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

Where have all the laid-off tech workers gone?

economist.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 451 posts

Re: Where have all the laid-off tech workers gone?

#91

Post by DoughnutHole »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #82
looping__lui wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess working on your empathy skills and trying to understand emotions of others (instead of solely focusing on your own) might make your life easier. I have met many engineers who thought along the same lines of “technology is the end and sales and product managers are the means to have me do whatever I want to code" and agree that these people struggled in environment focusing on "the customer". I doubt, that "cu…

The most shocking thing to me I’ve observed during my career is how many good technologists lack empathy. I hazard it’s because the same neurological structure that optimizes for what makes a good dev/technologist is also what makes empathy and social skills lacking, very broadly speaking. You can learn/fake it with enough time and practice (I’ve met those who do), it just doesn’t seem to be that common of a hack. ht…

A lot of people discover that they can get respect despite being an asshole if they're skilled enough.

You see this pattern of behaviour in all disciplines, but in tech it seems that social skills are less important than elsewhere so those types are attracted to the field, and we've also cultivated a culture that glorifies people who are assholes but are also visionaries - Jobs/Musk/Zuckerberg etc.

Re: Where have all the laid-off tech workers gone?

#92

Post by taude »

Eumenes wrote: post #33
Beaver117 wrote: post #13

I can't find another job even with a FAANG background. The market is brutal. Maybe my only choice is to start a startup.

The biggest reason I've seen FAANG candidates (mostly Google, FB, and Amazon) get rejected is too much experience with proprietary technology, esp. if they've been there a long time, like 5+ years. I've even spoke to some FAANG candidates who think their internal proprietary tech is widely known or commercial products.

Yeup. I had a similar comment above. I tried phone screening someone, and they had no working knowledge of the commercial apps that we integrate with, the databases we use, etc. And I can hire literally for half the price someone with working knowlege AND know they won't be resentful about the job....

Re: Where have all the laid-off tech workers gone?

#93

Post by taude »

fundad wrote: post #81
kkoste wrote: post #21

Probably back home to their original country since they only have 60 days to find a new job. I imagine that is extremely hard when you are in competition with a lot of your former colleagues.

The last thing this nation needs is to depopulate further.

What makes you think US Population is receding? By all census counts, we're still growing, a lot.

Numbers for 2022 are something like 900K immigrants living in the U.S. became U.S. citizens. 2 Million more migrants came with about @ 150K documented boarder crossings per month for 18 months straight. The only time there was a huge drop-off was during Covid, for obvious reasons. "The Build Back Better Act included a a $1.75 trillion framework that called for a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants and a recapture of visas that were not issued in previous years"

US is the third largest populated country at 335M.

Trying to understand your "depopulate further" statement.

Re: Where have all the laid-off tech workers gone?

#94

Post by jghn »

taude wrote: post #90
em500 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Moving down” can be more difficult than it looks. Anecdotally, employers can be reluctant to hire “overqualified” people (indicated by a high previous salary), because they believe these people will jump ship at the earliest higher paying opportunity elsewhere.

I don't think an elevated salary at a FAANG implies over-qualified, though. I phone-screened someone from a FAANG, and they knew very little about non-proprietary technologies that we used on a day-to-day. Any of the big-branded commercial apps, they weren't familiar with, and I can hire someone for a lot less with the required working knowledge AND know that they won't be resentful about it. I think it's going to ta…

> and they knew very little about non-proprietary technologies that we used on a day-to-day.

I had an eye opening experience several years ago. My group was partnering with a group at Google. Their developers were sharp, as one would expect. But were very lacking in what would otherwise be considered table stakes, the reason always wound back to they had a proprietary Google equivalent of X, so thus they weren't familiar with X. The one that really hit it home was that we had to teach them how to use Google Cloud, because at least at the time, internally Google folks didn't use GCP but instead used their own internal versions of things.

Re: Where have all the laid-off tech workers gone?

