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Three Paths in the Tech Industry: Founder, Executive, or Employee

blog.ycombinator.com

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Re: Three Paths in the Tech Industry: Founder, Executive, or Employee

#611

Post by sidlls »

alien_at_work wrote: post #560
sidlls wrote: post #466

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is partly why I wrote what I did about it being a self-inflicted problem: most engineers simply don't take that initiative, and many of the ones that do are thinking of features for resume driven development more than for the company's health. They're too busy arguing about whether Rust is our savior or how dumb blub programmers are, etc.

>most engineers simply don't take that initiative, and many of the ones that do are thinking of features for resume driven development more than for the company's health. There's no money in caring about the company long term. Increase in salary for an engineer comes in changing jobs, not internal promotion (which, for places where this is even a concept, is usually constrained by some arbitrary limit, where as job c…

> Increase in salary for an engineer comes in changing jobs, not internal promotion (which, for places where this is even a concept, is usually constrained by some arbitrary limit, where as job change depends on your negotiation skills and resume). We're optimising for what is successful.

I agree that there are limits internally, if your goal is to stay on the "tech ladder". Those limits carry over across companies once you get to a certain point, right around where you hit the "Lead/Principal Engineer" point. Once you get there, a switch to another company is more often going to be for technology and problem domain (e.g. to do something "more interesting") than for a promotion (pay increase). Promotion by job switching is less likely at this point simply because there are fewer positions of these types required.

It's different for a switch to the "non-tech ladder". Even "laterally" (e.g. "Lead/Principal Engineer" -> "(Senior) Engineering Manager") is effectively a promotion: the compensation is better and the leadership is more likely to listen. It also opens up more opportunities up the ladder internally.

> I know there are lame fan boys, but many of us are actually value focused and realize that a more powerful language is cheaper across the entire product life cycle.

This is by no means absolutely true. It depends strongly on the product and the duration of the life cycle, among many other things. Language choice sometimes has a significant impact which can be positive or negative. Most of the time it simply doesn't matter that much.

Re: Three Paths in the Tech Industry: Founder, Executive, or Employee

#612

Post by dang »

gxs wrote: post #54
ryandrake wrote: post #7

> Often times there are hard barriers preventing people from starting a company. In these cases my best advice is to move to a tech hub (preferably the Bay Area) and work for a tech company until you can save the money I had to laugh there. Moving to the Bay Area will reduce your ability to save money, not increase it. I was probably saving 40-50% of my salary when I worked in Nowhereville, Florida. With the housing…

This is an insult to the thousands of people who make it in the bay area on barista wages. Just fucking wow. You can save in the bay area, live with roommates and pay comfortably . You don't even have to do that forever, just long enough to move up a bit in your job and save for a downpayment if buying a home is your goal. Not to mention if your spouse works and makes similar money then you can live a really high qua…

> This is an insult [...] Just fucking wow [...] If you think you're entitled

It doesn't look like you've been in this kind of flamewar on HN before, or at least not recently, so I'm going to assume that something in the parent comment provoked a strong reaction in you based on experience that the rest of us don't know about. This happens all the time of course. On HN, we all need to remain respectful and give the other the benefit of the doubt, even if their comment was clueless. Your comment would have been fine with just the third and fourth paragraphs.

We have almost no information about each other—just a few dots—but since we're wired to relate to other humans, we always connect the dots to get a picture. Lacking information, we fill the picture in with past experiences of our own, often painful ones, especially when we've seen one or two of those dots before. (Just one is enough, two feels like absolute proof.) In reality we're mostly making these pictures ourselves and then seeing them in the other. Everyone does this everywhere, but it's acute in internet comments because we have so little information about whoever we're speaking with.

On HN, we need to watch for those reactions in ourselves and consciously hold them so they don't blast out at others. The reason is not so much to spare others' feelings, but to protect the commons. When people start blasting and blasting back, they destroy things like gardens and cities, and HN is like those.

