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Posting anonymously for obvious reasons. Unlike others, I actually find this story fairly believable. When I first joined Apple, straight out of college - a g

Posting anonymously for obvious reasons. Unlike others, I actually find this story fairly believable. When I first joined Apple, straight out of college - a good program, top three in the country - I was abused similarly. I joined a team that was on a project behind schedule. Our manager was a brusque, no-nonsense sort of dude. But he clearly had anger problems. On the team were 2 senior engineers, me, and a junior engineer that had just completed his internship and was on a work Visa. As the project got closer to the deadline, and the scope increased, the manager got agitated. In our team meetings, he would start yelling at us. People down the hallways would stare at us with those "looks." In our 1:1s he told us we might not have a job if our product doesn't ship on time (we were competing with another internal team to beat them to the punch.) The two senior engineers decided they'd had enough and quit the team. The manager told us to work overtime (no overtime pay, but we had to for fear of our job). He promised us that if we did it that we would get a month of vacation on him, and that he could secure it for us. The product released. After countless nights of overtime we did it. Our manager left, our guarantee of a month of vacation evaporated, and for the next three months, us two junior engineers were left on 24/7 primary/secondary on-call for a critical service. It was a nightmare. Calls at 3 AM, 6 AM, on weekends. Our manager got a promotion and is fairly high up at Apple now. Horrible experience. I left for a new company that pays me nearly double.

