
Netflix: Non-'A' Players Unworthy of Jobs - wyclif
http://slashdot.org/story/13/12/25/0242207/netflix-non-a-players-unworthy-of-jobs
======
gopalv
The best teams I've worked in has had A-players, B-players and C-players.

Some of the C-players were wild kids with potential, who needed mentoring.

Some of the B-players were people who were not motivated at all - some because
they wanted money and the company didn't pay, some because they had been
promoted upto their level of competence.

The best bit the A-players did more than anything else was to make the
B-players competent & motivate them. They added in their abilities and sure,
wasted a lot of time sitting in other people's desks. But the team of five or
so around an A-player grew and prospered to become incredibly effective.

That was an awakening. That was when I stopped overworking myself to write
tons of code and try to follow into the foot-steps of those A-players who
became "force multipliers" in any team.

Knowing the people I admired, I feel like it will take another decade, at
least.

~~~
raverbashing
I agree with most of your post, and the 'force-multiplier' aspect is
important, however

The definition of A/B/C players is mostly subjective _and_ dependent on the
company as well.

An excellent Java developer can suck at a Python house and vice-versa
(probably will suck less, but still).

But, the main definition of "A-Players" seems to be people that will overwork
themselves for the company

And for these I say: yes, I'm not an A-Player, sorry...

~~~
mdwrigh2
> An excellent Java developer can suck at a Python house and vice-versa
> (probably will suck less, but still).

I've yet to meet an excellent developer who was only excellent in his language
of choice. In my experience at least, almost all of the talents that make an A
player an A transcend whatever language they're using and has far more to do
with their ability to reason and hold an entire system in their head.

~~~
vonmoltke
Then why do nearly all of the "A-player" organizations still require X years
of language/framework-specific experience in their job postings?

------
fit2rule
What the heck is an "A-Player" or a "B-Player"? I think this is another
American sporting term that has no place in the technology field, personally
.. is it not discrimination wrapped up in a pop-cult package?

~~~
alan_cx
I see the answers given, and have to wonder if they know we are talking people
and not slabs of warm meat.

~~~
dictum
USDA Prime beef won't complain when it's rewarded for the 60-hour work weeks
with a firing.

------
polskibus
Firing once useful contributors is a failure of management. Managers should
find a way to repurpose experienced employees and use their experience and
knowledge of the company to greater mutual benefit.

~~~
tomp
Did you even read the original article? Even the part quoted above says:

> we had to be willing to let go of people whose skills no longer fit

If people's skills no longer fit, then by definition you cannot repurpose
their skills. In the original article, the author explained Netflix's
transition from DVD-over-mail to video-streaming-on-demand. I'm pretty sure
there were quite a few people that were useful in the old business model and
completely useless in the new one. The only fair thing in this case is to let
them go, gracefully of course.

~~~
protomyth
"If people's skills no longer fit, then by definition you cannot repurpose
their skills."

A-players cannot learn new skills?

Basically, they want specialists and not A players[1] and then they discard
and hire new specialists. Its HR checklistism disguised as elitism.

1) A players can learn new skills and still be A players. If they cannot, then
they weren't A players.

~~~
tomp
I'm a programmer. I learned programming over the past 10 years. Take the best
lawyer, doctor, or chemist, and I doubt that they can learn to be A player
relatively soon (i.e. in 2-5 years). Even if they could learn programming,
they would probably not be as good at it as they are at their own original
skill. I'm sure it goes the other way round as well.

And after all, why would an A player _want_ to learn a new skill, if they can
make a very good living using their present skillset (albeit in a different
company)?

~~~
trimbo
> why would an A player want to learn a new skill

Netflix is not giving those people a choice. They're firing them with no
notice.

------
Robadob
This appears to be a repost of yesterdays;
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6959269](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6959269)

~~~
wyclif
Yes, I read the HBR post yesterday. But the reason I submitted this is
(believe it or not) because of the rather cynical Slashdot commentary and
links adding value, as well as the continued interest in employment and hiring
trends on HN this week.

In the case of the latter, I'm not really sure why that's so. I suspect it may
have to do with the fact that it's the end of the year and that is when a lot
of companies do layoffs and firings, and an upcoming new year means some
people are thinking about transitioning to new jobs or roles.

------
greenyoda
I'd have more confidence in a company that retained only "A-players" if the
policy was applied to everyone up to the CEO. But I doubt we'll ever live to
see the CEO of Netflix resign because the company isn't performing well
enough. (If he ever gets fired by the board, it will only be after the company
under-performs for a very long time.)

~~~
macspoofing
Heh. The attempted spinning of the DVD business plus the fee increases were a
PR fiasco and cost Netflix huge amount of subscribers. Surely the CEO was off
his "A game" and was fired accordingly.

------
yalogin
Slashdot says it like it is. This made me remember why I liked it in the first
place. Unlike HN where its mostly people who look to implement or have
implemented such policies and so have no incentive to be harsh on Netflix.

------
lukejduncan
Everyone claims to hire "only A players." Alice interviews at TechCo, enters
the interview anti-loop, and doesn't get an offer. Alice leaves while TechCo
tells it's new hires "we only hire A players, you're the best of the best,
welcome to the team." Alice avoids the anti-loop at MicroCo, gets an offer,
and is told "we only hire A players, you're the best of the best, welcome to
the team."

And the myth of only hiring A players perpetuates itself.

edit: grammar

~~~
zmjjmz
I think the point of the article is that whether or not someone is an A-player
is context dependent. Alice might not be an A-player at TechCo (for some
reason e.g. the way they dole out projects) but is an excellent fit at
MicroCo, where she is considered an A-player because she can work well in
their context.

