What it's Like to Work for Linus - Employees Answer

[AdamFromLTT]

Linus Media Group is a pretty unique place to work, but what is it actually like? Is Linus a tyrant? Is cool tech not all it's cracked up to be? Is Colton fired? Find out what employees think in this set of interviews. Management had no say in the production of this video. Select full interviews will be released on Floatplane.com
 

 

[ahuckphin]

We need the Honest Answers playlist updated even if videos doesn't go under "honest answers" directly anymore

[tahsky]

Fantastic Video. I would absolutely love a "React" Video from Linus or all of Management watching this video.

[RednGold21]

Really enjoyed seeing some of the thoughts from the staff. I agree with the sentiment of more thought out videos and more focused on the low to mid range of PC building. Oh and yes more vlog content! Still some of my fav ltt videos are just the old moving vlogs with the original crew.

[Guest]

The only thing I have to say is that ASUS needs a better name for their monitor they sponsored the video for. 

[Uttamattamakin]

This is a very good and honest sounding video.  I know nothing about LTT but the videos. 

 

What I do know about life and work in general is this.  Sometimes you can have a job doing the thing you want but not with the people you'd want to do it with OR you can have a job doing something miserable but with good people.  Finding a job where you like the work, and the people is very individual and very rare. The same place that could be heaven for one person could be hell for another and both would be right... from their own perspectives. 

In short  the Simpsons 100% predicted what it would be like to work at LTT

and also how Linus would look with a beard. LOL.

[ToboRobot]

What would I change?

-Gaming Channel
-Automotive/Transport Channel
-Reality TV show for gamers/nerds
-Dedicated team that does higher quality videos with more time to do it, maybe a team that creates 1-2 videos per month
-Health, diet and exercise (maybe content) for staff to stay fit, and healthy which makes people more productive and less likely to be ill
-Build a custom HQ, with real labs, office space, parking, badminton and LAN party room with eSports arena to host world class gaming/tech events.

[GodAtum]

My 2 cent. I don't have time to watch 25+ videos a week so only watch the main channel. I really hate when YTubers release so many videos it's impossible for anyone with a job to watch them all.

 

Also is Canadian employment law as shit is USA, or is more better like the EU?

 

One a serious note, has Linus ever got professional help from transitioning from a startup to a company? There's plenty of consultancies out there that can help.

[Neroon]

I really liked Linus' answer on the old days, about missing it but also the need to move forward.

 

Look from a viewer perspective I get it, the Langley House had a vibe, a couple of young guys making videos in a house, they were super relatable, and even if tech isn't your line of work (mine isn't), you just feel like you would want to work there. It has a very homely feeling, and I absolutely understand Linus that he misses it, but you can't keep that going or recreate it.

 

If they had stayed going like that, a lot of people would have left, it's that simple, people want to grow, lives change, people get older. If I think back to when I was a kid, I just long for those days. I enjoyed my college time, and miss that as well, but they gotta end at some point. And even if you don't change, you stay, others won't. He wouldn't be doing the WAN every week with Luke, if they hadn't changed.

 

That said, I get why people end up leaving large companies they created behind. I remember how Silicon Valley really told that story well, from a few guys in a house, living from very little money, with just their friendship, dreams, enthusiasm and fun to get through the day. And the bigger they got, the further away they all got from that.
And while I have never been someone to work for a large company.. I mean I work for large organizations, but since I have virtually no contact to anyone outside of my teams and manager, I never feel like I have more than say 20 colleagues, when I think about SV and how it all changed to such a massive company, I just know I couldn't do it.

 

I definitely couldn't work at LMG as it is now, just way too big.

[Lord Szechenyi]

Obviously my favorite part of the video is how based Anthony is:

 

 

[manikyath]

2 hours ago, GodAtum said:

I don't have time to watch 25+ videos a week

the thing about it, though, is that not all 25 videos are meant for "you".

