Submitted by [deleted] t3_1223qcz in explainlikeimfive
segelnhoch3 t1_jdomwet wrote
So, you need hardware that physically houses the software. That means you need maintenance workers. Then you need customer support, which will be a large portion. You need people who can fix and improve the software, lots of them. You need people who will maintain your cyber security.
Then all the normal company stuff: HR, Accounting, Management, real estate, sales, marketing, janitors, etc.
They are still producing a product, and as with a lot of other companies a lot of the workforce isn't directly involved with the actual production.
could_use_a_snack t1_jdouxsh wrote
>janitors, etc.
As a custodian, thank you for remembering us.
BrevitysLazyCousin t1_jdpfkq2 wrote
When I was in third grade I asked my teacher for some extravagance like an ice cream party. The teacher said "You'll get your ice cream party when pigs fly". My mom was also a teacher so I hung out around the school once the kids left.
I cooked up a plan with the head custodian which included drawing a pig with wings on paper twice, stapling the two pigs together with cotton balls stuffed inside and coloring it pink. Then Melvin and I hung the flying pig from a long piece of twine taped to the side, GOT ON THE ROOF OF THE BUILDING, and swung the pig back and forth in front of my teacher's window.
She correctly concluded that pigs had flown, our ice cream party was arranged and Melvin got the first bowl. He retired as a much loved member of the community and I get to remember that here was a time like 40 years ago when some adults would help kids do cool shit.
could_use_a_snack t1_jdprvdv wrote
Wow. I'm sure he would be extremely grateful to know he is still in your memories.
Hugh_Mann123 t1_jdpywrk wrote
Good thing your teacher wasn't like Mr. Burns
It's just a little airborne, it's still good, it's still good
kinder-morder t1_jdph0td wrote
Unrelated to original post. Good story though.
amanuense t1_jdp4v91 wrote
Unsung heroes. I have the habit of spending time with janitorial staff in the places I've worked. Honestly I have met only good people and I'm sad to see how a lot of people just ignore them and belittle them.
could_use_a_snack t1_jdpe799 wrote
>Unsung heroes
True. For the most part. But you can always leave us treats. 😁
stewdrick t1_jdphwls wrote
Username checks out
amanuense t1_jdpnli8 wrote
Sadly not possible in my office. Janitors are not allowed to touch anything unless it has to be cleaned or thrown away. One of them told me they couldn't accept stuff from the engineers just in case someone thought they stole it.
could_use_a_snack t1_jdps1yz wrote
A sticky note on the trash can saying 'thanks for keeping my area clean' works too.
TooSoonTurtle t1_jdpq31g wrote
To be fair most companies don't employ their own custodians. They would contract a facility management organization which would handle all the custodians, groundskeepers, HVAC maintenance etc.
could_use_a_snack t1_jdps85m wrote
That's true, but they are still worth noticing. Without them you'd have to clean up after yourself. Lol.
thehim t1_jdop4y9 wrote
Software companies also have a lot of compliance folks, and legal teams to make sure they’re following the laws in the all the countries they operate. They also often have in-house data science/R&D teams that crunch numbers and help the company make decisions about how to innovate
hawkxp71 t1_jdph2vm wrote
You downplayed sales. My bet it's one of indeeds biggest groups,
hurricane14 t1_jdpk08w wrote
My first thought also. And no one in this thread mentioned product and engineering yet. OP might be right that you could launch an initial app with 10 people. But when your site gets big it takes a lot of work to maintain, let alone improve it. A lot of work goes into building the features of the application over time
Xannin t1_jdptv6z wrote
The comment at the top of this chain mentions engineering.
blankgazez t1_jdp4zrb wrote
Accounts payable, accounts recoverable, collections… they are a for profit business
pdfrg t1_jdpoc06 wrote
Middle managers. Lots and lots of middle managers, lol
fuzzypastels t1_jdpmteo wrote
To add some more details job board companies like Indeed will also have client facing teams with data analysts and client success managers who provide support to the companies who use their platform. Part of their product is being able to explain to their clients trends, provide guidance on job posting verbiage, show data on how well their postings are doing etc.
superstition40 t1_jdpuefy wrote
Yes, I think the role would be called something like 'account manager'
garublador t1_jdpbqqr wrote
As far as I know, Indeed is moving or has moved their tech infrastructure to AWS so they won't need the hardware to run the software. That doesn't invalidate your point, though. It does mean they need all of the engineers to migrate all that stuff off the internally managed hardware, too.
thunder_struck85 t1_jdpeszl wrote
Nah, all their hardware is likely someone else's hardware. All that shit is on the cloud now.
m0le t1_jdpld0u wrote
Sadly, it doesn't magically maintain itself.
