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Ask HN: How to Exit FAANG?

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Re: Ask HN: How to Exit FAANG?

#11

Post by 100011_100001 »

There is a weird hack about compensation. Move to a place with a much lower cost of living. I'm not talking about suddenly moving to Thailand, you can stay within the US, there are lot of smaller cities that needs tech but their cost of living is much lower.

Basically the math works like this, if your cost of living is 200% US average (San Fran, LA, NYC are there or higher) and you move to a 96% US average your salary might drop 50% but you are still making the same amount of money essentially. In reality it might drop 30% so you will be getting a raise.

Then you can do things like own a house for $100k or less.

Re: Ask HN: How to Exit FAANG?

#12

Post by metadat »

bugsliker wrote: post #6
ss108 wrote: post #5

You want to exit big tech, but don't want to give up the comp? I think you may have to make a tough choice.

I know I'll have to give up the comp but like you say, it's a tough choice. Mostly looking to see how others have rationalized this choice.

Money isn't everything. Your most valuable asset is actually your time. Every day you trade for a paycheck is a day you can never get back.

Re: Ask HN: How to Exit FAANG?

#13

Post by jstx1 »

fatnoah wrote: post #10

Meh, just go to a start-up. I went from startups to big tech, including a name that rhymes with "feta", and am back at startups. It's been a compensation roller coaster going from +360% to -68% over 6 years, but I have so much more energy and am making a substantial impact.

What's up people not wanting to write "Google" and "Meta" in this thread?

Re: Ask HN: How to Exit FAANG?

#14

Post by marcus0x62 »

What is it — specifically - you like about the high comp? Is it a sense of feeling personal security, proof of being valued, the desire to be able to buy expensive things on a whim? It may be easier to give up the money if you really identify what it is doing for you and ask yourself if a) you still need it and if so b) if there is a different way you can meet that need.

Re: Ask HN: How to Exit FAANG?

#15

Post by boring_twenties »

100011_100001 wrote: post #11

There is a weird hack about compensation. Move to a place with a much lower cost of living. I'm not talking about suddenly moving to Thailand, you can stay within the US, there are lot of smaller cities that needs tech but their cost of living is much lower. Basically the math works like this, if your cost of living is 200% US average (San Fran, LA, NYC are there or higher) and you move to a 96% US average your salar…

Not really, because saving the same percentage of a much higher salary gets you to retirement or financial independence much faster.

Re: Ask HN: How to Exit FAANG?

#16

Post by lacoolj »

Even at a non-FAANG (or even a non-software-focused company for that matter), I've found it very difficult to entertain external options. The security of multiple years in one place is very hard to give away, especially when your team and managers are willing to work with you on things a new place will quickly frown upon.

If one thing was going to get me (and possibly you) to leave, it would be a company of similar standing (how users interact with the product, amount of public users or private clients, type of product) offering the ideal tech stack for me (you).

Good luck though. Very interested in how you proceed if you decide to make a change

PS - sorry not so much advice as a generic "same here"

Re: Ask HN: How to Exit FAANG?

#17

Post by rmk »

boring_twenties wrote: post #15
100011_100001 wrote: post #11

There is a weird hack about compensation. Move to a place with a much lower cost of living. I'm not talking about suddenly moving to Thailand, you can stay within the US, there are lot of smaller cities that needs tech but their cost of living is much lower. Basically the math works like this, if your cost of living is 200% US average (San Fran, LA, NYC are there or higher) and you move to a 96% US average your salar…

Not really, because saving the same percentage of a much higher salary gets you to retirement or financial independence much faster.

Is that on the assumption that you will eventually move to the low COL area as described above?

Re: Ask HN: How to Exit FAANG?

#18

Post by phphphphp »

The thing you want, low stakes low effort programming, doesn’t really exist. The reason Google can survive building everything themselves — and thus giving you and many others endless code to write — is because they have exceptionally deep pockets and army’s of people.

Outside of Google-type companies, people write code to serve a direct business need which means the impressive software engineers are not the people who write good code but rather the software engineers who can use technology to benefit the business — which sometimes means writing code, but often does not.

If you go to a smaller company, even in a software engineering role, even as an individual contributor, expect to spend a lot less time having fun programming and a lot more time solving business problems.

You can absolutely coast in a low stakes environment at a smaller company, but don’t expect that being able to write Google-quality code will impress anyone. At a pragmatic company, people are more impressed by whatever benefits the bottom line. If you’re not a natural at the business side of things, it’ll be much more challenging to impress at a small company than it would be to impress at Google.

Re: Ask HN: How to Exit FAANG?

#19

Post by programmarchy »

jstx1 wrote: post #13
fatnoah wrote: post #10

Meh, just go to a start-up. I went from startups to big tech, including a name that rhymes with "feta", and am back at startups. It's been a compensation roller coaster going from +360% to -68% over 6 years, but I have so much more energy and am making a substantial impact.

What's up people not wanting to write "Google" and "Meta" in this thread?

TattleGPT might be reading this thread. Problem is that it can rhyme now.

Re: Ask HN: How to Exit FAANG?

#20

Post by rolisz »

I left Google in 2018. I was working in Zurich and moved back to Romania. My compensation dropped by ~60%. I don't regret the move at all. There's a lot of cool stuff outside of FAANG and there's lots of cool stuff outside of work.
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