My Failures Onboarding at Splunk(people-work.io)
people-work.io
My Failures Onboarding at Splunk
https://people-work.io/blog/my-failures-onboarding-at-splunk/
66 comments
Totally agree. This reads to me as someone who is more concerned with their trajectory and appearance than actually doing the work. I believe in doing hard work well, then showing it off to earn growth. It should be deliberate, but if your end goal is the title then I will smell then lack of sincerity immediately.
The tone of the writer comes across as mildly entitled as if they, just by wanting it, are entitled to the role. No mention of other senior leaders in the company that may have been on the same trajectory at the same time, and how he was measuring up against his peers. Most of the achievements listed in this post are purely overseeing groups of people, which in itself is the bare minimum for this level of leadership. I also perceive some cultural barriers in this post.
The tone of the writer comes across as mildly entitled as if they, just by wanting it, are entitled to the role. No mention of other senior leaders in the company that may have been on the same trajectory at the same time, and how he was measuring up against his peers. Most of the achievements listed in this post are purely overseeing groups of people, which in itself is the bare minimum for this level of leadership. I also perceive some cultural barriers in this post.
I'm the author of the post. Yeah you got it right, I think the hiring process got me into that mindset, i.e. "This is a step back from you title-wise but you'll get back there quickly". So the hiring process made all that look too easy and in retrospect got me into the wrong state of mind.
What I should have done, at the point of being hired, is to drop all that, and focus patiently on what I needed to do. And I'm sharing it because not enough people share this side of it, and because I am working on elements that would have made it better. Thanks for reading! :)
What I should have done, at the point of being hired, is to drop all that, and focus patiently on what I needed to do. And I'm sharing it because not enough people share this side of it, and because I am working on elements that would have made it better. Thanks for reading! :)
I definitely thought like the first commenter at first but the realization that you admitted what you did wrong and accepted responsibility for it really won my over by the end of your post.
It sounds like a very painful experience. Thank you for writing about it and sharing what you have learned.
Curious what your estimate is for what percentage of teams are actually underperforming?
And then of those underperforming teams, what percentage of those would the team members identify themselves as part of underperforming teams?
And then of those underperforming teams, what percentage of those would the team members identify themselves as part of underperforming teams?
When I was in big corps, I understood but really disliked the idea that people would do work in order to get a promotion. That's the only incentive structure they've set up, so that's what you do.
What I like about well-run small companies is that there is essentially no chance of a promotion: all we can do is do our work better, improve processes and make our customers (internal and external) happier. If you hook monetary rewards to title and responsibility treadmills, you lose all that. Hypergrowth is a trap.
What I like about well-run small companies is that there is essentially no chance of a promotion: all we can do is do our work better, improve processes and make our customers (internal and external) happier. If you hook monetary rewards to title and responsibility treadmills, you lose all that. Hypergrowth is a trap.
I like growth-oriented startups in that it is more of a team sport here. The promotion is pretty directly tied to:
* Doing your part to make the revenue grow. For management, going from say $1M annual revenue in seed to $3M in A means the company can support 3X the staff. Joining a startup is basically a bet that you can outperform when unleashed.
* Surf that wave. Show it makes sense to put new hires below you vs above, or give you increasingly big responsibilities, etc, bc you managed the past ones well. Startups run to their limit so can feel like pressure cookers, and they're relatively small, so your demonstrated ability should be pretty apparent to hands-on leadership.
* Compensation comes out of that. Stock becomes worth more, you get bigger refreshers, more experience, new title, etc
* Doing your part to make the revenue grow. For management, going from say $1M annual revenue in seed to $3M in A means the company can support 3X the staff. Joining a startup is basically a bet that you can outperform when unleashed.
* Surf that wave. Show it makes sense to put new hires below you vs above, or give you increasingly big responsibilities, etc, bc you managed the past ones well. Startups run to their limit so can feel like pressure cookers, and they're relatively small, so your demonstrated ability should be pretty apparent to hands-on leadership.