gabereiser 6y ago
Sadly, you can fill in the blank with any FAANG company with this story. I’ve heard it a thousand times. Toxic management. Sorry you went through that, sorry that was your first taste of engineering out of college. Glad you stuck with it. It’s a tough spot to be. Do you roll over and do the job your being yelled at to do even though you know any concessions are BS? Or like the senior folks, do you walk? It’s a really hard choice. Does Apple not have manager feedback mechanisms?
- hertzrat 6y ago
  Does anybody really want to be “the person who criticizes his or her managers,” in an official on-the-books capacity, in a context where your job is already being threatened?
  - nelson_muntz69 6y ago
    Welcome to wage slavery, friend. You can’t even criticize! Hah-ha!
- exApple-anon 6y ago
  > Does Apple not have manager feedback mechanisms? My manager left me out of the first review cycle, but at the end of the second review cycle I did leave a review of the manager. By this time he had left our team though. I don't think it did anything as he continued to rise through the ranks.
  - nicoburns 6y ago
    Would it not be appropriate to contact said managers (new) manager directly in this case?
    - Apocryphon 6y ago
      Not to speak for the OP, but cross-team HR situations at Apple don't exactly play well. I don't think jumping the chain of command so to speak to contact a manager's manager ever actually works.
- meekrohprocess 6y ago
  I don't think so. I've worked at other FAANG companies which had these sorts of posts written about them, and I've witnessed plenty of situations that I would call "abusive". But what I read in this article was beyond the pale. I never felt like anybody adjacent to any of my roles might have cause to fear for their physical safety. Reviews were used as political tools and occasional sources of psychological abuse, sure, but people still got marched out quickly if they stopped acting like empathetic human beings towards their peers.
  - coldtea 6y ago
    >But what I read in this article was beyond the pale. Yes, but while I believe it happened just like that, it's too beyond the pale to be representative of Apple at large. Looks like a particularly, close knit toxic team + gaslighting above levels about the new recruit.
    - Apocryphon 6y ago
      It's hard to say, because Apple is a huge corporation. It would be wrong for the takeaway to be "all of Apple is like this." But it should call into question "how much of Apple is like this?" and "how many more stories are there like this?" because I guarantee you that this author is not the only one who has experienced this at Apple, and there may be elements of its secrecy-obsessed, top-down culture that are common factors which contribute to it.
    - Daho0n 6y ago
      >it's too beyond the pale to be representative of Apple at large. Why?
      - coldtea 6y ago
        Because of a general understanding of how the world works, how businesses are, how western businesses are, people and so on. Same way if a told you some politician was sexually assaulting his pages, you woulnd't assume this is representative of congressmen and pages in general... I don't have recorded minutes of their interactions or other such hard proof.
- greesil 6y ago
  Some companies have a more open and transparent review process. I'm not sure if it would help with a clique, but at least people have to put information in writing which when push comes to shove can be verified. And, reports can review their managers. If your management chain doesn't care then yes, senior people walk.
- ineedasername 6y ago
  You can put just about any company in the "Apple" role here. A bad manager anywhere can cause a workgroup to turn toxic. I've seen it happen literally everywhere I've ever worked, though luckily only 1st hand at one location. (Actually there was one exception: working at a Barnes & Noble during college. I'd heard horror stories about other locations while I was there, but the store I worked at was run by an extremely good manager who cared for her employees and fostered that attitude in her assistant managers as well. It was also the most profitable store in the region, probably not a coincidence)
  - Apocryphon 6y ago
    Any large corporation that gets remotely near the headcount as Apple will have enough variance across team cultures that there will inevitably be cesspools of toxicity, true. But there's still the question if certain orgs foster a higher or lower standard across the org, and what factors contribute to it.
    - simonh 6y ago
      That’s true, I’ve seen toxic situations happening in other teams like those described here at several employers that were otherwise good places to work. Sometimes it’s down to a particular manager, but sometimes it can just be the consequences of a bad decision taken further up the food chain. This can leave a team in a no-win situation where even a good team lead can end up in a mess with no good options. I was at one employer where this happened and the team lead in question fell on his sword and quit rather than beat his team to death. I ended up taking on some of his responsibilities and team members and got some additional resources to deal with the re-org, so it worked out well for the team members and the company. It also gave me my first taste of management. It cost the guy his job though, which was grossly unfair. Not many mangers would have the guts and integrity to do something like that, and even if they did there’s no guarantee it would actually benefit the team. They could just be replaced by a tyrant. The only answer is to be open and honest about what you think and principled in your own actions. Call out bad behaviour where you see it and say when you see mistakes being made. If you aren’t prepared to do so, why should anyone else? Too many people silently tie the line and keep quiet and then wonder why these things spiral out of control and end in disaster. It’s because nobody said anything or did anything about it. We have to be prepared to take responsibility for calling out what’s happening around us and what we do about it as employees. It’s not somebody else’s problem, it’s our problem. Don’t be afraid of losing your job, it may well happen but jobs come and go. Having principles carries a cost, but one I think is worth paying.
- djcapelis 6y ago
  It’s not a hard decision. You unquestionably walk away from a situation like this. If your interactions with the team are going this poorly, walk immediately. There’s nothing to be gained from trying to hang on in a situation like this. This person should have walked much earlier. It’s agonizing how much broken US immigration policy plays a large role in forcing talented people who have decided to join our country to feel like this isn’t an option for them. We owe them much better.
  - uzakov 6y ago
    Not sure why you refer to the US immigration policy, this is how it works essentially everywhere. In the UK, for example, you get around 60 days to find a new job or you have to leave the country. https://iasservices.org.uk/tier-2-visa-termination-employment/ https://iasservices.org.uk/tier-2-visa-termination-employmen... I am not saying that the immigration policy is not broken or broken, I am simply stating the fact that other countries literally do the same.
    - PaulDavisThe1st 6y ago
      If you're on a H1 (or some of its cousins here) and you lose your job, you have no option to even try to find another. Your legal status in the US is coupled to that job, not just any job.
      - uzakov 6y ago
        Are you sure that is correct? According to results from googling you get 60 days to find a new job if you got laid off from H1B job. https://www.stilt.com/blog/2020/05/steps-after-an-h1b-layoffs/#:~:text=The%2060-day%20grace%20period%20is%20the%20time%20the%20USCIS,the%20evidence%20of%20your%20attempts https://www.stilt.com/blog/2020/05/steps-after-an-h1b-layoff.... Ps: to someone who downvoted, what don't you agree with?
        PaulDavisThe1st 6y ago
        You are right that I overstated this. You do have a window to try to find a new job. However, the new employer will need to be willing to sponsor a new H1B visa, and will need to get their part done within a fairly narrow timeframe. I agree that this is not an impossible scenario. But I also have a strong feeling that it's not a particularly likely one either.
- outside1234 6y ago
  Honestly, at Microsoft, I've never seen a situation like this, and I have worked in something like 15 roles now. That might also be, for better and worse, why Microsoft folks have such long tenure at the company. Its honestly a great place to work compared to these shit shows.
  - starky 6y ago
    I would suspect that finding out how many employees throughout the hierarchy have been there for a long time may be a good way to find a good company. The company I work for got acquired a couple years ago by a much older and larger company, and it usually feels like anyone you talk to has been there for 15, 20, even 30 years. I've yet to have a single issue with someone in that part of the parent organization, even though helping my group out isn't something they have been told to do.
    - tjalfi 6y ago
      My employer is like this - I'm the second newest person on my team and I've been here for 9 years. It's a great place to work and quite difficult to be hired here.
  - ThrowawayB7 6y ago
    To quote the old Tom and Jerry cartoon, "Don't you believe it." I could tell you comparable hair-raising stories I witnessed there over a couple of decades.
  - chihuahua 6y ago
    I agree, in 15 years at MSFT I've had mostly good experiences. The worst I've seen could only be described as "mildly annoying". If any manager behaved like the article described, I don't see how the team would get anything done, plus their MSFT poll score would quickly get them into trouble.
  - noen 6y ago
    I've seen it happen, multiple times, at Microsoft. Additionally know 2nd hand of dozens of other instances of abuse, career sabotage, and scorched earth management. Have been fortunate that the instances I was involved in directly, I was prepared, had extensive documentation, and my position (and my colleagues) were more valuable than the perpetrators, so they were swiftly shown the door. At the end of the day it's the same at every large company. HR protects the business, not the employee. They don't protect the victim, they protect the more valuable resource.
- justapassenger 6y ago
  Big difference is that other FAANGs have much less secretive inside culture. That of course doesn’t prevent abuse, and horrible experiences will happen everywhere. But it’s much easier to hide and develop pockets of abuse if everything you work on is top secret.
  - chihuahua 6y ago
    I've never been able to understand why Apple thinks they need to be so secretive. Most other companies do just fine without pretending that they're working on life-changing secrets that are worthless if they are leaked.
    - AgentOrange1234 6y ago
