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Signs that it's time to leave a company

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Re: Signs that it's time to leave a company

#251

Post by valdiorn »

kabdib wrote: post #21

Signs that I've seen before leaving: * There are more VPs than there are restrooms. * The free coffee and soda is no more. * Engineers are co-opted as salespeople ("... and why is the project late?").

I'm pretty sure that "removing the free soda/coffee/tee/biscuits" is an intentional action to reduce headcount. The effect it has on productivity by destroying morale is vastly more than the money saved. I noticed this at my very first job (a govt. owned company which had to remove a bunch of perks because of bad media coverage of an unrelated scandal, because the "optics" were bad), and I just refuse to believe that the "people in charge" (generally; the MBA suit and tie crowd) are too dumb to understand this.

It must be intentional even if nobody admits it, and it's a way to drive out people. Ironically, it also drives out the people that know they have better options, while you're left with the worst workers who are desperate and don't think they can get another job. But they don't care as long as the headcount target is met, and they can get that performance bonus.

Re: Signs that it's time to leave a company

#252

Post by the_only_law »

JohnFen wrote: post #31

For me, the main sign that it's time to leave a company is when I start fantasizing regularly about leaving the company. My gut seems to be wiser than my head on this stuff. Nearly every time that I've moved on, it's turned out to be the right call in hindsight.

Wish I could find a job where I don’t do this three months in.

Re: Signs that it's time to leave a company

#253

Post by Aurornis »

behringer wrote: post #194
Aurornis wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You are just built to work with more structure and processes. For what it's worth, some of the most highly structured and process-heavy tech companies I've worked at have been small startups. Small companies can be a haven for micromanaging first-time CTOs, inexperienced VPs of Engineering who learned how to "lead" from books and LinkedIn posts, Technical Program Managers who want to control every aspect of everyth…

Structure and process is not micro management. It's just management.

Micromanagers love structure and process. They'll give you more structure and process and management than anyone asked for.

There's nothing special about structure and process that makes it immune to micromanagement.

Re: Signs that it's time to leave a company

#254

Post by emmanueloga_ »

oneepic wrote: post #104

Here's a bizarre story about quitting. When I was at Microsoft, I had a manager who, despite good intentions, led through fear and paranoia. I had gotten yelled at for causing a production incident, which was not the first time, but that week I started having some very strange dreams involving seeing the number "69" in different places. Just some juvenile humor maybe, I just dismissed it. In the meantime, gradually t…

Reminds me of the number 23. Critics kind of panned it but I think it’s entertaining :-)

https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0481369/

Re: Signs that it's time to leave a company

#255

Post by bondolo »

I have worked primarily from home for most of the last 25 years at several companies. I joined Apple during the pandemic and worked from home for the first 18 months but left Apple about 15 months ago for Amazon, in part, because of the increasing RTO pressure at Apple. The Apple RTO policy has only gotten stupider since I left.

Unfortunately about a year after I joined Amazon chose to adopt an RTO policy as well. It is not going well. Dissatisfaction is high, people are quitting, people are planning to quit, respect for upper management dwindles. There are many heartbreaking stories of productive long term employees being force out by RTO. WFH had also been opening new opportunities to people who were unable to commute either because of disability, location or other reasons. It has been sad to see those people shut out again.

The RTO policy has really soured the culture. Adrian highlights the issues very well. Amazon is a global company. We are expected to work with remote teams routinely. Many teams, like mine are also geographically distributed. Going in to the office doesn't make a damn bit of sense for most people.

Re: Signs that it's time to leave a company

#256

Post by packetlost »

lucidguppy wrote: post #34

I don't understand this fascination with central offices. We live in the year 2024. We should be able to look at our workforce, find small offices, and have hub and spoke networks of offices - and work from home as a fallback. Rent a condo, do a communal office, if you want more close collaboration - shuffle your teams to colocate them - not force them into 1hr commutes into a fucking empty office. Our infrastructure…

As someone operating in exactly this manner, it sucks for the same reasons that hybrid sucks. Timezones, teleconferencing, shipping between offices, travel between offices, conversations that happen in one office not making it to the other office, etc.

