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Netflix CEO explains why he pays technologists huge salaries

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Re: Netflix CEO explains why he pays technologists huge salaries

#401

Post by lazyant »

leptons wrote: post #215
bob33212 wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reed is taking that into account. Reed and Netflix have been creating software for many years. They certainly have had "Rockstars" who could bust out functional but unmaintainable code. Those people are not valuable to Netflix because Netflix is looking for long term success. A 100x engineer exists in the context of a global company like Netflix. Because if a developer makes something just 1% better that translates i…

Netflix doesn't win or lose customers based on programmer performance, they win by having content that people actually want to watch. I don't care if the UI is 10% less slick, as long as they have stuff I want to watch. The only reason I've ever considered dropping Netflix is "why am I paying for this when there is nothing I want to watch". Fortunately, they have come through with some interesting content recently, a…

Just in case: Netflix is 15% of the Internet traffic world-wide and about 1/3 of the traffic in the US (these figures can be a bit obsolete). So the engineering challenges I'd imagine are not so much about UI and recommendation engine as it is about pushing bytes efficiently.

Re: Netflix CEO explains why he pays technologists huge salaries

#402

Post by notacoward »

nullsense wrote: post #272
98codes wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You mean doing the work _again_. I had all the algorithm stuff down cold out of college and maybe for another 5 years after. Now after 20 years of rarely needing any of it and having it be a web search away when I did, I couldn't come up with any of it on demand. "Doing the work" meaning having to study to relearn a thing that I'll maybe use sparingly in my work means the interview process is broken, not anyone's mot…

>"Doing the work" meaning having to study to relearn a thing that I'll maybe use sparingly in my work means the interview process is broken, not anyone's motivation I used to think this too, but as a filter I think it's having the desired effect. From the outside looking in Life at a FAANG seems competitive in nature and they are optimizing for the people willing to push themselves that far to learn something. The ad…

> they are optimizing for the people willing to push themselves that far to learn something

They are optimizing for people in one of two groups. One is people freshly out of college who still have that stuff at the top of their mind. The other is people who have the free time/energy to bring it back to the top of their mind instead of needing a few extra minutes to go back that far in their memories. Pick your privilege, in other words.

> all new hires at least know the effects of space/time complexity and how to make space/time trade-offs deeply well

In my experience, this advantage fades within their first evaluation cycle. And what they certainly don't seem to learn is when to do these kinds of evaluations. Oh, the number of times that I saw one of my coworkers hyper-optimize some part of a system where both N and K were too tiny to matter, then just cargo-cult a crappy higher-level algorithm where such analysis really would have moved the needle.

BTW, since I know someone will launch a "sour grapes" personal attack (and get a free pass for doing so because I'm on someone's target list) if I don't address it, I passed such interviews at 52 with zero preparation and zero trouble. So no, I don't take it personally. I just recognize this approach's flaws. It's why I refused to do interviews at that company, taking a hit for that every half until I left. Some of us stick to what's right instead of rationalizing what's wrong.

Re: Netflix CEO explains why he pays technologists huge salaries

#403

Post by borroka »

asciident wrote: post #257
trident1000 wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honestly I respect that and prefer that as well; just tell me up front so I can move on and not waste any more time. I come from a wall street background and did break through eventually, but they just leave you hanging with no follow up. And the recruiters treat candidates like dates they are ghosting, its really not an acceptable way to treat a human being after they put days even weeks into preparing and coming in…

I think you're missing the logistics needed to do this: 1) to officially reject someone usually needs asking around to build consensus that regardless of any changes to org structure, to outstanding offers, to the current set of interviews, etc. that this person will not get an offer from the company. Information is usually not precise, and often partially missing in the interview loop. Most of the information is foc…

Better.

1) Not really. Not where I work, not where I worked in the past. Maybe somewhere, but if we are talking about tech, rejections can be very quick. 2) In some companies they made a list and they then go down if the top option(s) do not accept, in others you are either the first or they re-do the search. It is company's/hiring manager culture/decision. 3) Very unlikely. Nobody likes to be chosen explicitly as second or third, as the hiring you also have to deal with someone who you did not want initially because you preferred the other(s) and as the candidate you accept to get into a problematic situation from the start. 4) Plenty of companies reject firmly and clearly with no legal follow-up whatsoever (or it they are very occasionally sued by some candidate, we all know it is part of the business).

Being rude, ghosting people, waiting for other candidates to accept before rejecting is all bully behavior of who's very often in a position of power, that is the tech company.

Re: Netflix CEO explains why he pays technologists huge salaries

#404

Post by chillacy »

LockAndLol wrote: post #370

I'm not entirely sure what the best way to pay anybody is, but I definitely think that `maxWage = minWage * 10` or something similar should be applied or even codified in law. 500k as a programmer in a tech company that's doing well sounds like justified compensation. They do write the product after all. I does make me question if there are any juniors present in that company and what kind of salary it is they have.…

Netflix doesn't hire junior engineers: https://www.quora.com/Why-aren%E2%80%99t-there-interns-at-Ne...

But at companies which do, progression usually goes up by around 100k per level: https://www.levels.fyi/?compare=Netflix,Google&track=Softwar...