      I speculate some reasons are: 1. Being able to reveal something new and surprising leads to a flurry of good press. Failing that, constant rumors about what they are working on is like free advertising. 2. Keeping something a secret until it is shipping gives competitors less time to react/plan. 3. Preventing your employees from publicly discussing what they are doing may make it harder to know whom to poach, and harder for folks who want to leave to sell themselves. 4. It is useful as a cultural tool: it brings employees together in sharing a secret, creating an in-group/out-group dynamic; it gives product launches a kind of mystery, makes them something special for employees to watch together and celebrate together. 5. It helps Apple keep control of the framing of a product and the narrative around its launch.
      - tdeck 6y ago
        So they're making it hard to leave, creating a distinctive in-group and air of mystery, and clamping down on information to maintain strict control of the narrative. I can't help but notice that some of these are the same reasons why cults are often so secretive.
        AgentOrange1234 6y ago
        Sure. I think there are some pretty deep parallels. The company had been really successful. That makes it easy to trust the leadership and believe they know best. If you’re changing the world and doing the best work of your life, maybe that’s worth making sacrifices for (overtime or whatever). On the bright side, I’m not sure there’s any equivalent of the malevolent, sexually abusive stuff we see in cults. Hard to complain about being a well-paid engineer with good benefits, etc.
- dirkgently 6y ago
  Sorry, but absolutely not true. Have worked at two FAANG companies, and neither would tolerate even a hint of such behavior. It's an open secret in silicon valley that you work at apple for one of the three reasons: 1. You didn't know better 2. Were a fan/fanboi. 3. That was the best you could do (for whatever reasons). Every time something negative about Apple gets posted here, I see this typical response - oh, they all do it. Stop with this nonsense.
- cmrdporcupine 6y ago
  9 years at Google and I've never heard of anything this bad here. I'm sure there are cases, and while I've been in unpleasant teams myself with crappy arrogant team leads who got away with dubious personal behaviour because of their engineering genius, the kind of obvious outright hostility and abuse would described by people here... well, I am pretty sure it would lead to some serious sanction. I could be wrong and just lucky tho. FWIW my wife worked at Apple in a non-engineering role for almost a decade about ten years ago, and I can completely see how this kind of dysfunction could happen in that company. Pressure cooker environment.
dwardu 6y ago
If this is true, it’s really sad, I’ve read the whole thing. I had an experience, not as bad as yours but I know the feeling. I really hope you will go public about this experience and share it, Apple aren’t the “virtuous” company as they pretend to be.
- deleted 6y ago
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exApple-anon 6y ago
Some extra tidbits that didn't make it in because the edit timer ran out: - Despite the big release and herculean efforts, both of us were paid a fraction of our target bonus. This was the day I decided to move jobs. - I eventually grew some balls and told Apple to (a) pay me 2.5x during overtime (b) hire SREs for this critical service, or (c) go fuck themselves. They chose (c), which worked alright because our service was pretty stable. - The primary lesson I learnt is that it doesn't matter if you work hard. Nobody notices, and even if they do you will likely not get anything out of it. Do your job, but don't kill yourself over it. Work-life balance is king. - Only my first manager at Apple was an asshole. My last manager was a kind and genial person.
- ma2rten 6y ago
  I got an offer from Apple. The hiring manager told me "You worked at a startup before, you'll have no problem working overtime". I didn't end up taking the offer.
  - raverbashing 6y ago
    I can only answer with LOL to such offers Yes I've worked for a startup. Yes I did long hours. Yes I learned that's not sustainable and not a good way to make things work. So, no, I won't do it again.
    - geophile 6y ago
      I never understood the supposed attraction of "just like a startup, but in a big company!". That appears to mean that you will work in a small team, putting in unsustainable hours, but not receive the financial reward that a successful startup could provide. I've worked in several startups, and occasional death marches are unavoidable. They don't work month in and month out. But enduring that kind of life for just salary is nuts.
      - andrewem 6y ago
        The other notable thing about “just like a startup but in a big company” (often for startups which have been acquired) is the frequent claim that the startup will be left alone by the rest of the company. Every single process and incentive is against that remaining true. Maybe in some cases you can hope for the acquired startup to be the pet project of the acquirer’s founder/CEO?
abledon 6y ago
sleek aluminum curves hide so much sadness and abuse.
valuearb 6y ago
Your story sounds believable (and sadly common). The posted story sounds incredible, ie it strains credibility.
limono 6y ago
What org was that in? IS&T? I am thinking that this story by OP was in IS&T because that is known to be the worst org in Apple
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- heimatau 6y ago
  What's their social? would be a good follow-up too. I'm not sure you understand that Apple could bury this person's career and numerous companies only need one phone call to let this person go. Please understand that you're creating an attack vector that is too great for this person to reveal.
  - saagarjha 6y ago
    The picture the author included has enough information for an outsider to piece together their organization. The fact that it includes a meeting time and room would be enough for Apple to figure out who it was, just by looking at who booked it. Unfortunately, they probably are already in a position where Apple knows exactly who they are, and perhaps their colleagues do too.
    - heimatau 6y ago
      > The picture the author included has enough information... I'll refrain from the sarcasm. Although...it's very appealing. Is exApple-anon (OG comment that I responded to protect the obvious attack vector) the same as limono (HN submission)? Do you have evidence of this? I hope you certainly don't believe that they are the same person in a 100,000 person organization. This would be terribly assumptive. I don't believe limono's questions were malicious but I wanted to make it clear why the questions were inappropriate.
      - 6y ago
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GloriousKoji 6y ago
I also worked for Apple and I had a very similar experience. Management was brutal and abusive from my immediate manager to all the way up to and including the VP level. For example even though vacation hours were accrued I never got to use them unless I wanted to endure the verbal backlash of abandoning the team and my responsibilities. When the holidays came around the director would email everyone reminding us there's a stipend for working through the holidays but in reality it pays less than our normal salary and was a means to justify not taking time off. A variant of Stockholm syndrome made me appreciate the clever design of having a convenient cash out vacation days button. In the end the team was meet with a hostile takeover; everyone was merged into another team working on something similar with new management. Meet the new boss same as the old boss. A good number of people ended up leaving the company shortly after that. One more thing, you can also include me as another data point for getting pay doubled after leaving Apple.
- fortran77 6y ago
  > everyone was merged into another team working on something similar with new management. Meet the new boss same as the old boss I worked for Apple before Jobs died. He'd frequently have several teams working on the exact same thing, in secret, and then pick the team that met his goals the best. Sometimes the "losers" would be merged into the "winning" team, but never treated well by the winners.
  - anonymouse008 6y ago
    Gosh - I hope that isn’t a prerequisite to greatness? How does someone even get the human and financial capital to run projects like this? I guess your first attempt with the first founding team has to ‘hit.’ Otherwise, how can you afford to triple headcount, management, etc?
    - wpietri 6y ago
      I suspect that abusive behavior is an optimal strategy if you're working for abusive people. Organizations tend to be set up such that people like the people in power succeed. Jobs was a notorious jerk [1] [2] [3], so it's not surprising that similar behavior is what gets promoted. [1] https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/steve-wozniak-cried-jobs-kept-atari-bonus-267711 https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/steve-wozniak-cried-jobs-kept-atar... [2] https://www.yahoo.com/news/memoir-steve-jobs-apos-daughter-133000491.html https://www.yahoo.com/news/memoir-steve-jobs-apos-daughter-1... [3] https://www.businessinsider.com/steve-jobs-jerk-2011-10 https://www.businessinsider.com/steve-jobs-jerk-2011-10
lordnacho 6y ago
I think for most people the question is whether there are reasons to think Apple's internal environment fosters this kind of behaviour. You can imagine a company of that size has a huge number of teams, some where everything is just dandy, some with terrible issues like yours and the author's. But is there something corporate-wide about Apple that makes you think what you went through was common, or the opposite (ie that you were unlucky)? You can ask the same about all the large techs.
- vp8989 6y ago
  The secretive nature of their product development and the supposed "allure" of being an employee there seem like they would combine to enable particularly douchey forms of management.
- arcatech 6y ago
  The internal culture was influenced by Steve Jobs. He was widely known for being an asshole who also happened to be an excellent salesman with a really good design sense. That's Apple.
  - coldtea 6y ago
    Sure, but I've never read an as-toxic Jobs story / exchange, as the things in this story...
  - throwaway8193 6y ago
    Exactly--Jobs was a raging asshole, and that became what the managers looked up to as the example of what brings success. During my time there, the assholes were the ones rewarded and promoted, and thus became the promoters, and the people with a shred of decency and empathy who just wanted to be good and do good work were marginalized and not rewarded. It's up and down the chain from VP level down to the first level managers.
  - m0llusk 6y ago
    That isn't really true. Steve Jobs was no nonsense, but was most often merely direct rather than rude. One thing which Steve Jobs did do was go to great length to assemble highly qualified teams for missions that were clearly stated and understood and which all involved agreed were worthwhile even if there might be quibbles over details. The Apple that rescued itself from near death with colorful and fun designs and then released a BSD derived OS was very different from the modern Apple where contributors joust for top status without much if any existential threat.
boxmonster 6y ago
