Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

What would a recession mean for developers?

blog.boot.dev

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 143 posts

Re: What would a recession mean for developers?

#21

Post by AlotOfReading »

AlchemistCamp wrote: post #12
bigDinosaur wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Part of the problem is perhaps that you were looking for titles explicitly coded 'junior' at all. Title inflation basically means that many devs that would basically be juniors in real engineering companies are considered senior. It's a weird market where the difference between 0 and 1 year of experience can be so dramatically reflected in salaries and opportunities.

I had 1.5 years of experience (in China). I hustled hard in SF, got rejected by 100+ companies, and really, really struggled to scrape by on some set price contract gigs. All of that changed one night when I showed a demo of a browser game I'd made at a meetup some Groupon devs happened to be at. That lead to a phone screen, an onsite, a job and then never another time when I couldn't get a decent tech job. Of course…

I suspect the answer is rather high. I had similar experiences getting back into tech when I decided archeology wasn't the field for me. I had about some years of experience paying my way through college with contract dev work, but after several offers were retracted once a execs saw my background I managed to find an old school hacker in SF said yes. They were filling in while the real boss was on medical leave. When the real boss got back, I was immediately informed shouldn't have been hired despite doing my job well.

Years and companies later, I've brought it up in those diversity hiring meetings, but that's not the sort of changes that are being sought at most places.

Re: What would a recession mean for developers?

#22

Post by hycaria »

AlchemistCamp wrote: post #5
steve_adams_86 wrote: post #2

The market being harder for juniors seems correct from what I’m seeing. I’ve been looking frequently for the last month to see what’s out there, and virtually no one I’ve noticed is seeking junior developers.

I haven't really paid attention to that market for quite a while, but when I was actively looking for a job as a junior dev in SF in 2012, I remember being absolutely maddened by patio11's repeated comments the roaring demand for devs. "Anyone who can fizzbuzz" was the phrase I remember him using. At that time I was junior, but I'd made and published 3 flash games, hacked on the UI of my WP blog quite a bit and made…

I don’t know what you graduated in. But I was given a chance at my first good company because I followed a pretty elitist (natural sciences I must add) curriculum. But in the meantime, I had found consulting jobs pretty easily. And even if they’re crap it launches you in the career.

Re: What would a recession mean for developers?

#23

Post by devwastaken »

steve_adams_86 wrote: post #2

The market being harder for juniors seems correct from what I’m seeing. I’ve been looking frequently for the last month to see what’s out there, and virtually no one I’ve noticed is seeking junior developers.

As Ive said for over a year now - CS grads cant get hired. Companies are not knocking on their door. Unis have to go out of their way to get companies to even associate.

What you hear of big hiring is select schools in select places.

Corps want experienced devs, they do not want to create experienced devs. They get away with this because there's no standards like any other field of engineering. We don't band together and create avenues for education, employment and advancement. This is largely the fault of existing devs knowing the above to be true, and they want it for themselves despite harming the market overall.

Degrees have largely become meaningless. Uni's have become democratic political battlegrounds that push activism above academics. There isn't anything learned in a 4 year degree that you couldn't get with a healthy appetite for YouTube. But they're just adult daycares for parents that think the system will work for their kids. I say that as someone whom unfortunately has to work at such a place.

Re: What would a recession mean for developers?

#24

Post by bjelkeman-again »

I have worked through three recessions as a software analyst, or tech entrepreneur. The investment climate gets worse in a recession (we had to shut down a company after the dotcom crash), but the job market never seemed an issue for me or those around me that worked with IT or software development. There where always jobs. None of my colleges ended up without a job for any longer period. There is a huge skills shortage in IT.

Re: What would a recession mean for developers?

#25

Post by lordnacho »

Don't spend your time getting better at your job. I'm not saying you don't need to be good, I'm saying the time is better spent doing something else.

That other thing is networking.

Connect with recruiters on LinkedIn and hit them up for referrals to jobs. I have a quite long list of recruiters in the quant trading niche who contact me from time to time. When they ping me I find out who is hiring and what they're after, and if it's not for me I might know someone for the role. When it's my turn to look, I reach out and there's a firehose of interviews.

With a little bit of effort you end up feeling quite comfortable that if you need a new role, there will be one. It contributes substantially to my tranquility.

Re: What would a recession mean for developers?

