It was after 10:30 again. Chen Qi picked up the coffee at the table and took a big sip. Chen Qi felt dizzy because of the recent flu, but everyone else in the group was still working and he couldn't just go offline.

Since the last time Meta laid off thousands of people, Chen Qi felt that there seemed to be an invisible pressure flowing within the company. Although the company's management has not pushed employees to work hard since then, the insecurity caused by the last wave of layoffs has made everyone nervous, vaguely worried that the next wave of layoffs will come soon, and they will be one of them.

Meta used to be an "overtime factory" in Silicon Valley, but recently the pace has become significantly more tense. In order to make their performance evaluation better at the end of the year, employees dare not relax even as the holiday season approaches.

In fact, in the current turbulent industry environment, not only Meta, but also many Silicon Valley technology companies are quietly changing.A workplace culture called "Hardcore" has begun to spread in Silicon Valley technology that used to be popular to "lie flat" and "lie down to win", and is affecting the lives of working people in Silicon Valley a little bit.

"Hardcore or leave", either "hardcore" or leave. The word, which comes from Musk's internal letter to Twitter employees, represents a more intense state of work than "WLB". Obviously, the rise of Hardcore in Silicon Valley is not what many employees who are used to working in the past would like to see. On the other hand, however, is the golden age that Silicon Valley "programmers" have enjoyed in the past few years just an illusion under a bubble that will not last long?

"hardcore" culture, starting from Twitter

There is more and more debate about whether Hardcore is challenging the innovation ecology or carrying out an efficiency reform for Silicon Valley.

Although a small number of Silicon Valley technology companies also worked overtime before Twitter layoffs, overtime and inscription were by no means a common phenomenon in Silicon Valley in the past. Apart from the occasional word "wolf nature", there is not a single word to describe the workplace stress in Silicon Valley, the common ones are freedom, flexibility and so on.

But now Musk has made a start.

After the severed arm layoffs at Twitter, the "surviving" employees received an email about "Hardcore or leave" from the new leader before they could catch their breath from the chaos of layoffs.

Musk's Hardcore starts with himself, not only working 120 hours a week and sleeping in the office for several days in a row, but even emails are sent to all employees punctually at 12:00 in the morning.In the email, he made it clear: either choose to accept a high-intensity job, or take the money and leave immediately.

"most of the people who are left behind must be people who are willing to roll. "an Twitter employee told the Silicon Man. Musk's work style is actually heard of by tech workers throughout Silicon Valley, but he didn't expect that his Hardcore request came so quickly that it left us little time for transition. "

After choosing to accept the hard core, Twitter employees immediately entered a state of intense work.Employees are required to immediately end the home office and return to the office for eight hours a day, unlike in the past when the company has lost more than half of its staff and the entire business has been asked to reshape, from morning to night. Employees' time is almost filled with work.

In order to meet Musk's requirements as soon as possible, some groups even slept in the office and worked 24-hour shifts for development and testing.

"in the past, when I was at home, the effective working time was about four hours a day, but now it is good to work no more than eight hours a day, not counting commuting. "Twitter employees said.

In fact, Musk's "volume culture" was implemented in all his companies long before Twitter.It's just that Twitter's high-profile change of ownership magnified all this in the spotlight, making more people feel Musk's work mode of the richest man up close for the first time.

It is not only Tesla, Inc., SpaceX and NeuraLink, who have made a lot of trouble in recent years, but also executives of The Boring Company, a tunnel-digging company whose corporate landscape is relatively low-key, publicly disclosed a week ago that the company's corporate culture is "ultra-long hours and weekend overtime", making it difficult for the company to retain talent.

However,Does the inability to retain talent mean that these companies under Musk are short of talent? The answer may not be quite so.Although many people flatly rejected Musk's "hardcore" request for voluntary resignation, there are still many people who are still willing to follow Musk. Some of them are inspired by Musk's various "poems and distances", while others are forced to accept them in a turbulent environment.

Under pressure, open the book!

It must be admitted that in the current environment, employees of many technology companies do not have much choice.

Twitter layoffs, Meta layoffs, Snap Inc layoffs, Amazon layoffs. Under the recent frequent layoffs, tens of thousands of experienced job seekers poured into the market in just a few months, adding to the competitive pressure to "go ashore".For those affected by layoffs or graduates, no matter whether the company asks to go back to the office or let them work overtime, it is no longer their top priority. Getting a job offer first and solving the immediate "food and clothing problem" is the first priority.

"now most of the companies that do not lay off staff have frozen recruitment, so if there is any Offer at present, take it first, and then take a look at it step by step. Adam, who was affected by this round of layoffs, said that he recently got a job offer at TikTok. Although he had heard that the pace of work in TikTok was comparable to that in China, the salary package and business development offered by TikTok were good as the holiday season approached. After several considerations, Adam chose to take over.

During this period of work, compared with the small factory where Adam worked before, Adam obviously felt a sharp increase in pressure. Not only does the working day take up eight hours, on average, I have cross-time zone meetings with Chinese teams three nights a week, and I have to work overtime at least one day on weekends.

