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I think I know why you can't hire engineers right now

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Re: I think I know why you can't hire engineers right now

#351

Post by JetAlone »

oleg_antonyan wrote: post #298

> Every engineer is at least a little bit techno-utopian. Funny how my career started in electronics and embedded software and one of the cool things I saw back then was smart home. It was before "IoT hype" and I really thought that controlling your lights or curtains remotely via XMPP is cool. Now I'm building a house and hell no - I want to stay away of this crap, I want "dumb house" not smart. But still, technolog…

I was listening to just one episode of a Stacey Higginbotham's podcast about IoT with one of her colleagues on smart cities (one of her articles got featured here yesterday), and it didn't take long for them to lament the use case for IoT being creepy surveillance rather than dominated by cool and interesting open-source future dream home projects. I think the monetary value gained from surveillance is simply too great for executives to deny, and the monetary value gained from the IoT best-case is too weak for the market to supply... :/

It's overwhelmingly a work force of thwarted techno-utopians. And that means many of the disillusioned workers have crossed the floor to become techno-dystopians, possibly bordering on luddites towards the very tech they are creating, which is an extremely demoralizing position to be in.

Re: I think I know why you can't hire engineers right now

#352

Post by exdsq »

eyjafjallajokul wrote: post #337
richardfey wrote: post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

100k-200k on top of let's say 100k? So they would be making 250k per year? How common is this?

100k is below starting salary in the Bay Area or Seattle. Most senior folks make 300-450k with Staff level engineers making 600-800k.

I don’t know if that’s true. I live in Palo Alto and know a fair few people at a fair few companies. Outside of a handful of companies they’ll only be hitting those with illiquid highly-valued stocks - not with base & bonus.

Re: I think I know why you can't hire engineers right now

#353

Post by bawolff »

pattusk wrote: post #40
hguant wrote: post #8

There comes a point where the money just isn't a motivating factor anymore, and companies are struggling to figure out how to work in that environment. This bit from the author hits the nail on the head: >Is an extra $10k per year worth learning a new org, a new skillset, a new set of expectations, a new set of coworkers, and a new boss? For many engineers, the answer is: “No.” Yes I could quit and get a ~20k raise b…

I do not disagree with your take, but I think you may only be speaking for a subset of engineers that are already fairly well compensated. The article likewise seems to discard the importance of money in favor of three other more immaterial factors, but I do not think this is representative of the situation of the global job market right now. I also think such a perspective can not fully explain the difficulties that…

> but I think you may only be speaking for a subset of engineers that are already fairly well compensated

Didn't the parent directly say that? Money not matering after a certain point means that it still matters before that point.

Re: I think I know why you can't hire engineers right now

#354

Post by exdsq »

eyjafjallajokul wrote: post #340
pjmlp wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Over in Europe and East Asia, $50 to $60k salaries are the norm Yes, and we have plenty of nice stuff that goes along with it Healthcare, 30 paid holidays, unions, paid overtime, weekends and calls off work come extra (it is 40h week period, want more pay for it), retirement, flex time, ... Like the OP, my expenses are more than covered, getting more isn't worth the hassle to change. Ah, and in some countries havin…

> Healthcare, 30 paid holidays, unions, paid overtime, weekends and calls off work come extra (it is 40h week period, want more pay for it), retirement, flex time, ... If you are in your 20's, it is totally worth moving to the US where you can get paid 500K+ per year if you navigate your career efficiently. I posit that making this much money more than covers any of these additional expenses that you call out.

Anyone here earning $500k in their 20s like this person suggests?

I’m sure some can but this is not the norm and expectations need to be checked and called out when wrong.

Re: I think I know why you can't hire engineers right now

#355

Post by bawolff »

mrkentutbabi wrote: post #17

That’s weird. I like money more than “work for cool stuff”. Cool stuff don’t pay bills. Heh, maybe this is why I am an average engineer.

Money also can't buy cool stuff if you spend all your time working.

I definitely prioritize a certain level of money over cool stuff. However i make money to spend on things that make me happy - what's the point if you don't spend it. Taking a lower paying but cooler job, is just another way of spending your money.

