How I negotiated a software-engineering job offer in Silicon Valley • Hacker News Board

Re: How I negotiated a software-engineering job offer in Silicon Valley

#121

Post by jjeaff » Sat, Feb 02, 2019, 9:21 AM UTC

tejon wrote: post #75

shakestheclown wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting that their suggestion "People often get tired of hearing their own name. Switch tracks and use your name instead." is at odds a bit with Dale Carnegie's "Remember that a person's name is to that person the sweetest and most important sound in any language."

My name is for getting my attention. Once you have my attention, I enjoy hearing it exactly as much as I enjoy an ongoing fire alarm.

Nothing sets off my sleezy salesman proximity sensor faster than someone using my name more than once in a few sentences.

Re: How I negotiated a software-engineering job offer in Silicon Valley

#122

Post by bosie » Sat, Feb 02, 2019, 11:21 AM UTC

iaw wrote: post #25

maxxxxx wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There must be some pockets with insane salaires but for most people 200K is pretty high. How many non-execs really make these high salaries?

"Median Facebook Salary" on Google returns ~$240K/year and I think they're up to 34,000 employees and still making more profit per employee than most companies. Do you think that a $200K/year salary is pretty high for tech in the Bay Area? At a global level $200K/year is very high, but regionally, between tech employees in the and their incumbent landlords, it is not that high.

Can you provide a link to the 240k? I can only find a claim for the total compensation to be 240k

Re: How I negotiated a software-engineering job offer in Silicon Valley

#123

Post by esoterica » Sat, Feb 02, 2019, 3:58 PM UTC

burfog wrote: post #118

esoterica wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And if it costs you as much but you get paid way more, then you have way more money to spend on other shit. The math is not that complicated.

Yes, you can save money if you are willing to live in a dystopia, crammed in like sardines. The quality-of-life comparison is not that complicated.

Not everyone has been brainwashed by their suburban upbringing into believing that living in an apartment is “dystopian”.

Re: How I negotiated a software-engineering job offer in Silicon Valley

#124

Post by alkibiades » Sat, Feb 02, 2019, 4:36 PM UTC

kmonsen wrote: post #119

alkibiades wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

yes but someone with a 50k equity grant will never make it up versus someone with a 200k one. (yes i’ve seen both)

Refreshes will quickly be much more important

they actually don’t. you can do the math. people actually usually have a steep income drop off when their initial grant runs out

Re: How I negotiated a software-engineering job offer in Silicon Valley

#125

Post by dclusin » Sat, Feb 02, 2019, 6:07 PM UTC

marssaxman wrote: post #63

dclusin wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have 8yr experience and saw offer for total comp of 225k/yr in bay area. No concurrent offers, non-faang company, publicly traded. Salary is extremely variable is my takeaway.

"Total comp" is not nearly the same thing as salary.

True. For the offer I saw it was about 169k base salary, 10k signing, and then 46k of equity. We're heading into the end of a market cycle imo so I figured that the equity value should probably be discounted by some factor.

Re: How I negotiated a software-engineering job offer in Silicon Valley

#126

Post by sershe » Sun, Feb 03, 2019, 4:39 AM UTC

ChristianGeek wrote: post #106

esoterica wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why are you using a McMansion and a boat dock as part of the canonical benchmark lifestyle? What if you want to live in a tiny apartment and direct your money towards travel, cars, hobby gear, or index fund shares so you can retire at 35 instead? All these things cost the same whether you live in the Bay Area or rural Kansas, so you’re better off maximizing absolute income even it means living somewhere with expensiv…

Because a tiny apartment in the Bay Area is going to cost you as much as a McMansion in rural Kansas.

What if you don't care about a McMansion? It's like a restaurant where they give you a 3-pound steak, but it tastes kinda crappy and you cannot box it.

We have a 1300sqft house in HCOL and it still has a bunch of unused space; we used to have the same problem even in a 1100ft apartment. My friends have a cheaper big house a 40-minute drive away; the reason they have a big house is because they want to be near certain outdoor activities, and there are no small houses in that area. Half the house is literally unfurnished, nobody ever goes there.

