
Lyft Moves Customer Support Team to Nashville to Combat High-Priced SF Market - mtviewdave
http://techcrunch.com/2015/09/26/lyft-moves-customer-support-team-to-nashville-to-combat-high-priced-sf-market
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joelrunyon
> The Lyft customer support team was informed that the move includes a lower
> pay in salary after one year in Nashville, according to sources.

Sort of a big ask, no?

Move to another state, take less salary or be fired.

Not saying it's not the right move for the company, but it's sort of a raw
deal for the reps.

~~~
BurritoAlPastor
If the pay cut isn't too large, this could still work out to a net increase in
real income, just because the cost of living in Nashville is about _half_ of
San Francisco.

Let's do a hypothetical. Glassdoor suggests Lyft support makes about $40k a
year. Let's suppose a cost of living in SF of $35k a year. (Our imaginary
support rep is young and spends a little recklessly. Ah, youth!) Now, they up
and move to Tennessee, and take, say, a 15% pay cut. Now they're down to
$34k/year; how will they make ends meet? Well, their cost of living is halved
(18k/year) - they can take a little bit of a lifestyle upgrade and still have
$10k in their bank account in December.

Moving across the country is a rough proposition, but unless Lyft is asking
for something like a 30% pay cut, the salary is a carrot and not a stick.

~~~
rodgerd
> If the pay cut isn't too large, this could still work out to a net increase
> in real income, just because the cost of living in Nashville is about half
> of San Francisco.

So long as you don't mind being stranded there.

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simoncion
Nashville is one of the few Real Cities(TM) in the Southeast. If I were
_forced_ to go back, my top three places to land would be:

* Nashville, TN

* Atlanta, GA (Assuming that I still possess enough of my tech "fortune" to purchase a place inside city limits.)

* Chattanooga, TN (For EPB internet and what appears to be sensible city stewardship, obviously.)

~~~
eitally
Maybe it's not far enough south to be considered Real(TM), but I think you
conspicuously omitted Raleigh (the overall Triangle area that includes Durham
& Chapel Hill, too).

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simoncion
I've actually never _been_ in NC, [0] and also don't know anyone from
_anywhere_ in the state, so I have no idea what it's like. Do you have either
personal or second-hand knowledge of the area?

[0] Not even to pass through on the periodic AL<->PA trips I used to take!

~~~
brianbreslin
Nvidia and a few other tech companies used to have big teams in that region
(raleigh/durham/chapel hill). Lots of biotech in the area, cheap cost of
living (relative), tons of colleges, moderate climate. Not a bad place, but a
bit slow/small-towny for my taste.

~~~
santaclaus
Red Hat is headquartered in Raleigh (founded in Durham I think), and Cisco and
IBM have big triangle presences too. Epic (of Unreal Engine fame) and SAS are
based in Cary.

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gjkood
Siting call centers in cheaper locations has been a norm in the US for years.
If it couldn't be done that way, it would all have moved to India or the
Philippines.

Most call center staff (non-technical) are easily and quickly trained on the
job. There is also very high turnover in the industry, so quickly ramping up
trained staff is part of basic operations. The recruits don't have to have any
specialized skills other than being literate.

The CRM systems in place are also designed with a lot of call scripting in
place to guide the conversations based on target companies and customers.
Generally a single call center handles the customer service operations of
multiple companies and teams of CSRS can be reconfigured to support different
companies at different times.

~~~
ennuihenry
Right. Urban Outfitters moved its customer support, sales and warehouse jobs
from Philadelphia to the Augusta, GA area in 2005.

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tedchs
Nashville has some of the nicest people in customer-facing roles, in my
experience, and coupled with its low cost of living and the area's desire for
a more diversified economy, this sounds like a multiple win.

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krschultz
This is an incredibly common move for startups that reach a certain size. Once
you have about 50+ customer service reps the math makes sense. In some
companies the customer service department is 50% of total headcount.

One thing to keep in mind, turn over in customer service is pretty high. You
could open another office and with natural attrition make the move without
layoffs in ~18 months.

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meddlepal
I think this is going to become more and more common. There are not a ton of
great reasons IMO to locate anything but your core engineering team in tech
hot spots like San Francisco, Boston and New York.

~~~
someear
Why are there a ton of great reasons to have your core engineering team in SF?
Biggest concentration of talent seems like the main (only?) positive. Super
high cost of hiring + recruiting these days, difficulty getting candidates to
accept offers, quick turnover are just a few reasons not to.

~~~
wyclif
Distributed teams are where it's at. There is no need to make your most
experienced people with the deepest knowledge (often the married people with
children) go through all the drama and hot mess that is the Bay region. The
taxes. Finding an apartment (or house!). Finding a school for your kids. The
cost of living. Parking. The NIMBYism, political correctness, and hatred of
engineers a la the Google Bus. The overhead of homelessness, and the aroma of
shit and piss on the street.

