Without unions, U.S. tech workers have no meaningful mechanisms for preventing mass layoffs like this. A (generally) competitive hiring market doesn't constitute robust, long-term protection against corporate execs who view labor as an extremely squeezable company expense, and until inelastic demands like healthcare are disentangled from our labor, layoffs like this will bring with them stress and grief for some people.
I think that instead of hoping the market continues to shield us (tech workers) from seeing our labor power weakened, and crossing our fingers that our employers will offer us comfortable severance packages (but not really knowing until the time comes), we should be organizing into unions.
CEO Stapler looks like he's doing well btw despite the 'restructuring', having acquired ~$4.3M in RSUs starting on June 15 (http://pdf.secdatabase.com/776/0001209191-23-038492.pdf) Not all vested yet, but it's good to see that, as usual, somehow needing to 'optimize spend' always seems to mean cutting workers but mysteriously, also means showering execs in the gatorade cooler full of money.
Used to work there (left well before today), it was hard watching good people leave because they were laid off or got burnt out & frustrated. The current CEO of newrelic was involved with the adobe cloud transition so obviously not bothered about alienating users to increase the stock price.
Kinda seems like the current CEO is preparing for a private equity buyout or something else equally bad for employees.
I still use newrelic because it's easy and works pretty well but with the way stuff is going it really makes me wonder how long it will be like that for.
I think that instead of hoping the market continues to shield us (tech workers) from seeing our labor power weakened, and crossing our fingers that our employers will offer us comfortable severance packages (but not really knowing until the time comes), we should be organizing into unions.
CEO Stapler looks like he's doing well btw despite the 'restructuring', having acquired ~$4.3M in RSUs starting on June 15 (http://pdf.secdatabase.com/776/0001209191-23-038492.pdf) Not all vested yet, but it's good to see that, as usual, somehow needing to 'optimize spend' always seems to mean cutting workers but mysteriously, also means showering execs in the gatorade cooler full of money.