Come think of it, my two main problems with my house is that (1) it's too long of a walk to a bus (like, 7 minutes) and bars/etc. (like, whole 5-15 minutes); (2) (didn't affect us directly yet) heroin addicts stealing stuff. Both of those would be worse in a typical LCOL where I could afford a McMansion I wouldn't bother fully furnishing.

I'm not in BA and I think BA is vastly inferior to where I'm at, but for me an apartment in BA >> a 4000sqft house in rural Kansas. It's like, not even on the same level. Judging by the prices, many people agree :P

Re: How I negotiated a software-engineering job offer in Silicon Valley

#127

Post by sershe » Sun, Feb 03, 2019, 4:42 AM UTC

burfog wrote: post #118

esoterica wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And if it costs you as much but you get paid way more, then you have way more money to spend on other shit. The math is not that complicated.

Yes, you can save money if you are willing to live in a dystopia, crammed in like sardines. The quality-of-life comparison is not that complicated.

Yeah, it's easy. Living in the burbs effing sucks.

Re: How I negotiated a software-engineering job offer in Silicon Valley

#128

Post by sershe » Sun, Feb 03, 2019, 4:48 AM UTC

angarg12 wrote: post #96

What bothers me about this is not the figures, but the feeling that the only thing that matters to increase your salary is competing offers. The more articles I read the more convinced I am that this is by far the most important factor in an offer, including interview performance. Companies seem to rely in a 'wisdom of the crowds' of sorts.

I've had two options last time I negotiated, and I couldn't really tell which project would be better. It's really hard to tell from the outside when the people giving you answers about the good and bad aspects of the job are the people trying to hire you. So in the end I just chose using the money. The not-so-surprising part is that the project is not as good as it was described. The surprising-but-unsurprising part is that the negative aspects are not at all what I would have predicted. Sure, I could have gone with the other company for less money; the odds are, I would have still had no idea beforehand w.r.t. what I'm getting into. Unless one of the teams/offers is obviously better, it's a crapshoot and the money is literally your only reliable data point. If you have to bail in a year (which I never had to do so far), at least you get more out of it.

Re: How I negotiated a software-engineering job offer in Silicon Valley

#129

Post by sershe » Sun, Feb 03, 2019, 5:00 AM UTC

mixmastamyk wrote: post #44

mattnewton wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Idk where you got the idea that being a Google engineer is innate haha, man the marketing and hype around the role is incredible. The “secret” is Google tries to hire smart hardworking people, not divinely ordained superhumans. My advice would be to study hard for the interview and let them figure out whether or not you pass the bar. At the very least it will be good practice for othe interviews and you might be acce…

The modern tech interview selects for luck and quick response under pressure as major decision factors that project the appearance of innate intelligence. "The only winning move is not to play."

Yes, that way you get to feel good about yourself.

Re: How I negotiated a software-engineering job offer in Silicon Valley

#130

Post by sershe » Sun, Feb 03, 2019, 5:08 AM UTC

matchagaucho wrote: post #28

To put this in bay area perspective, that $300K per year gets broken down as: 42% Tax bracket. Net $180K per year $6K per month in rent/mortgage. Net $108K $3K per month in living expenses. $72K $1K student loans (maybe). Net $60K $1K in insurance (health / renters / home). Net $48K $1K disposable income. Net $36K $8K vacation. Net $28K ( or about $2.3K per month for savings) Not bad. But you can see how bay area cos…

This is BS. I was renting in BA (a 3br in Inner Richmond) in 2015 and my total spend without kids and with gf not making much at all (i.e. I paid for most of the good stuff like vacations and restaurants), calculated precisely by Mint, was about 70-80k a year. That includes 1-3 vacations a year in places like Italy, China, etc. Sure, in 2019 it would be 90-110k due to the rent, big deal. Wtf are the living expenses excluding rent and insurance that add up to 3k, do you eat foie gras every day in rural Kansas?

Also, look up "marginal tax rate" and "effective tax rate".