I find it totally believable that a Muslim would get harrassed given the current toxic political climate.
- microtherion 6y ago
  It's hard to know what's going on in every corner of a company as large as Apple, but open harassment certainly would not fly in our particular organization. Our team alone has engineers belonging to 4 different religions I know of (and obviously quite a few not identifying with any particular religion), and I've seen at least Christians, Hindus, and Muslims promoted to management.
  - kamaal 6y ago
    >>but open harassment certainly would not fly in our particular organization. Can't comment much on Apple. But as a Muslim I've seen this in quite a few places. Both in India and the US. It's not even that much a company thing as much as it is a personal thing. Some people are just bigoted and don't like you. In fact the very sight of your existence disturbs them very deeply. And yeah, if you are better than them, it just makes the problem more worse. It's like they have to now deal with the realization deep down that they inferior to the person they hate. Mostly Muslims just move on, because we have bills to pay, and families to support. Over long periods of time, it's not really possible to fight these political battles every time you have bigots around you. I've also known cases when things are proven beyond doubt and the HR is likely to take action on the bigot, they start citing excuses like 'mental health' and 'personal preferences'. You can't win this, there are going to be these kind of people anywhere you go. You just leave them to their state, and move on.
    - microtherion 6y ago
      I can't vouch for a complete absence of hidden prejudice, and I'm sure sometimes things happen that people perceive as discriminatory (e.g. on team outings, not everybody automatically remembers the vegetarians when picking restaurants, and one person's jocular lunch banter might be stepping on the trunk / kicking the cross of another person's deity of choice, etc).
mgh2 6y ago
"If you are an Apple employee, please send this story to your upper management particularly Tim Cook." I doubt he will care, reflected at how he manages PR when accused of international labor abuses.
- BossingAround 6y ago
  > I doubt he will care, reflected at how he manages PR when accused of international labor abuses. Provided the article is now deleted, it seems someone cared, though in a different way :/.
  - mgh2 6y ago
    Sad...I wonder why, I hope she gets the courage to speak up long term
  - ksec 6y ago
    I am pretty sure somehow has a backup copy :)
isoskeles 6y ago
> (we were competing with another internal team to beat them to the punch.) What this intentional? I worked at a company that similarly had three projects that were "competing" with each other, unofficially. It was more like three different teams working on a spellchecker, all with different upper engineering management VPs or directors vying for more influence in the organization. Many other teams standing by were not choosing what project to integrate with because we didn't know which would be completed first (or if they made a choice, it was because VP / director told them they had to). In any case, it seemed silly, and worse, it revealed a lack of vision or leadership in upper management to just choose one of these projects instead of having multiple people working on the same thing, which would inevitably lead to two projects being canned and some number of engineers feeling demoralized and quitting.
z3t4 6y ago
Ianal. I think Apple broke a bunch of laws in your case you should be compensated for your overtime or at least the promised vacation, plus legal cost and a compensation for the abuse.
tsm_sf 6y ago
Haven't seen cocaine mentioned anywhere, and I know for a fact it was a bit of a thing there back in the day.
- corty 6y ago
  With a bit of fantasy, one could infer narcissism or cocaine abuse from some parts of the story: the childish ever-moving meeting with subsequent blaming of the victim, all the while ignoring that there were other managers (i.e. non-victims) being annoyed by the same ever-moving meeting.
mancerayder 6y ago
> In our 1:1s he told us we might not have a job if our product doesn't ship on time (we were competing with another internal team to beat them to the punch.) That sounds like behavior I've seen in banks - more the "competing with other teams" than straight job threats. It's baffling. If I'm a company, the idea of having more than one team doing the same thing in order to try to beat the other down strikes me as not just counter-productive, but expensive and evidence of a broken hierarchy and culture.
- BossingAround 6y ago
  > It's baffling. If I'm a company, the idea of having more than one team doing the same thing in order to try to beat the other down strikes me as not just counter-productive, but expensive and evidence of a broken hierarchy and culture. Depends... If you have the resources, multiple team can achieve the same result in many ways, one possibly being vastly superior than others. If you look at large companies like IBM or Oracle, this internal innovation is often stifled by "we have whale clients X Y and Z, ask them what they want and implement that". That said though, it can lead to duplication of efforts and pretty much the same result done twice (once for the finished product, and once for the almost finished product by team B). If you're apple with billions of dollars that you don't know what to do with, this is a viable and useful strategy (also employed by Amazon AFAIK).
ryanSrich 6y ago
Maybe I’m just too jaded, but this is how I assume all big tech companies operate. The people that win get the results, even if it means being a massive piece of shit and treating your employees like garbage. In fact, I would wager that not a single VP or higher at any major tech co isn’t a self-serving, backstabbing asshole. You simply don’t get into those types of positions on merit alone. You need to play the game. That type of environment, where it’s almost impossible to do good work because you constantly need to be watching your own back is so unappealing to me that I can’t fathom why anyone with self worth would work at a FAANG. Perhaps it’s because they don’t know yet, but Blind exists, and it’s more horror stories than not. Not having to deal with office politics and deranged managers is worth a hell of a pay cut imo.
- antiterra 6y ago
  The experience can vary wildly at those companies, sometimes while still holding the same role. I’ve seen people shifted from amazing transformative mentoring managers to gaslighting managers that counted lines of code as a key metric in performance reviews right before directly claiming they didn’t in team meetings.
m463 6y ago
I have a friend who went through this two times. (Second time was "shame on me"). One problem was that he worked with a lot of H1-B coworkers. So management would push, and they feared for their ability to stay in the country, and when he got there, people would just just suck it up. His first day, calls at 1am 2am 3am. He left. So a year later they cajoled and talked him into another job. He was given assurances and when he got there, basically the same culture slapped him in the face again. sigh.
person_of_color 6y ago
What company? I want to apply there!
mijkal 6y ago
I am so sorry this happened to you. :,( I hope Tim Cook sees this and takes swift action to make things right with you, hold others accountable, and ensure processes are changed to prevent this from ever recurring.
- ckocagil 6y ago
  ...and why would he do any of those?
  - AgentOrange1234 6y ago
    To defend Apple’s image as a progressive, innovative, diverse, compassionate company that values its employees and is a great place to work. Even if he does not care at all about this person, he at least has huge reasons to not want articles like this circulating among major programmer forums.
josto 6y ago
Talk to a workers compensation attorney. If this job was less than five years ago, don’t delay. It cost nothing! The attorney gets 15% when they settle the case.
- xvector 6y ago
  Doesn’t this only work if (s)he recorded the overtime? Otherwise the company would just say there’s no evidence.
  - josto 6y ago
    No evidence needed. Let the lawyer deal with that stuff. In California, the evidence is what a QME says it is. A medical report is the evidence. The QME will look at all medical records and make a determination.
M5x7wI3CmbEem10 6y ago
may I ask what pays double that of FAANG?
- BossingAround 6y ago
  > may I ask what pays double that of FAANG? Is Apple known for having high salaries? I was under the impression (possibly wrongly, I've never worked for Apple) that they underpay their engineers, relying on the engineers' desire to work for them because of their brand.
  - xvector 6y ago
    No, there has been a culture shift. Apple actually does pay quite well as of the last 2-3 years. They will match other FAANG at the very least.
neycoda 6y ago
"we were competing with another internal team to beat them to the punch" This is what Microsoft did, and later admitted it was bad for the products and users and teams.
- BossingAround 6y ago
  > This is what Microsoft did, and later admitted it was bad for the products and users and teams. Is there any research on the topic? Or in-depth post on Microsoft's strategy at the time?
lenkite 6y ago
Shows how terrific output can be achieved with abuse and slavery of youth. You only need to look at the Pyramids of Egypt to know that it really pays off for the folks at the top. These corporate overlords really need to be brought down several pegs. Please break up Apple.
gigatexal 6y ago
:( sorry that this happened to you! So much of a good job experience is on the project and the manager it seems. I hope to join Apple one day but youth ear stories helped me temper my resolve because I know a) don’t meet your heroes, and b) this is similar to high stress places like Amazon or Netflix that I’ve heard about. :/ But f, all of that, I’m glad you got out and are happy. I had a similar experience although at a very much just a microcosm of a place where when I left I had some legit trauma (PTSD) but I’m all good now.
gigatexal 6y ago
Teams competing with another team seems to hurt the whole “it just works”, no? Wouldn’t it be better if teams collaborated? Competition will do wonders for delivery of projects sure but it has all sorts of negative externalities.
engineersays 6y ago
About 10 years ago I was interviewing at Apple (Cupertino office) for a software architect level position for iTunes. So I'm sitting alone in cold conference room, waiting for the last interview with hiring manager. Finally middle-aged lady comes in with very serious impression on her face and first thing she says is: "So, tell me why are you dreaming about working at Apple?". That moment I realized it's not going to be good cultural fit :) When I rejected the offer their recruiter was very insistent on getting the answer whether it was the money or not. They never ever contacted me again. Another funny thing I remember from that experience is that they gave new hires t-shirt which says "Journey is the reward". So it's not "Money is the reward" but some mythical "journey". Apple is so full of shit.

