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The surreal experience of my first developer job

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Re: The surreal experience of my first developer job

#161

Post by jlg23 »

PicassoCTs wrote: post #133
jlg23 wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> we'd have to ring the "office manager" (ex-SAS) I'm not sure what's the fetish with the SAS, but I apparently know more people who where in the or with strong ties to the SAS than regular British folks... OTOH, after knowing some actual members of various special forces for 2 decades: If they saw action, they don't brag. They are usually shy to admit anything even if it is not classified. Or the other way around: T…

A drunk ex-pat walks into a bar. He is a navyseal, with three tours of combat and also the CEO of a public traded company.

Hrhr. I actually know a legit one who fits the description. But that is exactly one :)

Re: The surreal experience of my first developer job

#162

Post by txsoftwaredev »

petercooper wrote: post #78

I know many will disagree, but working a few jobs like this seems to be a rite of passage in some industries. I had some similar jobs back when I had the spare energy and lack of responsibilities to tolerate it and I look back on the time more fondly than I should. I made some friends, learnt how (not) to treat and tolerate certain types of people, and seat-of-the-pants developing has its educational moments.

I would agree. My first programming job was terrible. But I learned what type of people and companies to avoid and that made picking a new job much easier down the road.

Re: The surreal experience of my first developer job

#163

Post by systemBuilder »

selestify wrote: post #39
gkwelding wrote: post #32

This literally could have been written by any developer in the UK. I think most of us start out like this! I think the best one was a company I worked for in Leeds, it was building a secure learning platform for schools which ultimately fell flat on it's arse. The company was run by a self-made millionaire who was notorious for scamming people. He'd randomly lay off huge numbers of the sales team, and the first anyon…

You continued to work for 3 months without getting paid?

It happened to my wife, who was paid for 18mo and given lots of "options". People were steadily laid off around her until she was asked of she would work without pay? Because if you say no you're laid off and nobody wants that. I helped to convince her to quit. Company folded when she left ...

Re: The surreal experience of my first developer job

#164

Post by objclxt »

mmarq wrote: post #158
ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If by Europe you mean only the super expensive cities like Paris, Amsterdam or Munich, then yeah salaries maybe have increased, but to what good when property price increases have far outpaces whatever salary increases the industry may have seen. And most who stayed at one job haven't gotten any significant salary increases unless they job hopped often which brings it's own problems later in ones career. Edit: Had a…

A senior dev in London makes 60-80K, so it’s almost the same without cost of life adjustments. Outside of London, economy-wise, you are likely to find places more similar to eastern Europe than to Bavaria. 80K€ in Munich is a good salary, considering that you don’t have to pay for private healthcare (in the UK you have to), education is free (in the UK it costs a fortune, either in private school fees or in housing p…

Healthcare is free in the UK. I don’t know where you’re getting the idea you need to spend “£5-6k” on it.

A lot of employers in the UK offer additional health insurance as a benefit, but that’s on top of - not instead of - what the NHS offers you.

Re: The surreal experience of my first developer job

#165

Post by munk-a »

selestify wrote: post #39
gkwelding wrote: post #32

This literally could have been written by any developer in the UK. I think most of us start out like this! I think the best one was a company I worked for in Leeds, it was building a secure learning platform for schools which ultimately fell flat on it's arse. The company was run by a self-made millionaire who was notorious for scamming people. He'd randomly lay off huge numbers of the sales team, and the first anyon…

You continued to work for 3 months without getting paid?

This is a really good thing to highlight for new employees - you may think there is a lot of oversight in companies doing the right thing but be defensive about your labour. If benefits or pay are being withheld assume they will never materialize.

This property should also be applied to "salary increase freezes" or promised bonuses in lieu of raises. Unless the money is in your pocket (or the company has a literally terrible HR person who actually put things solidly in writing i.e. a promisory note) then any intangible compensation is likely to never be realized. And if there is a salary increase freeze the thing that won't happen next year (I guarantee it) is that they'll double up everyone's expected salary increase - you may still be in a freeze, or that freeze may be lifted so you all get normal CoL increases.

