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Things new engineers don't know, but should: 1. HR doesn't work for you; they work to minimize liability for the company. If HR thinks the best way to accompli

Things new engineers don't know, but should: 1. HR doesn't work for you; they work to minimize liability for the company. If HR thinks the best way to accomplish that is to destroy your life, that's exactly what they will do. 2. Many SV companies, as well as groups within large, respected SV companies, only survive through exploitation. They exploit their customers, their workforce, or both. Exploitation means obtaining something of value without paying a fair price for it. Exploitation is accomplished through a variety of coercive processes like gaslighting, manipulation, instilling fear, etc. Outright lying is probably the most common coercive tactic since it's easy and there's usually no penalty for it. If you find yourself in an exploitive work environment, you need to leave as quickly as possible. The situation is not going to get better. It's only going to get worse, and your options are two: Leave with your mental health and reputation intact or leave after they have been destroyed. There is no option 3.

sdoering 6y ago
I remember my SO working for a German bank. It was exactly as you describe. She was in a back-office job. She always said she was an overpaid perl script 95% of the time and interesting work for the rest. Exploitation is common in many companies. For me this stems from information asymmetry. Employer knows the job market, knows the salary spread, knows all internal salaries. As an employee you do not have these insights and need to trust the employer to be fair. As we probably all know information asymmetry makes efficient and rational markets to break down. Not sure what a potential solution would look like.
- Judgmentality 6y ago
  > Not sure what a potential solution would look like. Make all salaries public by law - you could even anonymize people, although there would be lots of issues with that caveat. I'm not saying this is a good solution (most people don't want to talk about their salaries), but it would solve the problem. It's already the case for government employees.
  - H8crilA 6y ago
    This is the case in Sweden. Absolutely not impossible.
  - sdoering 6y ago
    I am working as a works council member. I have access to anonymized salary information. Problem is - I can easily deanonymize at least 15 - 25% of all people working at our company. It isn't easy. Also in Germany we have a law in place that allows to query your employer for average salary data in some specific cases (there have to be at least 6 comparable coworkers of the other gender). Bu I agree - I would love for a more transparent approach. Even if this can come with it's own problems.
- WalterBright 6y ago
  With google searches there are plenty of sources of information available on the job market.
penguin_booze 6y ago
HR doesn't work for you That's what I've learned too. HR is an extension of the legal department. To be fair, their true job is to treat humans as resources. These days, they're sometimes rebranded as the "People Team"!
- worker767424 6y ago
  > humans as resources I'm still disappointed this game never got made: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/659943965/human-resources-an-apocalyptic-rts-game https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/659943965/human-resourc...
- reaperducer 6y ago
  These days, they're sometimes rebranded as the "People Team"! Sounds like it might be a minor improvement, but I'm not hopeful. I detest the phrase "human resources." I am not a resource. I am not a box of pencils, a copy machine, or a long ton of bituminous coal to be consumed by the company. I am a human being. "Personnel" wasn't so bad. I'm OK with that because I am a person. But that was before Human Resources departments became warehouses for the legions of yoga moms who think they're being rewarded for being slightly above average, when the reality is it's another industrial make-work program to keep the drones from revolting.
  - dreamcompiler 6y ago
    > I am not a resource. I am not a box of pencils, a copy machine, or a long ton of bituminous coal to be consumed by the company. In the Harvard MBA school of management which dominates American business and which Wall Street incentivizes, that is precisely what you are: You are a fungible cog in a large machine. This is certainly not the only viable business management philosophy, but it's the most common one in America. Regardless of what cute name the HR department calls itself, the MBA model should be assumed as the fundamental philosophy of the company until the company's actions (not their words) prove otherwise. Costco is an example of a successful American company that does not seem to use this model. There are many others, but you have to search carefully to find them.
throwaway888abc 6y ago
Words of wisdom, should be pinned up
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
th33ngineer 6y ago
> and reputation intact I'm staying at [large SV company] for now BECAUSE OF their reputation of hiring smart engineers, so that I will be able to hopefully get a gig at a more employee-friendly company later in life. New grads that were in my position often don't have much of a choice, and being offered the ability to pay off my student debt almost immediately at 22 seemed irresponsible to pass up. It's been 4 years and my mental health has degraded for sure (and the work I am doing is not glamorous in the slightest) but my savings are piling up and the thought that this is only temporary (and will give me a nice financial cushion) will keep me going until it's unbearable.
- pavel_lishin 6y ago
  So when do you decide to leave? Do you have a magic dollar amount? A particular mental health symptom you're waiting to develop? I'm not sure what you're waiting for. Four years at a company is a long time; it's not like you'd be accused of nonsense like job-hopping.
geomark 6y ago
Point number 1 is very important to never forget. No matter what level you are at, HR's job is to protect the levels above you, not help you. If you are an engineer that means an opaque shield of HR policies to protect the company and all people in your management chain. Middle manager? HR will shield the directors and VPs above you, concentrating particularly on keeping the VPs safe no matter what they do.
- ip26 6y ago
