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Ask HN: Did you change jobs during the Great Reshuffling and regret it?

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41–50 of 63 posts

Re: Ask HN: Did you change jobs during the Great Reshuffling and regret it?

#41
post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

UK potentially

As an expat currently in the UK - my electric tariff is about to go from .18p per kWh to .36p. Gas is doubling as well. Most homes here have awful insulation, so I’ll be looking at 230gbp a month for my little two bedroom apartment. It’s crazy out here.

Crazy, probably 3x what would be reasonable per kWh in Australia.

Re: Ask HN: Did you change jobs during the Great Reshuffling and regret it?

#42
post #22

Having entered adulthood in the US during the Great Recession and being laid off the second it benefited the company (despite easily turning a profit), I cannot understand your position. My grandparents had hefty pensions and their careers grew _with_ their companies. Modern management practices dictate short-term margin as a priority meaning high-salaried employees are considered risks before boons. That, coupled wi…

Pensions are long gone in most small "startuppy" companies. That takes away one big motivator to stay.

Agreed. That was a large source of "loyalty" for older generations. My wife's father will retire soon with a generous pension - one of the last of the factory workers who had a pension. Employees aren't loyal and that is largely a self-inflicted issue.

Re: Ask HN: Did you change jobs during the Great Reshuffling and regret it?

#43
> I do not think that companies deserve to be screwed by all this turnover.

While this line gets a lot of attention, I want to attack the misconception too:

You owe your employer exactly what's in your contract. That's your agreement.

If you think you owe them something out of the goodness of your heart, and they have no contractual obligation to compensate you proportionally for that, then you're making unnecessary rules for yourself.

I'm not saying you shouldn't be insensitive towards knowing your employer will be screwed if you leave; but if that is truly the case, and you're not explicitly being acknowledged for this importance (contractually, monetarily, benefits-wise, responsibility-wise), you need that to grow. Where you're at, or somewhere else.

I remember talking to a past manager about how excited I was about an acquaintance who had accepted a position through my effort. The manager said he would celebrate on the day this person stepped through the door on his first day, and not sooner, because he'd seen people change their minds up until the last moment. It's just business.

A part of being a professional is being able to operate with sunk costs.

Re: Ask HN: Did you change jobs during the Great Reshuffling and regret it?

#44

I can't help but think that this post is astroturfing by a company that keeps losing its employees due to better conditions elsewhere. The thought of feeling guilty for an employer is preposterous to me.

Not necessarily employer, but you can easily feel guilty for a team. I did when i left a few months ago because i knew i was a valuable contributor, there was lots of stuff going on and that it'd take a long time for me to be replaced, leaving the people I've worked with for years, and whom i liked, under extra pressure.

Re: Ask HN: Did you change jobs during the Great Reshuffling and regret it?

#45
post #24
post #9

Traitor? To a company? What a concept. Corps will happily throw people on the street.. I don't understand that guilt that seems interwoven in your post. I changed jobs recently and got much better pay and WLB. Not doing so would have been betraying myself.

> I don't understand that guilt that seems interwoven in your post. An account called "buttocks", with corresponding smiley in description... the potential for being trollish in nature is relatively high.

I'm not trolling, just anonymous and being goofy about it. Kiss my butt :D

Re: Ask HN: Did you change jobs during the Great Reshuffling and regret it?

#46

I can't help but think that this post is astroturfing by a company that keeps losing its employees due to better conditions elsewhere. The thought of feeling guilty for an employer is preposterous to me.

I really liked the mission of the company I worked for. The management was poor and they did nothing as they saw my coworkers going out the door. Then I left too. That doesn't mean I want to see my former company and its mission suffer. That may not be completely rational but preposterous seems a bit harsh.

Re: Ask HN: Did you change jobs during the Great Reshuffling and regret it?

#47
Loyalty is a two-way street or it's not loyalty, it's an abusive relationship.

It is not rational to treat a company like a human no matter what their policies and behaviors are, even when they are great, but especially when they don't treat you like a human.

Remember that basic thing any time anyone tries to make any other kind of argument.

If the company doesn't treat you the same way you would treat say your sister or a friend etc, complete with lending you emergency money and driving you to the airport and helping paint your deck... then they are not your friend.

Which is fine. The purpose of a company is not necessarily to be anyone's friend. A company is an artificial construct, a tool to perform a job just like a lawnmower. You don't feel guilty about replacing a lawnmower no matter how well it's served you.

People inhabit a company, but the company itself is not a person, it's a legal document and a structure of organization.

It has certain properties that make it somewhat of an entity, but so does a yeast cell.

It's not a person and it is wrong to allow it to convince you into granting it personhood considerations, especially when it does not grant them to you, ut really no matter what, even if it's been great to you.

All that means is that if they are fair and professional with you, then it's right to be fair and professional with them. You do honest work and don't seek to harm them for no reason etc.

But at it's best it's still only ever a purely business relationship. They don't owe you anything but the terms of the contract, which remember btw, they wrote, not you, and so you only owe them exactly that same thing. Not just legally but morally and ethically too.

You shopping for a better deal is not merely a technicality or legal loophole that lets you get away with behaving badly, it's simply not behaving badly in the first place.

It's not a mark against your integrity to insist on this basic respect and dignity. If anything it's a mark towards it because everyone who insists on being treated like a human are the ones helping to raise the standard that makes everyone else's lives less miserable. Too many people are too easily abused and exploited, and so the few that stand up for themselves are actually critical for us all.

Re: Ask HN: Did you change jobs during the Great Reshuffling and regret it?

#49

> I do not think that companies deserve to be screwed by all this turnover Perhaps companies should better look after their employees and give them a reason not to leave. Many of us are fed up of being underpaid and undervalued. Add to that the increasing demands to return to an office and it's not hard to see why we're jumping ship to work for businesses that pay better and offer remote working arrangements. I chang…

Yeap. Work my ass off and got rewarded with 3% this year. I have golden handcuffs with a retention bonus in early *2024* so they think I am locked in. Cue the shocked Pikachu faces when I resign soon because the idea of being there in 1.75 years almost gives me a panic attack.

Re: Ask HN: Did you change jobs during the Great Reshuffling and regret it?

#50

If you like the new job then you have nothing to worry about. Forget the “traitor” thing entirely. It’s just business. There has been a huge uptick of “I hate my new job what should I do?” posts in an advice/mentoring community I’m part of. The common theme in the posts is people who had quite comfortable positions at their previous employer but maybe didn’t realize it at the time. They went out and got higher paying…

Nothing ventured nothing gained. But of course, venturing is not risk free.

The, I you're comfortable where you are, the gains needs to be hi.

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