gabereiser 6y ago

Sadly, you can fill in the blank with any FAANG company with this story. I’ve heard it a thousand times. Toxic management. Sorry you went through that, sorry that was your first taste of engineering out of college. Glad you stuck with it. It’s a tough spot to be. Do you roll over and do the job your being yelled at to do even though you know any concessions are BS? Or like the senior folks, do you walk? It’s a really hard choice. Does Apple not have manager feedback mechanisms?

hertzrat 6y ago
Does anybody really want to be “the person who criticizes his or her managers,” in an official on-the-books capacity, in a context where your job is already being threatened?
- nelson_muntz69 6y ago
  Welcome to wage slavery, friend. You can’t even criticize! Hah-ha!
exApple-anon 6y ago
> Does Apple not have manager feedback mechanisms? My manager left me out of the first review cycle, but at the end of the second review cycle I did leave a review of the manager. By this time he had left our team though. I don't think it did anything as he continued to rise through the ranks.
- nicoburns 6y ago
  Would it not be appropriate to contact said managers (new) manager directly in this case?
  - Apocryphon 6y ago
    Not to speak for the OP, but cross-team HR situations at Apple don't exactly play well. I don't think jumping the chain of command so to speak to contact a manager's manager ever actually works.
meekrohprocess 6y ago
I don't think so. I've worked at other FAANG companies which had these sorts of posts written about them, and I've witnessed plenty of situations that I would call "abusive". But what I read in this article was beyond the pale. I never felt like anybody adjacent to any of my roles might have cause to fear for their physical safety. Reviews were used as political tools and occasional sources of psychological abuse, sure, but people still got marched out quickly if they stopped acting like empathetic human beings towards their peers.
- coldtea 6y ago
  >But what I read in this article was beyond the pale. Yes, but while I believe it happened just like that, it's too beyond the pale to be representative of Apple at large. Looks like a particularly, close knit toxic team + gaslighting above levels about the new recruit.
  - Apocryphon 6y ago
    It's hard to say, because Apple is a huge corporation. It would be wrong for the takeaway to be "all of Apple is like this." But it should call into question "how much of Apple is like this?" and "how many more stories are there like this?" because I guarantee you that this author is not the only one who has experienced this at Apple, and there may be elements of its secrecy-obsessed, top-down culture that are common factors which contribute to it.
  - Daho0n 6y ago
    >it's too beyond the pale to be representative of Apple at large. Why?
    - coldtea 6y ago
      Because of a general understanding of how the world works, how businesses are, how western businesses are, people and so on. Same way if a told you some politician was sexually assaulting his pages, you woulnd't assume this is representative of congressmen and pages in general... I don't have recorded minutes of their interactions or other such hard proof.
greesil 6y ago
Some companies have a more open and transparent review process. I'm not sure if it would help with a clique, but at least people have to put information in writing which when push comes to shove can be verified. And, reports can review their managers. If your management chain doesn't care then yes, senior people walk.
ineedasername 6y ago
You can put just about any company in the "Apple" role here. A bad manager anywhere can cause a workgroup to turn toxic. I've seen it happen literally everywhere I've ever worked, though luckily only 1st hand at one location. (Actually there was one exception: working at a Barnes & Noble during college. I'd heard horror stories about other locations while I was there, but the store I worked at was run by an extremely good manager who cared for her employees and fostered that attitude in her assistant managers as well. It was also the most profitable store in the region, probably not a coincidence)
- Apocryphon 6y ago
  Any large corporation that gets remotely near the headcount as Apple will have enough variance across team cultures that there will inevitably be cesspools of toxicity, true. But there's still the question if certain orgs foster a higher or lower standard across the org, and what factors contribute to it.
  - simonh 6y ago
    That’s true, I’ve seen toxic situations happening in other teams like those described here at several employers that were otherwise good places to work. Sometimes it’s down to a particular manager, but sometimes it can just be the consequences of a bad decision taken further up the food chain. This can leave a team in a no-win situation where even a good team lead can end up in a mess with no good options. I was at one employer where this happened and the team lead in question fell on his sword and quit rather than beat his team to death. I ended up taking on some of his responsibilities and team members and got some additional resources to deal with the re-org, so it worked out well for the team members and the company. It also gave me my first taste of management. It cost the guy his job though, which was grossly unfair. Not many mangers would have the guts and integrity to do something like that, and even if they did there’s no guarantee it would actually benefit the team. They could just be replaced by a tyrant. The only answer is to be open and honest about what you think and principled in your own actions. Call out bad behaviour where you see it and say when you see mistakes being made. If you aren’t prepared to do so, why should anyone else? Too many people silently tie the line and keep quiet and then wonder why these things spiral out of control and end in disaster. It’s because nobody said anything or did anything about it. We have to be prepared to take responsibility for calling out what’s happening around us and what we do about it as employees. It’s not somebody else’s problem, it’s our problem. Don’t be afraid of losing your job, it may well happen but jobs come and go. Having principles carries a cost, but one I think is worth paying.
djcapelis 6y ago
It’s not a hard decision. You unquestionably walk away from a situation like this. If your interactions with the team are going this poorly, walk immediately. There’s nothing to be gained from trying to hang on in a situation like this. This person should have walked much earlier. It’s agonizing how much broken US immigration policy plays a large role in forcing talented people who have decided to join our country to feel like this isn’t an option for them. We owe them much better.
- uzakov 6y ago
  Not sure why you refer to the US immigration policy, this is how it works essentially everywhere. In the UK, for example, you get around 60 days to find a new job or you have to leave the country. https://iasservices.org.uk/tier-2-visa-termination-employment/ https://iasservices.org.uk/tier-2-visa-termination-employmen... I am not saying that the immigration policy is not broken or broken, I am simply stating the fact that other countries literally do the same.
  - PaulDavisThe1st 6y ago
    If you're on a H1 (or some of its cousins here) and you lose your job, you have no option to even try to find another. Your legal status in the US is coupled to that job, not just any job.
    - uzakov 6y ago
      Are you sure that is correct? According to results from googling you get 60 days to find a new job if you got laid off from H1B job. https://www.stilt.com/blog/2020/05/steps-after-an-h1b-layoffs/#:~:text=The%2060-day%20grace%20period%20is%20the%20time%20the%20USCIS,the%20evidence%20of%20your%20attempts https://www.stilt.com/blog/2020/05/steps-after-an-h1b-layoff.... Ps: to someone who downvoted, what don't you agree with?
      - PaulDavisThe1st 6y ago
        You are right that I overstated this. You do have a window to try to find a new job. However, the new employer will need to be willing to sponsor a new H1B visa, and will need to get their part done within a fairly narrow timeframe. I agree that this is not an impossible scenario. But I also have a strong feeling that it's not a particularly likely one either.
outside1234 6y ago
Honestly, at Microsoft, I've never seen a situation like this, and I have worked in something like 15 roles now. That might also be, for better and worse, why Microsoft folks have such long tenure at the company. Its honestly a great place to work compared to these shit shows.
- starky 6y ago
  I would suspect that finding out how many employees throughout the hierarchy have been there for a long time may be a good way to find a good company. The company I work for got acquired a couple years ago by a much older and larger company, and it usually feels like anyone you talk to has been there for 15, 20, even 30 years. I've yet to have a single issue with someone in that part of the parent organization, even though helping my group out isn't something they have been told to do.
  - tjalfi 6y ago
    My employer is like this - I'm the second newest person on my team and I've been here for 9 years. It's a great place to work and quite difficult to be hired here.
- ThrowawayB7 6y ago
  To quote the old Tom and Jerry cartoon, "Don't you believe it." I could tell you comparable hair-raising stories I witnessed there over a couple of decades.
- chihuahua 6y ago
  I agree, in 15 years at MSFT I've had mostly good experiences. The worst I've seen could only be described as "mildly annoying". If any manager behaved like the article described, I don't see how the team would get anything done, plus their MSFT poll score would quickly get them into trouble.
- noen 6y ago
  I've seen it happen, multiple times, at Microsoft. Additionally know 2nd hand of dozens of other instances of abuse, career sabotage, and scorched earth management. Have been fortunate that the instances I was involved in directly, I was prepared, had extensive documentation, and my position (and my colleagues) were more valuable than the perpetrators, so they were swiftly shown the door. At the end of the day it's the same at every large company. HR protects the business, not the employee. They don't protect the victim, they protect the more valuable resource.
justapassenger 6y ago
Big difference is that other FAANGs have much less secretive inside culture. That of course doesn’t prevent abuse, and horrible experiences will happen everywhere. But it’s much easier to hide and develop pockets of abuse if everything you work on is top secret.
- chihuahua 6y ago
  I've never been able to understand why Apple thinks they need to be so secretive. Most other companies do just fine without pretending that they're working on life-changing secrets that are worthless if they are leaked.
  - AgentOrange1234 6y ago
    I speculate some reasons are: 1. Being able to reveal something new and surprising leads to a flurry of good press. Failing that, constant rumors about what they are working on is like free advertising. 2. Keeping something a secret until it is shipping gives competitors less time to react/plan. 3. Preventing your employees from publicly discussing what they are doing may make it harder to know whom to poach, and harder for folks who want to leave to sell themselves. 4. It is useful as a cultural tool: it brings employees together in sharing a secret, creating an in-group/out-group dynamic; it gives product launches a kind of mystery, makes them something special for employees to watch together and celebrate together. 5. It helps Apple keep control of the framing of a product and the narrative around its launch.
    - tdeck 6y ago
      So they're making it hard to leave, creating a distinctive in-group and air of mystery, and clamping down on information to maintain strict control of the narrative. I can't help but notice that some of these are the same reasons why cults are often so secretive.
      - AgentOrange1234 6y ago
        Sure. I think there are some pretty deep parallels. The company had been really successful. That makes it easy to trust the leadership and believe they know best. If you’re changing the world and doing the best work of your life, maybe that’s worth making sacrifices for (overtime or whatever). On the bright side, I’m not sure there’s any equivalent of the malevolent, sexually abusive stuff we see in cults. Hard to complain about being a well-paid engineer with good benefits, etc.
dirkgently 6y ago
Sorry, but absolutely not true. Have worked at two FAANG companies, and neither would tolerate even a hint of such behavior. It's an open secret in silicon valley that you work at apple for one of the three reasons: 1. You didn't know better 2. Were a fan/fanboi. 3. That was the best you could do (for whatever reasons). Every time something negative about Apple gets posted here, I see this typical response - oh, they all do it. Stop with this nonsense.
cmrdporcupine 6y ago
9 years at Google and I've never heard of anything this bad here. I'm sure there are cases, and while I've been in unpleasant teams myself with crappy arrogant team leads who got away with dubious personal behaviour because of their engineering genius, the kind of obvious outright hostility and abuse would described by people here... well, I am pretty sure it would lead to some serious sanction. I could be wrong and just lucky tho. FWIW my wife worked at Apple in a non-engineering role for almost a decade about ten years ago, and I can completely see how this kind of dysfunction could happen in that company. Pressure cooker environment.

