You're forgetting portman's first point - hire slowly. Avoiding people who, for whatever reason, can't meet expectations, should be the first priority of any organization that cares about results. You can do that by aggressively pruning people who don't meet expectations, but you can also do that by doing everything you can to ensure that the wrong people don't even get in the door.

I've worked in the converse - hire-quickly, fire-slowly - and I found it a horrible, hollow experience. Nobody, from the top down, gave a shit about getting anything done or learning. This is a place that refused to allow generics in Java code because people might not understand them. There were enough C players across the ranks that had moved up the ranks just by being there forever that the culture revolved around ignoring problems and not making waves, and it nearly killed the company. I bet you've heard of them. The company was AIG.

Where are you from?

You're absolutely correct that hiring and firing, like all management, is highly dependent on culture.

In North America, the overwhelming majority of research has shown that organizations that "hire slow, fire fast" have more positive work environments, with happier employees and lower job insecurity. You could literally fill a small library with the books and papers that have been written on this topic.

I would love to know more about your culture and the "hollow experiences" you're referencing.

I'm from the UK, and have worked for American companies before. My experience with working for American tech firms (and I'm not saying that they were like this because they were American, my sample is way too small to draw any conclusions) is that compared to the UK they tend to overwork people, focus heavily on building a culture with an overly (for UK culture at least) gung ho spirit a la 'yeah, go team foo!' - which in my experience (and again, not saying this is all American firms, just the ones I've worked for) means people working crazy unpaid hours, pressure to go out after work (if you're not out drinking after work you're not part of the team - I've seen two ex-colleagues' marriages break up because of this) and a corporate kick-off culture that seems to be more about a Ballmer-esque 'Ric Flair impressions contest'[1] than achieving real results. For me personally, this doesn't line up with my culture and as such feels forced rather than based on genuine bonds - hence the hollow sensation you've quoted.

By contrast, British companies tend to focus more on getting the job done, going home and spending time with the family. Sometimes you pull late ones, but you're not expected to be in the office at 9am the next day. In some places there's beer after work, but you're not expected to go (at the risk of being denounced as a 'non-team player').

To provide a comparison, working in France is completely different. In France the work-life balance is shifted further towards the life end, in the Middle East (if you're a local) even more so.

[1] - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvsboPUjrGc - ok, that's an extreme example, but tone it down about 97%, crank the alcohol levels up by 40% and you're roughly where ISS was in 2001.