When you're an employee be incredibly defensive about what you offer - your employer is being even more defensive, I can guarantee it.

Re: The surreal experience of my first developer job

#166

Post by munk-a »

hhmc wrote: post #45
selestify wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You continued to work for 3 months without getting paid?

It may also have been payment in lieu of notice or holiday.

Given the context that seems unlikely - and it's genuinely hard to rack up a three month severance liability at most companies these days unless you're C-level. Most employers will either evaporate or pay out unused annual vacation so you're looking at a year's accrual at most (we can be over generous and say they may have had five weeks owed) - plus any in lieu time which usually caps out at three weeks.

Re: The surreal experience of my first developer job

#167

Post by systemBuilder »

brycewray wrote: post #36
dakial1 wrote: post #29

I've noticed that many entrepreneurs have this immense drive and very little ethical/moral sense, and this helps them get by the most dire situations, where common people would simply give up, because they simply go on with a "fake it until you make it" mindset. Entering very dark grey areas and leaving a lot of bodies behind (figuratively speaking). There are the stupid ones of course that don't get far, but the sma…

“Entrepreneurs are not at all like ordinary businessmen. An entrepreneur who is not in trouble closes no avenues, keeps a lot of balls in the air, and will never tell you the whole truth when a half-truth will do. An entrepreneur who is in trouble will lie, cheat, and steal. He will smuggle cocaine or ship bricks. We should never measure an entrepreneur by the standards of a rock-solid businessman.” — attributed to K…

Sun used to ship bricks when they couldn't get enough Spark processors working. Every customer return was repackaged as a new computer and sent to the next customer as a stalling tactic .

Re: The surreal experience of my first developer job

#168

Post by mmarq »

alibarber wrote: post #156
mmarq wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the past few years IT salaries in continental Europe have increased significantly and, adjusted for the cost of life, German salaries are significantly higher. French and Spanish are almost on par. If you make less than 40K£ in London, you are likely to experience a form of poverty that is unseen in the continent (pests in your flat, revenge evictions, very very bad healthcare, etc…). Outside of London, salaries a…

I 'earned' about 24K (equivalent before tax - as a stipend) as a doctoral student in London. Yes, once we had a mouse in the flatshare, but this is ridiculously exaggerating things.

> Yes, once we had a mouse in the flatshare

While everybody I know who rented in London had to deal with mice or bed-bugs (and I don’t fully understand what these are, because before coming to London I never heard of them), at least those on low income, I don’t know of any other place where this is even remotely true.

Re: The surreal experience of my first developer job

#169

Post by darkr »

BigJono wrote: post #6

This is eerily similar to a job I had. I also worked for a young asshole CEO called Andrew, with multiple rubbish businesses, pretending to have more money than he had, having no idea what he was doing, and faced jail time a few years after I left. If you replace "property market" with "education sector" and "UK" with "Australia" we could have almost written the exact same article. I wonder how many of these companie…

> Look for some proof that they've built, designed or sold something substantial, before you agree to do all the work for them

I disagree. 4 months working for a semi-criminal part mad-man is an amazing opportunity to learn about life and humanity.

Every time I meet someone who went from straight A’s at school, to university/college and then straight into a graduate scheme at some multinational, then onwards and upwards into some successful, but otherwise shallow career I feel so sad for that person that they missed out on the beautiful weirdness of life.

Re: The surreal experience of my first developer job

#170

Post by kwere »

mrweasel wrote: post #124
dboreham wrote: post #33

"Never work for a small business unless you own it". Citation: me, 35 years ago after my first small business employee experience.

Also don’t work for one with more than 100 - 150 employees. Sweet spot seems to be somewhere around 20 to 45 people. But that’s just my experience.

Agree, expecially if One want a good work enviroment at normal Comp, not too shabby or too corporate with good growth potential
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