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Changing jobs during the Great Resignation

adamconrad.dev

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Re: Changing jobs during the Great Resignation

#231

Post by ngokevin »

dangus wrote: post #194
yoyohello13 wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reading these responses is pretty upsetting. No wonder big tech is so evil. So many talented developers willing to sell their soul for more money. No thought to whether what they’re doing is causing harm to the world.

The irony of the article is that Meta isn’t even that hard to get into because so many candidates hard no on them because they know Facebook is evil. I read an article that said how Meta has to pay well above market rates to acquire talent due to their negative perception. It’s basically working for the cigarette company of tech.

That sums it up. I've told friends and family it'd look poorly on them for going there if they have plenty of options.

Re: Changing jobs during the Great Resignation

#232

Post by TideAd »

lhorie wrote: post #157
nostrademons wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amazon is not going to change from the inside for anyone making $1M. If you go in thinking it is, you're deluding yourself and will be much less effective than if you just accept that Amazon is what Amazon is and you're whoring yourself out to them for $1M/year. Your paygrade needs to be at least $100M/year to have a reasonable shot of changing the culture of a large company. Most likely, by the time you get up there…

I know a guy in there (who most likely isn't making anywhere near 100M), who transferred into the HR org to try to make a dent into the problem of employee turnover, PIP BS, etc. Last I heard, he was giving middle managers a hard time for perpetuating the sorts of bad behaviors that give Amazon its bad reputation as an employer. Maybe Amazon is a lost cause, maybe it isn't, but you won't know if you can fix it unless…

PIP culture at Amazon comes from the very top. Bezos was a huge fan of it and so is the new CEO. There's no way your friend is going to be able to fight institutional power like that.

Re: Changing jobs during the Great Resignation

#233

Post by fires10 »

ngokevin wrote: post #229
yoyohello13 wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reading these responses is pretty upsetting. No wonder big tech is so evil. So many talented developers willing to sell their soul for more money. No thought to whether what they’re doing is causing harm to the world.

I have to agree. I do understand human desire to put themselves and their families first, and that it's a job at corporations, and that some people view themselves as cogs in capitalism no matter what However when one the pick of the litter, there's a spectrum between getting $1M for a company responsible for polarization, breeding hate, and damaging democracy...to living well comfortably on $200k+ (or even $300k+) t…

Some people the money is necessary for survival. Those salaries are not easy to replicate outside of big tech. Making six figures is difficult in a lot of places. When I interviewed for Meta I knew I would accept what they gave me as they were offering remote at the time. I did not get the job, but I do actually need to support a family. Heck, where I live in the US, I would jump for less than $200k right now.

Re: Changing jobs during the Great Resignation

#234

Post by wyclif »

AsusToss wrote: post #19
claudiulodro wrote: post #8

It's wild to me that his way of figuring out what companies to apply for was to make a list of the top-paying ones and just pick the top 10 highest-paying. Is that a common strategy? No thought about product, industry, impact on the world, just $$$. It looks like it worked out for them though, since I guess they got like a million dollar offer, so maybe I'm the one approaching this the wrong way?

It’s wild to me that the only reason his wife gave him 30 mins/day of personal time was because of the financial payoff. Bizarre dude and story.

What's wild to me is that he had to ask his wife for permission to get more personal time in exchange for getting a much higher paying job. I've been married over 10 years and have two kids, and I don't need permission from anyone to do something that I think is going to improve the life of my loved ones; I just do it. And anyway, 30 min/day x three months seems to be a really small ask considering the dramatic improvement in financial status his wife and family will benefit from. Essentially that extra 30 minutes a day counts as work he's doing to bring home the bacon.

Re: Changing jobs during the Great Resignation

#235

Post by jmchuster »

cebert wrote: post #124

Is something wrong with software engineering interviews that one could reasonably need to spend months prepping for interviews? Leetcode problems can be fun and interesting, but seldom represent problems and skills I employ daily as a more senior software engineer. Studying these problems won’t help me much at my current employer and likely wouldn’t after I passed the interview gauntlet at another firm.

