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Ask HN: Quitting Big Tech, what is it like?

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Re: Ask HN: Quitting Big Tech, what is it like?

#241

I quit full-time work in 2001, after being burned out in the dot com boom. I did well for myself financially after the startup I was in got bought. The phrase "well" is of course subjective, considering that no colleague of mine quit. I left a whole lot of money on the table, but never once have I regretted it. I decided that the name of the game is to optimise quality of life. That means, infrequent brutal deadlines…

You’re describing the reason I wanted to transition into developer management for so long - to be in a position to have the conversations that will prevent the type of environments that create burnout.

So far, it’s working but it’s not as easy at it should be. I do work for a company where I legitimately care about the mission, the company and it’s impact but I get most of my sense of purpose from taking care of my team.

Re: Ask HN: Quitting Big Tech, what is it like?

#242
post #149

These kind of posts keep making me think I should go work for a FAANG so I can actually retire one day. Anyways, as someone on the other side, who has never worked for or applied to FAANG, I have a few reactions. First, your salary is absolutely ridiculous. I know hard working people who have built their own businesses with blood and sweat, and they still don't make as much as a slacker engineer at FAANG. So I'd say…

What's FIRE?

Re: Ask HN: Quitting Big Tech, what is it like?

#243

I burnt out decades ago. Unfortunately, I kept coming back to tech when I could half-stomach it again and desperately needed money instead of doing what I really knew I should have done, which was to make a career change to something drastically different. This is one of my greatest regrets in life. Now I'm old, my skills are out of date because I really don't give a crap enough about tech to learn the latest buzzwor…

Welp, I changed careers drastically, just to find out that the major problem I have is... myself. Paradoxically, I've found out that the other half of the problem is seeing myself as a problem. So now I'm kinda stuck in this loop.

Re: Ask HN: Quitting Big Tech, what is it like?

#246

I quit full-time work in 2001, after being burned out in the dot com boom. I did well for myself financially after the startup I was in got bought. The phrase "well" is of course subjective, considering that no colleague of mine quit. I left a whole lot of money on the table, but never once have I regretted it. I decided that the name of the game is to optimise quality of life. That means, infrequent brutal deadlines…

I am 32 now. I am inspired to read this. I still need to get over the fact that I am not making anywhere near a FAANG engineer.

I was you, 5 years later I am working at a FAANG making 400k/yr

Mind you I was making only 80k less at my last job, a non-FAANG startup. So not saying FAANG is everything, but the workload is sufficiently less than the mad max startup lifestyle.

Re: Ask HN: Quitting Big Tech, what is it like?

#247
I woke up at 5:15 this morning because I was so excited to go into work at my startup. At Google, I wasn't excited a single day.

Think of something you care about, and do that. For me, that was renewable energy. My friends who stayed probably make twice or three times as much as me but who cares; they spend 3 hours a day on a bus and 8 hours at a desk they hate. Most days, I spend less than 1 hour doing things that I don't want to do.

Re: Ask HN: Quitting Big Tech, what is it like?

#248

I am struggling with this as well. If you were there a decade I'm guessing you are set for life financially? I know I would have been at a decade but left after 5 years so I am not set for life which means I'm in this dilemma. go back for the money (safe retirement) or do something more risky (dad took the risk, failed, might be in the poor house except married a younger wife who has good job). I'm 54 so not a lot of…

How many FAANGs have you worked for? You could try a different one and see if you can last 5 years there, thus making up the total 10 years needed to accumulate what to an average salary is a career's worth of income.

Or even a second/third tier FAANG. BigCo, sure, maybe even not technically a tech-company (I classify my own employer this way), but the base salaries are still pretty nice even if you'll be demoralized at how much less you get in annual RSUs compared to the first tier FAANGs.

