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lich_kingHNSource author
Business & incomeExperience excerpt · English

Before there was so much money in the system, we used to run companies that way

… Before there was so much money in the system, we used to run companies that way. Two decades ago, I worked for a company that had tens of millions of users, maintained its own complex nationwide infra (no AWS back then), and had 400 full-time employees. That made coordination problems a lot easier too. We didn't need ten layers of people and project management because there just wasn't that many of us.

Original discussionAre LLMs not getting better?156 source comments · at import
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SU
suttontomHN

This is unfair and dismissive of many roles. Coordination in a massive, technically complex company that has to adhere to laws and regulations is a critical role. I don't get why people shit on certain roles (I'm a SWE). Our PgMs reduce friction and help us be more productive and focused. Technical writers produce customer-facing content and code, and have nothing to do with supporting internal bureaucracy. There are arguments against this in Bullshit Jobs but do you think companies pay PgMs or HR employees hundreds of thousands of dollars a year out of the goodness of their own hearts? Or maybe they actually help the business?

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jmalickiHN

When doubling the number of employees can triple your revenue, you do it. Keeping a website running with high uptime is not the goal. Maximizing revenue and profit is. The extra people aren't waste, they're what drive the incremental imperceptible changes that make these companies profitable.

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AH
ahtihnHN

And how much revenue did that company bring in compared to something like Meta? Maybe there's a correlation there?

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