  I always figured it was more like, they protect the company aka the group. If your interests and the company's align they are in your corner; if not then you are the "other" and their enemy. The bias towards protecting the upper ranks not being their mission statement, instead the company's interests simply more often align with the VP than the NCG.
pembrook 6y ago
You’re correct on point 1, but point 2 is overly pessimistic. The fact that the economy grows every year is proof alone that companies on the whole are generating value and not just exploiting people. The economy is not a zero sum game. The truth is, all companies, no matter how cool their branding is, are just a collection of mostly average people. The larger the company, the more average the workforce will be. This is a statistical fact. Inside any large organization, most of your job (no matter how technical) will be coordinating among groups of people, not creating X deliverable by yourself. This inevitably results in the classic drama, tension, fights, camaraderie and occasional abuse you will find when you bring any group of humans together. The X% of abusive situations that arise when you bring human animals together does not equal proof of widespread exploitation among the worlds highest paid employees. Slavery this is not. It just means your experience in any big company will essentially be a probability game. At FAANG, you have a 95% chance of getting reasonably wealthy within 5 years, with a X% (lower) chance of abuse/toxic overwork and X% chance of dying in a traffic accident on your morning commute. The problem is nobody wants to acknowledge the potential downsides. If you aren’t okay with this, there is of course the startup and indie hacker route.
- hinkley 6y ago
  The fact that income inequality goes up every year says you're wrong about point 2.
  - Noumenon72 6y ago
    That doesn't follow in a growing economy, even a very simple two-person one where person 1 picks bananas by hand and person 2 builds a faster banana picker every year. No exploitation there.
    - pram 6y ago
      Who is buying all the bananas?
      - Noumenon72 6y ago
tiew9Vii 6y ago
> If you find yourself in an exploitive work environment, you need to leave as quickly as possible. The situation is not going to get better. It's only going to get worse, and your options are two: Leave with your mental health and reputation intact or leave after they have been destroyed. This is the right thing to do however for many people on a visa it has significant life consequences and financial hardship with having limited time to pack up your life and leave the country you built a life in. I’m sure if the author wasn’t dependent on having a visa they would of left much sooner than they did. Companies know they have unfair leverage on employees dependent on sponsored visas. Employees on sponsored visas have very little options and next to no rights, in this case the author felt suicide might be their only way out. I’ve been in a situation in a job I didn’t like with a bad manager well aware if I quit I had 90 days to find a new job or leave the country. 90 days isn’t a long time to find a new job or pack/sell all your belongings and ship to a new country without a job/place to live. I had to put a plan together to save enough money to cover the significant costs of leaving, a timeline to find a job with a deadline if it doesn’t work out to pack and go. The situation was far less stressful than the authors and I was in a good position where if the worst came to the worst I could take the financial hit and be relatively ok on the other end. Non the less it was incredibly stressful and put me in bad mental health so can completely understand why for some people they believe suicide to be a valid option. For some people leaving is not just a case of handing in their notice.
- sneak 6y ago
  This is a good example of why the arbitrary system of nations restricting free trade by deciding who is allowed to work where is a method specifically designed to aid in this type of exploitation.
  - ardy42 6y ago
    >> I’m sure if the author wasn’t dependent on having a visa they would of left much sooner than they did. Companies know they have unfair leverage on employees dependent on sponsored visas. Employees on sponsored visas have very little options and next to no rights, in this case the author felt suicide might be their only way out. > This is a good example of why the arbitrary system of nations restricting free trade by deciding who is allowed to work where is a method specifically designed to aid in this type of exploitation. Not really. Only nontransferable sponsored visas tied to specific employers (or ones with terms so short that they're effectively the same) have this exploitation problem. You don't have to go all open borders to fix this, you just need to give sponsored immigrants just as much job-hopping freedom as permanent residents already have.
hinkley 6y ago
3. After any major organizational change, such as a merger, any promises made by the diminished chain command are not enforceable. What you won't see is that some of those promises are encouraged by the new chain of command in order to maintain calm. Eventually the one making the promises will either not be around or find that they don't have the resources to fulfill the promise. They may quit when they figure this out, if they haven't already been let go once they've established their status as scapegoat. If something matters to you, make sure you get the new bosses to announce it in front of people. Be aware that you should have already thought at least briefly about the wording of your resignation letter prior to doing this.
- ed25519FUUU 6y ago
  > If something matters to you, make sure you get the new bosses to announce it in front of people. In writing.
  - hinkley 6y ago
    Definitely. Also don't stake your whole life plan on that promise being kept. Transitional promises have a habit of being walked back. There are many workplace promises that are disappointing or an inconvenience if they don't work out, but some end up being an existential threat (eg, "Don't worry, we're keeping the Boston office.") Accept the promise, but groom your professional network extra carefully until the dust settles.
- dreamcompiler 6y ago
  Agreed, but I've also seen this happen with only a minor change, such as your boss leaving. When your boss gets replaced, it can be quite difficult to ensure that previous promises are kept. Not always, but often.