Maybe it's because i know a lot of doctor friends, but months of prepping to then get paid more than they do seems way unfair in my favor.

Re: Changing jobs during the Great Resignation

#236

Post by vchynarov »

hintymad wrote: post #61

I don't quite get the study plan, as it sounds more like cramming. Nothing wrong with cramming per se except that what you learn does not stick, and you will have to repeat the process when you need to switch jobs again. I think a better system is to regularly study fundamentals and always deep dive in your work. Case in point, I've never had problems passing interviews by FAANG or other hot startups, I always got ti…

Despite your name referencing insanity I love your comment and it's a beacon of rationality in the current tech interview bubble. So generally I agree, but unfortunately sometimes the format and expectations of the coding interviews really demand prior grinding. I don't like it but it's the reality.

IE let's say you have a graph question that requires either BFS and DFS. You're a competent engineer who both recognizes the applicable algorithm and could reasonably implement it from scratch.

Some problems then have additional constraints such as adding bounds-checking (if searching inside some sort of "map") and checking visited nodes. The engineers who've grinded leetcode have muscle memory ready to regurgitate code for those conditions.

Competent engineers are able recognize these and implement them, but that lack of muscle memory wastes vital time for the interview. (Yes, those seconds are never a real constraint in the day-to-day).

Re: Changing jobs during the Great Resignation

#237

Post by fshbbdssbbgdd »

ngokevin wrote: post #229
yoyohello13 wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reading these responses is pretty upsetting. No wonder big tech is so evil. So many talented developers willing to sell their soul for more money. No thought to whether what they’re doing is causing harm to the world.

I have to agree. I do understand human desire to put themselves and their families first, and that it's a job at corporations, and that some people view themselves as cogs in capitalism no matter what However when one the pick of the litter, there's a spectrum between getting $1M for a company responsible for polarization, breeding hate, and damaging democracy...to living well comfortably on $200k+ (or even $300k+) t…

Invariably big companies are causing some harm as a side-effect of their business. They’d usually be better off if their business didn’t cause this harm. This means they employ people whose entire job is to reduce the harm. If your goal is to make the world a better place, these roles can be a good opportunity to do that given the scale involved. From a utilitarian perspective, it’s easy to argue that a person in that position is doing more good than most people in the world.

On the other hand, if someone is just trying to make the most money, they may end up causing harm. There are many jobs like that - but the scale is more at bigger companies.

I don’t think it makes sense to judge someone based on the company they work for if you don’t actually know whether that individual’s actions are making the world a better place or a worse place.

Re: Changing jobs during the Great Resignation

#238

Post by seattle_spring »

ngokevin wrote: post #230
BeFlatXIII wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the primary purpose of your job is to raise funds for the things that actually matter, what other method would you use? Take the biggest bag that leaves you with enough time to enjoy what you worked so hard to spend that money on.

Experienced engineers will have plenty of time and plenty of cheese to do whatever they want, up to them whether they choose to go to somewhere like Meta. The only thing I can imagine that $300k can't do that $750k-$1m can is buy up a bunch of property and price people out

You can retire far quicker on the higher salary.

Re: Changing jobs during the Great Resignation

#239

Post by [deleted] »

seattle_spring wrote: post #238
ngokevin wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Experienced engineers will have plenty of time and plenty of cheese to do whatever they want, up to them whether they choose to go to somewhere like Meta. The only thing I can imagine that $300k can't do that $750k-$1m can is buy up a bunch of property and price people out

You can retire far quicker on the higher salary.

[deleted]

Re: Changing jobs during the Great Resignation

#240

Post by driverdan »

dominotw wrote: post #200
gleenn wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The very last bit of the article interestingly stated that they author wouldn't spend time doing prep again, they would only make sure they applied with a referral. I definitely agree, it's kind of a blight on our industry that the interview process is so contorted compared to the actual work we're supposed to do.

> they would only make sure they applied with a referral. How is referral useful in general. You still have to go through the whole song and dance anyways?

At the very least referrals almost always bump you up the list. At best they can put you on the fast track for a position. IMO they are worth more than anything else you can do to get a job, so long as they are genuine.
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