Whether or not this works in practice is obviously a bit iffy, since finding
someone who fits exactly your context is incredibly difficult.

------
NAFV_P
A, B && C players. First you categorise programming languages, next people. I
thought this type of thinking died out in the late nineties, when people
realised it was a load of shite.

~~~
djillionsmix
As long as there's an asshole looking for an excuse to be an asshole they'll
keep reinventing the same stupid shit.

------
kiallmacinnes
Its amazing how different the Slashdot commentary is from yesterdays HN
post...

~~~
AmVess
The quality of /. comments section has been in a tailspin for years. so it's
no great shock that the opinions differ by a vast amount.

~~~
adestefan
There are many people who say the same thing about HN comments.

~~~
acjohnson55
Everything in degrees, I suppose!

------
it_learnses
What I got out of it was that HR didn't want to micro-manage so they allowed
employees and managers to think what was best for the company, rather than
treating them like children. They gave them spending leeway and trusted them
to spend it carefully. I think that was a good call.

They did let go a few people who they thought wouldn't be able to adapt but
with a good severance. I'm halfway split on this one. Is this a general
policy? Or do they re-purpose people who they think are capable of being re-
purposed and letting go the rest of them? It's sad that this happens, but I'm
not sure I'd blame Netflix. Maybe if we had a guaranteed living wage, then
this wouldn't even be an issue :)

~~~
walshemj
Unfortunately I think a lot of the tail functions in organizations (accounts
,HR building services) get delusions of grandeur and start trying to run the
company instead of just doing what they are paid to do - disastrous PRP and
stack ranking systems being some very good examples

As one "engineering" telecoms CEO told his building services director "world
class telecoms companies dont have a head office in a F^%&*ing shed at
Heathrow"

------
coldcode
So if I put "A-Player" on my linked-in page I will get hired faster? Such an
imbecilic way to divide up programmers. This definition is so open to multiple
definitions it's totally useless. Everyone's idea of a good/bad programmer is
radically different and likely a continuum. What matters in the end is the
team you have doing what you need them to do. Calling people A, B or C is like
trying to digitize an analog signal made up of multiple frequencies with 2
bits.

------
CGamesPlay
Using a bad definition of "A-level performance" obviously makes the idea of
only keeping A players sound like a bad plan. Individual performance
evaluations should create incentives that are aligned to company incentives.

\- Evaluating performance based on effort fails to incentivize output totally;
a high performer who works 9-5 is foolishly ranked underneath a mediocre
performer who stays overtime: the mediocre performer will be around forever--
the high performer will find a better job.

\- Evaluating performance based on high quantity of output without regard to
long-term viability (quality) of the output incentivizes reactionary behavior
and leads to technical debt: over time, even your high performers won't be
able to produce good output in a timely fashion because there is nothing sound
to build upon.

If the incentives are aligned, "performance" at an individual level means
increasing performance of the team and company, and involves the quantity of
high-quality output (ignoring low-quality output) and the degree to which an
individual enables the rest of the team to produce high-quality output.

I think the Slashdot comment totally misses the mark on how Netflix defines
performance.

------
yetanotherphd
I don't know if aggressively firing low performers is a good strategy, but it
has zero bearing on the economy as a whole, or H-1Bs.

 _All_ tech companies would gain if they were allowed access to cheaper labor,
regardless of their HR strategy. And all companies would prefer better
employees over worse, regardless of whether they prefer to achieve this in the
hiring stage or by firing people later.

------
avifreedman
A friend of mine is a director at Netflix. He was explaining to me that
compensation vs retention are different conversations there.

They want to pay people market+ for A players, but if you're not at the level
expected, you'll be let go if you don't get (back) to that level.

So a conversation shouldn't (but sometimes does) go from "we shouldn't give
her a $25k raise, {s}he hasn't been doing well enough" to firing her for not
improving.

On the other hand, no one is supposed to be confused about where {s}he stands
with respect to performance and improvement.

------
ChristianMarks
Let the A-players clean their own toilets.

------
lazyjones
Claiming to hire only 'A' players is probably much more important for
successful hiring than actually doing it. It seems to be en vogue suddenly to
claim to have only the best people. Is that really such a sought-after
attribute of companies for people who are looking into new tech jobs?

------
spacecadet
Im a member of the A-Team. I have a certificate from 1985 to prove it...

~~~
joezydeco
I pity you, fool.

------
auggierose
I think this is totally OK. Pay me 10 dollars a minute, and I will surely
understand when I will be let go because I am not fully adequate for your
current purpose anymore.

------
protomyth
How does new, disruptive technology enter the company if the consequence of
such technology is hiring new A players and firing the existing A players?

------
macspoofing
I'm interested to read about the rating system they use to differentiate A
players from others.

------
djillionsmix
You know who talked a lot about being A players who only hire A players?

The Bush administration.

------
stefan_kendall
I no longer believe in A/B/C players. It's an excuse, as many have mentioned,
of poorly managing a dysfunctional team.

Are there people at companies that shouldn't have been hired, or should be
fired? Sure, but that doesn't mean you can't take a team of differing skill-
set individuals and make great products.

When your product is iterating rapidly, you may suddenly find that your crack
team of javascript developers suddenly needs to analyze an sql execution plan.
The best guy on the team for the job probably isn't the smartest guy, it's the
one whose dealt with these sorts of issues before.

A team learns from each other.

