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Dark side of a Valley software engineer

businessinsider.com

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Re: Dark side of a Valley software engineer

#51

Post by zlw »

dham wrote: post #15

Then: Get up at 6am, go to work at grocery store. Get paid $7 an hour. Get out at 1pm, go to school. Go back to grocery store at 7 work till 12. Wake up do it again. Weekends nope. Holidays nope. Now: Wake up at 8 get to work at like 8:45 work till 6 or 7. Sit in air conditioning all day at a computer. Free lunch. Go home, don't worry about anything. No tests to study for, no worrying about paying rent. Holidays off.…

Yap. It's very easy to dismiss someone's frustration about X by comparing it with a more miserable Y.

Re: Dark side of a Valley software engineer

#52

Post by mc32 »

dham wrote: post #15

Then: Get up at 6am, go to work at grocery store. Get paid $7 an hour. Get out at 1pm, go to school. Go back to grocery store at 7 work till 12. Wake up do it again. Weekends nope. Holidays nope. Now: Wake up at 8 get to work at like 8:45 work till 6 or 7. Sit in air conditioning all day at a computer. Free lunch. Go home, don't worry about anything. No tests to study for, no worrying about paying rent. Holidays off.…

Working at pizza shops, malls, etc., those things used to be jobs for high schoolers or people between HS and college. It's a shame for many people, the lack of skills makes these the only jobs they can get.

I remember a good number of people on high school who thought they didn't fit in, only went because their parents made them go and who had no intention of going to college or university. Their plan was getting a blue collar job or working for a friend's dad or the like. These days their outlook is dim. There was little forethought in what their situation might look 20 years on, given their choices.

Re: Dark side of a Valley software engineer

#53

Post by dasil003 »

k__ wrote: post #20

This is why I always laugh when someone says "Start-Ups are hard! If you want to get rich easy, better get a job at a big company with 100k a year" First, getting such a job is a ton of work and then doing it isn't easy either. I mean, how much people even have the education to got into IT and then score a job at Google for example?

The difference is that at a startup you as one of a handful of individuals actually make or break the company. You should be getting sufficient equity to make it worthwhile, and yes you should be wise enough not to burn yourself out, but you also need to be ready to go the extra mile to give yourself a chance at success. That doesn't mean let companies take advantage of you, but there has to be some mutual level of trust and commitment between early employees or a startup will surely fail.

For larger companies it's more transactional in nature: they have a job and a budget, and you have your own interests. The agreement you come to is more of a coldly calculated negotiation.

Re: Dark side of a Valley software engineer

#54

Post by madgar »

superswordfish wrote: post #33
pakitan wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, indeed, turns out BI just cherry-picked the worst part.

Ten days per quarter, or forty days per year, in few-day shots at a time. That amounts to a monthly shift, and is just frequent/heavy enough to have a real impact on your personal life. No doubt the "extra" pay (let's be real, you'll never be in the inner circle if you forgo the duty) is barely enough to be noticeable.

> No doubt the "extra" pay (let's be real, you'll never be in the inner circle if you forgo the duty) is barely enough to be noticeable.

When allocated 100% to cash (vs. vacation) oncall pay amounts to more than an extra full paycheck every quarter.

If you don't notice an extra $10,000/year post-tax then please, send some of your moneybags to someone who appreciates the value of a dollar. Like me.

Re: Dark side of a Valley software engineer

#55

Post by k__ »

dasil003 wrote: post #53
k__ wrote: post #20

This is why I always laugh when someone says "Start-Ups are hard! If you want to get rich easy, better get a job at a big company with 100k a year" First, getting such a job is a ton of work and then doing it isn't easy either. I mean, how much people even have the education to got into IT and then score a job at Google for example?

The difference is that at a startup you as one of a handful of individuals actually make or break the company. You should be getting sufficient equity to make it worthwhile, and yes you should be wise enough not to burn yourself out, but you also need to be ready to go the extra mile to give yourself a chance at success. That doesn't mean let companies take advantage of you, but there has to be some mutual level of t…

Also, you can found your own start-up

Re: Dark side of a Valley software engineer

#57

Post by orodley »

superswordfish wrote: post #33
pakitan wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, indeed, turns out BI just cherry-picked the worst part.

Ten days per quarter, or forty days per year, in few-day shots at a time. That amounts to a monthly shift, and is just frequent/heavy enough to have a real impact on your personal life. No doubt the "extra" pay (let's be real, you'll never be in the inner circle if you forgo the duty) is barely enough to be noticeable.

>barely enough to be noticeable

For me it's (off the top of my head) about 10%. Definitely noticeable.

Re: Dark side of a Valley software engineer

#58

Post by chefkoch »

acveilleux wrote: post #50
bmj wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It depends entirely on your domain. I've been in the software industry for 15 years or so in the U.S., and aside from a couple of stints at start-ups during the first internet bubble/boom, I've rarely worked much overtime. I've worked for the same employer for eight years now, and management's perspective is this: "Sometimes work will require a bit more than 40 hours a week of your time. Sometimes your life will requ…

Startups attract and value the type of folks who will put in 60 hours every week and get obsessive about it. Sometimes it grows out of the company as it scales up. Other times it gets institutionalized. The Googles of the world are in a weird spot because they made it part of their culture but the financial and industry upside of working for them mean people apply even if they aren't the kind of folks who can work 60…

> people apply even if they aren't the kind of folks who can work 60h week for 10 years.

I think you don't know in advance how long you can stand this before you burn out.

Re: Dark side of a Valley software engineer

#59

Post by Avshalom »

zlw wrote: post #51
dham wrote: post #15

Then: Get up at 6am, go to work at grocery store. Get paid $7 an hour. Get out at 1pm, go to school. Go back to grocery store at 7 work till 12. Wake up do it again. Weekends nope. Holidays nope. Now: Wake up at 8 get to work at like 8:45 work till 6 or 7. Sit in air conditioning all day at a computer. Free lunch. Go home, don't worry about anything. No tests to study for, no worrying about paying rent. Holidays off.…

Yap. It's very easy to dismiss someone's frustration about X by comparing it with a more miserable Y.

It's really easy when almost anything is more miserable than X.

Re: Dark side of a Valley software engineer

#60

Post by Kurtz79 »

dham wrote: post #15

Then: Get up at 6am, go to work at grocery store. Get paid $7 an hour. Get out at 1pm, go to school. Go back to grocery store at 7 work till 12. Wake up do it again. Weekends nope. Holidays nope. Now: Wake up at 8 get to work at like 8:45 work till 6 or 7. Sit in air conditioning all day at a computer. Free lunch. Go home, don't worry about anything. No tests to study for, no worrying about paying rent. Holidays off.…

Agreed. As soon as I start complaining about how hard and stressful my job is, I always try to remember how lucky and privileged I am, in the grand scheme of things.
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