dwardu 6y ago

If this is true, it’s really sad, I’ve read the whole thing. I had an experience, not as bad as yours but I know the feeling. I really hope you will go public about this experience and share it, Apple aren’t the “virtuous” company as they pretend to be.

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exApple-anon 6y ago

Some extra tidbits that didn't make it in because the edit timer ran out: - Despite the big release and herculean efforts, both of us were paid a fraction of our target bonus. This was the day I decided to move jobs. - I eventually grew some balls and told Apple to (a) pay me 2.5x during overtime (b) hire SREs for this critical service, or (c) go fuck themselves. They chose (c), which worked alright because our service was pretty stable. - The primary lesson I learnt is that it doesn't matter if you work hard. Nobody notices, and even if they do you will likely not get anything out of it. Do your job, but don't kill yourself over it. Work-life balance is king. - Only my first manager at Apple was an asshole. My last manager was a kind and genial person.

ma2rten 6y ago
I got an offer from Apple. The hiring manager told me "You worked at a startup before, you'll have no problem working overtime". I didn't end up taking the offer.
- raverbashing 6y ago
  I can only answer with LOL to such offers Yes I've worked for a startup. Yes I did long hours. Yes I learned that's not sustainable and not a good way to make things work. So, no, I won't do it again.
  - geophile 6y ago
    I never understood the supposed attraction of "just like a startup, but in a big company!". That appears to mean that you will work in a small team, putting in unsustainable hours, but not receive the financial reward that a successful startup could provide. I've worked in several startups, and occasional death marches are unavoidable. They don't work month in and month out. But enduring that kind of life for just salary is nuts.
    - andrewem 6y ago
      The other notable thing about “just like a startup but in a big company” (often for startups which have been acquired) is the frequent claim that the startup will be left alone by the rest of the company. Every single process and incentive is against that remaining true. Maybe in some cases you can hope for the acquired startup to be the pet project of the acquirer’s founder/CEO?

abledon 6y ago

sleek aluminum curves hide so much sadness and abuse.

valuearb 6y ago

Your story sounds believable (and sadly common). The posted story sounds incredible, ie it strains credibility.

