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Ask HN: How do you know it's time for you to quit your FAANG job?

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Re: Ask HN: How do you know it's time for you to quit your FAANG job?

#71

Post by deanmoriarty »

I am in a similar predicament and heavily conflicted. Mid 30s, at FAANG, making ~$1M/yr liquid for the past few years, a net worth of ~$5M liquid in Vanguard ETFs, and have an offer for a very popular AI "startup" you all know, and I am not able to understand if the risk (illiquidity of my offer) and quality of life hit (longer hours, worse commute, higher stress) are worth the tradeoff.

On one hand, I am thinking that I really have no choice other than joining the opportunity presented in front of me, life in tech is either a constant uncomfortable growth and grind or I'll be left behind, there is really no "let's keep my current situation constant in my relatively cushy role".

On the other hand, I am so tempted to not disrupt my life until an external force does it for me (layoff etc) because things are, relatively speaking, going well for me.

Finally, since you mentioned seed etc, I would never, right now, start my own thing, but that's just me and my current circumstances.

Re: Ask HN: How do you know it's time for you to quit your FAANG job?

#72

Post by VirusNewbie »

deanmoriarty wrote: post #71

I am in a similar predicament and heavily conflicted. Mid 30s, at FAANG, making ~$1M/yr liquid for the past few years, a net worth of ~$5M liquid in Vanguard ETFs, and have an offer for a very popular AI "startup" you all know, and I am not able to understand if the risk (illiquidity of my offer) and quality of life hit (longer hours, worse commute, higher stress) are worth the tradeoff. On one hand, I am thinking th…

damn, very impressive. As I was reading your post I think the only thing that could tempt me away from a 1M a year job might be an offer from OpenAI, and sure enough it sounds like you have that option.

>"and quality of life hit (longer hours, worse commute, higher stress) are worth the tradeoff."

Looking back, the hours I put in were never the largest factor in my happiness, it's always been having a cool boss, having interesting problems to solve and having engaged coworkers that mattered most. YMMV.

"there is really no "let's keep my current situation constant in my relatively cushy role".

I don't know if that's true, if you're willing to take a (huge) pay cut. There are probably a ton of small companies that would take for a modest salary and some stock options that may or may not pay off, even if you were going to put in 30 hours a week or something.

Re: Ask HN: How do you know it's time for you to quit your FAANG job?

#73

Post by VirusNewbie »

dehrmann wrote: post #53
VectorLock wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think its less about size but more about paying ridiculous salary bands. Netflix does that, but to my knowledge Microsoft is still at "body shop" pay levels.

Isn't Amazon like that, too?

No amazon pays very well with RSUs. Much higher than Microsoft for equivalent titles. However, I don't know if people get 'upleveled' at Microsoft. Could be that a Senior Software Engineer at Amazon would be a Principal Engineer at microsoft or something.

Re: Ask HN: How do you know it's time for you to quit your FAANG job?

#74

Post by quantified »

hipadev23 wrote: post #38
ericmcer wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I get older this more and more seems like the way. I have friends with 10+ years at a single job. They work 2-4 hours a day remotely and are so senior they would be very difficult to replace. They will easily be able to retire in their early 40s. Meanwhile I have done 1-3 years at a bunch of different places, tried to start my own things, and am still grinding out 10 hour days.

> They work 2-4 hours a day remotely and are so senior they would be very difficult to replace. Everyone is replaceable. I'd argue this is entirely the continuance of zero-rate interest phenomenon and corporations are waking up to it. e.g. Google just announced more layoffs this morning.

It's truly lame and over-resourced management that allows this practice. I'd argue it signifies a lack of good management practice if the bus factor is high and the actual utilization is low.

I can't fault the engineer for taking advantage if they can.

Re: Ask HN: How do you know it's time for you to quit your FAANG job?

#75

Post by quantified »

iwangulenko wrote: post #28

Tech recruiter here in Switzerland with ~10 years of experience: People quit their teams/bosses, rarely do they quit for other reasons, like compensation or brand.

IDK, seems frequent enough from my experience. A good boss doesn't make up for crappy comp

Re: Ask HN: How do you know it's time for you to quit your FAANG job?

#76

Post by VirusNewbie »

chpatrick wrote: post #43
slavetologic wrote: post #7

You should realize that faang swe income, on a risk adjusted basis, is the best you will get. Hold on as long as possible and invest your earnings into the stock market. Ignore the noise. You quit when you have enough to retire

I think there is something to be said for starting a company when you're younger and more risk-tolerant though. If you wait until you're middle aged and set for life you might never do it.

conversely, money early on in life is worth more than money later on in life. This can be especially true once you get into a house you're happy with.

Your housing expenses are likely to be your single largest (fixed) expense, so if someone can work hard for a few years and buy a place, it's a lot easier to coast on lower paying jobs.

Re: Ask HN: How do you know it's time for you to quit your FAANG job?

#77

Post by ethbr1 »

VirusNewbie wrote: post #76
chpatrick wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there is something to be said for starting a company when you're younger and more risk-tolerant though. If you wait until you're middle aged and set for life you might never do it.

conversely, money early on in life is worth more than money later on in life. This can be especially true once you get into a house you're happy with. Your housing expenses are likely to be your single largest (fixed) expense, so if someone can work hard for a few years and buy a place, it's a lot easier to coast on lower paying jobs.

Agreed from personal experience. And a huge component of housing is where you live.

I'd argue that the single most financially-beneficial choice you can make as a SWE is finding a remote or hybrid job, then leveraging that to live somewhere you enjoy that allows you to save much more money.

Re: Ask HN: How do you know it's time for you to quit your FAANG job?

#79

Post by sdsd »

arcanemachiner wrote: post #68
sdsd wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll be your sacrificial lamb. The acronym is FAGMAN. I really wish the word "fag" wasn't a disgusting slur for a marginalized sexual minority, because if anyone deserves the nastiness of that word, it's not gay people, it's fucking FAGMAN.

I was thinking about this, and it should be MAGMAN since Facebook is now Meta. This would be so much simpler without Microsoft. At least MANGA is a word.

We just need a tech giant with an E and we can have MEGAMAN! Hey, if Netflix is allowed, why not EA (to represent the gaming industry too). There we go!

Re: Ask HN: How do you know it's time for you to quit your FAANG job?

#80

Post by shawnpang »

csallen wrote: post #15

You might want to edit your post. It seems like you're asking when to go full time on your startup, but you haven't made that context sufficiently clear, and people will have to read between the lines to get that. A lot of people quit FAANG jobs for reasons that have nothing to do with going full time on a startup.

Thanks! I don't know HackerNews even have the editing feature... but will make that more clear next time!
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