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Putting my hiring manager’s hat on, I recommend asking for more, without hesitation. There is practically no downside. Especially if it’s your dream company, be

Putting my hiring manager’s hat on, I recommend asking for more, without hesitation. There is practically no downside. Especially if it’s your dream company, because you are likely to be extra motivated, and this is a case you can genuinely make. Once an offer’s already on the table, the worst possible outcome from asking will be “sorry, that’s as high as we can go right now” without any rancour. If instead the response is in any way affronted, then run the fuck away because that’s a clear early warning sign of toxic, bullying management; avoiding such environments is also on my list of good outcomes. The only exception context being, if you don’t currently have any income at all.

Dracophoenix 5y ago
In your previous experience with FAANGs, were your requests for a higher offer taken as an affront? Also, what was your role with regards to ISP infrastructure?
- inopinatus 5y ago
  1. No. I'm also speaking from both sides of the table, as a hiring manager I could never be offended by someone simply looking to gain the greatest benefit from their employment. I won't say it can't happen, however, because every service team is different. 2. Well, over the course of the last few decades, I think probably most of them, having started out building dialup services in the '90s on shelves piled up with USR Sportsters, to principal engineer for a multinational service provider; developing various appliance products; developing global-scale provisioning & monitoring tools for transit and hosting services; helpdesk; operating a LIR; dating RIR staffers; standing up new IXPs; SRE; hiring; designing data centers; M&A due diligence; post-M&A systems convergence; webdev; postmaster. My concept of "full stack engineering" starts with racking the servers, or perhaps even before that: getting the business case approved and running the RFP. Never been a peering coordinator, though, I'm not demonic enough.
johnnyanmac 5y ago
The problem here is that (aside from the usual "FAANG or nothing" sentiment): you assume everyone can get a FAANG job to begin with. Apple never called back after my campus interview, I didn't make it past Google's automated programming test. I had no link to Microsoft so I just have a online resume in the virtual void. That first job hustle is painful. I definitely wouldn't be where I was today if I didn't spend a few years at a local studio, if only because it gave relevant work experience to what I wanted to do. Even if it was paying me half my current salary it was well worth the experience.
- inopinatus 5y ago
  Far from it; this advice is from my current perspective as a bootstrapped co-founder, but concurs with all my prior experience, including that at other startups and ordinary enterprises, as both manager and job candidate. Funny how people assume that just because you’ve been at one of the tech giants, that it was either the only experience you have, or that it’s the only experience you valued, or speak from. The assumption is a category error, and seems to be mostly invoked dismissively.

Dracophoenix 5y ago

In your previous experience with FAANGs, were your requests for a higher offer taken as an affront? Also, what was your role with regards to ISP infrastructure?

inopinatus 5y ago
1. No. I'm also speaking from both sides of the table, as a hiring manager I could never be offended by someone simply looking to gain the greatest benefit from their employment. I won't say it can't happen, however, because every service team is different. 2. Well, over the course of the last few decades, I think probably most of them, having started out building dialup services in the '90s on shelves piled up with USR Sportsters, to principal engineer for a multinational service provider; developing various appliance products; developing global-scale provisioning & monitoring tools for transit and hosting services; helpdesk; operating a LIR; dating RIR staffers; standing up new IXPs; SRE; hiring; designing data centers; M&A due diligence; post-M&A systems convergence; webdev; postmaster. My concept of "full stack engineering" starts with racking the servers, or perhaps even before that: getting the business case approved and running the RFP. Never been a peering coordinator, though, I'm not demonic enough.

johnnyanmac 5y ago

The problem here is that (aside from the usual "FAANG or nothing" sentiment): you assume everyone can get a FAANG job to begin with. Apple never called back after my campus interview, I didn't make it past Google's automated programming test. I had no link to Microsoft so I just have a online resume in the virtual void. That first job hustle is painful. I definitely wouldn't be where I was today if I didn't spend a few years at a local studio, if only because it gave relevant work experience to what I wanted to do. Even if it was paying me half my current salary it was well worth the experience.

inopinatus 5y ago
Far from it; this advice is from my current perspective as a bootstrapped co-founder, but concurs with all my prior experience, including that at other startups and ordinary enterprises, as both manager and job candidate. Funny how people assume that just because you’ve been at one of the tech giants, that it was either the only experience you have, or that it’s the only experience you valued, or speak from. The assumption is a category error, and seems to be mostly invoked dismissively.