Facebook employees are calling former colleagues to look for jobs outside the company and asking about the best way to leave

[steven36]

• Six former Facebook employees who left the company within the last two years told CNBC they've experienced a rise in contact from current company employees to inquire about opportunities or ask for job references.
• The shift in behavior comes as Facebook deals with scandal after scandal while seeing a nearly 40 percent drop in its stock price from a peak in July.

 

Mark Zuckerberg, chief executive officer of Facebook Inc.

 

Some former Facebook employees say their phone is ringing a lot more in the last two months. On the other line: former Facebook colleagues asking about job openings or looking for a reference.

 

This type of behavior is normal at most companies. But according to a half dozen former employees, all of whom left in the last year or two, it's a major change in behavior at Facebook, which had long been known around Silicon Valley as the company that no one leaves. These people requested anonymity as none is authorized by Facebook to talk about their time there or interactions with employees.

 

The shift could be an early warning of recruiting and retention challenges for Facebook after a turbulent year. In 2018, the company has faced public questioning at multiple congressional hearings, scandals around third-party abuse of user data and public relations practicesand flat or declining user growth in key markets. It's also seen its stock drop nearly 40 percent from July.

 

The stories from former employees are only anecdotal at this point, and there's no firm data showing a significant uptick in departures or employee dissatisfaction. On Glassdoor, a site where workers anonymously review their employers, Facebook is among the best-rated tech companies, with a satisfaction rating of 4.3 out of 5. However, that rating has fallen noticeably during the last year, with a particularly sharp drop in the last few months.

 

 

 

Even if Facebook employees are starting to consider other options, that's not uncommon as hot tech companies mature. Around 2010, Google saw a wave of engineers and executives leave for greener pastures, including Facebook. Microsoft faced a similar exodus in the early 2000s, captured most saliently by the anonymous employee blog Mini-Microsoft.

 

"Our retention rate continues to be very strong," said Anthony Harrison, a Facebook spokesman. "Everyone at Facebook is focused on making a positive impact in the world, and on working on hard challenges that matter."

 

But several former employees who spoke to CNBC believe that the wave of scandals and falling stock price are spurring more people to consider leaving for the first time.

 

"There's new things coming out every day," said one former company executive. "It's a quite somber atmosphere right now at the company."

'They're just burnt'

Employees have a tradition of posting photos of their badges on secret Facebook groups for alumni of the company when they quit, another former Facebook manager said.

 

"I've been seeing a lot of badges lately," he said. This manager also said he'd heard recently from a couple of current Facebook employees, including one individual who has been with the company for more than seven years but expressed that he has finally burned out.

 

"A lot of people want to do something different," he said. "They're just burnt."

 

A former Facebook recruiter said he has heard from more than 30 current employees in the past year, including approximately 15 in the past two months. Most of these employees say "'My manager sucks, and I need to look for something new. Do you know of any new opportunities?'" the recruiter said.

 

"They're coming to ask 'What are you seeing in the market across Silicon Valley?'" the recruiter said.

 

Some former employees cited a broader change in the culture as well. In the past year, the company has grown from nearly 23,200 employees in September 2017 to more than 33,600 employees a year later, according to the company's latest financial filings.

 

With that growth has come increased bureaucracy and an increase in a top-down management style, one former Facebook manager said. Whereas previously Facebook had a start-up environment where colleagues felt everyone had each other's backs, there is now more politics and more grandstanding, another former manager said.

 

"There's a lot of people who succeed more by how things looked than by the work they were doing, and there were people who were let go that were incredibly well-respected and it was because they weren't playing the politics game," one of the former managers said.

 

One former Facebook engineer said he has been contacted by about a dozen Facebook employees since leaving the company this summer, saying they were thinking about leaving the company or inquiring what his experience has been like since his own departure. Just before speaking with CNBC, another Facebook employee called him to ask for advice on clearance for setting up a start-up while remaining at Facebook, this person said.

 

"Overall, I've seen an uptick in people either looking for other activities or dipping their toes outside the Facebook pool," he said.

 

In the past, Facebook employees who had been with the company for only a year or two but were unhappy with their roles were likely to request a team switch. Now, employees in that situation are simply looking to leave the company, the former engineer said.

