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Some Apple engineers rewarded up to $180k in stock bonuses as incentive to stay

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211–220 of 272 posts

Re: Some Apple engineers rewarded up to $180k in stock bonuses as incentive to stay

#211
post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you imagine it playing out? It's unlikely to happen at huge scale since most people won't happily take a huge paycut regardless of how well-off they are. And there's enough people who want to work at those companies to replace the ones that leave.

> most people won't happily take a huge paycut regardless of how well-off they are. I would, but I guess I could be in the minority there.

It depends on individual priorities. Some folks just enjoy stacking cash. If you can do that, and maintain the status of being a top engineer at a well-known company, why rock the boat?

Additionally, it’s really hard to step away from solving large scaling issues, and go back to trying to finding your first customers/building an MVP.

I’ve been at startups and large companies. I like the money and challenges at large companies, and I don’t have crazy hours.

Re: Some Apple engineers rewarded up to $180k in stock bonuses as incentive to stay

#212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the designers get all the glory… sign me up! Maybe I’m naive, but designing UI stuff is a lot less stressful than making things actually work.

Designers and PMs. Apple is being ran by designers and PMs. Which is not really a bad thing from users point of view.

Apple doesn’t have PMs. SWE has EPMs but they have no power.

Re: Some Apple engineers rewarded up to $180k in stock bonuses as incentive to stay

#213

Would $180k over 4yrs move the needle if making $340k yr salary? Think not.

In the near term, no. Long term, with appreciation, yes. The bonus is paid as equity, not cash. If the share price doubles, that bonus is $360K, not $180K. The hope is that you’ll be incentivized to stick around for the appreciation.

Re: Some Apple engineers rewarded up to $180k in stock bonuses as incentive to stay

#214
post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In what ways did it become a dumpster fire? I thought Apple was a great place to work, but now I'm curious...

Things change. Their products used to be so good they were considered as a standard for quality and usability. Few of the iconic companies of the past retain their status. Apple has sunk a long way; but, like IBM and Microsoft, though, there's a still a lot of air to fall through before they hit ground.

Apple products are mostly still 10x better than their competitors products.

Re: Some Apple engineers rewarded up to $180k in stock bonuses as incentive to stay

#215

Apple is clearly an incredibly successful company but to take an example why would an energetic young developer ever choose to work on Apple Music over Spotify? I say this as an Apple Music subscriber but one is a company that is existentially all in and the other that sees a revenue stream. This is evident in the quality of the respective products. If you’re not in the AR/car divisions then what is the point.

I get your idea, but Spotify isn't exactly an innovative company either. They made a product that was successful and they simply maintain it while also exploring other revenue streams (podcasts, Car Thing).

Music streaming is a terrible business to be existentially all in to because the record labels own all the actual music and have all the power over you. But you can’t do anything about it either. So there’s not much reason to invest in it.

Re: Some Apple engineers rewarded up to $180k in stock bonuses as incentive to stay

#216
post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Coming from Menlo Park even, Cupertino feels a bit too dull and suburban, but it is astonishingly well maintained in comparison to anywhere else in the bay area. No doubt that the city is doing a great job.

I've lived here for 12 years and I can tell you that you are totally right -- it's very dull and suburban and also well maintained. It's practically a company town. The Mayor couldn't even name the second biggest employer in town after Apple. I think it's actually Amazon.

Of course, the people who live in Cupertino all hate Apple because they’re retirees and hate the traffic, think male tech employees will molest their children and hire prostitutes[1], cell phones will give them cancer, tech employees are too poor due to not yet being millionaires, etc.

* actual quote from current city council member

Re: Some Apple engineers rewarded up to $180k in stock bonuses as incentive to stay

#217
post #28

Interesting, Apple pays $180k over 4 years to prevent good engineers from going to Meta. Meanwhile, Meta gives >$1M in discretionary equity to top performers to prevent them from leaving. I don't think Apple picked a big enough number here.

Meta has a moral/ethical cost as well as a branding tax.

No post body was provided.

Re: Some Apple engineers rewarded up to $180k in stock bonuses as incentive to stay

#218

> "Most engineers received stock worth $80,000 to $120,000, with the bonuses provided as restricted stock units that are set to vest over the course of four years provided the employees stay with Apple and do not take jobs at other companies." Is that really a significant amount enough to ward off being poached? 120k over 4 years is 30k a year if linear. I would think at the pay scales being discussed they would get…

Proactive vs reactive bonus logic.

If you're proactive, people are generally happy and not really a huge flight risk so the bonus just keeps them from even entertaining external offers even though they're hearing rumors of people leaving for X% more.

If you're reactive, well they're probably already gone and you need to give them a huge counter offer to stay, many folks believe in the "never accept a counter" rule so again, you lost your employee.

Re: Some Apple engineers rewarded up to $180k in stock bonuses as incentive to stay

#219
post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I interview 50% or more of the senior engineers we (A YC-backed company that is post-IPO and still growing rapidly) hire. I assure you that our interview process for engineers at this level is weighted towards significant involvement in projects. We consider it unacceptable if all the projects a candidate wants to talk about "began before I was hired, and shipped after I left." And that's what you get if you are an a…

> major multi-year project I'm not sure what company you're at but there is certainly not a multi-year project in any I've worked at. There are long term _product_ roadmaps but in order to stay agile you never commit to something as big as a multi-year project. There are only individual features that get committed to. Even in core infra (heavily technical) where needs and solutions are known committed work goes out a…

This probably depends a lot on your industry. In my industry, every product I've worked on took multiple years to ship. It wouldn't be unreasonable to want to find sr engineers who had been through the whole cycle from early planning to post launch support.

Out of curiosity, what product does your company make? What kind of moat do they have if anything you do can be replicated in under a year by a competitor?

Re: Some Apple engineers rewarded up to $180k in stock bonuses as incentive to stay

#220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Human

There is actually very little evidence for this. It is likely that it is mostly dog poop. EDIT: the comments in response are non-sequiturs. The map does not display mostly human poop. It is mostly dog poop. I know I know, you see people poop all the time. But that’s not what the map is.

Regardless of what the map is about, the statement "poop on the streets is very common in San Francisco" is both about human and dog poop. The frequency with which people encounter human poop on the sidewalk in SF is very, very abnormal, even if dog poop is more frequent. One of my best friends owns a house on a street which is not a bad part of town by any means (both sides of the street are lined with immaculately-kept victorians that zillow thinks are worth $3+ million) and he has to clean human poop off of his own sidewalk about once a month.
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