* Compensation comes out of that. Stock becomes worth more, you get bigger refreshers, more experience, new title, etc
It’s because owners hoard the equity so workers have minimal stake in outcomes (usually the chance of the company tanking resulting in job loss is not a primary motivator or perceived risk either).
Small companies that aren’t worker-owned and without promotion ladders aren’t immune to this. They get workers who strive toward promotion via job switching.
You can debate the fairness of equity hoarding by those who invest money into the business but it doesn’t change the worker dynamics
Small companies that aren’t worker-owned and without promotion ladders aren’t immune to this. They get workers who strive toward promotion via job switching.
You can debate the fairness of equity hoarding by those who invest money into the business but it doesn’t change the worker dynamics
Employees are often not in a position (financially or sometimes legally) to take a reduction in cash in order to take an increased proportion of their value in equity.
Who decides that tradeoff? You are only reinforcing why workers have no stake in outcomes. Worker-owned organizations afford both
I believe that employees and employers both make choices that they think are in their best interests.
Employees might want to receive the most cash they can right now (and therefore prefer 100 units of cash over 90 units of cash and 10 of equity compensation). We shouldn't force them to accept a different mix of compensation, particularly one which forces them to invest in their employer via such a tradeoff. They might choose to work at business X instead of worker-owned cooperative Y for any number of reasons.
Employers think about the value proposition they offer to attract and retain employees and if there are 100 units of compensation available to be paid and they have reason to think that employees prefer cash over equity, they are likely to offer all 100 units of comp in cash rather than 90 units of cash and 10 units of equity. There's no sense tying up 10 units of equity that an employee only values as being equivalent to 5 units of cash.
In the case of workers working for public companies, they have a straightforward way to invest in their company if they want: take some of the cash and buy shares in the company. That's barred in most cases for private companies by practicality and accredited investor rules.
Employees might want to receive the most cash they can right now (and therefore prefer 100 units of cash over 90 units of cash and 10 of equity compensation). We shouldn't force them to accept a different mix of compensation, particularly one which forces them to invest in their employer via such a tradeoff. They might choose to work at business X instead of worker-owned cooperative Y for any number of reasons.
Employers think about the value proposition they offer to attract and retain employees and if there are 100 units of compensation available to be paid and they have reason to think that employees prefer cash over equity, they are likely to offer all 100 units of comp in cash rather than 90 units of cash and 10 units of equity. There's no sense tying up 10 units of equity that an employee only values as being equivalent to 5 units of cash.
In the case of workers working for public companies, they have a straightforward way to invest in their company if they want: take some of the cash and buy shares in the company. That's barred in most cases for private companies by practicality and accredited investor rules.
100 units isn’t 100% of available cash and equity. It’s the minimum number of units that founder (investors) think they can get employees to work for.
Most of the time in well funded startups they can afford to pay 200 units of cash and 500 units of equity. But the founders (investors) would rather take 50000 units of cash and 50 million units of equity for themselves and only pay employees 90 units of cash and offload their risk onto the employees so that they have greater reward and lesser risk.
Their argument is that no one will start a business (by investing their time or their money) without minimizing the units of cash and equity given to employees per whatever the market will bear. How do you address that?
Worker-owned co-ops are also free to offer cash vs equity options. The difference is that they don't have a hierarchy of ownership hoarding whatever the market will bear.
Great/agreed that they could offer choice. I wish them and the employees who choose to work at them well.
There's no choice to be had, it doesn't substantially exist in tech. It takes organizing and coordinating various resources to make a new reality, not passively evaluating current options at hand. So it's not productive to evaluate their viability based on what currently exists as if it's already a choice unorganized workers have evaluated and made. But it is an idea that is appealing even to some founders (there are upsides to working alongside people with a stake in outcomes) and some are working toward making this possible for workers to choose.
https://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/z1/dataviz/dfa/distr...
https://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/z1/dataviz/dfa/distr...
Most startups are open to trading cash for equity if you ask. Many even offer it explicitly. Investors also encourage it, e.g. see Index's Rewarding Talent guide: https://www.indexventures.com/rewarding-talent/balancing-cas....
