Yahoo India was pretty bloated, with layer after layer of management with very high salaries and not much to do. Hard to blame anyone for the decision. There were some really good devs embedded in all that lard, hopefully they'll be fine. Five months severance is pretty generous by Indian standards. That said, even very good engineers don't have as many options here as those in SF have, and not as many job opportunities,so I'm sure there are quite a few people feeling desperate today.<p>(Fwiw, Ms Mayer has been honing this particular axe for a long time now. Rumors have been circulating inside Yahoo India for quite a while now about an impending massacre. The good guys mostly left some time ago.)<p>PS: I don't work at Yahoo, but I do live in Bangalore and know people who worked there. Fwiw,my friends are all fine,either moved out in time or relocated to the USA etc. fwiw.)
I literally started my career there, spent six and half years and made a lot of friends (I had jobs before yblr) - if any of you worked there, I was the guy with the afro on roller blades.<p>Ten years ago, it was an amazing place to work - great people, good managers and a CEO who sat at the same table for lunch.<p><a href="http://notmysock.org/blog/yblr/" rel="nofollow">http://notmysock.org/blog/yblr/</a><p>I spent more time with those people than I did in college, in my high-school or any other job since or before. Some of those people today have gotten a card that says "Move to Sunnyvale or collect your severance".<p>I feel sad for them, because some of them would hold similar memories of a great office, want to keep contributing and feel some sort of great loss, simply from being told that they're not needed.<p>I don't really worry about them - they're awesome engineers who have been hiding their talents under a bushel for years.<p>All of them would have a new job by new year, would burn their severance on a nice vacation during their break and not worry about their life - it's just that the temporary but irreplaceable sense of loss, that I can feel as I got off the phone.<p>Most of this means nothing - just that this place where we all met and grew up to be engineers, is no longer there.<p>Like when your childhood home gets torn apart to make a skyscraper (or worse, a parking lot).
It is known that yahoo has identity problems compared to Google/facebook ...etc. If you are a loyal employee, who believes in turnaround and stay till the end, this type of decisions can be painful. He/she may/may not get a chance to US and due to other family reasons may not be willing to relocate.<p>Loyalty, it seems, does not have any value in modern organizations. Traditionally, in India, job/career is viewed differently than in America. Job indicates some sort of stability to life and these sort of decisions, can crash those views. There are some who misused that stability and there are many who utilized that stability properly and create value to life,society.<p>I read in news the statements of visiting American CEO's that they understand India,localize their operations ...etc. My suggestion is, in addition to understanding "customer/consumer" aspect of Indians, please understand the other aspects such as society,priorities, values, relative importance ...etc too. If that is the case, organizations will be careful during hiring, making sustainable business models avoiding knee-jerk policies.
My friend and a few more in Yahoo were looking for a job switch for quite some time as there were talks of layoff in the last few months. He got a job a few days back. And he is getting the severance package. I talked with him a few minutes back. He is actually feeling great.
Sources tell me that they are asking 90% of their staff at Bangalore to relocate to CA instead of laying off them. Not ideal, but better than being laid off.
All the best to the people affected with this decision. We have some interesting problems and are always open for talented people to join us - <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8396376" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8396376</a>
Does HN adds some weightage for domains, same news from original source(<a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8420579" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8420579</a>) can't be find on 1st four pages?
Humans Need Not Apply
<a href="http://motherboard.vice.com/read/why-automation-today-is-like-computers-in-the-1980s-video" rel="nofollow">http://motherboard.vice.com/read/why-automation-today-is-lik...</a>
To Yahoo! India devs, if you got laid off and need help in finding your next gig, please feel free to reach out: I am on archit@cleartax.in<p>A lot of startups in India are hiring and I would be happy to make intros if you are looking.
Yahoo India is <a href="https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_centre_%28business%29" rel="nofollow">https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_centre_%28business%29</a>
Nope. They are actually laying off most of the folks. Very few and the top guys are getting an offer to relocate to other offices, not specifically the US. Btw, posting a job requirement now wouldn't be opportunistic rite? :D