You made good points in this thread. But those go up in flames like everything else in a flamewar. That prevents good points from being expressed and received—the kind of exchange that leads to more complex behavior, which makes discussion interesting. Everything on HN boils down to trying to be more interesting where possible.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Three Paths in the Tech Industry: Founder, Executive, or Employee

#613

Post by dang »

urda wrote: post #113
gxs wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is an insult to the thousands of people who make it in the bay area on barista wages. Just fucking wow. You can save in the bay area, live with roommates and pay comfortably . You don't even have to do that forever, just long enough to move up a bit in your job and save for a downpayment if buying a home is your goal. Not to mention if your spouse works and makes similar money then you can live a really high qua…

> This is an insult to the thousands of people who make it in the bay area on barista wages. No this is the reality of living in the Bay Area. People who are living on barista wages are getting screwed by it. It's an insult to them that this is the reality today. > Just fucking wow. Alright calm down, you're on HN not reddit. You can express your viewpoint without being dramatic and vulgar. > You can save in the bay…

You didn't start this flamewar but you fueled it with condescension and got ruder as it went on. Please don't do that again.

Comments need to get more civil and substantive, not less, as a thread gets more provocative. Otherwise we all go up in flames.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Three Paths in the Tech Industry: Founder, Executive, or Employee

#614

Post by gxs »

dang wrote: post #612
gxs wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is an insult to the thousands of people who make it in the bay area on barista wages. Just fucking wow. You can save in the bay area, live with roommates and pay comfortably . You don't even have to do that forever, just long enough to move up a bit in your job and save for a downpayment if buying a home is your goal. Not to mention if your spouse works and makes similar money then you can live a really high qua…

> This is an insult [...] Just fucking wow [...] If you think you're entitled It doesn't look like you've been in this kind of flamewar on HN before, or at least not recently, so I'm going to assume that something in the parent comment provoked a strong reaction in you based on experience that the rest of us don't know about. This happens all the time of course. On HN, we all need to remain respectful and give the ot…

Not sure you read these responses, but thanks, appreciate your thoughtful response.

Definitely wish I had said what I said differently - you're right - it was an emotional response. I was in the middle of a busy day and didn't have to time to gather my thoughts better so it was all stream of consciousness.

That said, all my follow up responses were a lot more measured, and I even acknowledged that I shouldn't have used the language I used in that post.

I should know better than to call tech workers entitled on a site like HN and that's probably the best reminder for me out all of this - know your audience.

Regardless, apologies that you had to spend time cleaning this up.

Re: Three Paths in the Tech Industry: Founder, Executive, or Employee

#615

Post by dang »

gxs wrote: post #614
dang wrote: post #612

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is an insult [...] Just fucking wow [...] If you think you're entitled It doesn't look like you've been in this kind of flamewar on HN before, or at least not recently, so I'm going to assume that something in the parent comment provoked a strong reaction in you based on experience that the rest of us don't know about. This happens all the time of course. On HN, we all need to remain respectful and give the ot…

Not sure you read these responses, but thanks, appreciate your thoughtful response. Definitely wish I had said what I said differently - you're right - it was an emotional response. I was in the middle of a busy day and didn't have to time to gather my thoughts better so it was all stream of consciousness. That said, all my follow up responses were a lot more measured, and I even acknowledged that I shouldn't have us…

No worries. I do see that (and appreciate it) about your responses downthread . If you don't mind, I'll leave the long explanation at the top for others who don't.

Lots of people on HN feel that tech workers are entitled. Some of them are tech workers, some not. Some are even entitled tech workers. It's complicated! So I don't think this is a question of the specific audience so much as human nature. Both sides of this happen to all of us all the time.