Far too many business owners seem to think they're going to make huge staff savings ifnthey move to the cloud, and are surprised when that doesn't happen.
thunder_struck85 t1_jdpq66z wrote
Actually, it does. That's the point of going to the cloud. You maintain your software, but you don't maintain the hardware. You just pay for it.
I know. It's what I do for a living. People downvoting my first comment have no clue how it works, clearly.
m0le t1_jdpt1nj wrote
The hardware maintenance costs have been the least of your problems as an IT department for a very long time. You could bung off the shelf servers into colo racks and basically forget about them. All moving to the cloud has done is replace the emergency alert from your colo provider with a "the cloud is experiencing issues" message from your cloud provider (reliability and resilience may well have significantly improved, or may not depending on your cloud provider). Yes, you don't have to plan for new hardware every few years, but the cost of the that is small next to the cost of renting compute from the big cloud vendors. Even the dedicated staff planning out your hardware strategy have not gone anywhere, they've just become the staff planning cloud strategy.
Maintenance of the software has always been the biggest pain in the arse, and that is usually not particularly outsourcable.
50MillionChickens t1_jdpymr1 wrote
I have 30 years in the industry on both sides of this and radically disagree with this. Cloud computing is not free in money or service but it has fundamentally reduced tech and HR and service costs over the pre-cloud years when you had whole teams devoted to nothing but running a server farm, managing hardware, environments, cables, connections, internal networks, comms and goddamn telephonic.
Cloud computing changed all of that. Sure, the BiG Box hosts still have their centers to manage and your tech team needs Cloud expertise. But outsourcing the hardware and 90% of networking issues has made IT a much better management environment for the end user.
It's much less of a wild west week out there for tech teams. Now, just don't go unplugging those mega centers and we'll be fine. :-)
thunder_struck85 t1_jdqigc2 wrote
No, they have not been the "least of your problems". It's actually a big problem especially for a lot of legacy applications running on ancient stuff like mainframes that companies often had to hire special staff to keep running.
Migrating to the cloud has solved so many of those problems.
Of course it has created new ones, but that's not the scope of this discussion. This discussion was about maintaining hardware only. Not cost.
m0le t1_jdqj6oc wrote
Converting mainframe stuff to cloud is... nontrivial at best. If it were easy, it'd be off the mainframe and on something cheaper, because MIPS are horrifyingly expensive on every mainframe I've used. I've worked a lot on really legacy hardware (everything from a VAX cluster that's still in production to this day through Tandem nonstops to relatively recent IBM Z series stuff) and shifting loads to standard x86 hardware is never straightforward.
thunder_struck85 t1_jdqkkdv wrote
Again, you continue to confuse separate issues as one issue. Whether it is trivial or inexpensive or difficult is completely irrelevant to the discussion that spawned this comment chain.
The discussion that spawned this comment chain was simply hardware maintenance in the cloud. And the answer is there is none. You pay a premium to have someone do that for you. That's it.
Everything else is a completely different discussion
phryan t1_jdprbck wrote
This will be unpopular but I'd say that having 2,000 employees that are easily disposed of is also a result of upper management of a startup not understanding how to staff a company.
​
For your example hardware can generally be outsourced, once an organization reaches the point that owning hardware is cheaper outsourcing services like HR/Payroll is still more effective. However startups are often run by inexperienced management that can't min/max. When times get tough they pull in a consulting firm that make some recommendations that end up with a few thousand layed off.
I'll add consulting firms are a waste of time, a google search and 60 minutes will give you the same advice as a consulting firm. And the consulting firm will charge $1 mill plus easily.
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