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I've never held a job for more than 2 years. I can come up with a reasonably convincing story for every individual Job about why I quit that one. But taken tog

by hsn915 4y ago

I've never held a job for more than 2 years. I can come up with a reasonably convincing story for every individual Job about why I quit that one. But taken together, there's no reasonable story that would convince a hiring manager. It comes down to this: I hate being an employee. I want to work on my own projects on my own terms. This is the only way I can find work that is worth doing. That said, the wording of the article is weird. > If your job is terrible, you can leave As if you're affirming an anxious person. Listen, yes, you can leave, but you shoule know that there absolutely will be consequences for leaving too early. Fewer employers will consider hiring you. For one thing, I have relatives that got into the tech scene after me, but rack in much higher salaries than me. I'm not sure what it is, but probably staying in their jobs for more than two years helps. If your goal in life is to find a stable employment, then you should absolutely not "just leave". For me, that was never my goal in life (and frankly I can't understand people whose goal in life is that). So I had no qualms about leaving when I found that I lost the will to continue working the job. That said, I still hesitated and took my time. I still cared about finishing whatever project it is I'm working on. I felt a sense of responsibility for the company, because they are paying me to do a job, and quitting half way through is just not the right thing to do.

PragmaticPulp 4y ago
> I can come up with a reasonably convincing story for every individual Job about why I quit that one. But taken together, there's no reasonable story that would convince a hiring manager. > It comes down to this: I hate being an employee. If the bottom line is that you hate being an employee, then it seems that being suspicious of your resume would be the correct call. > I want to work on my own projects on my own terms. This is the only way I can find work that is worth doing. This is something hiring managers try to screen for during the hiring process. Being part of a team and working together on the teams' terms is crucial. There isn't room for a "lone wolf" kind of programmer in most companies. This personality might work at small companies that can only afford to hire a single programmer who owns an entire domain from start to finish, but those jobs come with their own issues.
- ditonal 4y ago
  I'm trying to figure out which part of the post you're replying to suggests that they're looking to work for you but I can't find it. Yet your response presumes it and comes off as presumptuous. Candidates are wise to screen out hiring managers like that. They generally don't run teams worth working for, and if you're not smart enough to filter out managers like that, you might end up with too many short tenures.
  - PragmaticPulp 4y ago
    > I'm trying to figure out which part of the post you're replying to suggests that they're looking to work for you but I can't find it. Yet your response presumes it and comes off as presumptuous. I wasn't trying to suggest the parent commenter was trying to work for me (nor would that even make logical sense, given that I'm replying to them...) The comment was a general observation on the hiring process, short tenures, and how hiring managers operate. I meant it in the general context of the article we're all commenting on. The bottom line is that hiring managers are looking for good employees. If someone outwardly identifies as a person who "hates being an employee" then it would seem the system is working if they're struggling to convince hiring managers otherwise.
    - avmich 4y ago
      > The bottom line is that hiring managers are looking for good employees. I think this looks closest to the problem of misunderstanding. Hiring managers should look for people who solve their problems, not for good employees (in the sense of this discussion). Hating being an employee should be understood correctly.
      - bruce511 4y ago
        The thing is, someone who's going to move on in say a year is going to cause more problems than they solve. Firstly it means the hiring manager has to redo this whole process again. So if nothing else a problem for him. Secondly everything the person worked on will have to be moved to someone else - an expensive cost of time. Thirdly there's typically a reason for them leaving, and they often pollute the workspace with that discontent on their way out. As an employer it's not hard to find people with sufficient skills. Despite what programmers think it's not tech chops that are unique. Being a "good employee" for lots of definitions of "good" is exactly what I'm looking for.
endtime 4y ago
> I want to work on my own projects on my own terms. This is the only way I can find work that is worth doing. Worth doing in what sense? Not in the capitalist sense of your work being worth at least your compensation. Maybe you mean "worth it to you, subjectively", but if so I don't understand what information is in the second sentence but not the first. And if you mean it in terms of social good, maybe if you have very unusual values? It can't be a matter of technical challenge; there are plenty of hard jobs out there. I've spent most of my career in big tech, and I've definitely been frustrated when I've had projects that I worked on canceled. That work obviously wasn't worth doing, in hindsight, except that I still got paid. But I've also had roles where I had meaningful positive impact on customers and on the business, and I don't think my situation was particularly unusual.
- hsn915 4y ago