#26

Post by TavsiE9s »

MisterBastahrd wrote: post #9

I've been contacted by a number of recruiters recently who are recruiting for positions that are paying FAR more than the market average of just a few years ago. I'm talking an average increase of over 50%. I'm honestly concerned that my entire team, after having received low percentage pay increases in the past year, is going to end up leaving within the next 4-6 months, and I'm not sure the product is capable of su…

I’ve heard the whole “money can’t be everything when deciding on a job” a couple of times when discussing salaries recently. Mostly from companies who realise they can’t or don’t want to compete with the market.

Shrug and move on. They’ll learn eventually.

Re: What would a recession mean for developers?

#27

Post by Apocryphon »

BigJono wrote: post #15
AlchemistCamp wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't really paid attention to that market for quite a while, but when I was actively looking for a job as a junior dev in SF in 2012, I remember being absolutely maddened by patio11's repeated comments the roaring demand for devs. "Anyone who can fizzbuzz" was the phrase I remember him using. At that time I was junior, but I'd made and published 3 flash games, hacked on the UI of my WP blog quite a bit and made…

I lucked into my first job with a startup and never had to go through the job hunt as a junior candidate (other than through a few big company mass grad hire processes which were an absolute fucking joke, and thank god I didn't actually pass any of them), but this mirrors my experience with hiring juniors. Every time I've done it I've been inundated with candidates. You pretty much have the pick of the litter. Person…

It’s really a sad state of affairs. An industry that hates its own young in experience while pushing ageism on its elderly in age. An ouroboros industry.

Re: What would a recession mean for developers?

#28

Post by Silhouette »

steve_adams_86 wrote: post #2

The market being harder for juniors seems correct from what I’m seeing. I’ve been looking frequently for the last month to see what’s out there, and virtually no one I’ve noticed is seeking junior developers.

The market is always harder for juniors whether times are easy or hard.

The unfortunate difference this time is that today's juniors might have spent their last couple of years reading stories on sites like HN and levels.fyi about starting on six-figure salaries at big name companies and maybe doubling that with the other perks. They might have also been exposed to some of the most mercenary attitudes to career development I can ever recall seeing where loyalty is a dirty word and jumping ship every few months for a pay bump is the norm.

At the same time they still have the usual conceit of most new grads in this industry and don't understand that at best they will probably contribute little real value to begin with while taking up a lot of time from other people who could. In other words juniors almost always have negative immediate value to their employer.

In the boom times we have enjoyed in tech for the past few years a lot of newbies could get away with that and make a lot of money but really that has been the exception and it's not normal. Now the reality is setting in that you can't reasonably expect an employer to invest a huge amount of money to pay you to cost them even more money and then leave before you get better and make them enough money to become a net contributor. In a world without the weird employment market dynamics of the recent boom times that just doesn't make any sense.

Re: What would a recession mean for developers?

#29

Post by AlchemistCamp »

hycaria wrote: post #22
AlchemistCamp wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't really paid attention to that market for quite a while, but when I was actively looking for a job as a junior dev in SF in 2012, I remember being absolutely maddened by patio11's repeated comments the roaring demand for devs. "Anyone who can fizzbuzz" was the phrase I remember him using. At that time I was junior, but I'd made and published 3 flash games, hacked on the UI of my WP blog quite a bit and made…

I don’t know what you graduated in. But I was given a chance at my first good company because I followed a pretty elitist (natural sciences I must add) curriculum. But in the meantime, I had found consulting jobs pretty easily. And even if they’re crap it launches you in the career.

> I don't know what you graduated in.

You don't know I graduated at all.

I'm not saying either way, but if I did, it had zero utility in my software career. Credentialism on degree subject matter for people making mid-career moves is misguided at best.

Re: What would a recession mean for developers?

#30

Post by Silhouette »

Apocryphon wrote: post #27
BigJono wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I lucked into my first job with a startup and never had to go through the job hunt as a junior candidate (other than through a few big company mass grad hire processes which were an absolute fucking joke, and thank god I didn't actually pass any of them), but this mirrors my experience with hiring juniors. Every time I've done it I've been inundated with candidates. You pretty much have the pick of the litter. Person…

It’s really a sad state of affairs. An industry that hates its own young in experience while pushing ageism on its elderly in age. An ouroboros industry.

Ironically a downturn might help with that culture. The problems you mention have been exacerbated by the "tech bro" attitudes of twenty-something or maybe thirty-something seniors and founders working in businesses that have been more about winning the next funding round than making a good product that produces a sustainable profit. That gravy train is probably off the rails for a while now and it's possible that we will see more interest in hiring or retaining older devs with the experience to actually get results. We might also see less emphasis on job-hopping very frequently for career growth and that will make hiring and training up juniors more attractive.
Post reply on HN