someone's future employment prospects by broadcasting to the world that they were fired."
IMO there need to be a better solution than this. I also don't like anti discrimination laws and I have a proposal for getting rid of them: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7727917
Don't forget that the ex-employee might be gone, but the guy who hired him is probably still there and doesn't really need documentation of how his judgment was screwed up at hiring time. So there is very little motivation to document why someone is being fired unless you can prove in writing the problem began after hiring or couldn't have possibly been detected in the hiring process.
The explanation is silly (does any company REALLY care about its employees much less ex-employees?) but the end result is the same, no point in talking about it.
Forcing employees to sign a non-disparagement agreement? -- Screw that. (Edit: force, compel, persuade, strongly hint: semantics.)
Saying that a former employee violating a non-disparagement agreement means that it's now a good idea for the company to take use an eye-for-an-eye policy in return? -- What.
No (American) non-executive employees should ever be forced to sign anything. I never have for any job. Employers are in too powerful of a position by default.
I don't think you're forced to sign. That point is also lightly touched on in the comment - "the non-disparagement we asked you to sign" and "Even if you don't sign the non-disparagement".
I've signed these before, and I was under no impression that I was being forced.
Then he shouldn't have signed the severance deal (which he didn't). An employer is not entitled to give you money to go away; they give you money in exchange for certain things, one of those being that you shut your mouth and not do an AMA on reddit about it.
This guy is an idiot and is likely going to have a hard time finding a job based on this behavior. What he's doing isn't illegal, but it's quite unprofessional.
I don't believe severance pay is required by law in California. In that case, asking someone to sign a non-disparagement agreement in exchange for helping them land on their feet seems like a reasonable request.
1. They never forced anyone to sign it; but in general it's a stupid idea to talk poorly about a former employer in public. This guy was doing a fucking AMA on reddit about his time being employed at reddit. He knew he had been fired; and he had to know the truth was going to come out.
2. That's not what he said. The former employee speculated that he was laid off in retaliation for something or other; and the company replied with the actual reason for his termination in its own defense.
In general, if you were laid off or fired from a job, it's best not to spout off about it in public (especially on the site that used to employ you). It doesn't matter whether you signed anything or not; unless your former employer was doing something illegal and you're blowing the whistle, it's best to keep your mouth shut.
The "speculation" was pretty mild. Most of it was vague, the most specific bits were either implausible (fired for being insufficiently charitable) or have been said by almost every employee of every company in history (management doesn't like criticism).
I see no reason a rational executive would feel compelled to raise the profile of the issue by responding at all, much less in this dramatic fashion.
No, the thread in question was pretty mild, but the guy basically ran an AMA to get revenge at reddit for firing him. It seemed like he didn't understand why he was fired, or he's trying to provoke them into giving him ammunition for a lawsuit.
Moral of the story is that if you just got fired from reddit, you probably shouldn't go on reddit to do an AMA about it.
Not arguing one way or another, but I personally would categorize the implied allegation (Reddit is being unwise in how it manages its finances, on the heels of a large investment round being announced) as a bit more than "mild."
Was this the best way to respond? Probably not. Did it warrant some kind of response? Probably.
Reddit deliberately portrays itself as unwise in how it manages its finances. It's a key part of their corporate image. If any of the investors didn't know this, they didn't do any due diligence.
Companies wasting money isn't an unusual theme, either. Even on the days I've been happiest in my employment, I could probably name you a half dozen ways in which I believed the my employer(s) were spending unwise amounts of money on things they shouldn't be.
I am not 100% sure of the agreements of his termination, but I am pretty sure no one is "forced" to sign anything, however, in the states, severance packages are optional, and not required. If the company wants to give severance packages if you sign a non-disparagement agreement, I do not see anything wrong with this.
"Forcing employees to sign a non-disparagement agreement? -- Screw that."
There's no way an employer can force you to sign a non-disparagement agreement (or do anything else) after they've fired you - what can they do to you, fire you again? The ex-employee gets something in return (a "consideration" in legalese) for signing the non-disparagement agreement. For example, the company agrees not to say bad things about the employee, gives them severance pay, etc. In return for severance pay, the employee usually also signs a "general release" which absolves the company from any legal liability (wrongful dismissal suit, etc.).
And pretty fair. The company says: we know you will suffer, we can help by giving you some extra $, in exchange please reduce our pain and sign this so we can avoid liability and lawyer expense in the future.
Did they force him to sign it? How could they force him; what are they going to do if he refuses? Fire him? Anyway, yishan gives a decent enough justification IMO
yishan needs to be terminated. Even his follow-up posts in other threads is demonstrating his smug self-righteous attitude that is unbecoming of a CEO in his position.
It's so much easier to casually fling things like this out there than it is to answer them, but FWIW, what you're insinuating is false. We penalize stories less, not more, when they're anti-YC, and every moderator is strictly instructed about it.
If the discussion is about the general topic of publicly airing private employee information, it could stay as it could be something founders could learn from. If this topic goes into drama mode about specific people or this specific instance, it should probably end up getting moderated.
Since the flag button seems to operate as a super downvote (and its UI is ostensibly "get the mods' attention" unless you know this) do you feel like the current system is useful? Should flag be a super downvote, or should it just get your attention? Is "both" useful?
I resist clicking flag because I know how hard it hits a story, and based on what you're saying, it seems like people are pretty free with flagging (which might be affecting controversial stories inordinately). Not that you'd compare your UI to Reddit's, but: Reddit's "report" function gets the mods' attention but does not impact the submission, to my knowledge. Recently, to cull people reporting things they just don't like, there's now a modal that pops up when you click it to demand a reason.
This is an interesting phenomenon. Given that the story is arguably fairly relevant to the recent investment by Sam, what safeguards are in place to ensure that content like this can't be taken out of the public light by a "reporting brigade?"
