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

cushychicken.github.io

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

#881

Post by freyr »

giantg2 wrote: post #763
freyr wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You’re being too hard on yourself. You suck at interviewing, you suck at applying to high-paying jobs, or you don’t live near high-paying jobs.

I got about a 4.5% effective pay cut this year. I'm 10 years in with an MS and I'm only a midlevel making under $100k. I don't think those excuses apply.

None of that has any bearing on what I said. If anything, having an MS and mid-level experience only make it easier for you than most.

But you’ve been complaining about your job for months and you’re still there. And you talk about all other jobs like they’re beneath you.

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

#882

Post by jiggunjer »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #751
jiggunjer wrote: post #405

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you assume a LCOL area is a downgrade. Those asian countries have still have pretty cheap private healthcare.

Many people in HCOL areas think LCOL areas are a downgrade, and…they are cheap for a reason. If it’s just lack of jobs, for a retiree that’s fine, but high crime bad weather poor infrastructure bad schools bad scenery are also possible. You don’t want to stop living in retirement, especially if you retire early. Desirable places to retire like Santa Fe are already getting expensive. Cheap private healthcare works for…

I still don't see you mention a reason for the (rather US centric) assumption. Fact is many LCOL areas are upgrades if you don't need to work.

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

#883

Post by _hcuq »

bluGill wrote: post #618
fnord123 wrote: post #475

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> specially compared to the US where quite some companies will match our European amenities (talking about software engineering jobs). Debatable. In most European countries, if you lose your job you still have health cover. If you lose your job in the US you do not keep the company benefit health insurance (except as part of a severance package for a limited time). For H1-B visa holders, they must leave the country (…

But it isn't hard to find a job, and there are other options for health care while you are looking. I agree that it is stupid to tie health insurance to your job, but it isn't the big deal you make it out to be, so long as you have savings

As a 55 yr old with 3 dependents, the insurance is $25,000 per year.

That’s quite a hill to climb before I see a penny of income into my pocket.

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

#884

Post by Qub3d »

hiq wrote: post #868
Qub3d wrote: post #739

> If you’re a strictly B2B company, you work when businesses work. That means “9-5” schedules, most major holidays observed, and almost no weekend pager duty. Mention this to your prospects. A sane workplace with defined starts and ends to the workday is very attractive to a certain kind of engineer - the kind that likes to be home for dinner, and read their children bedtime stories, for example. I am the "kind of en…

> I have been able to focus on my writing and speaking How did you do that?

I joined a meetup group and started prepping and giving talks. I also have been working on my personal website, as well as a hobby project, https://dotbun.com

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

#885

Post by seanmcdirmid »

jiggunjer wrote: post #882
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #751

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many people in HCOL areas think LCOL areas are a downgrade, and…they are cheap for a reason. If it’s just lack of jobs, for a retiree that’s fine, but high crime bad weather poor infrastructure bad schools bad scenery are also possible. You don’t want to stop living in retirement, especially if you retire early. Desirable places to retire like Santa Fe are already getting expensive. Cheap private healthcare works for…

I still don't see you mention a reason for the (rather US centric) assumption. Fact is many LCOL areas are upgrades if you don't need to work.

> Fact is many LCOL areas are upgrades if you don't need to work.

Sorry, having lived in Mississippi for 4 years, that is not really true. Or I guess it depends on what you mean by "many", because there are many bad cheap places out there (e.g. Gary Indiana, Port Gibson Mississippi, Monroe Louisiana, ...). It also depends on what you mean by upgrade: many people like big city amenities (food and cultural options) and would see moving to the sticks as depressing, just like many would see the opposite (they love the country side, hate big cities).

Internationally, LCOL areas are generally in developing countries, and even a city like Bangkok will get expensive after awhile (though big cities in the west might get more expensive faster). It is still a trade off, many can't make (and many can, good for them).

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

#886

Post by comp_throw7 »

exdsq wrote: post #796
nvarsj wrote: post #512

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unless it changed dramatically in recent years, when I was in Chicago prop trading firms were paying mid 200 to 300 after a few years. 500k was definitely not normal comp for most engineers at any trading firm, although obviously there are exceptions.