When I make someone an offer, I give them a spreadsheet where they can plug in different salaries and equity stakes to see outcomes based on future funding events, valuations, and exit scenarios. Without exception the people who've leaned into equity have turned out to be the best performers and ended up with higher salaries anyway, but a majority favor cash up front.
When I make someone an offer, I give them a spreadsheet where they can plug in different salaries and equity stakes to see outcomes based on future funding events, valuations, and exit scenarios. Without exception the people who've leaned into equity have turned out to be the best performers and ended up with higher salaries anyway, but a majority favor cash up front.
I addressed this elsewhere in this thread
Be the change you want to see in the world?
As you find reasons to object to that, many of those reasons are likely the same shared by others and make this a vastly less common arrangement, because someone has to take on the massive initial risk to start and fund the business through the unavoidable period of initial losses and probably wants to see a way to having a compensating upside in the event of success.
As you find reasons to object to that, many of those reasons are likely the same shared by others and make this a vastly less common arrangement, because someone has to take on the massive initial risk to start and fund the business through the unavoidable period of initial losses and probably wants to see a way to having a compensating upside in the event of success.
Well now you're talking about what investors want (including if the founder is also the investor sure). That's a reflection of the funding climate
I'm talking about the financial realities of starting a company from scratch, which impacts how many companies get started in what form and might be a significant part of the explanation why you aren't seeing as many worker-owned companies as you express a preference for.
Brainstorming and figuring a way to address that might be a way to help you mold/nudge the world towards your preference.
Brainstorming and figuring a way to address that might be a way to help you mold/nudge the world towards your preference.
That is an interesting point. Co-ops seem like they should out perform from a worker incentive point of view. But, why are co-ops basically non-existent in Big Tech. WinCo, groceries, and REI, expensive outdoor stuff, in the US are both big co-ops but are retailers.
Maybe VC money warps the economics so that every company needs to be winner takes all lotto tickets for the investors. Having it be worker owned gets rid of the extreme ROÍ VCs expect.
If you know any papers on the subject I would be interested though.
Maybe VC money warps the economics so that every company needs to be winner takes all lotto tickets for the investors. Having it be worker owned gets rid of the extreme ROÍ VCs expect.
If you know any papers on the subject I would be interested though.
> Co-ops seem like they should out perform from a worker incentive point of view. , why are co-ops basically non-existent in Big Tech. WinCo, groceries, and REI, expensive outdoor stuff, in the US are both big co-ops but are retailers.
REI is a consumer coop, not a labor co-op (and WinCo, while employee-owned through an ESOP, is not a co-op at all.)
Cooperative Home Care Associates, a home health care agency HQ’d in the Bronx, appears to be the largest US labor cooperatives (and labor intensive service industries are probably the most common places to find labor coops in the US.)
> Maybe VC money warps the economics so that every company needs to be winner takes all lotto tickets for the investors. Having it be worker owned gets rid of the extreme ROÍ VCs expect.
Right. VC goals and labor coop goals are almost never aligned, and instead are almost diametrically opposed. Labor coops tend to favor conservative expansion and risk mitigation and stability. VC’s want to swing for the fences on scale—a succesful steady-state business that will pay its founding employees good pay forever but not expand much is a massive failure for VCs, but a win for a labor coop.
REI is a consumer coop, not a labor co-op (and WinCo, while employee-owned through an ESOP, is not a co-op at all.)
Cooperative Home Care Associates, a home health care agency HQ’d in the Bronx, appears to be the largest US labor cooperatives (and labor intensive service industries are probably the most common places to find labor coops in the US.)
> Maybe VC money warps the economics so that every company needs to be winner takes all lotto tickets for the investors. Having it be worker owned gets rid of the extreme ROÍ VCs expect.
Right. VC goals and labor coop goals are almost never aligned, and instead are almost diametrically opposed. Labor coops tend to favor conservative expansion and risk mitigation and stability. VC’s want to swing for the fences on scale—a succesful steady-state business that will pay its founding employees good pay forever but not expand much is a massive failure for VCs, but a win for a labor coop.