Assuming you're not trolling; "brigading" is you talk to all your similarly, minded peers on IRC with long-standing, legitimate HN accounts to flag the story because it annoys you. (Different from a voting ring, which may include non-legitimate accounts and lacks the 'tit-for-tat')
I haven't flagged it because it's more than stupid high school drama, it's an object lesson - is the person who would become CEO on the startup team you're joining/funding likely to behave in a similar fashion?
Because CEO Yishan just opened up Reddit to a potentially expensive, but more importantly, distracting lawsuit. It may have saved face in the all important young-male demographic that Reddit caters to, and probably felt good as the CEO to be able to perform to such a public 'smackdown' of a former employee 'running his mouth off', but as as developer it says quite a bit about the the companies culture if the CEO bullies people like that. "Taking the high road" is how professionals act towards other professionals, and while the former employee was far from professional, that might have been the better option for the Reddit CEO to take.
Even waiting a few days to make sure the 'i's were dotted, and 't's were crossed by the legal team, followed by a (short) public blog post refuting the most disparaging remarks made would have been less childish and more responsible would have been better.
Brigading is not IRC slang. It is web forum slang, perhaps reddit specific. I've only heard it in the reddit/HN context, never in IRC. IRC is nevertheless a popular way to 'organize' such 'brigades'.
> what safeguards are in place to ensure that content like this can't be taken out of the public light by a "reporting brigade?"
There are no safeguards against reporting, which is why certain types of threads (gender, diversity) rarely hit the front page, unfortunately.
Many users associate Reddit content with low-quality content, so flagging would not be surprising. Almost every HN submission I've seen linking to reddit.com has been flagged down.
Gender and diversity threads don't hit the front-page because the decorum in those threads is so bad that they both trigger automated self-defense mechanisms in the HN code (the "flame war detector") and inspire flags. I try not to flag those stories, because I agree with the people who have qualms about HN effectively brushing those stories under the rug, but I've flagged some of the more hopeless-seeming variants.
Assuming sufficient admin intervention, I personally believe controversial stories should have a place on HN. Sure, some of them will result in flame wars in the comments but for the most part it allows us to discover content that is worth discussing in the first place.
Why would it? Seems like a perfectly reasonable and professional response by yishan, shows investors that he isn't going to take crap from ex-employees trying to bad mouth the company.
Heh, perfectly reasonable and professional right until the boldened "fired" in the second sentence? Care to give an example what would constitute a less-than professional response?
CA is an "at will" state. A company does not have to give a reason for letting anyone go. It is best practice NEVER to give a reason. If you provide a reason then you better be sure it is documented in detail and there is zero discrepancy between the documented reasons and anything that anyone could ever say in a court. If there is even the smallest issue with your documentation you could end up losing in court if you are sued. While posting this response might have felt good it is clearly not a smart thing to do. Reddit would have been better to delete the AMA and then sent a letter to the poster explaining the non-disparagement agreement and how it protects both parties. I would hope that a CEO would know better.
The person posting the AMA seems to lack the experience needed in dealing this this sort of thing and could of used a bit of help understanding the realities of work life. It is very reasonable to believe that he was angry on being let go but this is a life lesson and I hope in the future he is able to handle things better.
A reasonable and professional response by Yishan would've been to stay out of it and either ignore it or release an official statement, not comment on a reddit thread started by a disgruntled former employee...
That was an official statement, as indicated by the little [A] after Yishan's username. (If you hover, it says: "reddit admin; speaking officially".)
And placing it as a reply in the relevant thread is exactly what you'd do if you believe Reddit threads are a serious, important, and often-canonical source of information. That genuine belief is essentially a requirement to lead Reddit.
Wow, that was incredibly unprofessional on Yishan Wong's part. I can only imagine how rotten and horrible Reddit's work culture must be. No one could possibly pay me enough to work there.
I don't see how it's different from calling out a former employer and spreading (what seems like) false information. Cruel and perhaps unprofessional, but not completely in the wrong imho.
reddit hires incompetent people who are not getting much work done.
That explains why I don't recall ever seeing a new user feature (e.g. tagging, user blocking, a useful save or search function) in the years I've been on Reddit.
Non-disparagement agreements are common elements in the USA for severance/release contracts.
As for the 'unconstitutionality' of Sony trying to make people sign away their right to a class action lawsuit, it doesn't violate the freedom of speech. The freedom of speech, for the most part, only protects against the state infringing on your rights. This is often confused, even by people like Sarah Palin, so I'm not blaming you for not knowing it—but that's something to consider.
What Sony tried to do is egregious, though, and it can be struck down if a court says that the class action waiver is not enforceable.
https://www.reddit.com/r/RedditCensorship/comments/2ifd3p/ud...
"Hiya. It was a harsh response, I agree (there's actually more, but we're pulling our punches, if you can believe it), and in fact all day yesterday I didn't want to post a reply, hoping his AMA wouldn't get too much traction or he wouldn't spout too many misconceptions and we could all just continue going our separate ways.
Problem is, this was starting to really irritate a number of employees who'd worked with him, and he's the kind of guy who enjoys the attention he can get by saying "I used to be a reddit admin" even though he'll just post spurious stuff he doesn't know about, and left unchecked the positive attention encourages him to do it more.
In running reddit, there's an interesting balance between the normal standards of professionalism (which we try very hard to uphold even when someone is being unreasonable) and the fact that we're a huge internet forum where a higher degree of openness is expected. I'm actually really focused on building competent, professional management precisely because the spotlight is always on us - and also because I've been at other Silicon Valley companies where that hasn't always been the case - but it also means that because of that spotlight, any tiny deviation can be hugely magnified."