 

on topic:

the "flexible hours" thing hit right at home base for me. i've worked at a place where "flexibility" was mostly a means for the company to force employees to work more for free (impacting employee satisfaction => employee turnover). i've then also worked at a place where said "flexibility" was abused by employees to an astounding level...

 

the place i work now has defined hours, but "for good reason" there can be flexibility when necessary. 'productivity' is also fairly easy to measure for our workload, so it's easy to gauge the impact of flexibility.

 

for something more "vague" like the majority of roles at LMG (writer, inventory management, designer, ...) it's hard to gauge if the flexibility goes "both ways" equally, and ofcourse... collaborating trough flexible hours is a hot mess.

 

 

past that... i do really feel the need to echo that some projects really deserve more time investment.

[Levent]

Solid propaganda.

[ds5018]

lol

[Cazmorior]

Love to see Jake (Tivy) doing donuts!

And for the Germans: Dan ist einfach Besser.

[IPickle]

4 hours ago, GodAtum said:

One a serious note, has Linus ever got professional help from transitioning from a startup to a company? There's plenty of consultancies out there that can help.

Maybe I'm not reading your question correctly, but I believe they're way beyond the start-up phase now. They've got a sustainable business model, nearly 100 employees, I believe they're profitable etc. However, to answer your question, I'm sure they have gotten professional help before. It's not uncommon for start-ups to do so. Just depends on what you define by professional help. All I know for certain is they've done very well, however they did it.

[nhand42]

Good video and much needed. There's so much nonsense being repeated on the subreddit and other forums such as "ex-employee of LTT spills beans of Linus tyrannical behavior" and "LTT employees secretly hate working for Linus". That's such obvious NONSENSE because there are people who have been working at LTT for years. I've seen employees tearing up with emotion during their farewell videos. Those aren't things that happen at a toxic workplace.

 

I think what's true - and Linus himself says this in the video - is that he's chaotic, he's trying to do good, but he doesn't always get it right. I have no deeper insight into the company because I'm just a viewer but if the on-screen persona is anything to go by, he's also a bundle of energy which I imagine can be exasperating at times. But the very fact he has built a company from 2 people to 100 people, maintained high retention rates and faithful employees, speaks highly of the person and the company.

 

The important thing to remember is none of us can read minds. None of us should second guess their motives. We don't know them. They are on-screen personas and we're viewers, not their friends, not their family. And that's how you should interpret the comments by dumb *bleeps* on the subreddit. People who trade in gossip are worth less than zero.

[Arika]

The sentiment is fine, but ultimately this video doesn't really do much. the disclaimer already called it out, as it's a public video, they are not going to say anything that would put their job at risk, so how honest are they actually being?

[Mark_nz]

15:03 - More writers is more wages and more room needed in LMG.

Although... having online writers in other countries has the possibilities of bringing new ideas from their different backgrounds.

[manikyath]

5 hours ago, Arika S said:

The sentiment is fine, but ultimately this video doesn't really do much. the disclaimer already called it out, as it's a public video, they are not going to say anything that would put their job at risk, so how honest are they actually being?

because there is a gap between "saying things that put their job at risk", "saying things that may insult coworkers", and the corporate feedback equivalent of a "shillpiece".

 

for one, we now know there's a lot of internal people also wanting more time investment per video.

 

also - there's apparently more stuff on floatplane... that's mostly what the disclaimer was for..

[GTC]

9 hours ago, IPickle said:

They've got a sustainable business model, nearly 100 employees, I believe they're profitable etc.

They're definitely profitable lol. He may not be a billionaire or centi-millionaire but Linus is rich. He's said it himself that it's no secret he's wealthy.

LMG got a $100,000,000+ offer for the company, you don't get those kind of offers if you're not making money...

[manikyath]

1 hour ago, GTC said:

you don't get those kind of offers if you're not making money...

twitter.

[flameout]

3 hours ago, manikyath said:

because there is a gap between "saying things that put their job at risk", "saying things that may insult coworkers", and the corporate feedback equivalent of a "shillpiece".

