I am sorry to hear that ADL people got laid off (if it's true) but I would most like to be laid off too. I never thought that one day I would want to be cut, but now I do because it has become unbearably stressful and hard to work here. I'm sure I'm not the only one.
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Not every year -- every 6 months
Couple of things to clarify:
It seems to be becoming a common practice in the tech world (including Big-Tech) to use the bottom 10-15% as a way to eliminate jobs or control costs (e.g. people in the bottom tier won't get merit increases or bonuses). In fact, there is now a new term -- "annual culling", google it...its more widespread than C1
In this specific situation, from what I hear, some other big-tech companies are taking the opportunity of a new recession coming to your friendly neighborhood, and did the same thing to eliminate non Engineering/Product Management roles just as automation in QA played a role in eliminating the need for manual QA roles
Welcome to the 4th Industrial Revolution! More and more people will be displaced as automation gets entrenched in jobs previously done by humans. Same thing as the McDonald's burger flipper is no longer required because a machine can flip burgers better than a human without making a mistake and without getting tired or needing unions and bathroom breaks.
Reminds me of law school grading. Predetermined grades essentially. Even in a 5 person class where we were all friends, studied together, and had the same answers on our exams probably to the point it wouldn't be crazy to accuse us of cheating. But at the end of the day, only 1 A+ was given out, and someone had to eat that C- in the class despite all of us basically turning in the same test. Great system! Glad to see it implemented in the corporate world with similar fantastic results. So glad I never worked at C1.
quite simply, even if you are performing really well, you could end up in the bottom 15% pile. Imagine this way, if 10-15% end up in low bucket every 6 months, and half of those people leave, you either have to hire again or your own rating will be low because it reflects on you that you couldn't keep the head-count stable. In addition, you are almost guaranteed to get really bad feedback in Associate Surveys who would obviously feel they are not being helped by their immediate manager. Plus in the next cycle, you again have to find 10-15% in the lower bucket -- rinse and repeat. Eventually people will end up in that bucket in this rotational cycle every 6 months
In addition, people who are a bit older not graduating out of college with Machine Learning courses etc are worse off and HAVE to compete...or you are screwed. Best advice -- crack the code! Suck up to Product and higher management. If you are older, in this economy, good luck
Their stack-ranking system is an unfortunate but necessary byproduct of the aggressively mediocre talent pool.
As someone who was a director there: end of year, 15% HAD to receive an Inconsistent rating. Or else, you as the people manager, could get ranked lower for “not being able to make the tough decisions”. The cross calibration sessions were scheduled in order from lowest level to highest. Intentional so that if distribution numbers weren’t met, your boss could rank you lower to Matt target numbers
I don’t think it’s stack ranking if it’s a whole department. Surely not all of them are bottom 15%
They have year end merit ratings (exceptional, very strong, strong (satisfactory), below strong, poor). 15% of employees need to end up on the bottom, even if they are all performing well. Capital One employees are basically all competing with one another to work above and beyond their role, in order to get strong or better. Anything lower, and you face a performance plan or termination.
I've seen that several times, the bottom 15% thing, what exactly does that mean?
Yeah I hate Capital One's stupid stack ranking. it sucks. Left as soon as I figured out they need to have 15% scapegoats every year.