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Ask HN: How to find “senior” jack of all trades jobs?

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Re: Ask HN: How to find “senior” jack of all trades jobs?

#71

Post by anonytrary »

muzani wrote: post #68
soroboros wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm no expert, but I have a hard time believing the economics are this simple. Take health insurance: I'd imagine employers are buying plans offering per-employee costs lower than if each employee were paying for their own insurance. Economies of scale, bargaining power (at least when it comes to larger firms), etc. Perhaps at some firms the processing costs really do outweigh the savings, but I would expect this to…

None of the companies I've worked for offered a decent insurance plan. One had it, but it was more for the other 300 minimum wage workers and practically covered nothing other than car accidents. There were companies that offered full, proper health insurance, but I had my own so the value was close to nil, and the salaries were 25% lower than the smaller companies offered. Benefits tend to be mostly flat across empl…

This is another great point. When the employer controls benefits, they choose an average/bulk/bundled solution which may not cater to the needs of all employees. It is improbable to be completely inclusive. Better to give every employee a static dollar amount and let them choose exactly what works for them from a competitive marketplace.

In my opinion, we should do whatever maximizes product-market fit.

Re: Ask HN: How to find “senior” jack of all trades jobs?

#72

Post by t312227 »

KiranRao0 wrote: post #51
atoav wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not every nation on earth underpays their public sector workers.

Can you provide an example of a public sector job/country that pays their employees well while also not being extremely corrupt?

more or less all north-european countries

and austria :)

sure ... you don't get too much money in the public sector.

but payment is pretty ok, stress is on a considerably lower level than in the private sector, and if you want you are able to work there until you retire ... you remeber: job-safety ... the thing a lot of young people are constantly whining about.

Re: Ask HN: How to find “senior” jack of all trades jobs?

#73

Post by etothepii »

quickthrower2 wrote: post #2

I find that most jobs for small companies are unspecialised Jack of all trades. The smaller the dev team, the more you will be pitching in with product design and dev ops etc. I'm not sure how you can filter for such jobs, given that job descriptions are always vague - but maybe for each job description see if you can find out the company and then research if they are a small startup for small business, or a large co…

I don't think it's just small companies, it's any team that doesn't have a focus on technology. The power of computers is so vast that a moderately competent technologist can deliver enormous business value if they really get to understand the business problems a non technology team is trying to solve. This could be anything from a legal team auto billing a six minute unit for every email received to using python to combine excel workbooks.

This is why we're building https://peerwyse.com. We think finding people with good salaries from your LinkedIn network who you think of as your "skill-set peers" will identify opportunities in their industry that traditional job-title based searches can't reveal.

Re: Ask HN: How to find “senior” jack of all trades jobs?

#74

Post by soco »

moksly wrote: post #61
KiranRao0 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you provide an example of a public sector job/country that pays their employees well while also not being extremely corrupt?

I work in the public sector of Denmark. I make around 20-25% less of my peers in similar private sector functions. I have a friend that I graduated with who’s hopped between a few public sector jobs and for him the number is 5-10%. On the flip side, I work completely flexible hours. Never more than 37hours a week, and within those 37 hours I get a paid lunch break, so it’s really 34,5 hours a week. It brings flexible…

If you actually calculate your pay per amount of work and I mean just taking the official time - 37 hours /week and vacations, you'll actually get to similar numbers as your private sector colleagues. So the basic question is not whether you'd accept a lower pay, but whether you'd accept working less. Then you can add as bonuses the increased flexibility and less stress... Is there a difference in job stability between private and public jobs?

Re: Ask HN: How to find “senior” jack of all trades jobs?

#75

Post by moksly »

soco wrote: post #74
moksly wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I work in the public sector of Denmark. I make around 20-25% less of my peers in similar private sector functions. I have a friend that I graduated with who’s hopped between a few public sector jobs and for him the number is 5-10%. On the flip side, I work completely flexible hours. Never more than 37hours a week, and within those 37 hours I get a paid lunch break, so it’s really 34,5 hours a week. It brings flexible…

If you actually calculate your pay per amount of work and I mean just taking the official time - 37 hours /week and vacations, you'll actually get to similar numbers as your private sector colleagues. So the basic question is not whether you'd accept a lower pay, but whether you'd accept working less. Then you can add as bonuses the increased flexibility and less stress... Is there a difference in job stability betwe…

We have yearly budget cuts, so far I’ve not been involved and I likely won’t be, but it’s a yearly stress factor for everyone as the political level and the administration CEO later spends months figuring out how to cut.

Our private sector is still relatively booming for developers, so there is always jobs openings. People tend to shop around more in the private sector though.

Re: Ask HN: How to find “senior” jack of all trades jobs?

#76

Post by jen729w »

rozenmd wrote: post #63
KiranRao0 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you provide an example of a public sector job/country that pays their employees well while also not being extremely corrupt?

Australia

Yo, Canberra here. Yep.

I always find these posts from Americans amusing. “Yeah right, nice vision of some ideal world there, but it can’t possibly exist.”

Get a passport, kids.

Re: Ask HN: How to find “senior” jack of all trades jobs?

#78

Post by msh »

soco wrote: post #74
moksly wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I work in the public sector of Denmark. I make around 20-25% less of my peers in similar private sector functions. I have a friend that I graduated with who’s hopped between a few public sector jobs and for him the number is 5-10%. On the flip side, I work completely flexible hours. Never more than 37hours a week, and within those 37 hours I get a paid lunch break, so it’s really 34,5 hours a week. It brings flexible…

If you actually calculate your pay per amount of work and I mean just taking the official time - 37 hours /week and vacations, you'll actually get to similar numbers as your private sector colleagues. So the basic question is not whether you'd accept a lower pay, but whether you'd accept working less. Then you can add as bonuses the increased flexibility and less stress... Is there a difference in job stability betwe…

37 hours a week is a danish standard week, also used by private companies.

Re: Ask HN: How to find “senior” jack of all trades jobs?

#79

Post by AnIdiotOnTheNet »

altdatathrow wrote: post #34
badlucklottery wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Most jack of all trades jobs are at small companies in my experience Yup. I'd add public sector work to that list (mostly because it's chronically understaffed and heavily siloed so you have to fill in a lot of roles). BigCos tend to like specialization because of consistency/efficiency. They might have a skunkworks where you can be a jack of all trades but it's hard to get hired into those roles.

> I'd add public sector work to that list Unfortunately, working your ass off for $40k and a questionably managed pension doesn't put food on the table.

In my experience the lower paycheck of public sector was more than made up for by kick ass benefits, more vacation time, and a slew of non-vacation days off.
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