 

"This time around far more people are immediately jumping instead of switching teams," the former Facebook engineer said.

 

Leaving the right way is important

Many of the employees calling former colleagues also ask for advice on the best way to leave Facebook, according to multiple former employees. This is because the company categorizes departing employees under one of two tags: "regrettable" or "non-regrettable" attrition.

 

Being labeled as "non-regrettable" is the equivalent of getting blacklisted by Facebook and prevented from ever working there again. For anyone in Silicon Valley who wishes to work at a top company, getting a banned by Facebook cuts down job opportunities drastically.

 

"The way you do it and the timing matters a lot, and it requires knowledge of the game," the former Facebook engineer said.

 

"Once someone got one of these things ... it's like Voldemort," one of the former Facebook managers said. "It's a name you can not say."

 

Another former Facebook director said he has seen a rise in the number of his ex-colleagues who have reached out to ask about openings at his current company, and these employees often ask about advice on the best way to leave Facebook. He's also experienced an increase in calls from other companies that are running references on current Facebook staffers.

 

"Once it becomes weird to tell people that they work at Facebook, or once their moms aren't proud of them anymore, that's when people are going to head to the exits," he said. "I think we're already getting there."

 

Previously, Facebook's attrition rate was less than 5 percent, estimated one of the former Facebook managers, who left the company earlier this year. This person believes that attrition rate has risen this year.

 

"Nobody really left Facebook. There were not many places you could leave that were better jobs," the former manager said. "Now? I think it's normalized. People now don't look at Facebook as a dream job anymore.

 

They're open to leaving, and they can envision places that are better."

 

Source

 

 

 

[namek]

If a company bans people who worked there, just because they quit, why would You want to come back in a first place to such company or even better, why start working there? Money ain't everything.

[steven36]

I was black balled  from working at other places at a company they had several  different divisions in my area . if i did  not go back  to my old job at the same place,  they told the others not to hire me just so they could get me back. Lucky  for me i had kin people who worked for a different company  and went to work for a different company because they gave me a good reference.  I never did work for them again tell many years latter in another state for a bit, by then i was no longer black balled  because the place i had worked at before had closed down. You need try to  leave your job on good terms  if you need a good reference to get a job somewhere else . Sometimes I got jobs somewhere else before quitting my old job and just went to the other job instead  .  But  some  jobs  they need you back so bad because they can't find someone to replace you they give you a bad reference. So you really need to make sure you have another job.

[K7108]

2 hours ago, steven36 said:

But  some  jobs  they need you back so bad because they can't find someone to replace you

If there is one lesson I've learned for sure, it is that anyone and everyone is replaceable, even if they don't think so themselves. 

[steven36]

14 minutes ago, K7108 said:

If there is one lesson I've learned for sure, it is that anyone and everyone is replaceable, even if they don't think they are. 

This is true but it sometimes ends up costing the company 2 times as much money , as in my case the job I was doing  was 2 peoples jobs  when I started out i had help then i got so good at it I could do all by myself    and they took my help away, so they ended up having to pay two people to do my job again . I did not care if they replaced me or I would just took the job back my old boss even seen me in the store and beg me too come back, i didn't want it they was putting two men's work on me, so i got a job doing less work making more money somewhere else.

[K7108]

10 minutes ago, steven36 said:

i got so good at it I could do all by myself 

thats were you fucked up! never give them more than they pay you for, even if you can, it never gets you anything except fucked! Do what they pay you to do and do it very well, but never take on others work and then expect the company to be "sympathetic" to you and give you twice the pay, they will not, they will only fuck you by letting you do twice the work, plus the next poor bastard they hire to do the job will be expected to do an unfair amount too, all because of you. Sorry think we are getting off topic here.

[steven36]

35 minutes ago, K7108 said:

 

You act like people really have rights in non union companies when they don't. It went like this they had a slowdown   so they reduced the workload and laid workers off  were it was not bad doing it by yourself , well things picked back up to full speed twice as fast and   they never gave my help back  . I did not have a choice  of the matter , expect to quit long before i did..  I was having personal  problems so i had to take a few days off when `I came back they said i needed to talk too human resources and this company was bad about getting rid of you , so you would lose your benefits and hire you back the next day  so they didn't have to give  them to  you .. i had been there for years so i was getting good  benefits. . So instead of going to talk too HR  i just walked out and ended going to work up the road from them.