  Worth doing as in, I can look back 10 years later and be proud of what I did. That the work had meaning beyound getting a paycheck. > And if you mean it in terms of social good, maybe if you have very unusual values? "Social Good". I don't like terms like this. In the west this term is often conflated with leftist values. I'm mostly concerned with technical excellence and making products that provide some value to end users. These two criteria alone exclude that vast majority of tech jobs. Most software products suck, both on the technical front, and the user experience front. > It can't be a matter of technical challenge; there are plenty of hard jobs out there. Right, but they are challenging because you have to work with terrible tech. This is not an interesting kind of challenge. It's the annoying kind of challenge. Think of it this way: building a website using only Notepad (the default text editor in Windows XP) is probably challenging, but is it interesting? No.
  - andsoitis 4y ago
    > Most software products suck, both on the technical front, and the user experience front. Since you also hate being an employee, this could be your chance to venture on your own and make awesome technical products with great user experience, given that you posit most software suck.
AmericanChopper 4y ago
Just become a contractor. Sounds ideal for your mentality.
- jankcorn 4y ago
  Strongly agree. When you feel like the combination of administrative hassle and/or work content no longer fits you, it is trivial to just wrap up the current work cleanly (as mentioned above) and just move onto another, more appealing project. The nice side effect of being a contractor is that your CV now looks like you have been in the same position for 10 years instead of a series of 2 year stints. I have done this and always worked hard to help the team succeed. Later, when I decided to try working for a couple of large companies, I was stunned to be treated as "you work in my organization and will follow my every whim". One example is attending endless pointless meetings waiting for the client to decide what spec they want, just because the manager wants to everyone on the team to be present (and silent). As a contractor, it becomes quite easy to say "it looks like I am not adding much to your project until the project spec gets settled. Please let me know when you are ready to implement (or have more detailed questions that you need to know to flesh out the spec) and I will be happy to help anytime". In my experience, it is quite common that they will have hashed out the requirements and be ready to start work after 12 months or so and were happy to talk then.
  - Buttons840 4y ago
    > The nice side effect of being a contractor is that your CV now looks like you have been in the same position for 10 years instead of a series of 2 year stints. Can't you do this with W2 work too? "Oh, that was all private consulting work. No sorry, I'm not able to tell you who I was consulting."
    - em-bee 4y ago
      that's effectively what i did, but i listed all stints as if they were jobs, and my CV is rather lengthy as a result. some of them were contracts, some where were actual employment. we used whatever form was more convenient. sometimes employment was necessary for visa purposes. in the end i don't think it matters. consulting is consulting, and i may very well share who i was consulting for, it's still different from having a long term job. as a hiring manager i would still ask: "you have been consulting for the last 10 years, why are you looking for employment now?" the transition from independent consulting to long term employment is just as questionable as the one from job-hopping to long term employment. you'd have to be working as an employee for the same consulting company for multiple years to give the impression that you are willing to stick with the same employer for a longer period.
tokinonagare 4y ago
> It comes down to this: I hate being an employee. I want to work on my own projects on my own terms. This is the only way I can find work that is worth doing. Sounds familiar: after mild insuccess in academia I found a permanent job but quitted after 4 months. Didn't help that I was a not very well paid consultant with long commutation time. The job was easy but boring. I don't get how many people are able to endure this.
mathgladiator 4y ago
I hated being an employee too, but I found value in suffering the long game by focusing on TC (total compensation) to maximize my knowledge, skills, and war chest to start a business of my own.
- hsn915 4y ago
  Yea eventually that is the only path. Although I think you overestimate what is required (financially) to start an independent business. If you are single and you have funds to last you 6 months, you are probably good to do.
  - WitCanStain 4y ago
    Depends heavily on what type of company we're talking about.
  - mathgladiator 4y ago
    An argument for going deep on a career is that you can build relationships built on trust which let you climb the TC hierarchy. This then accelerates the warchest accumulation, and I'm looking ahead as a married man with decades available.
- moneywoes 4y ago
  What type of biz did you start
  - mathgladiator 4y ago
    First, I'm building out my dream infrastructure platform. https://www.adama-platform.com/ https://www.adama-platform.com/ This is going to take a few years to mature. While it matures, I'm spending next year improving my UX skills and building a WYSIWYG editor for board games. My aspiration is to ship a single online board game next year, and then I'll open it up as a "roblox for board games" I'm doing this solo for a variety of reasons.
WatchDog 4y ago
