Have the courage to stand up for what you believe in, even if it terminates your employment status. I'm only unkeen to have my name on this, because I haven't done it, and I wish several times in the past, I had. I respect the person who did this early in his career in one ISP immensely: it was stunning to watch somebody say "you're full of shit" to the new CEO, and walk out. (he was btw, full of shit)
What’s good career advice you wouldn’t want to have your name on?
21–30 of 218 posts
Re: What’s good career advice you wouldn’t want to have your name on?
#22Value all parts of compensation that you cannot easily sell at zero. Options? Zero. RSUs for a private company? Zero. Promises for future raises? Zero. Actually: any promises - zero. (Promises on signed paper may sometimes be worth more than zero) Always remember that the place you work at has no (and owes no) loyalty to you. Calculate accordingly.
I valued my stock options at 0, so I left after 2,5 years in a 4 year vesting. I didn’t believe the company would IPO. It did. The founders were good types, after all. Those 2,5 years are now worth 1,7m$, which after tax is about half. I do wish I had stayed the 4 years, instead of valuing them at 0.
Hindsight is 20/20. It’s all about what the right decision was with the information available to you at the time, not what decision would’ve had the best outcome in retrospect.
Re: What’s good career advice you wouldn’t want to have your name on?
#23Earlier quoted context omitted.
Which FAANG company hasn't been giving you bonuses or refresher grants?
Has to be Amazon or Apple. Probably Amazon due to the skimping on RSUs and bonuses, have heard that they’re upping the PIPs lately
You know, it baffles me that Amazon is the only tech giant[1] that consistently sounds absolutely terrible to work at. (In my experience - YMMV)
How do they keep finding engineers?
[1] Well, except Intel. You don't hear about them much online, but around here the local office (not sure about others) bait-and-switches employee openings for contractor openings. They don't even pay that well, and no extra compensation either.
Re: What’s good career advice you wouldn’t want to have your name on?
#24Earlier quoted context omitted.
Which FAANG company hasn't been giving you bonuses or refresher grants?
Has to be Amazon or Apple. Probably Amazon due to the skimping on RSUs and bonuses, have heard that they’re upping the PIPs lately
I’ve heard similar accounts lately from some friends at Amazon. They seem to be tightening the belt.
Re: What’s good career advice you wouldn’t want to have your name on?
#25Value all parts of compensation that you cannot easily sell at zero. Options? Zero. RSUs for a private company? Zero. Promises for future raises? Zero. Actually: any promises - zero. (Promises on signed paper may sometimes be worth more than zero) Always remember that the place you work at has no (and owes no) loyalty to you. Calculate accordingly.
Important: same goes for bonuses, which are also practically promises, and are not guaranteed.
Yup I value bonuses at $0 during negotiation. A few times companies have tried to low ball a counter on the base by promising an increase in bonus percentage. No thanks
Re: What’s good career advice you wouldn’t want to have your name on?
#26Value all parts of compensation that you cannot easily sell at zero. Options? Zero. RSUs for a private company? Zero. Promises for future raises? Zero. Actually: any promises - zero. (Promises on signed paper may sometimes be worth more than zero) Always remember that the place you work at has no (and owes no) loyalty to you. Calculate accordingly.
Honestly this is bad advice. Sure, you shouldn’t plan your life around striking it rich but if you’re going to take a job thinking the equity comp is worthless then you are probably choosing the wrong company and/or going to negotiate poorly. Late stage growth companies that offer RSUs can be sold on secondary markets, so even though it’s not as easy to sell it is probably not worth 0 unless something is very wrong,…
Strong disagree - you absolutely need to factor in liquidity effort alongside vesting schedule and face value for equity comp, and in general for most non-public companies that liquidity capability is zero.
- RSU's that I can only dump on a secondary market are worth a fraction of their face value. - Grants in a company that'll never have a liquidity event are worth a fraction of their face value. - Options in a public company are definitely worthwhile, but I shouldn't be negotiating their face value one-to-one with cash.
It's possible you've had a great outcome liquidating some equity from a private company, in which case I'm super stoked for you and that's a great outcome - but it's not the norm.
Re: What’s good career advice you wouldn’t want to have your name on?
#27Unless required by law in your profession: Don't go to college.
Re: What’s good career advice you wouldn’t want to have your name on?
#28Someone should actually write the article that goes with this headline -- it'd be super interesting.
Re: What’s good career advice you wouldn’t want to have your name on?
#29"HR does not operate with your interests at heart, do not talk to them."
-- Anonymous
Re: What’s good career advice you wouldn’t want to have your name on?
#30Have the courage to stand up for what you believe in, even if it terminates your employment status. I'm only unkeen to have my name on this, because I haven't done it, and I wish several times in the past, I had. I respect the person who did this early in his career in one ISP immensely: it was stunning to watch somebody say "you're full of shit" to the new CEO, and walk out. (he was btw, full of shit)
How is that beneficial to someone's career though?
Sure, it shows one's morals and standards, but how does that boost one's career?