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Ask HN: How's the job hunt going? (For those laid off)

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Re: Ask HN: How's the job hunt going? (For those laid off)

#301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Curious if you don’t mind sharing, did this candidate have crazy comp due to Twitter RSUs before the implosion? And if so, are you all roughly matching that, or they’re settling for less?

Not particularly crazy. Doesn’t seem like the Total Compensation for this person will change dramatically, although it’s worth nothing that different companies have different philosophies on how the package is structured. What’s salary, what’s a performance-based annual bonus in cash, what’s equity-based compensation and within that what’s granted upfront and what’s performance-based and granted annually, what’s the…

Amazons assumed appreciation scheme is blasphemy IMO - are there even any other companies that do that?

Recently lots of companies have moved to quarterly vesting which is very employee friendly

I’m guessing you’re a startup meaning illiquid options - high risk with a tiny chance of a high reward after its all said and done, and the standard 90 day exercise window upon leaving is very employee unfriendly

But thanks for sharing!

Re: Ask HN: How's the job hunt going? (For those laid off)

#302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Curious what do you specialize in? Sounds like your engagements are usually like 3mos max?

3-6. But I try to line up the next one in the last 3, or right away if it’s a 3 month gig. Lately I’ve been “specialized” in cloud ops mentorship. Lots of businesses still run monoliths, have no CICD or secops. I don’t automatically nudge them to break the monolith up; some are well organized and documented and work for the biz. Mostly I help them establish a smoother “idea to deployment” pipeline. Though after 4 yea…

Thanks for sharing, and super interesting!

I’ve done an about 1 year stint contracting, all with a single client pretty much staff aug web dev, then went back to fulltime.

I’d love to find engagements where you’re not tied to their 9-5 hours, have to attend their daily stand ups etc. I think the only opportunities like that on a standard full stack engineer skill set is building MVPs for new startups, or companies with no in house dev team

Re: Ask HN: How's the job hunt going? (For those laid off)

#303

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm also confused. It's my understanding that staff engineers are responsible for taking the software into a certain technical direction. "Upper management" related to engineering. Wouldn't that automatically involve managing those engineers who are involved with the project(s)?

(broad generalizations ahead) Technical management and people management are different jobs. People management involves a lot more focus on hiring, performance evaluation, and performance management. It also tends to have many more meetings, including 1:1 meetings with all of your reports weekly or biweekly. This generally does not leave time for significant individual contributor work.

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Re: Ask HN: How's the job hunt going? (For those laid off)

#304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm also confused. It's my understanding that staff engineers are responsible for taking the software into a certain technical direction. "Upper management" related to engineering. Wouldn't that automatically involve managing those engineers who are involved with the project(s)?

(broad generalizations ahead) Technical management and people management are different jobs. People management involves a lot more focus on hiring, performance evaluation, and performance management. It also tends to have many more meetings, including 1:1 meetings with all of your reports weekly or biweekly. This generally does not leave time for significant individual contributor work.

Yes, I've had meetings with those people managers. I would consider them more HR type managers. After some reading it's my understanding that - from an HR perspective - the main difference between a manager and an "individual contributor" is that the IC doesn't have direct reports. Since those tasks would take up too much of their time. Those tasks are being transfered to the HR style managers. But the IC still performs many tasks which are traditionally considered "management responsibilities" with their day-to-day work.

Re: Ask HN: How's the job hunt going? (For those laid off)

#305

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do I get those contracts? I'm a full-stack developer with 10 years of experience, also some data analytics experience. I got laid off almost two weeks ago. I would love to start my own contracting business. Do you have any insight?

Lets talk. I have recently started consulting focused on data analytics. May be we could collaborate.

Feel free to reach out! My email is my username at protonmail.com

Re: Ask HN: How's the job hunt going? (For those laid off)

#307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well my rent is only £600/month which helps a lot. It's in a less popular neighbourhood, but it's still in Zone 2 with good transport links and it's very nice.

Do you live alone or with other people and you split the rent? How much do you pay for council tax and bills? 600 is very cheap in London.

There's zero chance they are living alone anywhere in London for £600, let alone zone 2.

Re: Ask HN: How's the job hunt going? (For those laid off)

#308
Actively looking. Jobless and homeless since completing my technical degree from a Nordic country. Subsisting on ~3€/day.

The responses have been: not a cultural fit, wasn’t the perfect match (German speaking responses), overqualified (mostly from western countries), under qualified (from countries like Czechia, Poland, Romania,etc.) for junior positions.

Getting interviews has been difficult and sparse. Contributed to FOSS, and keep learning programming/higher maths. Hope is low.

Re: Ask HN: How's the job hunt going? (For those laid off)

#310

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't like Elon either but am happy he's blown $44m on a side project that it looks like is going to fail

Billion

Billion/Shmillion - you're right though. Amazing it's still a rounding error to Elon...for now.
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