limono 6y ago

What org was that in? IS&T? I am thinking that this story by OP was in IS&T because that is known to be the worst org in Apple

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heimatau 6y ago
What's their social? would be a good follow-up too. I'm not sure you understand that Apple could bury this person's career and numerous companies only need one phone call to let this person go. Please understand that you're creating an attack vector that is too great for this person to reveal.
- saagarjha 6y ago
  The picture the author included has enough information for an outsider to piece together their organization. The fact that it includes a meeting time and room would be enough for Apple to figure out who it was, just by looking at who booked it. Unfortunately, they probably are already in a position where Apple knows exactly who they are, and perhaps their colleagues do too.
  - heimatau 6y ago
    > The picture the author included has enough information... I'll refrain from the sarcasm. Although...it's very appealing. Is exApple-anon (OG comment that I responded to protect the obvious attack vector) the same as limono (HN submission)? Do you have evidence of this? I hope you certainly don't believe that they are the same person in a 100,000 person organization. This would be terribly assumptive. I don't believe limono's questions were malicious but I wanted to make it clear why the questions were inappropriate.
    - 6y ago

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GloriousKoji 6y ago

I also worked for Apple and I had a very similar experience. Management was brutal and abusive from my immediate manager to all the way up to and including the VP level. For example even though vacation hours were accrued I never got to use them unless I wanted to endure the verbal backlash of abandoning the team and my responsibilities. When the holidays came around the director would email everyone reminding us there's a stipend for working through the holidays but in reality it pays less than our normal salary and was a means to justify not taking time off. A variant of Stockholm syndrome made me appreciate the clever design of having a convenient cash out vacation days button. In the end the team was meet with a hostile takeover; everyone was merged into another team working on something similar with new management. Meet the new boss same as the old boss. A good number of people ended up leaving the company shortly after that. One more thing, you can also include me as another data point for getting pay doubled after leaving Apple.

fortran77 6y ago
> everyone was merged into another team working on something similar with new management. Meet the new boss same as the old boss I worked for Apple before Jobs died. He'd frequently have several teams working on the exact same thing, in secret, and then pick the team that met his goals the best. Sometimes the "losers" would be merged into the "winning" team, but never treated well by the winners.
- anonymouse008 6y ago
  Gosh - I hope that isn’t a prerequisite to greatness? How does someone even get the human and financial capital to run projects like this? I guess your first attempt with the first founding team has to ‘hit.’ Otherwise, how can you afford to triple headcount, management, etc?
  - wpietri 6y ago
    I suspect that abusive behavior is an optimal strategy if you're working for abusive people. Organizations tend to be set up such that people like the people in power succeed. Jobs was a notorious jerk [1] [2] [3], so it's not surprising that similar behavior is what gets promoted. [1] https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/steve-wozniak-cried-jobs-kept-atari-bonus-267711 https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/steve-wozniak-cried-jobs-kept-atar... [2] https://www.yahoo.com/news/memoir-steve-jobs-apos-daughter-133000491.html https://www.yahoo.com/news/memoir-steve-jobs-apos-daughter-1... [3] https://www.businessinsider.com/steve-jobs-jerk-2011-10 https://www.businessinsider.com/steve-jobs-jerk-2011-10

lordnacho 6y ago

I think for most people the question is whether there are reasons to think Apple's internal environment fosters this kind of behaviour. You can imagine a company of that size has a huge number of teams, some where everything is just dandy, some with terrible issues like yours and the author's. But is there something corporate-wide about Apple that makes you think what you went through was common, or the opposite (ie that you were unlucky)? You can ask the same about all the large techs.

vp8989 6y ago
The secretive nature of their product development and the supposed "allure" of being an employee there seem like they would combine to enable particularly douchey forms of management.
arcatech 6y ago
The internal culture was influenced by Steve Jobs. He was widely known for being an asshole who also happened to be an excellent salesman with a really good design sense. That's Apple.
- coldtea 6y ago
  Sure, but I've never read an as-toxic Jobs story / exchange, as the things in this story...
- throwaway8193 6y ago
  Exactly--Jobs was a raging asshole, and that became what the managers looked up to as the example of what brings success. During my time there, the assholes were the ones rewarded and promoted, and thus became the promoters, and the people with a shred of decency and empathy who just wanted to be good and do good work were marginalized and not rewarded. It's up and down the chain from VP level down to the first level managers.
- m0llusk 6y ago
  That isn't really true. Steve Jobs was no nonsense, but was most often merely direct rather than rude. One thing which Steve Jobs did do was go to great length to assemble highly qualified teams for missions that were clearly stated and understood and which all involved agreed were worthwhile even if there might be quibbles over details. The Apple that rescued itself from near death with colorful and fun designs and then released a BSD derived OS was very different from the modern Apple where contributors joust for top status without much if any existential threat.

boxmonster 6y ago

I find it totally believable that a Muslim would get harrassed given the current toxic political climate.

microtherion 6y ago
It's hard to know what's going on in every corner of a company as large as Apple, but open harassment certainly would not fly in our particular organization. Our team alone has engineers belonging to 4 different religions I know of (and obviously quite a few not identifying with any particular religion), and I've seen at least Christians, Hindus, and Muslims promoted to management.
- kamaal 6y ago
  >>but open harassment certainly would not fly in our particular organization. Can't comment much on Apple. But as a Muslim I've seen this in quite a few places. Both in India and the US. It's not even that much a company thing as much as it is a personal thing. Some people are just bigoted and don't like you. In fact the very sight of your existence disturbs them very deeply. And yeah, if you are better than them, it just makes the problem more worse. It's like they have to now deal with the realization deep down that they inferior to the person they hate. Mostly Muslims just move on, because we have bills to pay, and families to support. Over long periods of time, it's not really possible to fight these political battles every time you have bigots around you. I've also known cases when things are proven beyond doubt and the HR is likely to take action on the bigot, they start citing excuses like 'mental health' and 'personal preferences'. You can't win this, there are going to be these kind of people anywhere you go. You just leave them to their state, and move on.
  - microtherion 6y ago
    I can't vouch for a complete absence of hidden prejudice, and I'm sure sometimes things happen that people perceive as discriminatory (e.g. on team outings, not everybody automatically remembers the vegetarians when picking restaurants, and one person's jocular lunch banter might be stepping on the trunk / kicking the cross of another person's deity of choice, etc).

mgh2 6y ago

"If you are an Apple employee, please send this story to your upper management particularly Tim Cook." I doubt he will care, reflected at how he manages PR when accused of international labor abuses.