#95

Post by 908B64B197 »

MontyCarloHall wrote: post #31
nubela wrote: post #18

We actually tracked every laid off individual from Google to understand the story behind the layoffs. Here's the summary: - 747 out of the 2,762 laid-off Googlers have since updated their profiles to indicate a change of employment status in the last 4 months since November 2022. - Only 56.7% of these people joined a tech company. - 1/3 of these ex-Googlers joined startups. See the full blog post here: https://nubela…

>Only 56.7% of these people joined a tech company Does this suggest that a large fraction of laid off employees were in non-tech roles (e.g. pro{ject,duct} managers, scrum masters, sales, etc.)? If so, perhaps the layoffs are a good thing—in my experience, the worst tech companies to work for are those dominated by non-technical employees. Perhaps layoffs are being used as a blunt instrument to shift the balance away…

> Does this suggest that a large fraction of laid off employees were in non-tech roles (e.g. pro{ject,duct} managers, scrum masters, sales, etc.)?

A lot of them were in "tech-adjacent" positions. PM, tech recruiters or evangelists, community managers, sales, DEI folks... At one point one layoff announcement had "returning to a healthy ratio of engineers to non-engineers" as a goal.

[0] https://interviewing.io/blog/2022-layoffs-engineers-vs-other...

[1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-01-24/tech-layo...

[2] https://www.computerworld.com/article/3690309/about-those-te...

[3] https://www.gartner.com/en/newsroom/press-releases/2023-03-0...

[4] https://techreport.com/news/3493451/microsoft-layoffs-ethics...

Re: Where have all the laid-off tech workers gone?

#96

Post by KptMarchewa »

arroz wrote: post #85
robin_reala wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“every laid off individual” should be “every laid off individual with a LinkedIn account”.

Actually even this is wrong. Every laid off employee with a LinkedIn account that changed their employer on LinkedIn. I typically am not in a hurry to change mine.

Waiting 2-3 months to see if new job is a good fit is usually a smart move.

Re: Where have all the laid-off tech workers gone?

#97

Post by KptMarchewa »

300bps wrote: post #72
red-iron-pine wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't be surprised if most FAANG and similar tier companies require a linkedin account; mine did. HR sent policies, and would help you with a headshot, with the idea you'd use that w/ your email, Teams, etc. as well.

Is that requirement to aid in the prevention of double-working? That is, people who accept two full time jobs and do a half-assed job at both of them.

Usually those people do quarter-assed job at best - unless you literally have work that could be done on upwork.

Re: Where have all the laid-off tech workers gone?

#98

Post by Beaver117 »

esskay wrote: post #23
Beaver117 wrote: post #13

I can't find another job even with a FAANG background. The market is brutal. Maybe my only choice is to start a startup.

Are you expecting a salary similar to the one you were getting at a FAANG though? Because that seems to be the main issue - FAANG people thinking they're worth way more than they actually are.

It will be painful to get a 50%+ paycut but I'm willing to accept any job - but like others guessed small companies instantly reject me. I only get interviews with other companies similar to FAANG, only for them to tell me they have a hiring feeeze. Or very early stage startups, like seed or series A, which I'm not comfortable joining.

Re: Where have all the laid-off tech workers gone?

#99

Post by Beaver117 »

thaufeki wrote: post #20
Beaver117 wrote: post #13

I can't find another job even with a FAANG background. The market is brutal. Maybe my only choice is to start a startup.

Could also be why you can't find a job. You may be too expensive, and they're looking for engineers in the sweet spot of cheap/can keep the machine running.

It's funny because for 10 years people were saying "get this big company on your resume and you can just walk into any job!"

Clearly not the case anymore

Re: Where have all the laid-off tech workers gone?

#100

Post by gumby »

nubela wrote: post #18

We actually tracked every laid off individual from Google to understand the story behind the layoffs. Here's the summary: - 747 out of the 2,762 laid-off Googlers have since updated their profiles to indicate a change of employment status in the last 4 months since November 2022. - Only 56.7% of these people joined a tech company. - 1/3 of these ex-Googlers joined startups. See the full blog post here: https://nubela…

> Only 56.7% of these people joined a tech company.

There’s a very good chance that their new jobs are similar to their former jobs.

Unfortunately, the term “tech” has become diluted to the point of worthlessness. Every company of any size needs programming, statistics, and such.

Conversely many companies swept under the “tech” term don’t develop any technology at all.

It’s so bad that actual technology development is now referred to as “deep tech”.

Post reply on HN