8 ms·

I think for software development, it takes about a year to get fully up to speed on a company's development practices and processes. So after a year, most peopl

by jbob2000 10y ago

I think for software development, it takes about a year to get fully up to speed on a company's development practices and processes. So after a year, most people will ask themselves, "is this the company I want to stay with for a while?" and leave or stay for a few more years. Under 1 year, I have to think that something out of the ordinary happened and I would be inclined to ask about what happened. Did the company go under? Were there some crazy red flags that forced you to leave? And internally, I'd ask myself, is this person really picky? Do they have some red flag that keeps getting them let go? Etc. I don't have an upper limit, but definitely a lower limit; 2 years. 1 year to get up to speed, 1 year to give the company a chance. I recognize that all companies have problems and I want to see progress being made on solving those problems. If, after 2 years, we're still talking about the same issues we faced when I started, then I'm going to start looking. Curious why someone would place an upper limit on time served? If the work is good and the company is good, why leave?

fullshark 10y ago
> Curious why someone would place an upper limit on time served? If the work is good and the company is good, why leave? I guess in terms of professional development the person might think it's important to expose themselves to new companies and challenges. They don't want to just get comfortable somewhere and let their skills slowly deteriorate. I agree that it's not a 100% fool proof plan but I get it as a rule of thumb.
- 35bge57dtjku 10y ago
  Plus I hear it can be the only way to get real raises.
  - fullshark 10y ago
    It's the easiest way for sure if you work in a competitive industry.
  - fweespeech 10y ago
    As a counter point, I'm not able to get a raise by leaving my job and I've been trying for ~1 year. I'm still going to leave, but I'm probably going to eat an effective 10-15% pay cut.
mkaziz 10y ago
It's also really easy to get silo'd in. My company is fairly niche and I love working here, but a decent chunk of what I'm learning isn't transferable.
- infinite8s 10y ago
  Really? They are in a market that's so unique that nobody else has similar business problems?
  - mkaziz 10y ago
    Depends on how broadly you define similar. Of course some patterns are repeatable across industries, but a lot of the work I do is specific to only this industry.
burrox 10y ago
What if the reason why that person left had nothing to do with the work environment? Right now I'm a bit worried about leaving my current job (10 months in) because I have the opportunity to go backpacking through South America with a friend, which I honestly believe is not something that comes up very often. Anyways I was just wondering how a manager might react to my situation once I come back and start looking for a job again. Could it impact my professional profile in a negative way?
- pklausler 10y ago
  Probably not, if you wrap up your current obligations in a professional manner and can demonstrate that you haven't lost your skills while on your trip. You don't want to appear irresponsible, so just be responsible about it. I hope that you have fun!
  - burrox 10y ago
    Thanks! it was a tough decision to make but now that I've made up my mind I'm very happy about it.
    - pklausler 10y ago
      Caveat: don't make major life decisions based solely on advice from random strangers. All I'm saying is that I would be fine if I saw "backpacked South America" filling a gap on a resume.
  - Silhouette 10y ago
    Probably not, if you wrap up your current obligations in a professional manner and can demonstrate that you haven't lost your skills while on your trip. I strongly agree with this. We're talking about hiring human beings, not machines, and someone with the character traits that would make you go adventuring for an extended period probably has a lot to offer, other things being equal. The challenge is demonstrating that other things have not suffered as a result of that choice. For example, a good reference from the last employer confirming that everything was professionally handed over before leaving might go a long way to mitigating concerns about only working there for a few months. I'm not generally a big believer in relying on references when hiring, but in a case like this, that sort of specific detail could be an important asset. Given the relatively short professional career so far, I would also be tempted to work a brief mention of this point into the covering letter or, if it's a resume-only application next time, into the resume itself.
jackmaney 10y ago
> If the work is good and the company is good, why leave? Possible reasons, off the top of my head: 1. Being approached by a recruiter or hiring manager and end up being given an offer you can't refuse (eg much more money, dream job, etc). 2. Your spouse or significant other has to move to another city for their job, you don't want to leave them, and your current employer won't let you work remotely. 2a. Ditto with needing to move to care for an older and/or ill family member. 3. A shift of passion into a new career. 4. Health problems that cause such an extended leave of absence that you may as well leave. 5. I've encountered some managers who are leery of people who have spent "too long" at one place, wondering, eg "Why did s/he stay there for ten years? Did this person just find a spot to coast and collect a paycheck? Why hasn't s/he moved on to bigger and better things?" I think this line of thinking is just as knee-jerk as being leery of "job hoppers".
- JustSomeNobody 10y ago
  re: 5. That's just wrong-headed logic. Nothing wrong with being at a company that long. In fact I would love to see more companies able to keep devs for their entire career.
  - jackmaney 10y ago
    Can anyone name a company that, in 2016, is known for keeping a significant number of their employees for their entire career?
- delphinius81 10y ago
  re 5: Or they live in the SF/Bay Area and that one job pays them enough that they can afford to pay their mortgage (if they are lucky enough to have one), children's school/college, car, etc. and still have money left over for date night. Once all those expenses pile on, there are very few companies that will pay you enough. You aren't going to hop to a risky startup @100k/year when you have those kinds of expenses. But then, if you finally got that job at Google, you can probably move on to wherever you want afterward no matter how long you were there.
delphinius81 10y ago
> Curious why someone would place an upper limit on time served? If the person has the same title at a company after 4+ years (unless they are already in a lead/senior role), it's a bad sign. If this is in the first 10 years of someone's career, it tells me they might only be doing enough to get by. Whether it's because they a) are not ambitious enough, b) aren't talented enough, or c) the company they work for is terrible at recognition/promotion is something that I would have to find out during an interview (if everything else on paper looked ok).
- aldanor 10y ago
  Some companies have very horizontal structure, there isn't much of a corporate ladder to climb. E.g., in trading firms a Quant is often just a Quant even after 10 years in the company. This doesn't mean at all, though, that the pay scale and level of responsibilities don't change drastically within a role over time.
  - delphinius81 10y ago
    That's a good point. I would hope to see evidence of the increased responsibilities on the person's resume then - whether it is through project leadership or personnel management, depending on what they are applying for.
    - infinite8s 10y ago
      In the case of a quant, they probably just have a much higher desired salary to move over to your company.
- sheepmullet 10y ago
  > If the person has the same title at a company after 4+ years (unless they are already in a lead/senior role), it's a bad sign. It really depends. My company just has the role Developer. No junior, senior, lead, principal, etc. There is a $300k+ difference in salary between the min and max pay so we have plenty of developers here who haven't moved up in title for 10+ years.
jghn 10y ago
While I disagree with the sentiment, I've heard people who argue that folks who stay in one job for a long time are more likely to have not kept up with best practices, aren't enough of a go-getter, and stuff like that.
smileysteve 10y ago
> Did the company go under? Were there some crazy red flags that forced you to leave? And internally, I'd ask myself, is this person really picky? Do they have some red flag that keeps getting them let go? I describe each company on my resume, and on the "not a decision" to leave ones describe the reason. Examples: * "Division / [City] Office Closed * "An early stage startup..." And in person, I typically make it clear that the company was unable to make salaries or was still looking for product market fit.
hacknat 10y ago
It really depends, IMO, if a person has a company they were with for many years, then a hop, then another at-least-two-year stint, than I probably won't care about that hop at all.
tedmiston 10y ago
> I think for software development, it takes about a year to get fully up to speed on a company's development practices and processes. I'm not sure what size company this perspective comes from, but in early to mid stage startups, I don't think anyone would give you a year, more like 2–4 weeks. More than a month or two without might suggest poor culture fit.