sdoering 6y ago

I remember my SO working for a German bank. It was exactly as you describe. She was in a back-office job. She always said she was an overpaid perl script 95% of the time and interesting work for the rest. Exploitation is common in many companies. For me this stems from information asymmetry. Employer knows the job market, knows the salary spread, knows all internal salaries. As an employee you do not have these insights and need to trust the employer to be fair. As we probably all know information asymmetry makes efficient and rational markets to break down. Not sure what a potential solution would look like.

Judgmentality 6y ago
> Not sure what a potential solution would look like. Make all salaries public by law - you could even anonymize people, although there would be lots of issues with that caveat. I'm not saying this is a good solution (most people don't want to talk about their salaries), but it would solve the problem. It's already the case for government employees.
- H8crilA 6y ago
  This is the case in Sweden. Absolutely not impossible.
- sdoering 6y ago
  I am working as a works council member. I have access to anonymized salary information. Problem is - I can easily deanonymize at least 15 - 25% of all people working at our company. It isn't easy. Also in Germany we have a law in place that allows to query your employer for average salary data in some specific cases (there have to be at least 6 comparable coworkers of the other gender). Bu I agree - I would love for a more transparent approach. Even if this can come with it's own problems.
WalterBright 6y ago
With google searches there are plenty of sources of information available on the job market.

penguin_booze 6y ago

HR doesn't work for you That's what I've learned too. HR is an extension of the legal department. To be fair, their true job is to treat humans as resources. These days, they're sometimes rebranded as the "People Team"!

worker767424 6y ago
> humans as resources I'm still disappointed this game never got made: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/659943965/human-resources-an-apocalyptic-rts-game https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/659943965/human-resourc...
reaperducer 6y ago
These days, they're sometimes rebranded as the "People Team"! Sounds like it might be a minor improvement, but I'm not hopeful. I detest the phrase "human resources." I am not a resource. I am not a box of pencils, a copy machine, or a long ton of bituminous coal to be consumed by the company. I am a human being. "Personnel" wasn't so bad. I'm OK with that because I am a person. But that was before Human Resources departments became warehouses for the legions of yoga moms who think they're being rewarded for being slightly above average, when the reality is it's another industrial make-work program to keep the drones from revolting.
- dreamcompiler 6y ago
  > I am not a resource. I am not a box of pencils, a copy machine, or a long ton of bituminous coal to be consumed by the company. In the Harvard MBA school of management which dominates American business and which Wall Street incentivizes, that is precisely what you are: You are a fungible cog in a large machine. This is certainly not the only viable business management philosophy, but it's the most common one in America. Regardless of what cute name the HR department calls itself, the MBA model should be assumed as the fundamental philosophy of the company until the company's actions (not their words) prove otherwise. Costco is an example of a successful American company that does not seem to use this model. There are many others, but you have to search carefully to find them.

throwaway888abc 6y ago

Words of wisdom, should be pinned up

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

th33ngineer 6y ago

> and reputation intact I'm staying at [large SV company] for now BECAUSE OF their reputation of hiring smart engineers, so that I will be able to hopefully get a gig at a more employee-friendly company later in life. New grads that were in my position often don't have much of a choice, and being offered the ability to pay off my student debt almost immediately at 22 seemed irresponsible to pass up. It's been 4 years and my mental health has degraded for sure (and the work I am doing is not glamorous in the slightest) but my savings are piling up and the thought that this is only temporary (and will give me a nice financial cushion) will keep me going until it's unbearable.

pavel_lishin 6y ago
So when do you decide to leave? Do you have a magic dollar amount? A particular mental health symptom you're waiting to develop? I'm not sure what you're waiting for. Four years at a company is a long time; it's not like you'd be accused of nonsense like job-hopping.

geomark 6y ago

Point number 1 is very important to never forget. No matter what level you are at, HR's job is to protect the levels above you, not help you. If you are an engineer that means an opaque shield of HR policies to protect the company and all people in your management chain. Middle manager? HR will shield the directors and VPs above you, concentrating particularly on keeping the VPs safe no matter what they do.

ip26 6y ago
I always figured it was more like, they protect the company aka the group. If your interests and the company's align they are in your corner; if not then you are the "other" and their enemy. The bias towards protecting the upper ranks not being their mission statement, instead the company's interests simply more often align with the VP than the NCG.