> For one thing, I have relatives that got into the tech scene after me, but rack in much higher salaries than me. I'm not sure what it is, but probably staying in their jobs for more than two years helps. Interesting perspective, I usually hear the opposite advice. That it's easier to find a new job that pays more rather than get a raise through your existing job. I suppose at some point that can have diminishing returns, I imagine particularly in management positions.
- PragmaticPulp 4y ago
  Job hopping can have a high ROI for junior people who enter the industry at the bottom end of the compensation curve. Someone starting at a $60K entry-level job at a small, no-name company generally has no good options for significant salary increases other than changing to another job. On the other end of the spectrum, someone who joins a Big Tech company right out of college has a lot to gain by staying, learning how the promotion system works, and then working their way upward through the promotion ladder. I think the job-hopping advice has lost a lot of context after being reduced to a short aphorism. The companies that compensate toward the top end of the curve are actually great places to establish long tenures and move up the comp ladder. The longer you stay, the more allies you have within the company and the more knowledge you have of how the system rewards people.
- hsn915 4y ago
  > That it's easier to find a new job that pays more rather than get a raise through your existing job. Yes, but after you have spent 3+ years in your current job. It also helps to have the ability to put up with all kinds of bullshit - which I don't have. One time I quit a job because the "boss" talked to me in a bad tone. Two times I threatened indirectly to leave when someone tried to use their "authority" to talk bullshit to me. Everytime when the project was setup with complex/confusing maze of docker/k8s scripts, I simply refused to learn their config system because I viewed it as beyond bullshit. But my relatives who get paid a lot more than me are all just "suffering" this kind of bullshit to keep the job.
  - mplanchard 4y ago
Ancalagon 4y ago
TBH if this is your anecdotal experience it is completely opposite to what I've seen. I've seen CS grads that could not code very well, 5 years later make >500k working as Senior SWEs for AirBnb by switching jobs every 1.5-2 years. My own tech lead left his last two jobs in < 8 months. He's a staff eng now making similar cash. And before my current position the other staff/principal engineers I saw had similar tenures.
- rr888 4y ago
  Sounds like we need a proper recession
kamaal 4y ago
>>It comes down to this: I hate being an employee. Why should anybody hire you to do a thing, you hate doing it?
- cpsns 4y ago
  I’m not speaking for myself on this one, but don’t most people profess to hate their jobs? I’ve met very few who love working.
  - dijit 4y ago
    Given the choice though, between someone who loves their job and someone who simply tolerates it (because they hate being told what the priority is): then most people will choose the former. Personally I am similar to the parent, I have a strong anti-authoritarian streak and I work hard to curb it; what helps me is trying to maintain an open dialogue with my managers and try to get on board with how they prioritise so that I'm invested in solving the same problems as they are. Being equals in my own mind helps me curb my anti-authoritarian tendencies.
- hsn915 4y ago
  Did I say they should?
- hansel_der 4y ago
  i feel you but the obvious answer is: because the alternatives are worse
fasterik 4y ago
"I hate being an employee. I want to work on my own projects on my own terms." Is there a word for people like this? A philosophy? I feel like most people either don't care about their work and find meaning in other areas of life, or are invested in playing the corporate game and enjoy being in that environment. If you tell them that you don't want to be an employee at a company, they look at you like you're speaking a foreign language. The problem is there isn't any identifiable group of people who are like this. It's not "anti-work"; I can work just as hard as or harder than anyone given the right circumstances. It's orthogonal to any specific political view. "Independent" is too broad. "Anti-establishment" is focused on external factors rather than intrinsic motivations. It would be useful to have a term where you could say "I am X" and it would immediately bring up all the right connotations.
- hsn915 4y ago
  That's interesting. I never thought I was in a weird minority. I thought most people hate their jobs but do them anyway because they can't think of an alternative. Maybe that is true. Maybe the degree to which I hate being an employee is just much larger than it is for most people? The problem is with programming it's really hard to leave your job at the office. It's a deep thinking job so it comes with you to bed whether you like it or not. Jon Blow has previously (8 years ago) left a comment elaborating how working a job robs you of your potential. I have it saved in my favorites. I read it often to remind myself the importance of going independent. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7789438 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7789438 There's also this essay by Palladium editor in chief about quitting your job. It was posted a while ago to HN to a mostly negative reception because apparently it's too elitist. It's also one of the pieces I keep re-reading periodically. https://www.palladiummag.com/2022/01/06/quit-your-job/ https://www.palladiummag.com/2022/01/06/quit-your-job/
  - fasterik 4y ago
    Maybe I was being a bit melodramatic. More realistically, a lot of people hate their job and exist somewhere on a spectrum between accepting it and trying to change it. I just happen to be biased toward making more radical changes when things aren't motivating me. That Jon Blow comment resonates with me a lot. Definitely saved for future reference.