BossingAround 6y ago
> I doubt he will care, reflected at how he manages PR when accused of international labor abuses. Provided the article is now deleted, it seems someone cared, though in a different way :/.
- mgh2 6y ago
  Sad...I wonder why, I hope she gets the courage to speak up long term
- ksec 6y ago
  I am pretty sure somehow has a backup copy :)

isoskeles 6y ago

> (we were competing with another internal team to beat them to the punch.) What this intentional? I worked at a company that similarly had three projects that were "competing" with each other, unofficially. It was more like three different teams working on a spellchecker, all with different upper engineering management VPs or directors vying for more influence in the organization. Many other teams standing by were not choosing what project to integrate with because we didn't know which would be completed first (or if they made a choice, it was because VP / director told them they had to). In any case, it seemed silly, and worse, it revealed a lack of vision or leadership in upper management to just choose one of these projects instead of having multiple people working on the same thing, which would inevitably lead to two projects being canned and some number of engineers feeling demoralized and quitting.

z3t4 6y ago

Ianal. I think Apple broke a bunch of laws in your case you should be compensated for your overtime or at least the promised vacation, plus legal cost and a compensation for the abuse.

tsm_sf 6y ago

Haven't seen cocaine mentioned anywhere, and I know for a fact it was a bit of a thing there back in the day.

corty 6y ago
With a bit of fantasy, one could infer narcissism or cocaine abuse from some parts of the story: the childish ever-moving meeting with subsequent blaming of the victim, all the while ignoring that there were other managers (i.e. non-victims) being annoyed by the same ever-moving meeting.

mancerayder 6y ago

> In our 1:1s he told us we might not have a job if our product doesn't ship on time (we were competing with another internal team to beat them to the punch.) That sounds like behavior I've seen in banks - more the "competing with other teams" than straight job threats. It's baffling. If I'm a company, the idea of having more than one team doing the same thing in order to try to beat the other down strikes me as not just counter-productive, but expensive and evidence of a broken hierarchy and culture.

BossingAround 6y ago
> It's baffling. If I'm a company, the idea of having more than one team doing the same thing in order to try to beat the other down strikes me as not just counter-productive, but expensive and evidence of a broken hierarchy and culture. Depends... If you have the resources, multiple team can achieve the same result in many ways, one possibly being vastly superior than others. If you look at large companies like IBM or Oracle, this internal innovation is often stifled by "we have whale clients X Y and Z, ask them what they want and implement that". That said though, it can lead to duplication of efforts and pretty much the same result done twice (once for the finished product, and once for the almost finished product by team B). If you're apple with billions of dollars that you don't know what to do with, this is a viable and useful strategy (also employed by Amazon AFAIK).

ryanSrich 6y ago

Maybe I’m just too jaded, but this is how I assume all big tech companies operate. The people that win get the results, even if it means being a massive piece of shit and treating your employees like garbage. In fact, I would wager that not a single VP or higher at any major tech co isn’t a self-serving, backstabbing asshole. You simply don’t get into those types of positions on merit alone. You need to play the game. That type of environment, where it’s almost impossible to do good work because you constantly need to be watching your own back is so unappealing to me that I can’t fathom why anyone with self worth would work at a FAANG. Perhaps it’s because they don’t know yet, but Blind exists, and it’s more horror stories than not. Not having to deal with office politics and deranged managers is worth a hell of a pay cut imo.

antiterra 6y ago
The experience can vary wildly at those companies, sometimes while still holding the same role. I’ve seen people shifted from amazing transformative mentoring managers to gaslighting managers that counted lines of code as a key metric in performance reviews right before directly claiming they didn’t in team meetings.

m463 6y ago

I have a friend who went through this two times. (Second time was "shame on me"). One problem was that he worked with a lot of H1-B coworkers. So management would push, and they feared for their ability to stay in the country, and when he got there, people would just just suck it up. His first day, calls at 1am 2am 3am. He left. So a year later they cajoled and talked him into another job. He was given assurances and when he got there, basically the same culture slapped him in the face again. sigh.

person_of_color 6y ago

What company? I want to apply there!

mijkal 6y ago

I am so sorry this happened to you. :,( I hope Tim Cook sees this and takes swift action to make things right with you, hold others accountable, and ensure processes are changed to prevent this from ever recurring.

ckocagil 6y ago
...and why would he do any of those?
- AgentOrange1234 6y ago
  To defend Apple’s image as a progressive, innovative, diverse, compassionate company that values its employees and is a great place to work. Even if he does not care at all about this person, he at least has huge reasons to not want articles like this circulating among major programmer forums.

josto 6y ago

Talk to a workers compensation attorney. If this job was less than five years ago, don’t delay. It cost nothing! The attorney gets 15% when they settle the case.

xvector 6y ago
Doesn’t this only work if (s)he recorded the overtime? Otherwise the company would just say there’s no evidence.
- josto 6y ago
  No evidence needed. Let the lawyer deal with that stuff. In California, the evidence is what a QME says it is. A medical report is the evidence. The QME will look at all medical records and make a determination.

M5x7wI3CmbEem10 6y ago

may I ask what pays double that of FAANG?

BossingAround 6y ago
> may I ask what pays double that of FAANG? Is Apple known for having high salaries? I was under the impression (possibly wrongly, I've never worked for Apple) that they underpay their engineers, relying on the engineers' desire to work for them because of their brand.
- xvector 6y ago
  No, there has been a culture shift. Apple actually does pay quite well as of the last 2-3 years. They will match other FAANG at the very least.

neycoda 6y ago

"we were competing with another internal team to beat them to the punch" This is what Microsoft did, and later admitted it was bad for the products and users and teams.

BossingAround 6y ago
> This is what Microsoft did, and later admitted it was bad for the products and users and teams. Is there any research on the topic? Or in-depth post on Microsoft's strategy at the time?

lenkite 6y ago

Shows how terrific output can be achieved with abuse and slavery of youth. You only need to look at the Pyramids of Egypt to know that it really pays off for the folks at the top. These corporate overlords really need to be brought down several pegs. Please break up Apple.

gigatexal 6y ago

:( sorry that this happened to you! So much of a good job experience is on the project and the manager it seems. I hope to join Apple one day but youth ear stories helped me temper my resolve because I know a) don’t meet your heroes, and b) this is similar to high stress places like Amazon or Netflix that I’ve heard about. :/ But f, all of that, I’m glad you got out and are happy. I had a similar experience although at a very much just a microcosm of a place where when I left I had some legit trauma (PTSD) but I’m all good now.

gigatexal 6y ago

Teams competing with another team seems to hurt the whole “it just works”, no? Wouldn’t it be better if teams collaborated? Competition will do wonders for delivery of projects sure but it has all sorts of negative externalities.

engineersays 6y ago

About 10 years ago I was interviewing at Apple (Cupertino office) for a software architect level position for iTunes. So I'm sitting alone in cold conference room, waiting for the last interview with hiring manager. Finally middle-aged lady comes in with very serious impression on her face and first thing she says is: "So, tell me why are you dreaming about working at Apple?". That moment I realized it's not going to be good cultural fit :) When I rejected the offer their recruiter was very insistent on getting the answer whether it was the money or not. They never ever contacted me again. Another funny thing I remember from that experience is that they gave new hires t-shirt which says "Journey is the reward". So it's not "Money is the reward" but some mythical "journey". Apple is so full of shit.