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In my experience, there are 2 major things that contribute to this from the company. If you want a solid work/life balance, avoid very small companies like the
by nscalf 5y ago
In my experience, there are 2 major things that contribute to this from the company. If you want a solid work/life balance, avoid very small companies like the plague. Their whole thing is working you hard to see if the company can become a thing, with a high chance of getting little to no return for the extra work.
The other major item that's contributed to that in my career/careers of people I've talked to about this is growth. You want a company that is experiencing moderate, steady growth. Doubling every year? That's going to be a painful job. Declining every year? Better work harder to justify your job. But a cool 3-15% each year in a steady company means you get to go home at 5.
More than any of that though, the most important contributor to work life balance is you. If you really value that balance, be ready to tell your manager you're not working late and accept that eventually you may get fired. If you're willing to do that, and you do your job well, you'll be fine (either at that role, or the next). I've had to explain to managers that I won't work 60 hour weeks to make a deadline they made up. It's not my company, I don't get any upside in spending more than the agreed upon hours working on it, and it's just a job. People scoff at that mentality, but you need to decide how you live your life and be ready to enforce those boundaries.
- jmann99999 5y agoI have to take exception with nscalf saying that you should avoid very small companies like the plague. I think that expectation is based on a very silicon Valley view. However, there are many small companies out there who have a culture that don’t want to grind you to nonexistence. Sure, they may be in Kansas City, or Nashville, or Denver, but their founders understand that the goal isn’t to sell out, the goal is to build a business. True, eventually they may get bought by another company, but along the way they aren’t interested in killing their golden geese. Before discounting smaller companies, I would recommend delving deep into their culture. You may find that it works for you or you may find that you want no part of it. However, I would give it a shot. You may find that it’s something that you can’t get anywhere else.
- thethethethe 5y agoI second this, I once worked for a small software company with around 15 people working for the company total, including sales. They had steady income for years and there wasn't much pressure to work long hours to deliver a promised product to investors. I had flexible hours, I'd typically come in at 1 and stay until 7-8 to avoid traffic, I worked from home regularly, and they had free snacks. It was really chill
- gaws 5y agoWhat happened?
- thethethethe 5y agoWhy did I leave? Because I got a job at Google
- memling 5y agoSeconded. My first long-term job out of school was as the 7th man in a well-established telecommunications company. It had easily the best retirement benefit and work-life balance. Second to working from home, it was the best commute (seven minutes in rush hour to start, then 25 minutes after a move). There were downsides: the engineering wasn't that exciting, and there was no HR (both pro and con, I guess), and the budget was an accounting mistake at any Fortune 500...but I look back on it very fondly.
- inter_netuser 5y ago7th man in a well-established company out of schoool? Can you parse it for me?
- djhn 5y agoI guess in their use of the word established it's possible to be both small and well established?
- memling 5y agoIndeed, the business was well over ten years old when I joined and had excess of 1M USD in sales. My boss matched my 401k contributions dollar for dollar without limit up to the maximum you can contribute. The health benefits were chancier because of economy of scale—we just couldn't get the same rates the big guys can—and I plateaued eventually. When I got married and realized that health benefits could trump a bunch of other considerations, and that I needed to think a little harder about my future skillsets, I moved on. But it remains one of my favorite jobs.
- dqh 5y agoAgreed! Our approach with 12 or so developers: no deadlines, code review begins when you are ready. I am actively suspicious of work done quickly. I personally ensure the clients don’t expect guaranteed delivery on a fixed date. Work 38 hours a week. Once every year or two we might need to push something harder for a few days - track how many extra hours you did and take them off later whenever you like. But we try to avoid any sort of crunch. To get a job you pass my personal, practical, coding test. By practical I mean using an IDE with full web access, Google, Stack Overflow, whatever. I try to hire people with at least 10+ years experience, but the more the better. Some of our best are well over 30 years experience. In exchange we have a happy group of strong developers enjoying their work and having time for their lives outside of it. This has led to an extremely stable system that’s easy to add features to even after 15 years of evolution. Because of that perhaps it’s actually cheaper to work this way.
- wikibob 5y agoWhat is the total compensation range that the company pays?
- dqh 5y agoIt’s at the high end of the scale for the city. Transparently based on years of experience, with about 10 years qualifying for the maximum rate. And we proactively raise the scale when we can, individual negotiation not needed. No KPIs. All pretty simple really, and based on how I would have wanted a job to be.
- nscalf 5y agoThis is a really good point. I did have Silicon Valley, VC funding startups in mind when I said this. To add on to this, I would probably ask about what their goals and timelines are. If they’re aiming to raise a round and get acquired, you should probably dig deeper into their culture and the pressures they put around deadlines.
- toto444 5y agoIndeed. I work in Europe for a startup that has experienced 100% growth several years in a row and everyone (except for the founders) works 9-5, goes to the pub on Thursday afternoon and leaves early on Friday.
- christophilus 5y agoThe best place I’ve ever worked from a work life balance perspective was a small company (3 devs). I’m still working there. I don’t think there’s a simple answer. I have noticed that managers who are parents tend to be more understanding of work life balance. Not sure if that observation would pass a statistical analysis, though.
- alexfromapex 5y agoYeah the only reason this has been allowed is because people used to tolerate it. Now I just leave if a company sucks and it is so empowering, I can’t describe how good it feels.
- loopz 5y agoI want to think it's because leadership, but people also do it for themselves "competing" against other people. It's kind of a prisoner's dilemma. It's kind of shitty anyways.
- gaws 5y ago> Now I just leave if a company sucks and it is so empowering, I can’t describe how good it feels. And it's easy for you to hop onto the next job?
- 01100011 5y agoAvoid growth companies. Small companies can be laid back and sleepy. I once worked at a small manufacturer of serial-to-ethernet boxes run by a bunch of older folks who seemingly just wanted the company to survive until they retired. I also worked at a small defense contractor. Great work-life balance and a very friendly environment. No backstabbing or politics. AFAICT, 99% of "software companies" are outside of the asshole belt(i.e. SiValley). They won't pay you $400k/year, but you probably won't care. My opinion on SiValley just keeps getting lower, frankly. It doesn't help that I'd have about the same amount of money in the bank($300k) after almost 3 years of working my ass off as if I had stayed at home at my lower-paying job and just let my home appreciate in value. From what I hear, the larger SiV companies are starting to hire people into non-SiV offices, so hopefully the valley stops getting worse and those companies don't export their caustic work ethics to the rest of the nation.
- thelastknowngod 5y agoFor what it's worth, I work for a very well known, high growth company. Many others seem to have a problem with work/life balance based on feedback I hear through the grapevine. My team experiences very little of that though. We are well staffed, globally distributed so on call rotations always match our waking time zones, there are loose deadlines at most, and we are given the benefit of the doubt if something takes longer than originally expected to complete. I refuse to answer slack or emails after 5pm (even if I'm on call) and take vacation whenever I want with little approval needed beyond making sure an on call shift is covered. For all the hate silicon valley-type companies get, I honestly love the spot I'm in. I think it has more to do with team structure and management trusting you enough not to micromanage. Hard to verify that as a job seeker though.