ar_lan 4y ago
> and frankly I can’t understand people whose goal in life is [to find stable employment] I grew up lower middle class - first to graduate college in my family. Dad could never hold down a job for long. It was a very pressing need for me, for a long time, and still is, to be able to keep gainful employment. I’m at a stage in my career now where I should not worry about that - I’m skilled enough that if I put in the 3-6 months of leetcode practice I can probably land whatever job I really want. So therefore, my skill and career experience should theoretically land me “stability” and should no longer be the goal - but I resonate with folks that do share that goal. I think upbringing and seeing others not be able to hold a job, let alone a dream job, brings out some conservative sides to folks. I don’t know your story, but most of my friends that did startups for a long while out of college were almost all from wealthy families. That just never really felt like an option for me.
- brailsafe 4y ago
  > I’m skilled enough that if I put in the 3-6 months of leetcode practice I can probably land whatever job I really want. It's a shame that your actual experience doesn't count for much in comparison to wasting 3-6 months of spare time on arbitrary brain teasers. Not a good place for hiring to be.
brailsafe 4y ago
> For me, that was never my goal in life (and frankly I can't understand people whose goal in life is that). That's unfortunate. Unless you're already rich, finding stable employment that pays well and reliably is an important goal to have. The opposite would be volatility, and that's not really good for much. There's something said against keeping the exact same job for 5-10 years perhaps, but securing a reliable is the only thing I care about when I'm an employee or contractor. Tech doesn't really have much virtue when you don't have that.
- hsn915 4y ago
  > finding stable employment that pays well and reliably is an important goal to have This is just your opinion and temperament.
  - brailsafe 4y ago
    Because I'm not already rich. Instead, I could seek to spend the majority of my time working on something that may or may not actually pay for my rent, but why would I? Not to say that I wouldn't work for a startup, but if that startup can't pay me a sustainable income, they can get fucked.
    - hsn915 4y ago
      I'm not rich. I didn't grow up rich. It has nothing to do with growing up rich. I know people who are not rich, have held the same job for 10+ years, and think it's very important. This is my ideology: a bird does not feel safety from being on a sturdy branch, but from his self belief that he can always fly to a new branch at any time.
      - brailsafe 4y ago
        > This is my ideology: a bird does not feel safety from being on a sturdy branch, but from his self belief that he can always fly to a new branch at any time. and maybe that's always been true for you, which is an aspect of being, if not rich, certainly quite fortunate in some way. I felt that way when I was 22, but I had a naive view of the market and my own place in it. There will very likely be a time where that's not true, but if you don't believe that, then the smart move would be to buy the most expensive house you can with debt; you'll never miss me a payment. Getting new jobs has never been easy for me, and it's getting harder every year, because of ludicrous hiring processes and not choosing to live in any arbitrary forest with flimsy branches. The problem as well with the analogy is that you'd be stupid to intentionally choose to work for companies that can't pay you, if you need to be paid. It's more likely that you can weather this if you've already been paid, and therefore it's more wise to jump from flimsy branch to sturdy branch until you feel like the risk of the flimsy branch is tolerable. Therefore, unless I have hundreds of thousands of dollars lined up, I won't be quitting my job before looking for a new one, and that new one will be scrutinized heavily to ensure it can hold my weight.
BerislavLopac 4y ago
Have you ever considered contracting?
nsgi 4y ago
If you hate being an employee, is applying for a full-time job really the best move? > and frankly I can't understand people whose goal in life is that Not sure I'd call it a goal in life since most people in tech are in-demand enough to take it for granted, but providing the job has good work-life balance and isn't too stressful it's the best way to work to live. Also, not everyone has the luxury of not needing stable employment
bravetraveler 4y ago
I think you're underselling yourself/your ability to sell the story. Up until my current employer, I couldn't hold a place more than three years. I'd get bored, my edges would fit the shape of the company, and I just couldn't move. I did this... at least a dozen times? It's come up surprisingly little! Whenever it did, I'd usually say the kind of trite things you'd expect from an early 20-something. "I want new opportunities to grow", whatever. I've had more offers (and turned many away) than outright rejections. I don't think hopping is perceived that poorly, but there's probably a rather severe grade for someone averaging say, less than a year compared to two or three. However, this was before the pandemic and the relationship between worker/employer seems more strained now...
willio58 4y ago
> As if you're affirming an anxious person. Honestly I'd be willing to bet most (> 50%) readers of HN including myself fit in this description.
- hsn915 4y ago
  I'd be really surprised if the majority of HN readers are anxious people with low self image who need external affirmation. I do think it applies to reddit (probably ~80% of them are like that), but for HN I don't think would apply to more than 10%.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

