While I did certainly enjoy the short time that I worked at Parsable, there is certainly something to be said about how I left, which was certainly not by my choice.
To coin a phrase from Alan Greenspan, the former Federal Reserve Board chairman, "irrational exuberance" was in full swing at Parsable by the time that I had joined. They were hiring people in droves, sometimes at a rate of 10 or more per month.
In the back of my mind, I had a bit of concern about how long the company could grow so quickly and sustain itself. However, the future looked so incredibly bright, and senior management continually reassured all of us that our cash flow was good and that we still had lots of runway.
And then the pandemic hit. Only a couple of weeks after offices were closed and everyone was directed to work from home, we were given the news that mass layoffs would take place.
Granted, this sort of thing has happened to numerous companies, so in and of itself, this is hardly unique. What puts salt into the wound is that Parsable has recently announced the closing of a Series D funding round of $60 million. The clincher is that in one article, it says the company "plans to hire for essential needs over the next several months."
Why lay off a quarter of your staff if you still need to hire again afterwards? I honestly didn't come across any deadwood at Parsable, and all of the people that I knew who received their walking papers were top performers and excelled at what they did.
