Someone needs to explain to me why our tech companies are so tied to interest rates. Are VCs borrowing with home mortgage equity??
DCF
The tech sector teardown is more catharsis than crisis
171–180 of 258 posts
Re: The tech sector teardown is more catharsis than crisis
#172Earlier quoted context omitted.
Meta very publicly announced a hiring slowdown, Netflix is introducing levels and slowing down hiring, Coinbase is slowing down hiring, etc.. Even with the above names slowing down hiring, I would guess big tech uses this opportunity to stockpile even more engineers to come out of this stronger. I don't see the competition for engineers that can pass those interviews slowing down. Startups? Yes, the cohort that raise…
Twitter is in a freeze, so combined that puts a lot of slowdown into the market. There may be smaller/other companies running to pick up the crème of the crop before the music stops, however.
I would wager Google, Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, et al. all are more than happy to take in the supply slack. They compete for the same engineering pool.
Would love to see data to the contrary vs. us guessing at this putting a lot of anything on the overall market.
Re: The tech sector teardown is more catharsis than crisis
#173I think this is just the correction that was inevitable as hiring had become a cargo cult. Everyone was hiring so everyone felt compelled to hire, creating a feedback loop of insane wages and offers. Now its time to pay the bills and many organizations realize the engineers they hired cannot possibly provide the value necessary to keep their job. I know one individual who got hired as a Sales Engineer for a platform…
I has a phone screen at Coinbase and they just threw out 380k as the salary without me saying anything as far as expectations. This reminds me of the dot com bubble. In 2000 people who had no software background and were making 50k would get offers for 80k, just for showing up at an interview and saying they know Java or HTML
I believe they quoted me the same number recently. From what I recall this was dual purpose - letting you know up front this is the comp range, but I believe the recruiter also let me know that because it was algorithmic(75th percentile for my market/zip code) that it was also a non-negotiable offer.
Re: The tech sector teardown is more catharsis than crisis
#174Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Why? Because it’s higher than you’re used to seeing? You don’t even know what role that person was applying for. Is your position that 380k is just “too high”, period? Perhaps because the company lost half a billion dollars last quarter and is in a controversial space facing regulatory scrutiny? > That number (or higher) has been the norm at a huge swath of stable and profitable tech companies for a decade+. Yeah,…
> Perhaps because the company lost half a billion dollars last quarter So what? Last year COIN made $3.62B earnings. They may need to shift at some point, but I think it's incorrect to act like 1-2 bad quarters means a company should completely shift their plan. If anything, it's more important than ever to hire top people - which requires a decent salary.
What do you mean, so what? Have you not read the article under discussion?
Re: The tech sector teardown is more catharsis than crisis
#175My biggest question behind all of this is how interconnected is the tech bubble, and how self-perpetuating will a downturn be? The venture-backed startups that I’ve worked at have themselves utilized tools built by other venture-backed startups. It seems like there’s an entire cottage industry of SaaS tools designed to make it easier to scale up small companies. What will the effect of a startup downturn be on compan…
I definitely think there's an advertising bubble and it's popping. Lots of startups' "business model" is "growth and engagement" - pump up user and "engagement" numbers and VCs will throw money at you, and maybe you even get a bigger sucker that outright buys you out. Spend all that money on advertising & marketing to keep these "engagement" numbers going up, all while having no actual product users pay for. This in…
> Lots of startups' "business model"
and what is the share of startups in Ad tech comparing to behemoths like Walmart etc?
Re: The tech sector teardown is more catharsis than crisis
#176Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is extremely out of the ordinary- Levels.fyi lists a salary of $224,000 for a Staff level SWE at Google
I wonder if this is sort of imposter syndrome, where an engineer thinks a year of my time is just not worth $380k to $495k. We all know plenty of examples where good employees are worth this and much more to growing or very profitable companies. Ask for what you can get and realize that you are worth more than you realize in the right situation. And never begrudge a peer who earns a lot.
