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On Leaving Facebook

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Re: On Leaving Facebook

#481

Post by patja »

ruph123 wrote: post #473
nathanfig wrote: post #464

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some people are very good at BSing their way through interviews, even technical ones. Those people also end up being very difficult to fire and are generally poisonous to culture. Asking them to code is a great filter, it’s hard to fool a compiler. It shouldn’t be the only filter, but for coding roles a coding interview is pretty critical.

How are people in the US difficult to fire?

Because attorneys know how deep the employer's pockets are, which gives them a great incentive to pull out all the stops, which gives corp HR the incentive to make sure there is a long and painful performance management process before anyone can be fired without it exposing the company to too much risk.

Re: On Leaving Facebook

#482

Post by chasd00 »

pdimitar wrote: post #429
thematrixturtle wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bingo. Working from home also exacerbates this, since there is no longer a physical division between "work" and "home", plus there is virtually no social pressure not to slack off.

...And the problem is, what exactly?

Lack of self discipline. If you’re going to wfh you have to be disciplined enough to work during work hours and not work during non work hours.

Re: On Leaving Facebook

#483

Post by [deleted] »

pdimitar wrote: post #422
tippytippytango wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't work like that. You have to be "on" even if you aren't working. That means you feel like you can't commit to anything substantial since you feel like you should be working. Fucking off on the internet is a coping mechanism to numb the pain of being in this limbo where you aren't working; but, feel like you should be working because you are getting paid a lot. In retrospect it's easy to see that there's thi…

So don't admit it to anyone. Work on it by yourself or by sharing it on HN / Reddit / etc. It still reads too much as a very first world of a problem to me, admittedly. I recognize that us the people need to have a goal and a direction, otherwise we start feeling like aimless leaves on the wind -- but you can still do a ton of things at home (if you work remotely which you should) while checking your Slack and email…

[deleted]

Re: On Leaving Facebook

#484

Post by patja »

sockgrant wrote: post #210
zionic wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's not going to stain your CV. Not with that attitude. I refuse to hire anyone with FAANG on their resume and you can all do it too. Most of you on here are all woo woo Linux this and FSF that, but you won’t put your money where your mouth is. I won’t hire you if you work for these assholes, and I’d love for more of you to join me. To the rest of you: Sure, take that $300k total comp bro. Good luck working outsid…

Hi, I’ve worked for two of FAANG, it’s super duper easy to work outside of SV. The reason you sound salty is because you evaluate candidates based on whatever perception you have about who they are instead of trying to understand who they are. I’m sure you don’t care, sounds like it’s working for you, so in any event congrats on finding what makes you happy!

I firmly believe that actions speak louder than words. People will say all kinds of things to project an impression, and then you see what they actually do or did, and sometimes it's quite surprising with the inconsistency.

Re: On Leaving Facebook

#485

Post by sailingparrot »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #308
voakbasda wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Somebody here on HN recently shared the notion that leetcode tests are a legal way to discriminate by age or lifestyle, as older and well-rounded developers do not have the time or inclination to grind on such things.

As a successful developer well past middle age, I find this to be nonsense. The most common complaint I hear around this is "yeah, that discriminates against people who don't have time to grind to do the preparation." Why is it weird that people should spend time preparing for ask for a new job? I mean, ask an orchestra musician how much time they put into preparing for auditions, or how much time many degreed profes…

> Why is it weird that people should spend time preparing for ask for a new job?

Because that preparation, by and large, is not related to the actual job.

> I mean, ask an orchestra musician how much time they put into preparing for auditions, or how much time many degreed professionals put into passing a certification (e.g. the bar exam or medical boards).

Those are all instances of people being asked to do/know things that they will need to do/know for their actual jobs. An actual comparison would be if the orchestra musician was asked to perform blindfolded on a random piece of music, and have to spend 6 months training to memorize the most often requested pieces to be ready for the interview, only to play for the rest of their career with the sheet in front of them. (Not trying to compare difficulty, but absurdity. I don't doubt orchestra musician's auditions are harder)

Also, bar exam and certifications are not job interview. You also have exams and certifications in CS and no one is complaining about having to train for those. A lawyer/doctor certainly doesn't have to pass the equivalent of the bar/medical exam every time they want to change firm/clinics. They just talk about their past experiences. Barely any prep required beside being able to give a good sales pitch about you.