Re: I think I know why you can't hire engineers right now

#356

Post by pm90 »

BoorishBears wrote: post #294
optymizer wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

20% seems very low to me. In the 2 FAANG's I've worked at, the RSU's ended up being 100+% of my salary (which was average for my level).

Initial grant was 100% of one year's salary you mean right? So +25% of yearly salary before appreciation? Otherwise you're saying something like a 250k base, 1MM RSUs before stock appreciation... which is a very lopsided looking offer

This is actually a common offer. Some companies that wanna continue to offer high compensation without this upfront sticker cost are now resorting to one year rather than 4 year grants (stripe, Lyft).

Re: I think I know why you can't hire engineers right now

#357

Post by warner25 »

reikonomusha wrote: post #29

Purely anecdotal: In my experience as a hiring manager seeing trends change over the past 10 years, and selecting from the top 10% of candidates by some vague metric, it's primarily about "does it pay a lot" and secondarily "does it offer full-remote"? A lot of my friends, former colleagues, and candidates I've failed to hire end up going to either a FAANG or a very successful brand-name company (typically a SV compa…

I think that "pay a lot" and "full remote" are basically the dream for anyone who's currently responsible for supporting a family. Your company sounds like it offers some great things, but those things would be much more valuable to single and empty-nest folks. At this point in my own life, with four growing kids and an overwhelmed spouse, I don't have the luxury of being able to trade time and money for "really cool work."

Re: I think I know why you can't hire engineers right now

#358

Post by ihateolives »

techsupporter wrote: post #26
mrkentutbabi wrote: post #17

That’s weird. I like money more than “work for cool stuff”. Cool stuff don’t pay bills. Heh, maybe this is why I am an average engineer.

> Cool stuff don’t pay bills. I'm very much on board with this. I put stability and money on about the same pedestal and is why I still work where I do after many years for a salary that is fantastic for 90% of the country but is "merely average" for Seattle. Working for a rock solid medium-sized that's been in existence for a hundred years and funded by a stable endowment and a pile of public service contracts and h…

> a stable endowment and a pile of public service contracts and has never had a layoff is more interesting to me than knowing that the odds of me still having a job in the 2030s, if I still want it, is well above 90%

How do you know you're still around by 2030? I've had 3 people from my close circle die off in the past 6 months. One of them my age, left behind a spouse and two kids. That really changed my perspective. If I'm gonna spend most of my waking hours labouring away in a cubicle away from home then I at least want it to be meaningful. I'm not going just to tick-tock my life away doing meaningless shit for boatload of money that I may or may not get to use eventually.

Re: I think I know why you can't hire engineers right now

#359

Post by evancox100 »

InvaderFizz wrote: post #202
schmookeeg wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you have ever met a recruiter who was NOT an unhelpful middleman, I'd love to meet them. My spam folder is filled daily with dozens of body-shop spammers with 50-point scrabble names offering me jobs I don't do in places I won't live for money I haven't made since I quit my newspaper route in college. It's maddening and has been very consistent throughout my career. I've toyed with the idea of finding a for-fee re…

The recruiter that got me my current gig was great. I literally didn't fill out anything or apply. I handed him my current resume and that was it. He scheduled the interview rounds, managed the negotiations (10k more than my requirements), did everything. Sure, he's getting like $30k from my employer in a month, but whatever. That $30k has almost no impact on my compensation. He mainly does Dallas, but my position is…

Can you email me your Dallas recruiter’s information? Not currently in the market for anything but would be good to have on file and may be useful to some friends in town.

Email is my username with one less 0, at gmail

Re: I think I know why you can't hire engineers right now

#360

Post by suifbwish »

eyjafjallajokul wrote: post #337
richardfey wrote: post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

100k-200k on top of let's say 100k? So they would be making 250k per year? How common is this?

100k is below starting salary in the Bay Area or Seattle. Most senior folks make 300-450k with Staff level engineers making 600-800k.

Sounds like someone who invested in property in the Bay Area or Seattle and is trying to get its value to go up. I would need to see numbers on that.
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