I think I know why you can't hire engineers right now • Hacker News Board

Re: I think I know why you can't hire engineers right now

#241

Post by jandrewrogers » Thu, Jan 13, 2022, 5:39 AM UTC

user123456780 wrote: post #150

reikonomusha wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's an under-discussed topic that this apparent utopia isn't available to everyone. Race, gender presentation, academic background, country of residence or origin, Twitter blue-check, etc. all seem to be correlated (no numbers; purely anecdotal) to those who enjoy (or don't) this utopia. Being masterfully technical, social, or political have a lot to do with it too, it seems.

> Being masterfully either technically, socially, or politically have a lot to do with it too, it seems. I don't think you need to be a master to get more money. What I have noticed as a hiring manager/tech lead is candidates/team members fall into either asking for more money or not. I have guys on my team who if they asked for money I could easily add 20 - 50k to their salary. But they don't, they also don't shop t…

Allow me to give a slightly different perspective. When engineers are consistently outperforming their wage, I immediately recognize that with an unsolicited pay increase to match their performance. This has always been met with appreciation, as it demonstrates both that outperformance is actively recognized and rewarded, and secondarily that management is looking out for the benefit of the employees. This has positive cultural impact.

This is more or less difficult depending on the company. In a few cases, I had to go to war with HR to get a deserving employee a raise who deserved it but hadn't asked for it. Other companies have processes that are highly amenable to it.

In many cases, if employees have to ask for more money when they've earned it then it is a management failure.

Re: I think I know why you can't hire engineers right now

#242

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Jan 13, 2022, 5:39 AM UTC

Der_Einzige wrote: post #182

ssalazar wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a hiring manager I’ve worked with internal recruiters and a good one is invaluable. - the transactional part of setting up interview loops, coordinating schedules, etc is extremely tedious for a field of 3-5 serious candidates for a given role. Internal recruiter takes all of this away from a hiring manager who has other duties. - an internal recruiter can plow through LinkedIn to find solid candidates, identifyin…

That should be your job. Even the "tedious" parts are too important to be left to a non technical person. Time of day for scheduling interviews really does matter and the initial communication of scheduling this can tell you an enormous amount about the candidate. Your job should also include lots of time on LinkedIn searching, as many HMs do today. Letting a recruiter do this for you will give you many more bad inte…

[deleted]

Re: I think I know why you can't hire engineers right now

#243

Post by trixie_ » Thu, Jan 13, 2022, 5:39 AM UTC

loeg wrote: post #137

The headline is > I Think I Know Why You Can't Hire Engineers Right Now But nothing on the article touches on an exploration of why these factors (which seem reasonable, in general) are any more relevant now than they were a year ago. Or five years ago.

Exactly. All of this was true 10 years ago, but there wasn’t a labor shortage. Why? Because none of these reasons have anything to do with it.

Re: I think I know why you can't hire engineers right now

#244

Post by lmm » Thu, Jan 13, 2022, 5:40 AM UTC

tharkun__ wrote: post #97

anonporridge wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The absolute value of your salary doesn't tell you anything about how long it takes to get to retirement (or more accurately, financial independence). That's exclusively a function of your spending and saving rates. https://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2012/01/13/the-shockingly-si...

I don't think that is accurate. I would say it is a combination of both. The article you link to obviously makes it sound like it's an exclusive function. But it simply dismisses the fact that not everyone can reasonably sustain the savings rates mentioned. Sure, there's reports of very motivated people that live on next to nothing and have a huge savings rate for the first 10 years of their working life, abstaining…

> If I increase my take home pay, I can stay on the same savings rate as before and retire earlier (assuming that I don't want to make a certain percentage of my last pay during retirement and instead have a fixed goal for my retirement income).

That would be extremely unwise - if your savings rate hasn't changed then that means your lifestyle has inflated, and so your fixed retirement income will be a bigger step down and harder to sustain. This isn't just theoretical - people set a retirement goal when they're young thinking they can live like a student, gradually get accustomed to a more comfortable lifestyle, and then get a pretty sharp shock when they try to retire early and realise they're not actually willing to go back to living like that.

The only way increasing your take home pay lets you retire earlier is if you use it to increase your savings rate, by not letting your lifestyle inflate proportionately.

Re: I think I know why you can't hire engineers right now

#245

Post by avmich » Thu, Jan 13, 2022, 5:40 AM UTC

Good engineers can't get hired, at least judging by local selection among those who didn't have problems before.

This is literal - you can't hire engineers because you don't hire good ones. The process is more broken than before.

It's both hilarious and sad to hear complaints of employers. The non-hiring is on their side, there is little engineers can do if they aren't considered good - great experience notwithstanding.