[namek]

15 hours ago, steven36 said:

I was black balled  from working at other places at a company they had several  different divisions in my area . if i did  not go back  to my old job at the same place,  they told the others not to hire me just so they could get me back. Lucky  for me i had kin people who worked for a different company  and went to work for a different company because they gave me a good reference.  I never did work for them again tell many years latter in another state for a bit, by then i was no longer black balled  because the place i had worked at before had closed down. You need try to  leave your job on good terms  if you need a good reference to get a job somewhere else . Sometimes I got jobs somewhere else before quitting my old job and just went to the other job instead  .  But  some  jobs  they need you back so bad because they can't find someone to replace you they give you a bad reference. So you really need to make sure you have another job.

It can't be like that in a big scale. Few companies might have this agreement, but there are always more companies. In case You could prove it, at least where are I live, they would be fined so bad, that next time they would think if it's worth it. Here we usually do this: We never talk about quitting our jobs before finding a new one or having some sort'a plan. Can't live on hopes ;D Freelancing is an alternative, do it all the time.

[steven36]

6 hours ago, namek said:

It can't be like that in a big scale. Few companies might have this agreement, but there are always more companies. In case You could prove it, at least where are I live, they would be fined so bad, that next time they would think if it's worth it. Here we usually do this: We never talk about quitting our jobs before finding a new one or having some sort'a plan. Can't live on hopes ;D Freelancing is an alternative, do it all the time. 

In the USA in order to have many rights  they have to  have a union   , many places would shut down before they would allow one to come in, you have some rights because they are laws  but any other rights you have are made up by the company as they see fit , but as far as giving you a bad reference  or telling other divisions not to hire you in the same company that's there right , This company even had a rule  if you quit or got fired you had to wait 90 days before any of the other  divisions could hire you only if you went back to the division you worked for could they hire you back before so they could keep you trapped on the same job. You missed work and did not have a Doctors note they would terminate you and hire you back so you would lose your benefits. Now days places just  use temporary  agencies and  never give them no benefits to begin with .   If a company has been around 50 or over a 100 years they  didn't stay around  that long  by being nice to people .  Most nice places shut down, you have to  not care about anything but making a profit .  Only very few companies  in the USA have any morals ..  It's like GM  that makes cars they rather make them down in Mexico  and pay the workers $4 .00  a week ,only thing stop them from closing all plants in the USA is they have agreements with some cities they would not  close certain plants down. Well many  places already make stuff out of the USA  if they have anything left its mostly there high end division stuff they make in the USA that only rich people can afford.

 

Most of these big  internet companies  today most likely want be around for the long haul. IBM is the oldest Big Tech Company  .  Google  started out in the late 90s  and  Yahoo could of bought it  for 1 million but didn't , Facebook started in 2004 , Yahoo could bought it for 1 billion but didn't , Now Yahoo sold out and  is owned by  a Big Telecom company..  People were complaining yesterday about how  Google whenever they offer a new service and  if they can't profit off it like they want they kill it after a bit. Anything they make you can't depend on it to be around long, so it's its best to use something else to start out with .Microsoft are the same way. They slowly phasing out Windows  and there Cash Cow is there Azure Cloud witch  is powered by Linux .  The internet is no longer about good software it's about what services  they can sell you . Many services on the internet have unofficial apps and OS that are better than the official apps and OS .

 

Most free services suck and are limited and the more Data and privacy  laws they come up with  the more services Google kills and makes them paid Enterprise only. But Google sells all kinds of stuff  but none of it is very successful so it most likely want be around long.  Only thing they been successful at is harvesting data  in the name of free  and now there under fire from most of the worlds governments. A big data breech could come along and wipe out any of  these internet  companies out any day now like happen to Yahoo.

[namek]

Wow, USA needs a big job reform or people who won't apply to those kind of jobs. We know the latter will not going to happen.