fullshark 10y ago

> Curious why someone would place an upper limit on time served? If the work is good and the company is good, why leave? I guess in terms of professional development the person might think it's important to expose themselves to new companies and challenges. They don't want to just get comfortable somewhere and let their skills slowly deteriorate. I agree that it's not a 100% fool proof plan but I get it as a rule of thumb.

35bge57dtjku 10y ago
Plus I hear it can be the only way to get real raises.
- fullshark 10y ago
  It's the easiest way for sure if you work in a competitive industry.
- fweespeech 10y ago
  As a counter point, I'm not able to get a raise by leaving my job and I've been trying for ~1 year. I'm still going to leave, but I'm probably going to eat an effective 10-15% pay cut.

mkaziz 10y ago

It's also really easy to get silo'd in. My company is fairly niche and I love working here, but a decent chunk of what I'm learning isn't transferable.

infinite8s 10y ago
Really? They are in a market that's so unique that nobody else has similar business problems?
- mkaziz 10y ago
  Depends on how broadly you define similar. Of course some patterns are repeatable across industries, but a lot of the work I do is specific to only this industry.

burrox 10y ago

What if the reason why that person left had nothing to do with the work environment? Right now I'm a bit worried about leaving my current job (10 months in) because I have the opportunity to go backpacking through South America with a friend, which I honestly believe is not something that comes up very often. Anyways I was just wondering how a manager might react to my situation once I come back and start looking for a job again. Could it impact my professional profile in a negative way?