Meanwhile, as a dev, you are expected to do it all over again every time you will change job. Even for internal moves, many of the GAFAMs expect you to go through this again.

Re: On Leaving Facebook

#486

Post by DitheringIdiot »

pkdpic wrote: post #11

Glad to see this was about working at FB / Meta rather than being a user. Just for personal interest. Newish dev doing my first attempt at a FAANG interview. Wondering if I should be trying for FaceBook as long as Im bothering to study. Had a very positive-feeling convo with a recruiter there ~6mo ago before "Meta". Sounds like it might be a negative thing to have on your resume now though? Any thoughts?

I’m not in a position to hire anyone, but I would immediately dismiss anyone who continued to work at facebook after the genocide in Myanmar. It shows either a lack of morals, massive ignorance, or both.

Re: On Leaving Facebook

#487

Post by kooshball »

zionic wrote: post #140
iamstupidsimple wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unpopular opinion: Facebook is widely disliked by the loudest voices in the room (for good reason), but the vast majority of people still just treat it like a fancy forum. It's not going to stain your CV. Plus, Facebook-the-app is far more disliked than Meta-the-company especially now that's a formal distinction. I imagine it's still relatively cool to work on Instagram, for example.

> It's not going to stain your CV. Not with that attitude. I refuse to hire anyone with FAANG on their resume and you can all do it too. Most of you on here are all woo woo Linux this and FSF that, but you won’t put your money where your mouth is. I won’t hire you if you work for these assholes, and I’d love for more of you to join me. To the rest of you: Sure, take that $300k total comp bro. Good luck working outsid…

truly one of the most delusional comment of all time on hn.

Re: On Leaving Facebook

#488

Post by andrew_ »

patja wrote: post #481
ruph123 wrote: post #473

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How are people in the US difficult to fire?

Because attorneys know how deep the employer's pockets are, which gives them a great incentive to pull out all the stops, which gives corp HR the incentive to make sure there is a long and painful performance management process before anyone can be fired without it exposing the company to too much risk.

This doesn't apply to right-to-work states. Nuance is required in an argument like this. For nealy half the country, "hard to fire" is bullshit FUD. It's another excuse to be lazy in interviewing and follow FAANG in lock step.

Re: On Leaving Facebook

#489

Post by chillage »

zionic wrote: post #140
iamstupidsimple wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unpopular opinion: Facebook is widely disliked by the loudest voices in the room (for good reason), but the vast majority of people still just treat it like a fancy forum. It's not going to stain your CV. Plus, Facebook-the-app is far more disliked than Meta-the-company especially now that's a formal distinction. I imagine it's still relatively cool to work on Instagram, for example.

> It's not going to stain your CV. Not with that attitude. I refuse to hire anyone with FAANG on their resume and you can all do it too. Most of you on here are all woo woo Linux this and FSF that, but you won’t put your money where your mouth is. I won’t hire you if you work for these assholes, and I’d love for more of you to join me. To the rest of you: Sure, take that $300k total comp bro. Good luck working outsid…

Hey. I've never worked for a FAANG, but I am considering joining Facebook. They way I see it, Facebook is hugely impactful and there is real work to do there, ex: flagging disinformation, flagging external government influences, etc. It's challenging and extremely valuable work.

If everyone who works at Facebook is blacklisted by people like you, it would just make the company a worse influence on the world because there would be noone left there to make it better. So I would prefer if good people had the freedom to try to make an impact according to their will without fear that people such as yourself will then work hard to tarnish their reputations. Thanks!

Re: On Leaving Facebook

#490

Post by krallja »

SamoyedFurFluff wrote: post #397
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a successful developer well past middle age, I find this to be nonsense. The most common complaint I hear around this is "yeah, that discriminates against people who don't have time to grind to do the preparation." Why is it weird that people should spend time preparing for ask for a new job? I mean, ask an orchestra musician how much time they put into preparing for auditions, or how much time many degreed profes…

I think some of the weirdness is that orchestra musicians at the very least demonstrate skill reflective of the job, and doctors and lawyers only have to get the license once. Software is in this weird category of interviewing being it’s own technical domain that needs dedicated study, of which no amount of experience or prior success graduates you from. Additionally, I find the logic behind this strange. It implies…

> doctors and lawyers only have to get the license once

Doctors have to recredential over their whole career. Used to be every ten years, but some specialties are moving to annual “quiz-sized” credentialing over once-a-decade cramfests.

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