VCs don’t have ROI. They’re gambling with someone else’s money and taking big fees.
ROI implies that there is a return — but they’re already making more than they deserve just for the fee, and they are not investing anything themselves.
Oh thanks for setting me straight on WinCo and REI. I didn’t realize they weren’t labor co-ops. That is what I get for being lazy and not questioning the marketing. Too late for me to edit my post though.
Does “consumer co-op” mean that you have to buy a plastic card in order to get the corporation money, like Costco?
No, Costco is a public company that sells annual memberships and then retails to its members at prices that are just about break even not counting the membership fee. The shareholders of the company elect the board of directors who runs the company.
REI is owned by people who pay a one-time lifetime membership fee. Those co-op members elect the board fo directors who runs the company.
REI is owned by people who pay a one-time lifetime membership fee. Those co-op members elect the board fo directors who runs the company.
REI is not worker-owned FYI. It's a consumer-owned co-op. Different beast
VCs are not interested in worker-owned coops. Economic climate works against the concept at scale. Workers are also divided on it and are not organized around enabling it. Employers are highly coordinated on maintaining current employer-worker relations.
edit: here is some related reading you might find interesting:
- Sociocracy - consent-based decision-making organizations (as opposed to dreadful unanimous decision-making which doesn't work and is a common criticism of non-hierarchical organizations) https://www.sociocracyforall.org/sociocracy/ // https://sociocracy30.org
- a UK tech co-op network: https://www.coops.tech but it seems a lot of these are more tech services than product companies
VCs are not interested in worker-owned coops. Economic climate works against the concept at scale. Workers are also divided on it and are not organized around enabling it. Employers are highly coordinated on maintaining current employer-worker relations.
edit: here is some related reading you might find interesting:
- Sociocracy - consent-based decision-making organizations (as opposed to dreadful unanimous decision-making which doesn't work and is a common criticism of non-hierarchical organizations) https://www.sociocracyforall.org/sociocracy/ // https://sociocracy30.org
- a UK tech co-op network: https://www.coops.tech but it seems a lot of these are more tech services than product companies
Thank you for the links and the correction on REI. I wasn’t aware that consumer co-ops were even a thing. I have some reading to do. Too late to edit my parent post unfortunately.
There are a lot of retail consumer co-ops, especially in the grocery area. REI is a relatively large example although it's not huge by retail and certainly tech standards.
Capitalism works because the worker feels they deserve better and will go to the open market to get it. Some workers may choose to become their own bosses. The free market makes it possible.
Hypergrowth is an extreme, but so is a communist mentality where everyone is happy where they are and does not see any incentive to improve. There is a moderate middle ground that is best for economic mobility.
Hypergrowth is an extreme, but so is a communist mentality where everyone is happy where they are and does not see any incentive to improve. There is a moderate middle ground that is best for economic mobility.
> and therefore aggressively sought to showcase my leadership within the first few weeks
I feel this is as close to “Management 101” as it gets, or even “employee-ing 101”, as it applies to technical roles too.
Don’t do it!
Just write down your list of gripes for the first month; use them as your list of things to ramp up on.
If something seems odd or wrong, it may be actually broken, but it’s unlikely to be so urgent that you have to go out on a limb like this.
It’s more likely that there is some context you are missing. By Chesterton’s Fence you need to spend some energy to understand why the thing was put there, before you tear it down.
Even if you are right - you will face an uphill battle because you haven’t built trust yet. So pick your battles carefully!
I feel this is as close to “Management 101” as it gets, or even “employee-ing 101”, as it applies to technical roles too.
Don’t do it!
Just write down your list of gripes for the first month; use them as your list of things to ramp up on.
If something seems odd or wrong, it may be actually broken, but it’s unlikely to be so urgent that you have to go out on a limb like this.
It’s more likely that there is some context you are missing. By Chesterton’s Fence you need to spend some energy to understand why the thing was put there, before you tear it down.
