5 ms·

Boston also has lower mobility for tech workers, because in California non-competes are unenforceable but in Massachusetts they are.

e1ven 8y ago
Massachusetts has recently banned them. https://www.jacksonlewis.com/publication/massachusetts-legislature-finally-passes-non-compete-law https://www.jacksonlewis.com/publication/massachusetts-legis...
- ghaff 8y ago
  Not quite banned but definitely an improvement. As I understand it, the bill imposed a fairly significant garden leave requirement on companies looking to exercise a non-compete. It also prohibits companies from retroactively imposing.
  - arthurjj 8y ago
    "Garden leave" meaning the employer needs to pay the employee during the non-compete timeframe. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garden_leave https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garden_leave
- ljw1001 8y ago
  definitely not a ban. They're limited to salaried workers and to a year in duration. Not the three years that used to be standard.
eropple 8y ago
I've worked in Boston my entire life, for some of the area's bigger tech employers, and I have never-not-once had anybody even consider the prospect of having a problem with a non-compete.
sidr 8y ago
From what I hear, the lower mobility is endemic to biotech culture. The only folks who are able to run significant research programs are junior faculty poached from the nearby medical schools. If you are a fresh PhD or postdocs you have a low ceiling on growth potential and starting salary. This is probably due to a glut of cheap highly educated (PhD+) labor in the life sciences - way more so than CS. Also, at these biotechs, the software/informatics/stats folks are just playing support roles and are treating accordingly in terms of autonomy and compensation. This is mostly heresay from folks I know from my PhD days in a computational life science field in Boston. The other computational folks I know have either tried to stick it through in academia or have left for greener pastures in software. The wet lab people who joined biotechs are not thrilled.
- jghn 8y ago
  The second class citizen for software/stats/informatics is indeed generally true but not universal. It seems like the trend is in the right direction at least. My workplace is definitely changing in that regard.
- aaavl2821 8y ago
  I've heard the same thing. Biopharma does a pretty bad job developing young talent. Too many smart young scientists and not enough jobs, and the scientists are used to less than stellar compensation and treatment in academia From what I've heard this is a bit worse in Boston than the Bay Area. There seems to be more hierarchy and ageism in Boston and some of the VCs are very vocal in their preference for older employees. Bay Area is a bit better, some tech VCs are trying to get into biotech by supporting young scientists but there's still a long way to go
  - ghaff 8y ago
    Funny you use ageism in that context. It usually refers to preferring younger workers. I don’t know about biotech specifically but anecdotally the Boston area is probably more generally often to older workers because of things like embedded, other kernel level stuff, and other tasks that require traditional engineering disciplines and people with experience from a Boston-area computer companies.
    - aaavl2821 8y ago
      "Reverse ageism" is actually a fairly controversial topic in biotech. After a Twitter debate, a top VC (and one of the only biotech VCs who blogs) wrote this post about why he likes older entrepreneurs [0] IMO he has valid points, but there are all kinds of issues with his analysis, but bottom line is there isn't enough data to prove either sides point, so there's a lot of opinions presented as facts [0] https://lifescivc.com/2018/02/grey-hair-c-suite-experience-age-ipos-biotech/ https://lifescivc.com/2018/02/grey-hair-c-suite-experience-a...

e1ven 8y ago

Massachusetts has recently banned them. https://www.jacksonlewis.com/publication/massachusetts-legislature-finally-passes-non-compete-law https://www.jacksonlewis.com/publication/massachusetts-legis...

ghaff 8y ago
Not quite banned but definitely an improvement. As I understand it, the bill imposed a fairly significant garden leave requirement on companies looking to exercise a non-compete. It also prohibits companies from retroactively imposing.
- arthurjj 8y ago
  "Garden leave" meaning the employer needs to pay the employee during the non-compete timeframe. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garden_leave https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garden_leave
ljw1001 8y ago
definitely not a ban. They're limited to salaried workers and to a year in duration. Not the three years that used to be standard.

eropple 8y ago

I've worked in Boston my entire life, for some of the area's bigger tech employers, and I have never-not-once had anybody even consider the prospect of having a problem with a non-compete.

sidr 8y ago

From what I hear, the lower mobility is endemic to biotech culture. The only folks who are able to run significant research programs are junior faculty poached from the nearby medical schools. If you are a fresh PhD or postdocs you have a low ceiling on growth potential and starting salary. This is probably due to a glut of cheap highly educated (PhD+) labor in the life sciences - way more so than CS. Also, at these biotechs, the software/informatics/stats folks are just playing support roles and are treating accordingly in terms of autonomy and compensation. This is mostly heresay from folks I know from my PhD days in a computational life science field in Boston. The other computational folks I know have either tried to stick it through in academia or have left for greener pastures in software. The wet lab people who joined biotechs are not thrilled.

jghn 8y ago
The second class citizen for software/stats/informatics is indeed generally true but not universal. It seems like the trend is in the right direction at least. My workplace is definitely changing in that regard.
aaavl2821 8y ago
I've heard the same thing. Biopharma does a pretty bad job developing young talent. Too many smart young scientists and not enough jobs, and the scientists are used to less than stellar compensation and treatment in academia From what I've heard this is a bit worse in Boston than the Bay Area. There seems to be more hierarchy and ageism in Boston and some of the VCs are very vocal in their preference for older employees. Bay Area is a bit better, some tech VCs are trying to get into biotech by supporting young scientists but there's still a long way to go
- ghaff 8y ago
  Funny you use ageism in that context. It usually refers to preferring younger workers. I don’t know about biotech specifically but anecdotally the Boston area is probably more generally often to older workers because of things like embedded, other kernel level stuff, and other tasks that require traditional engineering disciplines and people with experience from a Boston-area computer companies.
  - aaavl2821 8y ago
    "Reverse ageism" is actually a fairly controversial topic in biotech. After a Twitter debate, a top VC (and one of the only biotech VCs who blogs) wrote this post about why he likes older entrepreneurs [0] IMO he has valid points, but there are all kinds of issues with his analysis, but bottom line is there isn't enough data to prove either sides point, so there's a lot of opinions presented as facts [0] https://lifescivc.com/2018/02/grey-hair-c-suite-experience-age-ipos-biotech/ https://lifescivc.com/2018/02/grey-hair-c-suite-experience-a...