[ChrisPebble]

Ignorance more than callousness appears to be the sin here. From snippets of communications posted with the mods it looks like they weren't really aware of what Victoria did for the mods.

Since the community is their "product" I find it disconcerting that they're not more familiar with the details of how these relationships work and what Victoria actually did. I would actually find it more comforting if they were aware of all of this and made a rational business decision that may have been seen as callous, but they appear to have had very little clue as to what was actually going on. That doesn't bode well for future business decisions if they really don't understand their product.

[slg]

Devils advocate, that is partly Victoria's fault. If your managers don't know what you do all day, I don't think it is surprising that you are fired. Yes, it is a sign off bad management, but it is also a sign off an employee not communicating up to management.

EDIT: The downvotes seem to indicate I wasn't clear. I'm not saying the Reddit management team thought Victoria wasn't doing any work. However, it was clear that Victoria was spending time doing things that management didn't know about. From the sound of it, Victoria saw work that needed to be done and did it. Her job responsibilities likely continued to expanded as IAMA grew. However if management truly didn't know how involved she was in that, that is a failing of both management for not staying involved in the process and her for not communicating up the extra work she was doing.

[danudey]

If you don't know what your direct reports are doing, why the heck are you their manager? If she's spending so much of her time dealing with AMAs, surely it's worth sitting down and going over her process regularly and how it's changed over time. If her management didn't take an interest in how the system worked, that's on them.

That said, it honestly seems like they didn't know or care. No one told any of the subs she helped moderate (not even one of the largest on the site) that Victoria had been let go. If they had any idea what she did at all, and had any interest whatsoever in keeping the community together, they would have at least tried to get that information to the people who would be affected. Instead, they shoved her out the door and called it done until a celebrity showed up at their door with an appointment and no one knew what to do.

Anyone taking over her role should have immediately checked to see what was happening. Even if she left no notes or schedule whatsoever, they could have checked the AMA schedule, talked to the mods, and gotten some kind of temporary plan in place. Instead, they just let the whole thing collapse and then tried to sweep it under the rug later. It wasn't that they didn't know what she did, it's that they didn't care and didn't think it needed doing.

[bduerst]

To be fair, I don't think the full reason why they were let go was ever disclosed, just hearsay and rumors.

I've observed situations where people had to be let go immediately (e.g. deceitful resume) even though they were in some pretty critical positions that set us back after losing them.

There could have been a reason for the suddenness.

[munificent]

> If your managers don't know what you do all day

If your managers can't tell what you do all day when they merely need to go to reddit.com/r/IamA and see dozens of upvoted posts from celebrities whose top comment says, "Victoria is here helping me...", then I don't think you can really blame her for that.

[slg]

I don't expect my boss to dive into my commit logs to figure out what I am doing. I instead tell him.

[nostrademons]

So I did the same when I was an employee, but I'll point out that this introduces a pretty strong adverse-selection effect. Time spent managing up is time not spent doing your job or building value for users. If managers rely simply on what their reports tell them, they select for people that can navigate internal politics well, not ones who do their job well. Over time the organization is filled with people whose attention is always focused upwards, not outwards, and then the company becomes bait for a startup.

A skilled executive makes sure they have a pulse on what's going on inside their organization beyond what they're told. Relatively few executives are that skilled.

[jaawn]

I'm so glad you posted this. This has practical applications for just about anyone, especially those in enterprise environments (like me). I have been noticing this phenomenon but hadn't quite put it into words yet, and you've perfectly described it.

[danudey]

Really? I don't go bug my boss about everything I do. We have regular one-on-ones so that we can bring up any new issues, but he trusts me to get my job done and let him know if there's anything that needs doing/knowing. If everything was going well in the AMA scene, there seems little reason to waste time discussing it.

That said, they fired Victoria and didn't replace her with anyone. That tells me that they both didn't know what she did in her role, and also didn't care. Anyone assuming the role, even temporarily, even without any of her notes/schedule/documentation, could have just checked the AMA schedule to find out that an AMA was scheduled, and contacted the mods to see what the arrangement was. No one did.

This isn't your boss not knowing what your code does because you didn't tell him. This is your boss firing the IT guy and not telling anyone until someone's laptop needs fixing before a big meeting and there's no one who knows how to do it.

[logfromblammo]

Devil's advocate here. If your boss doesn't check your commit logs, you should tell him what you're doing, and tell him that you're also doing things that you aren't actually doing.

I expect my boss to know that some people engage in dubious ethical practices to advance their own careers.

After all, if it were my job to do my boss's job, couldn't my boss be my boss's boss instead?

[tmd83]

Your boss don't really need to see every commit to know what you are doing. It should be visible/understandable from the product. And most people who are beating the drums talking about what they are doing at micro level are more focused on making themselves look good than doing the work. So its a bad thing to rely upon.

And you should be fired first from your managerial post if you fire someone yet not know what kind of work they do and what they are responsible for. For that matter you should be blacklisted from holding any managerial position moving forward.

[zxcvcxz]

Do you tell your boss about the code you don't commit?

[evan_]

The code you don't commit is guaranteed to be bug-free, something you can't say about the code you do commit.

[0xdeadbeefbabe]

I am so reluctant to code now thank you.

[Merovius]

If I expect this code to be relevant to my job and their evaluation of it: Sure. Why wouldn't I?

[nilkn]

I've read reddit on and off for years and have never even noticed that.

[ChrisPebble]

We need to differentiate between fault and responsibility. Victoria may very well have been at fault, but the responsibility for steering the ship was management's and they appear to have been unaware that you needed someone in the engine room to make sure everything kept working.

Even if Victoria hid everything she did and didn't document anything, the tone of the initial response was one of surprise that seems to indicate they didn't fundamentally understand how everything worked.

[danudey]

This is the fundamental problem. This seems like the community equivalent of firing the IT guy and not telling anyone until someone's laptop needs fixing right before an important client meeting and finding out no one knows what to do about it.

[vidarh]

If your managers thinks your're not contributing, then their first step should be to ask you, and ask your co-workers what it is you're doing, and to figure out if there's something that needs to be improved.

If their first impulse is to fire you if they think you're not really doing anything, then they're not doing their jobs.

EDIT: And this is part of the reason why I prefer to live somewhere with tolerable worker protections. E.g. in large parts of Europe it would be illegal to fire someone in this hypothetical situation without going through a proper process of issuing warnings and consulting with the employee to ensure the facts of the situation are on the table.