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Poll: Why are people leaving their jobs?

news.ycombinator.com

281–290 of 773 posts

Re: Poll: Why are people leaving their jobs?

#281
post #54

I'll be departing my job at the end of the month. I had too many roles, affecting too many pieces of engineering, and my title didn't reflect my work. I needed to go down to a 4 day work week and have my title reflect my roles, but my manager attempted to call my bluff and essentially said it's not going to happen. I hinted about what my decision would have to be if these accomodations couldn't be made, but he didn't…

Re "trust is broken" - I used to think like this and I understand, but I would encourage you to try a more nuanced POV. There's a decent chance your manager was simply not allowed to accommodate you, and your verbal notice unlocked options from upper management.

Re: Poll: Why are people leaving their jobs?

#282
post #54

I'll be departing my job at the end of the month. I had too many roles, affecting too many pieces of engineering, and my title didn't reflect my work. I needed to go down to a 4 day work week and have my title reflect my roles, but my manager attempted to call my bluff and essentially said it's not going to happen. I hinted about what my decision would have to be if these accomodations couldn't be made, but he didn't…

I was playing a board game with my 7-year-old niece recently. She negotiates the same way most companies do. She holds the line firmly until her bluff is called, and then backtracks quickly once it's too late.

The biggest différance is my 7-year-old will learn, while companies will continue to make the same mistakes.

Re: Poll: Why are people leaving their jobs?

#283

My old boss Eric Carlsen used to say, nobody left because of money. They may get more money if they change jobs. But they start looking because they're unhappy. So when somebody asked for more money, he'd start by asking what was bothering them.

Depends on how much money. If I can get 50K-100K a year more? (significant if you make under 250K annually) Then I'll probably look around even if I'm fairly happy.

Re: Poll: Why are people leaving their jobs?

#284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What investment can reliably get > 5% APR with low risk?

I paid mine off years ago. I got the same thing then. "Name me one investment I can put this 100k into that will pay 1500 a month". That is closer to 15% per year...

Your actual return is only the interest portion of the payment, so that's an odd way to calculate it

Re: Poll: Why are people leaving their jobs?

#285
post #54

I'll be departing my job at the end of the month. I had too many roles, affecting too many pieces of engineering, and my title didn't reflect my work. I needed to go down to a 4 day work week and have my title reflect my roles, but my manager attempted to call my bluff and essentially said it's not going to happen. I hinted about what my decision would have to be if these accomodations couldn't be made, but he didn't…

Re "trust is broken" - I used to think like this and I understand, but I would encourage you to try a more nuanced POV. There's a decent chance your manager was simply not allowed to accommodate you, and your verbal notice unlocked options from upper management.

A good human being would say, "i'm not allowed to say this but...". Which good managers will do. You're on the path to leaving anyway.

Re: Poll: Why are people leaving their jobs?

#286
post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What sort of stuff are you doing? I’ve been in the blockchain space for three years and enjoy the work. HN hates any mention of it though - you’re better off using other mediums for decent conversations on the topic.

I'm currently rebuilding my website and swapping as much of the tech stack for web3, the tech has really come a long way.

Cool! I worked on Cardano for about a year and a half, and have been working on DEXs since (Cosmos and Polkadot). There are some fun technical challenges involved :) It’s a cool space to be in atm

Re: Poll: Why are people leaving their jobs?

#287
I have been programming on the same team for 2 1/2 years and have a very hazy idea what salary I could be making. So one reason for going out and getting offers will be to get an idea of that. If they offer the same or near what I make I am more likely to stay. If my pay is bumped $20k that is more enticing, and even more enticing the higher it is.

So I chose compensation, but company culture and life balance are part of that too. There was a reorg about a year ago, and not long after that people have been complaining about how much workload there is, and how we're not given the tools etc. to deal with it. I gave polite responses to recruiters prior to December, in December I had my first phone call with an inside recruiter in 2 1/2 years. The other night I was programming at 10PM to make a deadline the next day and fired off two applications, maybe just because it made me feel better (although the positions looked good).

It's not just workload, if my workload was refactoring and learning the technology deeper I might not mind the hours, but it is a lot of meetings with multiple teams and a lot of bureaucratic stuff.

The workload/culture just increases or decreases the timeline somewhat. I am socking away enough money a month, I know the team and the stack and have the institutional knowledge (almost everyone on the team joined later). I would also prefer to spend a few months reading the Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs to practicing Leetcode. But crazy workload and culture stuff speeds up my timeline - I am switching from SICP to Leetcode, and am more apt to interview at places "before I am ready". But if work calms down more I might push the timeline out more.

Re: Poll: Why are people leaving their jobs?

#288
Curious to find out if anyone is able to achieve strong career satisfaction working less than less than 20 hours a week.

For me, I've always looked at the exchange of time for money. The problem with that is that you can't exchange money for time, only time for money.

Realizing this, I set work to 0. There seems to be a step function at 40 hours - the "full time job", but I haven't heard of many people that are successful in traditional software engineering jobs with a 20 hour work week, aside from perhaps those that work for themselves and have their project in "maintenance".

Re: Poll: Why are people leaving their jobs?

#289
post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who is making 150/hour and owns a house as a dev in Canada ? Nobody that works for Canadian companies that’s for sure

I thought Canadian houses were purely to be investment vehicles for foreign speculators. Canadians actually live in homes they own?

No, plenty of Canadian speculators as well.

Re: Poll: Why are people leaving their jobs?

#290

My old boss Eric Carlsen used to say, nobody left because of money. They may get more money if they change jobs. But they start looking because they're unhappy. So when somebody asked for more money, he'd start by asking what was bothering them.

Well, my landlord raised my rent 40% this year. So you better believe that made me start looking for another job

It's nice to think an employees's world revolves around office culture. Until Bright Horizons hand you that $4500 childcare bill (food not included, of course)

I could move to a lower COL city. But said job decided not to approve anyone moving to a remote location, we have to be ready for that return to office riiight around the corner

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