At some point, companies are going to have to get with the program if they
want to keep their best people. That will happen once enough of them can't
fill senior roles. They'll respond to quality of life issues—those are getting
more important in hiring, not less. You don't need to locate your engineering
team in SF and force them to put up with all that bullshit. Make life easier
for them, not harder.

~~~
hugh4
I wonder if there's good ways to connect your offices via connections in
physical locations, always on.

I envisage a whole wall that's a screen with a camera, acting like a portal to
a different office location. Stick it in a corridor or a tearoom, a common
area where people can just encounter one another at random and chat. If you
want to have an in-depth talk with someone at another office, send them a
message asking to meet at one of the portal locations rather than scheduling a
Skype session. Encourage people to meet and introduce themselves to people
they happen to see through the portal.

Does anyone do this kind of thing?

~~~
jon-wood
Atlassian did exactly that, scattering large displays with a permanent
audio/video link to an equivalent in another office around their hallways.

~~~
crazysim
Would you happen to know what software setup they have for this?

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mondo
Where I work it has been done with Google Chrome Boxes. It's a video
conferencing platform for Hangouts.

~~~
JBlue42
We have someone working remotely through Hangouts. Unfortunately, he has to
reconnect a few times a day because the call quality drops after a couple
hours. Have you experienced similar?

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adpirz
Having just moved form Nashville to the Bay Area, I can say that you actually
get a lot of the wonderful cosmopolitan bits in the city without the
overcrowded mayhem. Also, Nashville is an upcoming GFiber city. I've heard it
described as the next big Austin in terms of being another tech hub of the
region.

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works_remote_
Seems a bit rushed. I'd be curious why Lyft wouldn't open up the new office in
Nashville and let attrition take care of the SF roles that they wish to
eliminate, or even offer increased responsibility, and therefore career
advancement, for those that move to Nashville.

If it really is rent costs, as techcrunch seems to suggest, then they could
allow their more senior members in the SF office just work remotely.

Finally, if I were working for Lyft at this point, despite what department I
may be in, I would be looking for a new job immediately as they have shown a
complete lack of respect for the lives that their employees have and are
building. This move has definitely tarnished their brand in my eyes and would
make me question having them as a potential employer.

~~~
ohmyiv
Even with senior members working remotely, they'd still have to pay for an
office for the non-senior members. It might be smaller and maybe a bit
cheaper, but it's still a high cost. As a business owner, what looks better:
$70/sqft or $22/sqft?

If I were working for Lyft, I'd be thinking about moving to Nashville. The
cost of living is better and my money will go farther. There's also the whole
not-in-a-drought thing. The move also shows me that the company has the
insight to not run the company into the ground paying ghastly overhead prices
in SF. (I'm not saying it won't run into the ground other ways, but at least
it won't be by paying outlandish SF rent prices.)

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nell
Good to see a startup (unicorn?) taking costs and expenses seriously.

The biggest let down to employees is running the company into the ground
burning your money all the way. Good job Lyft!

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robbrown451
If you are going to live in the South, Nashville is the place.

~~~
hugh4
In my limited experience of the South, I found Nashville a bit dull. I'd much
rather live in Charleston or Savannah or Mobile or Asheville or even New
Orleans, personally.

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CardenB
It's gotten a lot better lately. East Nashville has become pretty cool.

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bryanbuckley
it's been "pretty cool" for at least about ten years. to me, that IS
Nashville.

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vinceyuan
(I am not living in the US and never heard Nashville.) When I read this title,
I thought Lyft is moving customer support team to India. OK, now I know
Nashville is the state capital of Tennessee. :-)

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jleyank
It's not mentioned elsewhere, so I'll do a top-level comment. Think hard about
moving from SF to Nashville, as the social and political differences might be
quite a surprise. While the tech work might be similar, the people you'll see
day to day will be rather different...

It might not matter, but don't go into the South unless you understand that
it's different in the Red State areas vs. the Blue.

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dmourati
You don't suppose this has anything to do with Uber's announcement that they
are doubling down (or more!) on the Bay area with the Sears building in
Oakland?

[http://www.sfchronicle.com/entertainment/article/Uber-is-
com...](http://www.sfchronicle.com/entertainment/article/Uber-is-coming-for-
Oakland-s-soul-all-right-6528037.php)

No, probably totally unrelated.

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yardie
Didn't Garmin do this to their Spot watch team. I believe basically everyone
working in that product left rather than move to Utah.

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jzwinck
They definitely did it with the Garmin Connect team. Used to be Motion Based,
then acquired, then told to move, then quit. Garmin Connect stagnated for
about three or four years after that, with no new features, Strava took off,
and now Garmin has to integrate Strava.

~~~
yardie
Is Strava the old Connect team then?

I'm not surprised they let it stagnate. I use their instruments on our
sailboat. They have an iPad app that works pretty well and integrates with our
onboard navigation. But it is so limited compared to other navigation apps.

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johnhkg
Asking employees settled in a place to move to a different state, and then
take a pay cut, seems like a big deal.

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15155
When you aren't paying a 9%+ state income tax, CA SDI, or more importantly:
some of the most expensive housing prices in the nation, it's a much different
deal.

Lot of speculation, but, it's entirely plausible these employees will come out
ahead in take-home pay. Their net worth will likely improve if this is the
case (you can feasibly own property in Nashville.)

I would imagine they'll also come out ahead in quality of life.

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ennuihenry
Eventbrite and Warby Parker have opened offices in Nashville in the last year
for customer support, so it seems like a trend.

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sabujp
google fiber and nashville has been lyft friendly

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codeonfire
Wow there are going to be...culture problems both ways.