Thank you. This is really my point. People share these rumors of a small minority making huge sums and normalize it as what anyone can do, which just does harm to the industry and to individuals. People actually in the sector/area know it’s not true yet there are those just sharing things they heard like facts.

Entry-level SWE comp for top-end finance shops in Chicago & NY is 400k+, so, ah, no. See levels.fyi.

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

#887

Post by comp_throw7 »

exdsq wrote: post #829
dastbe wrote: post #465

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i would guess as a percentage there are two orders of magnitude more senior engineers at an arbitrary tech company vs managing directors at an arbitrary investment bank. senior engineer is ~5 years of experience to achieve, with maybe 1-2 years extra if you're meandering.

I was being facetious - advising someone to become rich and retire early by getting a very difficult to achieve role in another country 10x that counties annual salary in their 20s is not much better than saying to someone if they want to become rich they should just become a world famous actor or something. It’s just unrealistic advice that does more harm than good (and it rubs me the wrong way hence these responses…

It is actually a lot better. The hard part is getting into the US, not getting one of these jobs. People meme about practicing leetcode for months but the reality is you should be able to land an offer with no more than 50-100 hours of practice (sure, you might need to do more if you're not actually that strong, but FAANG literally employees 5%+ of the engineers in the country, their standards aren't _that_ high).

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

#888

Post by ridethebike »

decafninja wrote: post #740
ridethebike wrote: post #636

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Worked in several banks. "We are not bank, we are tech company with bank department" - was mentioned occasionally in each of them. What was also common - red tape, outdated software (tools, libraries, frameworks), restricted access to workstation, processes focused around pushing approvals around (instead of automation). That's why my response to "we are not a bank" sentiment above is "it's a bank, alright".

Saying that they are a tech company is popular amongst the big banks these days. Technically that's true - they (and most businesses these days) are driven by tech and would fall apart without it. But tech is most definitely a cost center entity at such firms and tech employees likewise treated as second class citizen. As my old engineering manager at a bank told us - "if a trader tells you to jump and dance like a m…

I personally can't speak to SV tech company. However I worked in msft and difference is staggering, it's two completely different universes.

>> ([..] most businesses these days) are driven by tech and would fall apart without it

Yup. It's like, is Coca-cola a "tech company with soda department"? Pretty sure they have programmers and some non-trivial IT infra as well.

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

#889

Post by comp_throw7 »

episteme wrote: post #469
IshKebab wrote: post #464

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah same in the UK. 25 days is the norm. 28 days is good. 30 days is very rare. Also nobody gets paid overtime, the company's pension contribution is 5% of your salary. Yes benefits are better in Europe, but not so much that you're better off earning $100k here than $200k in America.

But does this include bank holidays? We have 8(?) paid bank holidays in the UK so even 22 days is in reality 30. There are much fewer in the US.

Err, what? The company I work for (in the US) has like 13-14 paid holidays, and recently gave everyone an extra 3 days off right before the New Year. I think we probably have one or two more than average, but not by that much.

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

#890

Post by elihu »

moonchrome wrote: post #771
tablespoon wrote: post #685

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> These things might be reasonable in a startup with a dozen people, but we have over a hundred thousand. My opinion is that once an organization is a certain size, everything really needs to be written down and easily accessible. I shouldn't have to regularly ask people how to do basic things, it should be on a wiki. If it's complicated, it should be in a training video, or a user manual. Here's the root cause of yo…

Few people read the documentation (spent a lot of effort early in my career on writing docs and copy pasting the docs in replies to questions). Writing good documentation is a skill that takes a non-trivial amount of time to develop. It also takes time to write. Keeping documentation up to date is hard and takes time/effort. Poorly written or out of date documentation is worse than no documentation.

If the software cannot be used for its intended purpose without some special knowledge, and that knowledge is not available to everyone who uses that software, then the people who don't have access to that knowledge are going to be unable to use the software for its intended purpose.

To some people in some kinds of organizations, this is a feature. The people with the hidden knowledge are more powerful than those without it.

If the software is written well enough that it doesn't need much or any documentation, then great! If that's not true, though, there had better be documentation if you want people to use it.

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