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Toxic culture is driving the great resignation

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Re: Toxic culture is driving the great resignation

#331

Post by jjk166 »

2-718-281-828 wrote: post #76
Areading314 wrote: post #34

A huge problem with this industry is the inflexibility to pay current engineers LARGELY increasing comp each year. The thought is that there is a market rate for an engineer and that pay can increase with the market rate, but this is a fallacy. An engineer that has been at a largish company for 1 year is worth 20-30% more than the year they were hired because they have specific knowledge of the tech stack. Yet that e…

so, my pay should increase within 10 years of being employed more than six-fold (1.2^10). makes sense!

Is someone who has been with the company for 10 years worth 20% more than someone who has worked there for 9? Presumably the rate that your value increases slows down once you have a good understanding of what you're doing and the organization.

Re: Toxic culture is driving the great resignation

#332

Post by cjbgkagh »

Buttons840 wrote: post #325
cjbgkagh wrote: post #153

Perhaps I’ve been unlucky but my experience at big tech has been marred by churn and burn culture - high pressure tactics to get the most work out of employees and discarding them when they inevitably burn out. Average tenure was 1-3 years. Amazon was particularly bad at this. The only modicum of power employees have is in quitting and now that they’re exercising it the employers are acting like their throats have be…

Thanks for the story, would love to hear more. Everyone at the company probably thinks the well understood and documented and lovely Java version, which never actually worked, is the better version.

Thanks, well the Scala involved a pretty nice Hierarchical State Machines and an embedded DSL combinator for the custom rules engine. The Java process used Eclipse with State Machine plugins and god knows what for the rules engine. The Java version was an unwieldy monstrosity. It's creators couldn't abandon it fast enough. It was only two people tasked with replacing it, out of a pretty huge company, it really wasn't that big of a deal for the company so few knew about it.

Re: Toxic culture is driving the great resignation

#333

Post by nottorp »

slibhb wrote: post #157
skrebbel wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll never understand the American thirst for money for the sake of it. If HN comments are to be believed, top performer at your average FAANG easily earn $500k per year. At that point, aren't you well past the point where more money brings more happiness, even in high cost-of-living places? What's the point? Why not find a job that's fun and fulfilling?

It's a myth that Americans are greedier than other people. Few people want money for its own sake. Some people are competitive, they want to earn money for status reasons. Or they just want to advance their career and money is a follow-on from that. Other people want money so they can buy expensive things or live in a nice house. Others just want to support their family.

> It's a myth that Americans are greedier than other people.

You think? Just one thing I read between the lines before LED lights. Europeans had 1-200 W of lighting in a room, or even less. Americans had 400W+.

I move that some things aren't even noticed but more wasteful in the US.

Re: Toxic culture is driving the great resignation

#334

Post by varelse »

wonderwonder wrote: post #293
ghaff wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No reason to downvote you. However, if someone has generally changed jobs every year or two and I wouldn't hire someone who I knew with certainty would only stay that long, I might think I'm special enough that I can keep them around. But I'd probably be wrong.

I can only speak for myself but so much of my job hopping is geared towards both getting more money but just as importantly trying to find an environment I really like. I want to find work that is fulfilling and that does not make me dread Mondays. I have reached a level financially where while I can always use more I make more than I ever reasonably expected to make and I am making far far less than many on here. My…

Yes you have figured out the secret (tm) in my opinion. Sturgeon's law applies to tech which is to say 90% of it is crap. Don't waste your time with that 90% and if you find yourself in one of those positions feel no guilt whatsoever running away as fast as you can.

Re: Toxic culture is driving the great resignation

#335

Post by SergeAx »

Areading314 wrote: post #34

A huge problem with this industry is the inflexibility to pay current engineers LARGELY increasing comp each year. The thought is that there is a market rate for an engineer and that pay can increase with the market rate, but this is a fallacy. An engineer that has been at a largish company for 1 year is worth 20-30% more than the year they were hired because they have specific knowledge of the tech stack. Yet that e…

Not to disagree with your take, but where this "40% raise elsewhere" comes from? Are the other company pays new engineer in advance for all those specific knowledge and skills they will learn in a next three years?

Re: Toxic culture is driving the great resignation

#336

Post by kkjjkgjjgg »

awakeasleep wrote: post #180
kkjjkgjjgg wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually aggressively promoting "diversity" (like forcing people into diversity trainings) would count as toxic workplace culture to me.

This seems like a good post to remind everyone that diversity training exists because it shields companies from financial liability when found guilty of discrimination. https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=c5184a20-085e...

Interesting, but not really reassuring.

Re: Toxic culture is driving the great resignation

#337

Post by diordiderot »

kkjjkgjjgg wrote: post #169
gwd wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When you think of "toxic work culture", is "failure to promote diversity" the first thing that comes to mind? Are people really quitting SpaceX and Netflix in droves because they're not sufficiently supporting minority / LGBTQ rights? If anything, doing some "window dressing" for "diversity" is probably a lot easier than actually changing toxic patterns of behavior of the existing set of employees. (And of course act…

Actually aggressively promoting "diversity" (like forcing people into diversity trainings) would count as toxic workplace culture to me.

On average unconscious bias training has no statistically significant effect on average.

Re: Toxic culture is driving the great resignation

#338

Post by vecinu »

Nihilartikel wrote: post #118
skrebbel wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll never understand the American thirst for money for the sake of it. If HN comments are to be believed, top performer at your average FAANG easily earn $500k per year. At that point, aren't you well past the point where more money brings more happiness, even in high cost-of-living places? What's the point? Why not find a job that's fun and fulfilling?

I think that the American thirst for money is perhaps sometimes greed, but most often it's a gnawing psychological side effect of our relative lack of personal security in our society. A person can have $100k in the bank and still be bankrupted and left literally living on the streets if they have the audacity to get cancer, lose their job, and have unlucky circumstances. (edit) This insecurity is a 'feature', not a…

> Personally, I only started feeling safe when my savings edged up towards 1M.. but I may also be more anxious than most.

I'm sure a lot of us feel this way because you need some psychological threshold where you realize that even in the worst case scenario, you can keep yourself fed and still keep a roof over your head.

Make sure you hold on to those gains, a divorce could cut your safety net in half super quick.

Re: Toxic culture is driving the great resignation

#339

Post by mikewarot »

antris wrote: post #184
sbarre wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In effect, you threatened them into giving you a raise. And I'll say congrats on getting it, but are you at all concerned about your ongoing relationship with management? Do they think "he's good for a few years at least now" in terms of comp adjustment, and/or do you expect a raise again next year? At my company, I understand (but have not seen first hand) that anyone who tries this (either comes to the table with a…

Companies will never, ever be loyal to their employees. Don't fall for that "being loyal to your company" mindset. You won't get rewarded.

I used to work for a Marketing company that was pretty loyal to us workers. It's since been sold, I have no idea how the new owner has been handling things.

Re: Toxic culture is driving the great resignation

#340

Post by vecinu »

kubb wrote: post #130
freedom2099 wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just did (although not my first, that one I bought 10 years ago)… sold may old apartment (still in the French Riviera) and with my wife we bought a very nice house 100m from the sea! Mortgage interest rates are great at the moment… 0.9% ain’t bad!

"Why do you need money? Aren't you already rich like me?"

Yeah the cognitive dissonance is fascinating in people all over the world. I hear the same responses from people here in California.

"Why don't you stop renting? Just buy a house like I did 15 years ago, taxes are so low!"

Right... your taxes are artificially low thanks to Prop 13.

"Why do we need high density housing? Just look further away from the city for cheaper housing, I'm going to stay put".

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