I ask since I also ruminate on this question (a lot more commonly since my 5 year mark passed a few months ago) but I've also observed we get a lot of incoming hires from places like Microsoft/Intel/even Apple. While I'm not sure the frustrations at the other BigCos would be any more tolerable after a prolonged period than my current BigCo, I do think they'd at least be different, and eventually intolerable in different ways. That can be enough to make it work out. For me, the stresses aren't so much the team or even the project, but the higher level company policies/dysfunctions that can't be solved by moving to a new team. (I think "not having any say in product direction" is something that can be solved by moving teams -- or similarly "tired of having to do the PM's job" for those who just want to code solutions to given problems.)

Of course there are always the smaller companies available, and their base pay isn't that much less than the FAANGs. Soon I'll get to welcome back a former coworker who left our BigCo for the then not so big and just-recently-IPO'd Tableau. There are many such pre-IPO or recently-IPO'd companies that are well funded enough to offer comparable base salaries, with stock options that if they pan out will tend to be a nice little boost on what you'd get just having worked at a FAANG and receiving RSUs. (And if not, at least the base salary is still quite a bit better than you'd get doing many other things instead.) I know his mental sanity was a lot better for the move, it'll be interesting to see how long it takes for him to leave again.

And of course there are various consulting routes. At my previous job we were a 2 (and at times 4) person unfunded startup. To fill the coffers the founder occasionally leveraged his consulting network he built prior to going full-time startup and took on small projects that I'd also shift my focus to. The change in work to deliver on those was fun, and if you do that all the time instead you can make good money. I'm not that great at network building though, but fortunately if you can't find your own clients to do a project for (or a client who will have you work on a team of full timers for a fixed term) there are plenty of intermediaries. One of my close coworkers in his early 40s has had a good time alternating between long stints and doing contract work in between. Unlike me though he doesn't want to reach a state of not working. (Technically I see it as wanting "not having to work to live" rather than not working ever again, but he doesn't want to stop working period, so "having to" work isn't really a concern. My mom was like that and she was working until she died, I didn't inherit that trait though.)

I think back to https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7423626 a lot and consider "just suck it up" as a decent solution. Or take a year break (easier for me, I'm only 29), then suck it up for another 5 somewhere else in order to hit the threshold "effectively retired, barring a Great Depression" investment number. Then I can do what I want, which could very well be described as noodling, as opposed to something with a "mission" or "meaning".

Like you I sometimes feel stupid for not just internalizing "work is work" and carrying on. It's not such a terrible problem to face, wanting to get out of a cushy-yet-soul-crushing gig with minimal hazards, yet here I am ruminating about it.

Re: Ask HN: Quitting Big Tech, what is it like?

#249

> How do I know what the source of the problem is? You don’t like working for FANG. That seems like a totally normal sane response to me. I’d be more concerned about the people who love that corporate environment rather than those it doesn’t give meaning to. Some people like the security and routine and structure (understandable), some people like the politics (weird), but I don’t think you need to overthink this. Th…

> You don’t like working for FANG. That seems like a totally normal sane response to me. I’d be more concerned about the people who love that corporate environment rather than those it doesn’t give meaning to. There are lots of people at Amazon, Google, and I'm sure Facebook that find meaning in their job. Improving search actually does help people, billions of them. Improving the web stack (Chromium) also helps bill…

Yeah, I think you’re right in that I’ve come across as _too_ dismissive.

I’m sure many people do find meaning at Amazon etc on specific projects, I just think it’s extremely unlikely that _most_ of their employees will; in large corporations there are few cutting edge robotics jobs etc and lots of jobs that don’t really have a purpose outside of serving the corporation. I guess I’m talking about the majority.

Re: Ask HN: Quitting Big Tech, what is it like?

#250
post #149

These kind of posts keep making me think I should go work for a FAANG so I can actually retire one day. Anyways, as someone on the other side, who has never worked for or applied to FAANG, I have a few reactions. First, your salary is absolutely ridiculous. I know hard working people who have built their own businesses with blood and sweat, and they still don't make as much as a slacker engineer at FAANG. So I'd say…

What's FIRE?

Financial Independence/Retire Early

The core idea is to define your annual expenditures (let’s say $50k), a long term investment strategy you personally feel comfortable with (say 5% ROI), and from there you can deduce the amount you need to save to be financially independent (in this case, $1M).

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