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If you want my advice, it is simply this: look for dysfunctional companies. They're easy to recognize, because they look like pretty much the opposite of those
by hnarn 6y ago
If you want my advice, it is simply this: look for dysfunctional companies. They're easy to recognize, because they look like pretty much the opposite of those companies everybody really want to work at.
Take everything you see from a website like Elastic[1] for example and invert it:
- It should NOT be clear what the value proposition is.
- The website should NOT adhere to modern design standards, or at least do so very poorly.
- Bonus points for lots of unnecessary, buzz-heavy text that does not give any further indication of what the product/service offers.
Just look for any remote developer job via linkedin or any other place recruiters frequent and just invert what seems to be a "good" job and look for that instead. Approach it with your current attitude (maybe not in the actual interview) and assume that you probably won't even want to add it to your resume.
I think you won't have any problem finding a role where you can get away with this: how it will affect your mental health is another question, but that's for you to find out. If you ever want to bail out, you can just drop it and fill this gap period with something else in your resume, like whatever hobbies you were busy with.
For the record, I think the incredulity in some of these responses is pretty hilarious. 99,9 % of companies do not care about your well being as a person, by choosing this attitude you're really just treating them the way they are already treating you: a disposable business partner that will be removed from the equation as soon as they are no longer beneficial for you.
[1]: https://www.elastic.co/ https://www.elastic.co/
- koheripbal 6y agoSpecifically, stay away from the tech industry. 1. Look for a smaller antiquated company or department that doesn't understand IT, and has few if any in-house IT professionals. Make sure the role doesn't include user support. Look for "Operations" jobs. 2. Look for positions that have a TON of manual work. Search for "prepare daily/weekly/etc... reports." and similar job functions. 3. Automate as much of it as possible. 4. DO NOT TELL ANYONE that you have automated those functions. (optional - ethical constraints) 5. Insist on working from home so you can work for multiple companies simultaneously.
- glitchc 6y agoExcellent points except (5) Usually immoral and often illegal
- faeyanpiraat 6y agoExcept if you are hired as a contractor
- cercatrova 6y agoI never understand this point personally. If you're delivering value to the multiple companies you work for such that they like you, or at least don't fire you, then I don't see anything immoral in that. It's merely corporations who insist on people working for one and only one company at a time when in reality it shouldn't matter.
- seniorivn 6y agothere is a chance you are going to have access to valuable information of competing companies, that would put you in position of power over them, and is a clear conflict of interests. So it's like a lawyer serving opposing parties in court, nobody's asking why it's impossible
- amw 6y agoThat's only true in that particular hypothetical. There are a lot of possible circumstances without such a clear conflict of interest. Also, in the lawyer example, someone's freedom or livelihood is on the line. In the company example, it's a company's profits, which has a much less clear relationship to either of those two things, especially in today's world of 250:1 salary ratios.
- confidantlake 6y agoCompletely agree. Do we insist that corporations only sell to a single customer? No that would be absurd. But insisting a person can only sell their labor to a single customer is seen as perfectly normal.
- User23 6y agoThe backhaul VOIP telco space has TONS of companies that meet these criteria.
- nautilus12 6y agoI'm curious, could you be more specific?
- User23 6y agoWell I'm not going to name specific companies, but you know those international calling cards that are sold basically everywhere in areas with a large migrant work force? Those cards tend to use these discount VOIP networks.
- lotsofpulp 6y agoI assumed WhatsApp audio and FaceTime audio killed that market years ago.
- subpixel 6y agoYou might also assume Vonage was killed off, as I did until recently discovering they have a multi-billion market cap.
- lotsofpulp 6y agoVonage is supported by people like my parents, who for years have used the landline via Vonage for at most 2 phone calls per month that could have been done via a multitude of apps, yet refuse to heed my advice to cancel it.
- TimTheTinker 6y agoTry setting up E911 service for a GVoice voip phone in your house sometime -- you'll run across a lot of web UIs that look >10 years old.
