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Ask HN: Laid off folks, are you getting hired?

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Re: Ask HN: Laid off folks, are you getting hired?

#331

Post by Yoric »

UncleOxidant wrote: post #264

Sr. Software Dev with some hardware background. Laid off in early December. Started looking about a month ago. One phone interview so far with a startup that seemed a bit sketchy (didn't know where the funding was coming from) and in a very inconvenient timezone (I'd likely have to wake up at 3AM for meetings). Many recruiter pings/week, but mostly not great fits (they glom onto a keyword that doesn't mean what they…

> So far it's pretty easy to make my 5 contacts/week as required by the unemployment dept.

Is that standard?

Re: Ask HN: Laid off folks, are you getting hired?

#332

Post by denvrede »

kioleanu wrote: post #110
Jommi wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this isn't the case in northern Europe at all. First of all you get around 1kish a month no questions asked, more if you have bills etc. you can prove you need to pay and if you opted into "unemployment insurance" while employed, you'd be getting 60-80% of your salary for the next 12 months this insurance costs around 100e a year to opt into

Chiming in for Germany where unemployment insurance is mandatory and deducted from the salary each month. I personally pay 82 euros per month for 80% over a 1 year period (I think, I haven't checked in a while)

60% (67% if you have at least one kid) of your average net salary over the last 12 month before unemployment. Capped at ~2k in the old states and ~1.8k in the new ones. Paid for a max of 12 month for ages 49 and below after that it gets slightly longer.

Re: Ask HN: Laid off folks, are you getting hired?

#333

Post by rk1987 »

JSavageOne wrote: post #254
titanomachy wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m a low-senior engineer recently laid off. I got lots of emails like that and politely declined. I have a bit over four months of severance pay. For the moment, I’m enjoying other fulfilling activities as well as spending some time upgrading my tech skills through independent study. I’ve considered some startups, but it seems like it’s often difficult to enforce boundaries on work… I benefit a lot from being able t…

> Also, I have a hard time getting objective information about the work culture at startups. Yes this is a big problem as you have no idea what you're signing up with startups. Maybe the founder expects you to work 12 hours/day and constantly be available, maybe they will fire you a month before your equity vesting, or just randomly fire you one day despite having never given any negative feedback. I've seen all of t…

So true.

I know a friend who led product at a startup (YC). One fine day he shared concerns on how company is narrowly focusing on just one parameter. 10 mins later, he got employment termination letter.

Re: Ask HN: Laid off folks, are you getting hired?

#334

Post by thwayunion »

TradingPlaces wrote: post #328

I know no one gets a CS degree dreaming of working for Walmart, but they have over 1100 openings with the word “software” in the title https://careers.walmart.com/results?q=software&page=1&sort=r...

Serious question: how is working for Walmart different from working for Amazon Retail?

Re: Ask HN: Laid off folks, are you getting hired?

#335

Post by RangerScience »

mywittyname wrote: post #316
RangerScience wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apparently a lot of us also like really old books? (mmmm 1910 manual on steel production.)

Seriously? I mean, I have a collection of very old engineering books, including one on Petroleum Refinery Engineering and a Reinforced Concrete Design Handbook printed when text books where $2. But I had no idea this was a "thing" among developers.

Apparently. I went into the Last Bookstore in Los Angeles, found that manual, and... had to have it. Didn't understand why. Mentioned that to the clerk, who said: "You're a software developer, aren't you? A lot of you have that reaction."

So, very very anecdotally: yep it's a thing.

Re: Ask HN: Laid off folks, are you getting hired?

#336

Post by bluGill »

VLM wrote: post #129
psim1 wrote: post #25

Weirdly, a senior dev from my company was recruited by another company and will be changing jobs in a couple weeks. And to be clear, he is not a unicorn type. He's a good senior developer in a common language. It's hard for me to understand recruiters "fishing in the neighbor's pond" while there are plenty of unemployed, qualified senior devs out there right now.

Sure there's plenty? Some reqs are ridiculously detailed and specific. Oh you have Python 3.10.7 installed, sorry we can't hire you we use 3.10.6 here. Next! Oh we want someone with 4 years experience, you only have 3 yrs 11 months call back later. Next!

My favorite was from some years ago when Java was about 8 years old and C# about 3. They wanted 10 years of Java and 5 years of C#.

Re: Ask HN: Laid off folks, are you getting hired?

#337

Post by layoff_payoff »

I was laid of in November, started interviewing a week later. I got about 50% response on my applications; I bombed most of them at various stages (I should have increased prep time by another week or 2). I got an offer in early January and started last week.

My compensation dropped by 30-40%, but I figured if I'll probably spend more than 30% of the year waiting for an offer close to what had before. Considering my poor interview performance, I did not want to compete with a glut of engineers I had a hunch would be let go in the new year (which turned out correct).

I registered a Delaware LLC for $200, my current job is not as remotely challenging as my FAANG job so I have plenty of mental energy at the end of my 8-hour(!) work day, even when I go out of my way to add tasks outside of my duties. I just haven't thought up a lifestyle-business idea to run with.

Re: Ask HN: Laid off folks, are you getting hired?

#338

Post by Yoric »

dangwhy wrote: post #220
renewiltord wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who did this for "low-latency min-allocation Java", the answer is that I have the need for this X now but I'm confident they can adapt to whatever comes later. The truth is that anyone on my team can become proficient in this given time, but I'd rather get someone who can juice the machine by showing up with existing knowledge and we'll all get ahead faster with them. I wouldn't fire someone in order to ge…

> rather get someone who can juice the machine by showing up with existing knowledge This doesn't feel like a sustainable way to build engineering org. You only get N chances for such 'juicing', what do you do when you need to juice but don't have open headcount. You have to come up with a strategy for that anyways, so why not implement ' want juice but no headcount' strategy and expand your hiring pool. I've also fo…

There is a niche of Rust SAP Java engineers? Wow :)

Re: Ask HN: Laid off folks, are you getting hired?

#339

Post by cowthulhu »

layoff_payoff wrote: post #337

I was laid of in November, started interviewing a week later. I got about 50% response on my applications; I bombed most of them at various stages (I should have increased prep time by another week or 2). I got an offer in early January and started last week. My compensation dropped by 30-40%, but I figured if I'll probably spend more than 30% of the year waiting for an offer close to what had before. Considering my…

Why did you register the LLC? Sounds interesting!

Re: Ask HN: Laid off folks, are you getting hired?

#340

Post by sharemywin »

sharemywin wrote: post #244
giantg2 wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"they'd be willing to take anything." That would apply to me too. I have 10 years in the industry but have been underpaid and have a family. My current plan if I get fired is to work at Walmart or Lowes until I can find another job.

pretty sure unemployment pays better than walmart.

I wasn't trying to be cheeky with this. I was saying sometimes the ~40% that unemployment pays would be much better than walmart. and working there could stop your benefits.

Also, you can focus on a finding a job in your field. If for some reason you didn't want to get unemployment while you look for a job I would try to find any type of contracting job even upwork or fiverr so you can at least put Self-Employed Consulting on resume.

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