Even if you are right - you will face an uphill battle because you haven’t built trust yet. So pick your battles carefully!
The "WTF" list technique is great for this.
Every time you see, or encounter, something that makes you go "WTF?!??" you write it down.
Chances are you don't have NEARLY enough context yet to figure out why it's like that, and so barelling in to "fix" it is just going to lead to frustration and bruised ego's all around.
After a few months you'll either have crossed off things "Oh, THAT's WTF" or you have a list of things to start chipping away at, now that you have the FULL context.
Every time you see, or encounter, something that makes you go "WTF?!??" you write it down.
Chances are you don't have NEARLY enough context yet to figure out why it's like that, and so barelling in to "fix" it is just going to lead to frustration and bruised ego's all around.
After a few months you'll either have crossed off things "Oh, THAT's WTF" or you have a list of things to start chipping away at, now that you have the FULL context.
From the author of the post: 100% I knew this advice but didn't follow it. Being patient early on is SO important!
I think the hard thing is as on engineer you're paid to have the "right" answer, but as a manager you're paid not to be right but to bring all the "right answers" together. That's a subtle but important shift.
I think the hard thing is as on engineer you're paid to have the "right" answer, but as a manager you're paid not to be right but to bring all the "right answers" together. That's a subtle but important shift.
Weird to have a bit of a window into the cryptic world of directorial promotions. Sounds like it’s mostly about self promotion sadly and perhaps unsurprisingly.
I agree, it's an interesting view. I found it quite positive about the culture in that part of Splunk. The writer parachuted in, threw their weight around, bruised a bunch of people, but lost out to another manager who openly acknowledged the contributions of their people.
From the author of the post: it looks that way at first, but it's honestly about aligning people all around you. The true self promoters don't keep their eye on the ball of universal success.
I think I didn't study the actions of the people enough, a point I was trying to make in the post. If I would have I would have made better decisions.
I think I didn't study the actions of the people enough, a point I was trying to make in the post. If I would have I would have made better decisions.
All other things aside this author is not a good enough communicator to be a director where I work.
That this is an ad actually makes the grammar issues worse.
That this is an ad actually makes the grammar issues worse.
From the author: yeah the failures I outlined were ... failures for sure! I'm not in the market for a director position at your company, but if I were I'd hope to find a place wanting people to have an honest assessment of what worked and what didn't and how they grew from it. If that's disqualifying I worry that you'll get people who are lying to you.
I'm sorry it came across as an ad, I'm full-time in a bootstrapped company working to try to solve this problem without any VC funding. It was a problem for me and for many people I know so I thought I'd share it in hopes to help people.
Also the grammar part here is interesting, I purposely write without AI because I think that's important, but I'd love your help in making it better - reach out on LinkedIn if you can. Thanks :)
I'm sorry it came across as an ad, I'm full-time in a bootstrapped company working to try to solve this problem without any VC funding. It was a problem for me and for many people I know so I thought I'd share it in hopes to help people.
Also the grammar part here is interesting, I purposely write without AI because I think that's important, but I'd love your help in making it better - reach out on LinkedIn if you can. Thanks :)
Yeah, the writing and overall narrative are lacking. I got to the end of the piece and thought to myself: “wait, that’s it?”
Splunk has been around nearly 20 years. I’d hardly call them a high growth tech company.
Not all certainly but many enterprises use them and it feels like Splunk is printing money. The cost for log ingestion is high. But, it’s highly trusted and other Splunk killers like ELK stacks haven’t caught on everywhere.
Cisco saw enough value to buy it for $28 B as part of their security portfolio: https://strategyofsecurity.com/p/ciscos-cybersecurity-shoppi...
Right that’s my point. Licenses for log ingestion with Splunk are $$$$. As opposed to rolling your own (and probably not passing an audit)
> and probably not passing an audit
What kind of audit one might not pass? People use all kind of log solution all the time without any problems.
What kind of audit one might not pass? People use all kind of log solution all the time without any problems.
Anything have to do with RMF
I am really disappointed. On one hand this was settling in as a good lesson learned blog post but ended up looking like the stuff you see on LinkedIn every day wrapped up as an ad.