Re: I think I know why you can't hire engineers right now

#246

Post by oblio » Thu, Jan 13, 2022, 5:41 AM UTC

ldjkfkdsjnv wrote: post #129

reikonomusha wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't say for certain, but it seems there are lots of squeaky wheels about it and lots of chatter on the internet about them, but AMZN/FB/whoever else aren't actually facing any serious repercussions in terms of being able to hire. (I hope I'm wrong, because I do feel there needs to be a moral reckoning about how we technologists—whatever the specific discipline—are contributing to the world, and whether it's truly…

I think amazon is absolutely facing pressure from word getting out about working conditions. They raised their pay band for a middle level engineer 100k.

When?

Re: I think I know why you can't hire engineers right now

#247

Post by jgoldshlag » Thu, Jan 13, 2022, 5:41 AM UTC

cushychicken wrote: post #2

Author here. Questions, comments, vitriol - all gratefully accepted.

Honestly, stop with the E*on and whatnot. It just makes the article annoying to read. He doesn't care about any possible SEO "juice" you think that your blog post would give him, and it just makes the thing look unprofessional, IMHO

Re: I think I know why you can't hire engineers right now

#248

Post by trixie_ » Thu, Jan 13, 2022, 5:44 AM UTC

pwinnski wrote: post #6

It's so weird to see an author express such disdain for Elon Musk, and yet still credit him repeatedly with something he hasn't actually done, which is start all of the companies he runs. He bought Tesla, he didn't start it.

Saying, ‘he didnt start Tesla’ as a way to imply it would still be where it is today without him is comical.

Re: I think I know why you can't hire engineers right now

#249

Post by hirako2000 » Thu, Jan 13, 2022, 5:46 AM UTC

ehnto wrote: post #147

hguant wrote: post #8

There comes a point where the money just isn't a motivating factor anymore, and companies are struggling to figure out how to work in that environment. This bit from the author hits the nail on the head: >Is an extra $10k per year worth learning a new org, a new skillset, a new set of expectations, a new set of coworkers, and a new boss? For many engineers, the answer is: “No.” Yes I could quit and get a ~20k raise b…

Being able to work alongside the people you're solving the problem for is a really great intrinsic motivator. You can be abstracted away quite a bit as an engineer, which makes it so most of your motivations have to come from within and it ends up being quite a narcissitic evaluation of your role. You're not always going to love the problems you're solving, but when you know it's part of a bigger picture you believe…

I've come to this realisation as well. there is a tipping point where the impact we have starts to become a critical factor. when i started in the industry I'm in, I apparently had absolutely no problem being entirely detached from the people I impact. Even not knowing what exactly my value to society was didn't scratch my curiosity. 8y later, I'm desperate for any initiative no matter how small that I get to know who it's helping.

It is now internalised, a strong demotivation happens each time something abstract comes my way, no matter how technically exciting the task is. Something else wroth mentioning, the whole remote work somewhat becomes also a factor against content to be part of a labor community. It's not an issue the first few years, but total remote work for over 5 years has started to make me value proximity to business circles. proximity with my colleagues and proximity with who use whatever we make. there is a sort of guilt that builds up when benefiting from the hard work of the local community to provide physical services (coffee shops, organic food markets, drivers, etc) and have our time spent online contributing to solutions with colleagues and paying users residing thousands of miles away, who only appear to exist as email addresses and occasional faces/voices spit out by a laptop.

Re: I think I know why you can't hire engineers right now

#250

Post by Thorrez » Thu, Jan 13, 2022, 5:46 AM UTC

caymanjim wrote: post #72

symlinkk wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You must live in the sticks or something. I make well over 6 figures and can’t afford a house.

Maybe not today, if you haven't saved, but if you have no major debt now, there is noplace in the country where six figures won't allow you to buy a house once you have a downpayment. Mortgages are cheaper than rent, and you're presumably living somewhere right now.

What is your definition of house? Does a studio condo count? And how far of a commute are you talking about?

Let's take Mountain View. Looking at "houses" and "townhouses" on Zillow, the cheapest one is this one[1] for $1,295,000. Zillow says the estimated monthly cost is $6,176. I don't think that's possible on a $100k salary once you factor in taxes. Zillow also says the rent "Zestimate" is $3,949/mo, so Zillow thinks it would be cheaper to rent than to buy. One hypothetical reason that renting could be cheaper than buying is that landlords buy for the expected price growth rather than just for the rental income.

> you're presumably living somewhere right now.

Maybe with roommate(s). If you buy 50% or 33% or 25% of a house with your roommate(s), that's not really $100k buying a house, that's $200k or $300k or $400k buying a house.

[1] https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1993-Plymouth-St-APT-8-Mo...