pembrook 6y ago

You’re correct on point 1, but point 2 is overly pessimistic. The fact that the economy grows every year is proof alone that companies on the whole are generating value and not just exploiting people. The economy is not a zero sum game. The truth is, all companies, no matter how cool their branding is, are just a collection of mostly average people. The larger the company, the more average the workforce will be. This is a statistical fact. Inside any large organization, most of your job (no matter how technical) will be coordinating among groups of people, not creating X deliverable by yourself. This inevitably results in the classic drama, tension, fights, camaraderie and occasional abuse you will find when you bring any group of humans together. The X% of abusive situations that arise when you bring human animals together does not equal proof of widespread exploitation among the worlds highest paid employees. Slavery this is not. It just means your experience in any big company will essentially be a probability game. At FAANG, you have a 95% chance of getting reasonably wealthy within 5 years, with a X% (lower) chance of abuse/toxic overwork and X% chance of dying in a traffic accident on your morning commute. The problem is nobody wants to acknowledge the potential downsides. If you aren’t okay with this, there is of course the startup and indie hacker route.

hinkley 6y ago
The fact that income inequality goes up every year says you're wrong about point 2.
- Noumenon72 6y ago
  That doesn't follow in a growing economy, even a very simple two-person one where person 1 picks bananas by hand and person 2 builds a faster banana picker every year. No exploitation there.
  - pram 6y ago
    Who is buying all the bananas?
    - Noumenon72 6y ago

tiew9Vii 6y ago

> If you find yourself in an exploitive work environment, you need to leave as quickly as possible. The situation is not going to get better. It's only going to get worse, and your options are two: Leave with your mental health and reputation intact or leave after they have been destroyed. This is the right thing to do however for many people on a visa it has significant life consequences and financial hardship with having limited time to pack up your life and leave the country you built a life in. I’m sure if the author wasn’t dependent on having a visa they would of left much sooner than they did. Companies know they have unfair leverage on employees dependent on sponsored visas. Employees on sponsored visas have very little options and next to no rights, in this case the author felt suicide might be their only way out. I’ve been in a situation in a job I didn’t like with a bad manager well aware if I quit I had 90 days to find a new job or leave the country. 90 days isn’t a long time to find a new job or pack/sell all your belongings and ship to a new country without a job/place to live. I had to put a plan together to save enough money to cover the significant costs of leaving, a timeline to find a job with a deadline if it doesn’t work out to pack and go. The situation was far less stressful than the authors and I was in a good position where if the worst came to the worst I could take the financial hit and be relatively ok on the other end. Non the less it was incredibly stressful and put me in bad mental health so can completely understand why for some people they believe suicide to be a valid option. For some people leaving is not just a case of handing in their notice.

sneak 6y ago
This is a good example of why the arbitrary system of nations restricting free trade by deciding who is allowed to work where is a method specifically designed to aid in this type of exploitation.
- ardy42 6y ago
  >> I’m sure if the author wasn’t dependent on having a visa they would of left much sooner than they did. Companies know they have unfair leverage on employees dependent on sponsored visas. Employees on sponsored visas have very little options and next to no rights, in this case the author felt suicide might be their only way out. > This is a good example of why the arbitrary system of nations restricting free trade by deciding who is allowed to work where is a method specifically designed to aid in this type of exploitation. Not really. Only nontransferable sponsored visas tied to specific employers (or ones with terms so short that they're effectively the same) have this exploitation problem. You don't have to go all open borders to fix this, you just need to give sponsored immigrants just as much job-hopping freedom as permanent residents already have.

hinkley 6y ago

3. After any major organizational change, such as a merger, any promises made by the diminished chain command are not enforceable. What you won't see is that some of those promises are encouraged by the new chain of command in order to maintain calm. Eventually the one making the promises will either not be around or find that they don't have the resources to fulfill the promise. They may quit when they figure this out, if they haven't already been let go once they've established their status as scapegoat. If something matters to you, make sure you get the new bosses to announce it in front of people. Be aware that you should have already thought at least briefly about the wording of your resignation letter prior to doing this.

ed25519FUUU 6y ago
> If something matters to you, make sure you get the new bosses to announce it in front of people. In writing.
- hinkley 6y ago
  Definitely. Also don't stake your whole life plan on that promise being kept. Transitional promises have a habit of being walked back. There are many workplace promises that are disappointing or an inconvenience if they don't work out, but some end up being an existential threat (eg, "Don't worry, we're keeping the Boston office.") Accept the promise, but groom your professional network extra carefully until the dust settles.
dreamcompiler 6y ago
Agreed, but I've also seen this happen with only a minor change, such as your boss leaving. When your boss gets replaced, it can be quite difficult to ensure that previous promises are kept. Not always, but often.