Same here. I honestly enjoyed reading it and didn't expect an ad to slap me in the face.
And what a slap, right out of left field. Drop that one, final paragraph and the post is fantastic.
The paragraph only barely, tangentially links to the conclusion paragraph above it. No lead up or reference in the post. And you are left dazed. I don't even know what this supposed tool would do even slightly. A hard souring of trust built up in the article.
The paragraph only barely, tangentially links to the conclusion paragraph above it. No lead up or reference in the post. And you are left dazed. I don't even know what this supposed tool would do even slightly. A hard souring of trust built up in the article.
Yeah I'm not sure what an onboarding tool is going to do for a guy who gets hired, decides from day 1 that he must be promoted immediately, makes other peoples' lives miserable by showing to his manager that he's "aggressively" doing something before he even understands what's going on, and whines constantly about not being promoted within a few months.
It’s like the lesson told in the paragraph above “this is what my team did” and imply “and I am their manager”.
This is what I learned and imply “and I can help you learn too”
Heya, not the author, but I know him. Will share this feedback.
NCR maintains legacy POS systems with a mostly outsourced labor force.
Splunk maintains a logging aggregator with a mostly San Francisco staff.
A manager’s job at NCR is mostly about cracking the whip to try to get your team to solve boring enterprise client technical problems, but they usually don’t have enough context to understand the problem.
A manager’s job at Splunk is to motivate a team that used to work at a hip, fast growing startup who just got their payout from an Cisco acquisition and feel like the product is getting sidelined.
Splunk maintains a logging aggregator with a mostly San Francisco staff.
A manager’s job at NCR is mostly about cracking the whip to try to get your team to solve boring enterprise client technical problems, but they usually don’t have enough context to understand the problem.
A manager’s job at Splunk is to motivate a team that used to work at a hip, fast growing startup who just got their payout from an Cisco acquisition and feel like the product is getting sidelined.
Relationships drive business success and recognition. The author seemingly didn’t know how to establish critical relationships as the new kid on the block. Common mistake in the technical world, one I’ve made myself.
> Another Director at Splunk told me his process: he wrote down everything good that his teams did in a doc, and then every Friday sent that out on Slack celebrating their achievements. Implied in the whole exercise was "and I am leading this group of people", but he never said that because he didn't need to. This person got promoted to Sr. Director. He had a process that he regularly followed to a T that was borne out of a deep understanding of the culture around him.
Without knowing this Sr Director, I have to wonder if this is actually the take away they were trying to offer. If a senior engineering manager isn't regularly celebrating their team's wins, being proud if their achievements and recognising the smart and hard work, providing exposure to the rest of the company, then there's something amiss.
If the take away really was "do this and you will make yourself look good for a promotion" then, yuuuuuck.
Without knowing this Sr Director, I have to wonder if this is actually the take away they were trying to offer. If a senior engineering manager isn't regularly celebrating their team's wins, being proud if their achievements and recognising the smart and hard work, providing exposure to the rest of the company, then there's something amiss.
If the take away really was "do this and you will make yourself look good for a promotion" then, yuuuuuck.
this person's whole worldview seems really gross. Like they have swallowed the entire framework of growth-oriented capitalism uncritically and reorganized themselves completely around maximizing their returns. Fortunately the world is still somewhat human, so they failed catastrophically---but they're trying. Even their attempt at reflection is a shameful ad.
It's not wrong to wonder about your career trajectory, but it's telling to see someone pretty nakedly talk about optimizing for changing their level at a company, before they've even landed there and evaluated if they can help / how they are helping their team. I'm not naive, and I recognize those people exist and can acknowledge that they can do good work. But if someone came into my workplace with the mindset of "aggressively [seeking] to showcase my leadership within the first few weeks" and their goal was going "from Senior Manager to Director in ... 12 months", I'd be skeptical that they weren't going to damage peer relationships and optimize for being recognized at the expense of their direct reports, even if I thought they could be a valuable asset in the short term.