 

for one, we now know there's a lot of internal people also wanting more time investment per video.

 

also - there's apparently more stuff on floatplane... that's mostly what the disclaimer was for..

Yes the disclaimer also serves as ad for Floatplane instead of them putting that somewhere else, weird. But this video, for me, was only useful for employees suggesting the direction they'd like to see certain things go. As for the title/thumbnail, it's useless, no one is going to bash Linus or the company in a video like that. Which is why it's stupid that they even go to the effort of having minimal people involved in the production of it.

[Geneleco]

Considering some of the staff dont think the quality of the videos is always up to par and want to do less, and my experience of a decent amount of the vidoes the last year or so being kinda meh, maybe its time to do less videos per week on the main channel.

[manikyath]

2 hours ago, flameout said:

weird

i'd prefer to describe it as "clever".

 

2 hours ago, flameout said:

no one is going to bash Linus or the company in a video like that. Which is why it's stupid that they even go to the effort of having minimal people involved in the production of it.

in general, it takes a *very* disgruntled employee to bash the boss or a company *at all*, even if not in a public facing outlet.

as for the amount of people involved.. difficult to say. ofcourse it becomes public after the fact anyways so everyone can see, but for content like this it's sort of a given that management cannot have a go/no-go poll before launch so to speak.

 

essentially, see it as this:

upper LMG management giving employees the go-ahead to make a piece of content "among themselves" to talk about their experiences working for LMG. the fact the video is made  at all means two things:

- management trusts the staff to do a good job, and is confident enough about their position that a few annoyances mentioned by staff wont make them insecure in their position. (example: the "pls more time spent on videos")

- the staff is satisfied enough (specificly not using "happy" here) to make a piece of content about their employer.

- at the end of the line, it's a business, and despite being on top of the hill... linus is as much "just a cog in the machine" as everyone else is.

 

have you noticed linus's main annoyance is not having flexible hours? the only reason that happens is because they were in a position they couldnt let everyone be flexible anymore, and they took the decision that if not everyone can choose their own hours, that is a limitation that should just count up the stack with no exceptions, even for the 'big' man himself. to me, it's details like that that make the video matter, because details like that will tell more about how it is to work at a place than any employee review ever will.

so, essentially.. what is 'said' in the video is irrelevant, it's the indirect messaging that tells the story.

 

and just like last time they made a piece like this, this video <for me> is a confirmation i'd rather work for LMG than my previous boss.

[Kisai]

23 hours ago, manikyath said:

the thing about it, though, is that not all 25 videos are meant for "you".

 

This is a thing that a lot of people do not understand.

 

When you get past a certain size, you can not be "that company that ONLY produces X niche content/product", you diversify (including diversifying your staff), take less risks (it's easy as a 1-4 person company to just bet the company on things, but when you have 100 people, that's 100 people who now have no jobs when you bet the company) and eventually you hit an equilibrium point where, you can't grow without burning money, and can't stay at your size without losing opportunity costs.

 

Like I'd say, the minute you start having more than one layer of management, your company is too big, and you are better off "legally" breaking the company up, so that certain things can't sink the company. If there ever came a day where Linus gets canceled (*cough* 

*cough*), you'd want to be in a position to eject anyone from the company without them taking the company down with them. Usually this is not the case in very large companies, where someone in the C-suite can shoot their mouth off, and the company doesn't do anything about it, because they can't legally remove them, no matter how much damage they create.

 

A company should only have people-managing-people-who-are-doing-things, not people-managing-people-who-manage-people. The people at the top communicate with each other to make sure they're on the same page, and the people beneath them aren't gatekept from doing their job by having to seek approval via the management unless there is a legal or financial risk that requires input from another department. One of the things that always made big companies feel soulless was when you had to seek approval for everything from taking a break/using the bathroom to even going home. Know which companies do that? Retail.