Within the company, multiple teams are often arranged to work on the same project at the same time, and the Chinese team and the American team compete with each other to sort out the advantages and disadvantages. On the surface, this is to improve efficiency and promote innovation, but at the practical level, it is to keep employees working hard physically and mentally.

In fact, like Musk's "Volume", TikTok's 996-like culture has always been controversial overseas. From last year to this year, employees in Europe and the United States have complained, complained and even sued TikTok for overtime and high-pressure work.

But even so, due to the rapid development of TikTok business in the entire international market, there are still a large number of people willing to join and accept this high-intensity work mode. According to Forbes, there were only about 1500 employees in TikTok's US office in mid-2020, but the number is now more than 10, 000.

"many people leave, and many people come. Although it is different from the common working environment in this industry, it is not difficult to find people to take the initiative to work overtime with adequate wages and expectations. "Adam said.

In addition to TikTok, the working atmosphere inside Amazon.Com Inc, another "roll factory" in Silicon Valley, is also becoming more and more tense. Employees are nervous after Andy Jassy recently said it would cut 20, 000 jobs from the fourth quarter to next year.

Ken recently learned that one of his friends in Alexa had been laid off and was worried that it would be his turn next. Although department leaders held a meeting immediately after the first wave of layoffs, they reassured people that their department was a profitable part of the retail business and that layoffs were not risky. But Ken clearly sensed that the working state of his colleagues in the group was tighter than before.

Some people take the initiative to claim the task, while others begin to work overtime spontaneously at night or on weekends. Ken himself did not like to work overtime. In the past, it was usually the manager who arranged what tasks to ensure quality and quantity, but because he just bought an apartment with a car loan on his back last year, Ken did not want to be laid off in the current depressed industry environment, so he had to move to get a better performance evaluation.

Earlier, on the anonymous workplace forum Blind, Alphabet Inc-CL C and other employees had publicly told Amazon.Com Inc employees to stop spreading volume culture, saying that many employees were "aggressive" after Amazon.Com Inc left office and were at odds with the work habits of other companies. But now, many companies have joined Amazon.Com Inc.

Including Alphabet Inc-CL C, employees of companies that have recently laid off staff in Silicon Valley or are rumored to have layoffs are more or less all of them.People who used to go to work in paddling and fishing are now in high spirits, but those who freely choose to work from home have also begun to increase the number of times they go to the office.

"although it is not 996, it is certainly not as relaxed as it used to be, both in terms of mentality and actual working state. By this time last year, many companies had already entered a state of semi-holiday, and this year everyone was worried about whether they could keep their jobs next year. "Ken said.

Under "Hardcore", is innovation still there?

Many people in Silicon Valley hold strong opposition to the rising trend of "Hardcore" in Silicon Valley.

They argue that a big driver of Silicon Valley innovation over the past few decades has been the free and open corporate culture of companies. It is because of tolerance and encouragement of the flow of talent and a flat management structure that employees have the space to create freely, and then come up with ideas that make the company great.

But if the management of all companies, like Musk, puts the will of leadership above the will of employees, then employees can only become machines that perform tasks mechanically, rather than the source of creativity of the company.

Silicon Valley technology companies offer their employees high salaries not just to make mediocre code typewriters, but to promote product and cultural innovation. But Musk took the lead in stifling this creative model. "one netizen wrote on Blind.

But in this regard, some people have also made different voices.

In the past few years, the number of technology workers in Silicon Valley has exploded amid a frenzied release of water from the Federal Reserve.The salary packages sent out are getting bigger and bigger, but at the same time, more and more people are fishing in troubled waters.

"you see, the number of people who have walked more than 70% of Twitter this time, apart from some functional instability at the beginning, basically does not have much impact. "an employee of a technology company talked to the Silicon Man. In fact, in the final analysis, as far as the function of Twitter, a relatively single product is concerned, 7500 people are not needed at all. "

In fact, examples of overhiring like Twitter have been ubiquitous in Silicon Valley in the past two years.A simple thing could have been solved by a few people working normally for seven or eight hours a day, but in the end, more than 10 people were recruited, each working four or five hours a day.Some people say that after the home office boom, the situation has become more serious, and the increasingly relaxed environment has not led to equal proportion of innovation, but has led to the loss of the will of more employees.

Many people believe that employees of Silicon Valley technology companies have been oversought in recent years.The "robbing wars" launched by major companies make everyone think that they are unique and complacent because of their high salaries and benefits, but neglect to think about their value to the company as ordinary employees.

"now Musk, TikTok and Amazon.Com Inc are starting to take the lead in Hardcore, which I think may also be a good thing to some extent. Wake everyone up from the dream, eliminate a group of people who make up the number, and let everyone return to the reality of beating workers. "said the engineer. "I don't think it will lead to the decline of Silicon Valley, but to speed up efficiency. "

So, what do you think of Hardcore? Do you think it will become the norm, or will it destroy the innovation culture of Silicon Valley?