- an_opabinia 6y ago> look for dysfunctional companies This theme is common in the thread and is wildly wrong. First I recommend reading Bullshit Jobs to get some perspective on how others have fulfilled your goals. Big, rich, process-driven companies and institutions are the easiest to do the least work in for the longest time. Process is the toxin low-effort thrives on. An admin role at Google pays more and works much less than an engineering role at a dysfunctional company. If you look at (rich) university departments the admins are impossible to fire and work very little despite being paid only about 30-40% less than a professor with multiple postdocs working five to ten times as hard. Anything in government: remember, process is where you thrive, and big rich city and state governments have incredible amounts of process.
- hnarn 6y agoYou're not wrong, but I also firmly believe that most if not all dysfunctional companies are extremely process heavy.
- delecti 6y agoThere's definitely lots of overlap in the venn diagram of "process heavy" and "dysfunctional", but there are plenty of each category that is not the other. Lots of industries require process, and lots of startup type places are dysfunctional without being process heavy.
- toss1 6y agoYes, they are either over-heavy on process or over-heavy on micromanagement Each creates different kinds of misery, and could be exploitable by OP for his goals. The over-process version is likely more durable (both the org not imploding soon, and the position lasting) and potentially less interpersonal misery.
- nostromo 6y agoI think more dysfunctional companies are constantly working hard and sprinting... in circles. They are making no real progress, but on the inside they’re all working hard at accomplishing nothing.
- redisman 6y agoDysfunctional companies in my experience have been horrible places to work where they work the devs to death and make them do all kinds of unrelated tasks.
- xtracto 6y agoThis or, these are companies where managers need people to "look busy", which in a "remote allowed" environment will not be possible or will mean surveillance software.
- nikisweeting 6y agoIf you're a dev working from home, surveillance software might be easy to get around ;) Automate some real-looking work processes and just use your personal computer for everything else.
- xkeysc0re 6y agoI can vouch for this. Dysfunctional companies have no conception of humanity and you will suffer as you try to squeeze through the cracks, which is much harder than it looks.
- zepolen 6y agoThe funny thing about this is that all the people I know who work or worked at Elastic say it's one of the most dysfunctional and toxic environments.
- hnarn 6y agoI wasn't in any way trying to say Elastic must be a great place to work, only that the type of places I'm talking about normally have web sites that look like the opposite of theirs.
- bombcar 6y agoSlick websites often cover a multitude of sins - in a dysfunctional company "update the website" is something they can subcontract out and point at. Look for multiple changes to the website with no consistent plan over years.
- sixdimensional 6y agoFor what it's worth (sample size of 1 - me) - if you are at all competent and bad at setting boundaries, the dysfunction will absolutely frustrate the heck out of you. Seeing what is broken, knowing that it can be fixed, and having even the slightest bit of motivation or knowledge of how to do so, and how it goes on forever and ever and doesn't get fixed becomes incredibly tiring. I suppose, if you go into a dysfunctional company hoping to "coast", just be aware, if you are not good at managing boundaries and passing off the "frustration", it might be a lot worse than you realize. Just imagine.. if you are spending 8 hours a day, 5 days a week, watching a slow motion wreck.. and powerless to do anything about it... sure, you get paid, but is it worth spending the time?
- nikisweeting 6y agoIf I were being paid like $250k/yr+, think I could tolerate it for enough years to retire and go do my own things.
- knodi123 6y agolol, well the slow motion trainwrecks are, in my experience, about a quarter of that. But it's still enough for a comfortable life, especially if you have a side hustle or you're self-teaching stuff that will help your resume.
- nikisweeting 6y agoI know some Google teams that might qualify.
- the_local_host 6y agoDysfunctional companies consume effort, but they waste it. People work themselves to the point of burnout with little to show for it. What the original poster needs is a company that is already functioning without them, and does not require any of their effort to keep going.
- krmmalik 6y agoThis is great advice but if I could just add one thing, from experience, and that is, do treat the interview with dispassion. I have consistently found employers (esp in a dysfunctional organisation) often read dispassion as confidence and that is always a plus point.
- nikisweeting 6y ago+1 for this advice. In my experience skepticism and hesitation (within reason) are often highly regarded in these environments, and enthusiastic upstart types are seen as inexperienced / naive, even when that's not the case.
- rorykoehler 6y agoThis is how your life becomes endless putting out fires