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Ask HN: Looking for advice on my situation at work?

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11–20 of 108 posts

Re: Ask HN: Looking for advice on my situation at work?

#11
I’d prioritize finding someone else in the company that can give you another viewpoint on the situation. These types of situations make us feel isolated, so see if you can find a way to be “seen”, even if it’s by someone who has no way to help you professionally.

The get the heck out of there and find somewhere that is willing to treat you with more respect.

Re: Ask HN: Looking for advice on my situation at work?

#12
I've been dealing with the "you're the best....sorry no raise" for a while, you just have to decide if it's worth staying? What I don't deal with is management trying to replace me, like they are trying to replace you. I suggest looking for something new, yo seemed to have hit a brick wall at your company and it really doesn't matter who's at fault or the reason, it's just time to go.

Re: Ask HN: Looking for advice on my situation at work?

#13

Listen, there’s an unfortunate lesson to be learned here. Job hoppers earn a lot more, over time. It sounds like it’s time to go. Perhaps there’s another department you could move to, as well? Otherwise, time to spend a weekend or two on Leetcode and then wrangle up some interviews. I suspect something else is going on here, and without further details, I have to assume that leaving to a higher-paying job would be be…

1000% this. You should never stay at one job longer than 5 years, and I think 3 years per job is probably optimal. There are people that will tell you that "job hopping" will catch up with you, but those people are dead wrong.

Re: Ask HN: Looking for advice on my situation at work?

#14
Get out. The same thing happened to me and my mental health has yet to recover. There is nothing you can do about it. This is the oligarchy of capitalism, the HR team, sorry the "Human Capital Management" team is only there to execute the bidding of the management hierarchy. The sooner you leave, the sooner you heal.

Re: Ask HN: Looking for advice on my situation at work?

#15
post #9

I’m blown away by some of the other comments here. There’s no value in having a victim mentality. Have you openly spoken to your manager about your concerns? How it doesn’t feel fair? How you feel you’re being treated? There’s a chance they have no idea. Maybe they’re not that experienced and are just working things out themselves. Or if they seem like the wrong person, is there someone above them you can voice your…

> I did also come to them with a job offer from another company that had a larger dollar amount associated to it.

As far as I know, this negotation strategy is orders of magnitude more effective than voicing feelings about being treated unfairly. Unless OP comes with better competing offer, there is likely nothing that can be changed in his situation.

Re: Ask HN: Looking for advice on my situation at work?

#16
This sort of behaviour isn't a one off. It also isn't universal. You'll be able to find the same at other companies but you'll also be able to avoid it. Researching the place before you sign up is prudent.

The feedback you won't like is that it's partially self inflicted. If you change company and combine working very hard with looking like you're happy with a pay cut each year (inflation is a thing) again, you'll be exploited again.

Re: Ask HN: Looking for advice on my situation at work?

#17
Definitely time to go.

As to whether it's the standard Canadian culture, I'd say from personal experience and what I've seen with friends/family it is more common in the crown corps and tech oligopolies (i.e., Bell, Telus). So when you say Top 5, I'm not surprised the manager did this and got away with it.

That, and I know I'll be accused of Québec bashing, but when a company in Montreal is franco-dominated, there is a tendency to be, let's call it nepotistic, so that a member of the "family" calls the shots for the "outsiders", regardless of ability, understanding or basic competence. It's not always been my experience and the top companies don't do it but, it definitely happens more than it should. Especially those doing work for the provincial government or directly with schools/healthcare facilities.

Source: the child of Mediterranean immigrants born and bred in Montreal, with experience in startups, SMEs and one of the Big Telcos

Re: Ask HN: Looking for advice on my situation at work?

#18
Just go for a different team. Your manager doesn't care about you, other managers only know about you from your manager.

I've had managers who strong me along before, it often happens because they perceive you as unable to move to the next level for valid or invalid reasons. It makes their job easier to tell you what you want to hear.

Re: Ask HN: Looking for advice on my situation at work?

#20
post #10

I don't want to assume it's you at all. Vitamin B is a real thing and there are shitty managers out there but was there anything else going on? Are you overly sexist? Bitchy? Difficult? If not use your time to find something better! You probably can't win this game. One thing you could try: ask everyone on your team in private what you could do to be better. Perhaps this might shine up something.

Vitamin B is used in Germany as a euphemism for favoritism or nepotism. B is the first letter of Beziehung which means relationship.
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