Introduction

I'm not more intelligent than the top engineering leaders.

However, I'm here to share my thoughts and am open to having a conversation and learning.

Here are my thoughts on the layoffs and overhiring. 🫡

How could this happen?

I found it fascinating that some big tech companies laid off people with a simple email. They laid thousands of people off as if they were never needed in the first place. Some discovered they got laid off by not being able to log into their work computers anymore.

It's a tough reality to accept. It's cold as fuck. 🥶

This brings up a question: How could they lay a massive amount of people off at the same time without worrying things will go south?

To me, it seems that many companies were overhiring. When I say many companies, it doesn't only apply to big tech.

A co-worker who worked at Google told me that at times people would get hired at Google since they wanted to reduce a smart brain in the market for their competitors.

Let's talk about it though. Why waste more money and overhire? Why not improve the existing teams?

Overhiring instead of improving

Back to the title of this post. Why choose to hire more before you improve?

Let me give you an example:

A team wants to get things done sooner. They want to ship things faster. Instead of thinking about how the team can improve to do so, they think they need to hire more people.

When in fact hiring more people will likely make things go slower than becoming more productive. 🤷‍♂️

Instead of hiring:

• Increase the collaboration

• Invest in and train your people

• Eliminate waste

• Start less, finish more

  • Work in short cycles

I'm not saying we should do this forever. At some point, we will have to hire people.

That doesn't mean we should begin doing so. We should begin by maximizing and using what we have. We should create an environment where adding people will make things go faster.

By that, I mean doubling down on improving the existing team before adding new members.

Conclusion

If there is one thing you should take from this article:

Hiring often hurts teams more than it helps. Be aware of that.

Teams can often do much better as a team before beginning to add more manpower. 😉