Re: Three Paths in the Tech Industry: Founder, Executive, or Employee

#616

Post by dlwdlw »

kartan wrote: post #378
sidlls wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a different (admittedly controversial) take, having been on the "tech ladder" for some time now (as a Senior SWE and Lead Engineer): most individual contributors overestimate how much value they actually provide, especially in the Bay Area. That isn't to say we're not under-appreciated and under-compensated (we are both). But realistically much of the time work we do is easily done by literally thousands of ot…

> The same just isn't true of product development, sales and marketing. Any one of those three teams, staffed well, will account for well more than the value of the entire engineering organization. Why is it not true for them? Sales are not magic, it is a profession that can be learned. I have seen a lot of companies stating how important is sales, and how unique they are. It can't be true for all companies. It is li…

Another thing is that software is more mercenary while sales/marketing is more embedded. Theres more domain expertise that needs to be built and legacy folks that need to relinquish their positions. This requires more time and risk.

Though IMO the mercenary freedom exists only in theory as the true freedom which makes it worth it is blocked by the inane interview processes that develepers impose on each other. There is a dissonance in the way technical skills are supposed to be some sort of objective measure and the moat digging this culture creates. (It specifically allows in only a certain class of "technical")

Though taking a few steps back these are all first world in first sorld problems. :/

Re: Three Paths in the Tech Industry: Founder, Executive, or Employee

#617

Post by findoer »

Lately I'm getting less emotional about this stuff, and realizing that the market is probably smarter than me. If skilled businesspeople, politicians, and people managers are more rewarded by the market, they are probably more valuable to more of society, or at least the parts with money to give. The elite probably choose to have their children educated in the humanities rather than the sciences for a reason. Given that an entry level software development job will give me enough money to sustain myself indefinitely while saving a lot, I'm investing in these areas rather than being upset. My logical reasoning skills (as I can observe them through my performance at chess or math, two of my hobbies) seem to be improving anyway.

Re: Three Paths in the Tech Industry: Founder, Executive, or Employee

#618

Post by eru »

mgkimsal wrote: post #606
eru wrote: post #398

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I wouldn't think it has to be 'single-payer' to get past this but... I don't know. For a start, eliminate the tax discrimination that makes employer paid health insurance cheaper.

From a tax standpoint, as an independent contractor, my premiums are 100% deductible. But I don't get any sort of 'group rate' discount.

But for regular employees there's a different tax treatment when they pay for their own health insurance, isn't it? (Not an American myself.)

Re: Three Paths in the Tech Industry: Founder, Executive, or Employee

#619

Post by CoreXtreme »

sheepmullet wrote: post #461
slg wrote: post #414

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>If your product is software, literally it is impossible that sales add more value than the engineering organization that builds the product. Without engineering organization, you don't have anything to sell. Without sales and marketing, you will also have a hard time. It is collaboration what brings success. The distinction is that product development, sales and marketing can act as multipliers in a way that enginee…

> The distinction is that product development, sales and marketing can act as multipliers in a way that engineering seldom does. Engineering is the key multiplier. > For example, what would happen if magically Twitter's tech became 50% better overnight? What if twitter only needed 50-100 engineers? What if twitter had an ad platform that was as good as facebooks or googles? If the world had 50% better tech we could a…

>> What if twitter only needed 50-100 engineers?

Their IPO will suck because every wannabe big company must have lots of employees to raise more money.

Re: Three Paths in the Tech Industry: Founder, Executive, or Employee

#620

Post by CoreXtreme »

alien_at_work wrote: post #564
beachy wrote: post #386

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You seem to assume its easy to sort the wheat from the chaff. If you offer $1m per year (which is a ridiculous premise from the get go), you'll maybe get more good candidates (though a lot would assume there was something weird going on and would balk), but you'll certainly also get way more bad candidates, including many who are cunning and able to take up a lot of your recruiting bandwidth, and maybe cunning enough…

>It's just too simplistic to assume that throwing money at the problem will solve your talent problems. Labor is a market exactly as any other: paying the highest price does not always get you the best quality but paying the lowest price always ensures you don't.

I've hired plenty of technically rockstar employees for cash strapped startups.

Those who get kick out of these technical challenges are willing to do it for nearly free - we only gotta make sure, their other needs are taken care of.

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