pklausler 10y ago
Probably not, if you wrap up your current obligations in a professional manner and can demonstrate that you haven't lost your skills while on your trip. You don't want to appear irresponsible, so just be responsible about it. I hope that you have fun!
- burrox 10y ago
  Thanks! it was a tough decision to make but now that I've made up my mind I'm very happy about it.
  - pklausler 10y ago
    Caveat: don't make major life decisions based solely on advice from random strangers. All I'm saying is that I would be fine if I saw "backpacked South America" filling a gap on a resume.
- Silhouette 10y ago
  Probably not, if you wrap up your current obligations in a professional manner and can demonstrate that you haven't lost your skills while on your trip. I strongly agree with this. We're talking about hiring human beings, not machines, and someone with the character traits that would make you go adventuring for an extended period probably has a lot to offer, other things being equal. The challenge is demonstrating that other things have not suffered as a result of that choice. For example, a good reference from the last employer confirming that everything was professionally handed over before leaving might go a long way to mitigating concerns about only working there for a few months. I'm not generally a big believer in relying on references when hiring, but in a case like this, that sort of specific detail could be an important asset. Given the relatively short professional career so far, I would also be tempted to work a brief mention of this point into the covering letter or, if it's a resume-only application next time, into the resume itself.

jackmaney 10y ago

> If the work is good and the company is good, why leave? Possible reasons, off the top of my head: 1. Being approached by a recruiter or hiring manager and end up being given an offer you can't refuse (eg much more money, dream job, etc). 2. Your spouse or significant other has to move to another city for their job, you don't want to leave them, and your current employer won't let you work remotely. 2a. Ditto with needing to move to care for an older and/or ill family member. 3. A shift of passion into a new career. 4. Health problems that cause such an extended leave of absence that you may as well leave. 5. I've encountered some managers who are leery of people who have spent "too long" at one place, wondering, eg "Why did s/he stay there for ten years? Did this person just find a spot to coast and collect a paycheck? Why hasn't s/he moved on to bigger and better things?" I think this line of thinking is just as knee-jerk as being leery of "job hoppers".

JustSomeNobody 10y ago
re: 5. That's just wrong-headed logic. Nothing wrong with being at a company that long. In fact I would love to see more companies able to keep devs for their entire career.
- jackmaney 10y ago
  Can anyone name a company that, in 2016, is known for keeping a significant number of their employees for their entire career?
delphinius81 10y ago
re 5: Or they live in the SF/Bay Area and that one job pays them enough that they can afford to pay their mortgage (if they are lucky enough to have one), children's school/college, car, etc. and still have money left over for date night. Once all those expenses pile on, there are very few companies that will pay you enough. You aren't going to hop to a risky startup @100k/year when you have those kinds of expenses. But then, if you finally got that job at Google, you can probably move on to wherever you want afterward no matter how long you were there.

delphinius81 10y ago

> Curious why someone would place an upper limit on time served? If the person has the same title at a company after 4+ years (unless they are already in a lead/senior role), it's a bad sign. If this is in the first 10 years of someone's career, it tells me they might only be doing enough to get by. Whether it's because they a) are not ambitious enough, b) aren't talented enough, or c) the company they work for is terrible at recognition/promotion is something that I would have to find out during an interview (if everything else on paper looked ok).

aldanor 10y ago
Some companies have very horizontal structure, there isn't much of a corporate ladder to climb. E.g., in trading firms a Quant is often just a Quant even after 10 years in the company. This doesn't mean at all, though, that the pay scale and level of responsibilities don't change drastically within a role over time.
- delphinius81 10y ago
  That's a good point. I would hope to see evidence of the increased responsibilities on the person's resume then - whether it is through project leadership or personnel management, depending on what they are applying for.
  - infinite8s 10y ago
    In the case of a quant, they probably just have a much higher desired salary to move over to your company.
sheepmullet 10y ago
> If the person has the same title at a company after 4+ years (unless they are already in a lead/senior role), it's a bad sign. It really depends. My company just has the role Developer. No junior, senior, lead, principal, etc. There is a $300k+ difference in salary between the min and max pay so we have plenty of developers here who haven't moved up in title for 10+ years.

jghn 10y ago

While I disagree with the sentiment, I've heard people who argue that folks who stay in one job for a long time are more likely to have not kept up with best practices, aren't enough of a go-getter, and stuff like that.

smileysteve 10y ago

> Did the company go under? Were there some crazy red flags that forced you to leave? And internally, I'd ask myself, is this person really picky? Do they have some red flag that keeps getting them let go? I describe each company on my resume, and on the "not a decision" to leave ones describe the reason. Examples: * "Division / [City] Office Closed * "An early stage startup..." And in person, I typically make it clear that the company was unable to make salaries or was still looking for product market fit.

hacknat 10y ago

It really depends, IMO, if a person has a company they were with for many years, then a hop, then another at-least-two-year stint, than I probably won't care about that hop at all.

tedmiston 10y ago

> I think for software development, it takes about a year to get fully up to speed on a company's development practices and processes. I'm not sure what size company this perspective comes from, but in early to mid stage startups, I don't think anyone would give you a year, more like 2–4 weeks. More than a month or two without might suggest poor culture fit.