Re: Netflix CEO explains why he pays technologists huge salaries

#405

Post by chillacy »

legohead wrote: post #137
ffggvv wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

amazon is actually known for paying low salaries...

No they're not, at least here in California. Maybe you're thinking of warehouse jobs. Several people from my work have come over from Amazon, and we constantly interview people who either take Amazon over us (citing more $), or are trying to get away from Amazon but they end up getting a big counter offer from Amazon and staying with them.

On Blind they're famous for paying the least out of any FAANG company and having the fewest perks. I have met some talented engineers who work there though.

Re: Netflix CEO explains why he pays technologists huge salaries

#406

Post by chrismcb »

baq wrote: post #266
bird_monster wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The first time I interviewed at Amazon, the interviewer either pretended that a fire alarm was going off, or was actually going off, so they had to cut the phone interview short. When I asked if they wanted to call me back, they said they didn't think so, and that I'd be hearing from the recruiter. I did not ever hear from that recruiter again. It was a pretty gutting way to interview with, at the time, the company o…

Fire alarm tests happen at office campuses at regular intervals and aren’t announced beforehand. That said, the thing to remember at all times is that the dude doing the interview is just doing his job and you’re little more than a row in a spreadsheet before and after the interview, perhaps even during, too. I wish this was taught instead of having to be hard won experience, especially since this is obvious as soon…

At regular interviews, like every few years. And they will almost always announce them ahead of time. Not to the second, but I've always known when a test was coming. Of course they weren't always tests.

Re: Netflix CEO explains why he pays technologists huge salaries

#407

Post by AnonHP »

unoti wrote: post #163
jcadam wrote: post #144

I interviewed at Netflix several years ago. It was a fairly standard SV interview. That is - whiteboard questions on basic data structures and algorithms (I'm 40 and I still absolutely suck at those). Failed of course :) But they put me up in a really nice hotel, so there's that. In the years since, I've definitely lost all interest in working in SV (the fact that I've failed every single interview I've had with SV c…

> ...whiteboard questions on basic data structures and algorithms (I'm 40 and I still absolutely suck at those)... at my age it's time to accept that the window has closed on some things :) If you want to learn and are willing to put in the work you can do it. It will take some number of weeks or months, but it is totally doable with reading and practice. I read and practiced for a few months before getting my job at…

> I read and practiced for a few months before getting my job at Microsoft at age 45.

What resources did you use and what resources would you recommend?

Re: Netflix CEO explains why he pays technologists huge salaries

#408

Post by bradlys »

winphone1974 wrote: post #242
MR4D wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lots of things are broken. The question is do you want to work hard enough to overcome it? My guess is you’ve got a good enough job already, so it’s not worth the effort.

But these are the people we need to entice to leave their jobs! The best potential hires always have jobs; they rarely go to the open market. They rarely respond to open casting calls and don't need to go through the broken song and dance routine. We know this as the most reliable metric is prior work directly with someone who you trust who vouches for them. Everything else like whiteboarding data algos is weak sauce…

> they rarely go to the open market. They rarely respond to open casting calls and don't need to go through the broken song and dance routine.

I don’t know why people think this. Is there some data to back this up...? I’ve seen great engineers go onto the open market and have to go through the hoops...

Meanwhile I’ve seen plenty of terrible ones have no issues getting through side doors.

Re: Netflix CEO explains why he pays technologists huge salaries

#409

Post by bradlys »

bird_monster wrote: post #342
nkingsy wrote: post #336

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had the “misfortune” of getting fired for going to bat for a junior co-worker who was being taken advantage of by the company. If I hadn’t taken 2 months to do nothing but grind on leetcode problems, there’s no way I was ever going to do it in my precious free time (2 kids, lots of hobbies). I’d never make a bet like that on myself by choice, but in hindsight it would have been an excellent investment years ago. My…

I suppose I'm pointing out the nuance between "Big Tech Co", "Startup" and FAANG. There are plenty of big tech companies that pay well, offer a lot of freedom, interesting tech, but are also not FAANG companies with silly interviewing practices.

> There are plenty of big tech companies that pay well, offer a lot of freedom, interesting tech, but are also not FAANG companies with silly interviewing practices.

Names? I’m genuinely interested in places paying near 400k/yr but without stringent whiteboard exercises. Haven’t seen them tho...

Re: Netflix CEO explains why he pays technologists huge salaries

#410

Post by rusticpenn »

nkingsy wrote: post #390
bird_monster wrote: post #378

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess the splitting point is thinking that whiteboard interviews select candidates that are good coders - a point I have an entire career of anecdotes to disagree with. YMMV, as with everything. edit Also, to be clear, you seem very proud of your interview, your company and coworkers, and I do not mean to discredit your pride or success. I am simply pointing out that your experiences are not universal experiences a…

To the edit: more like I was deeply unsatisfied with each and every non-whiteboard interview process. This is regardless of outcome, including many offers and years of working at companies with broken interview processes. I don’t think whiteboarding is a great methodology, but the other methodologies are worse. As an interviewer, I find it stressful to give whiteboard problems and my data point usually feels fairly n…

The interviews I had, usually are a discussions about the projects I had done and the choices I had made and questions that stem from there. I am not sure what is unsatisfying about interviews like that.
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