Re: Signs that it's time to leave a company

#257

Post by 000ooo000 »

zmmmmm wrote: post #152
whilenot-dev wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Time and time again job announcements are mentioning fast-paced environments , and exactly those companies like to churn through an immense body count. Loyalty needs to go two ways. Stability seems to be a game for the older folks, whereas younger people prefer efficiency and risk taking. "we can't have infinite exponential growth forever", I agree, but I can create infinite exponential personal growth for my younger…

> Loyalty needs to go two ways This is one of the more perplexing elements of both working as an IC and a manager. I'm constantly battling the line between treating the relationship as purely transactional and one where work is more meaningful than that. The problem is that whenever you bring other things in - "loyalty", "passion" etc etc you are at very high risk that these are circumstantially dependent on the coin…

Well said. For me, it was a great source of burnout when the true transactional nature of work was thrust on me. I had been giving work 110%. My work ethic and output were part of my identity, and I was integrated well socially in the team/unit. I was motivated, gaining influence, getting interesting shit done, and working with great people. But I was also green, and when all of those motivating factors were eroded away, I wasn't prepared. I found my complaints were falling on deaf ears - surely it's obvious to management that there are legitimate problems which will result in worse business outcomes? Surely all of the rhetoric about passion, collaboration and The Mission wasn't just BS? It was very difficult to move from that naive thinking to a more detached one where work is simply a means for earning money to live. The unfortunate reality is that there are few employers at few moments in time that tick more of my boxes as a human than simply paying me money. I think this warrants scaling ones inputs in the same way a business does; I put enough in to get what I need out, and no more.

Re: Signs that it's time to leave a company

#258

Post by vlaxx »

jay_kyburz wrote: post #219
vlaxx wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't understand this fascination with central offices. It's not about you, it's about them. What they control, what they own, what they have. They are in love with the feeling of dominance in a room full of people. They love to see the minions that they command. Its about being able to visualize and understand the domain that they control.

I wouldn't want to work in a company with strong "us" and "them" culture. If I don't feel everybody is working towards the same goals and is receiving a fair piece of the pie I would go somewhere else. Running your own company for a while really helps see both sides of the equation.

> I wouldn't want to work in a company with strong "us" and "them" culture.

That seems like a pipe dream to me. Money and power often to change people for the worse.

Re: Signs that it's time to leave a company

#259

Post by _huayra_ »

velcrovan wrote: post #4

Other signs for me personally: * Sales schedules dictate product development timelines rather than the other way around * Leadership thinks about practical operational/logistics issues only when forced to * The importance of "culture" is brought up without fail when talking about working from the office, and never at other times * Leadership is fond of setting goals and deathly allergic to providing incentives

> Leadership is fond of setting goals and deathly allergic to providing incentives.

This hits me hard now. I was considering whether I should hit the gas at work trying to meet some completely unrealistic metrics, only to be in a conference call where some guy from another team basically did the same (missing a lot of events with his family), only to get a bunch of those stupid animated emoji things in Teams as his only compensation (I asked him offline if he got any bonus from it).

I'm leaving work early to hit the ski slopes tomorrow. Life is too short to be rewarded by digital clapping hands and hearts.

Re: Signs that it's time to leave a company

#260

Post by askvictor »

velcrovan wrote: post #4

Other signs for me personally: * Sales schedules dictate product development timelines rather than the other way around * Leadership thinks about practical operational/logistics issues only when forced to * The importance of "culture" is brought up without fail when talking about working from the office, and never at other times * Leadership is fond of setting goals and deathly allergic to providing incentives

Depending on the stage a company is at or its cashflow, #1 can sometimes be acceptable. It's a balancing act; if you haven't got money to pay developers, you haven't got development.
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