No post body was provided.
Re: The tech sector teardown is more catharsis than crisis
#177Earlier quoted context omitted.
Coinbase isn't paying $380k base either..are you just quibbling over the meaning of salary?
I don't think it is quibbling. It is a really important distinction. Salary is (mostly) guaranteed. Equity isn't guaranteed at all.
It’s a bit pedantic to be honest. Multiple times it’s been pointed out on this thread that the OP was referring to total comp so I’m not sure why this keeps being brought up.
While equity in a public company can go down and go down significantly it’s liquid. Especially in companies like coinbase that don’t have a 1 year cliff, are public, it’s a significant part of your comp and not funny money like you get in many early stage companies.
Re: The tech sector teardown is more catharsis than crisis
#178Earlier quoted context omitted.
levels.fyi shows $498,910 in total compensation for a staff level SWE at Google. Different companies compensate using a different blend of cash and equity. At a public company like Google, it's all liquid. Similarly, an E6 at Facebook gets $576,886. These are also roughly speaking first-year salaries. You can expect a refresh grant equal to 1/4 of a new-hire equity grant each year vesting over 4 years, plus a staff-l…
> After 3-4 years in a staff role you can easily be making $1-2M/yr. Refreshes exist but this is a total lie. I'm staff at Google. Nobody at L6 is making $1M in annual compensation, even if they have their sign-on equity and three refreshes. Let alone $2M.
Ok so I'm speaking from personal experience and network.
The point is that 3-4 years tenure is enough for significant appreciation in equity, especially in the earlier grants. Let's work an example, for someone who started 3 years ago.
- May 2019. -
Base: $225K.
Equity: $880K grant = 785sh @ 1120/share = 220K.
Bonus: $60K.
Total: $500K.
- May 2020. -
Base: $236K.
Equity: 196sh @ 1428/share = 280K.
Equity: $220K grant = 154sh @ 1428/share = 55K.
Bonus: $63K.
Total: $634K.
- May 2021. -
Base: $247K.
Equity: 196sh @ 2411/share = 473K.
Equity: 39sh @ 2411/share = 94K.
Equity: $220K grant = 91sh @ 2411/share = 55K.
Bonus: $66K.
Total: $935K.
Trust me, if they've been there for 3-4 years, they're making more than 1M in total comp. If you back my example out to someone who started in 2018, those refreshers easily push them into 1.2-1.4M, and factor in promo grants?
Re: The tech sector teardown is more catharsis than crisis
#179Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is extremely out of the ordinary- Levels.fyi lists a salary of $224,000 for a Staff level SWE at Google
levels.fyi shows $498,910 in total compensation for a staff level SWE at Google. Different companies compensate using a different blend of cash and equity. At a public company like Google, it's all liquid. Similarly, an E6 at Facebook gets $576,886. These are also roughly speaking first-year salaries. You can expect a refresh grant equal to 1/4 of a new-hire equity grant each year vesting over 4 years, plus a staff-l…
Totally accurate and valuable information based on people in my network.
You can make a lot of money working as a staff engineer at a top tier company.
Re: The tech sector teardown is more catharsis than crisis
#180Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I can't see the future but I don't think it's going to be a bloodbath like the .com crash. I agree. I've went through .com and the gfc, and key to both times was to make sure the company I was with was making money. While I think tech will see downward pressures on salaries, each company will be in a different situation. For example, if you're in a company that needs a runway, assume it may get cut short at any tim…
>Almost every company views tech as a competitive edge, and that is simply not going away. I hope you're right. In my experience, most large companies see tech as a cost center.
the entire point of large scale technological literacy is to replace the tech sector. no web app you write is going to be more useful to an organization than an administrative staff that just knows SQL and can use it on the fly for queries, reports, and analysis. software developers are working against the tide: think about how much simpler dev tools are than user tools. as users become more sophisticated then you expect them to need simpler rather than more complex tools.