by hsn915 4y ago

PragmaticPulp 4y ago

> I can come up with a reasonably convincing story for every individual Job about why I quit that one. But taken together, there's no reasonable story that would convince a hiring manager. > It comes down to this: I hate being an employee. If the bottom line is that you hate being an employee, then it seems that being suspicious of your resume would be the correct call. > I want to work on my own projects on my own terms. This is the only way I can find work that is worth doing. This is something hiring managers try to screen for during the hiring process. Being part of a team and working together on the teams' terms is crucial. There isn't room for a "lone wolf" kind of programmer in most companies. This personality might work at small companies that can only afford to hire a single programmer who owns an entire domain from start to finish, but those jobs come with their own issues.

ditonal 4y ago
I'm trying to figure out which part of the post you're replying to suggests that they're looking to work for you but I can't find it. Yet your response presumes it and comes off as presumptuous. Candidates are wise to screen out hiring managers like that. They generally don't run teams worth working for, and if you're not smart enough to filter out managers like that, you might end up with too many short tenures.
- PragmaticPulp 4y ago
  > I'm trying to figure out which part of the post you're replying to suggests that they're looking to work for you but I can't find it. Yet your response presumes it and comes off as presumptuous. I wasn't trying to suggest the parent commenter was trying to work for me (nor would that even make logical sense, given that I'm replying to them...) The comment was a general observation on the hiring process, short tenures, and how hiring managers operate. I meant it in the general context of the article we're all commenting on. The bottom line is that hiring managers are looking for good employees. If someone outwardly identifies as a person who "hates being an employee" then it would seem the system is working if they're struggling to convince hiring managers otherwise.
  - avmich 4y ago
    > The bottom line is that hiring managers are looking for good employees. I think this looks closest to the problem of misunderstanding. Hiring managers should look for people who solve their problems, not for good employees (in the sense of this discussion). Hating being an employee should be understood correctly.
    - bruce511 4y ago
      The thing is, someone who's going to move on in say a year is going to cause more problems than they solve. Firstly it means the hiring manager has to redo this whole process again. So if nothing else a problem for him. Secondly everything the person worked on will have to be moved to someone else - an expensive cost of time. Thirdly there's typically a reason for them leaving, and they often pollute the workspace with that discontent on their way out. As an employer it's not hard to find people with sufficient skills. Despite what programmers think it's not tech chops that are unique. Being a "good employee" for lots of definitions of "good" is exactly what I'm looking for.

endtime 4y ago

> I want to work on my own projects on my own terms. This is the only way I can find work that is worth doing. Worth doing in what sense? Not in the capitalist sense of your work being worth at least your compensation. Maybe you mean "worth it to you, subjectively", but if so I don't understand what information is in the second sentence but not the first. And if you mean it in terms of social good, maybe if you have very unusual values? It can't be a matter of technical challenge; there are plenty of hard jobs out there. I've spent most of my career in big tech, and I've definitely been frustrated when I've had projects that I worked on canceled. That work obviously wasn't worth doing, in hindsight, except that I still got paid. But I've also had roles where I had meaningful positive impact on customers and on the business, and I don't think my situation was particularly unusual.

hsn915 4y ago
Worth doing as in, I can look back 10 years later and be proud of what I did. That the work had meaning beyound getting a paycheck. > And if you mean it in terms of social good, maybe if you have very unusual values? "Social Good". I don't like terms like this. In the west this term is often conflated with leftist values. I'm mostly concerned with technical excellence and making products that provide some value to end users. These two criteria alone exclude that vast majority of tech jobs. Most software products suck, both on the technical front, and the user experience front. > It can't be a matter of technical challenge; there are plenty of hard jobs out there. Right, but they are challenging because you have to work with terrible tech. This is not an interesting kind of challenge. It's the annoying kind of challenge. Think of it this way: building a website using only Notepad (the default text editor in Windows XP) is probably challenging, but is it interesting? No.
- andsoitis 4y ago
  > Most software products suck, both on the technical front, and the user experience front. Since you also hate being an employee, this could be your chance to venture on your own and make awesome technical products with great user experience, given that you posit most software suck.

AmericanChopper 4y ago

Just become a contractor. Sounds ideal for your mentality.

jankcorn 4y ago
Strongly agree. When you feel like the combination of administrative hassle and/or work content no longer fits you, it is trivial to just wrap up the current work cleanly (as mentioned above) and just move onto another, more appealing project. The nice side effect of being a contractor is that your CV now looks like you have been in the same position for 10 years instead of a series of 2 year stints. I have done this and always worked hard to help the team succeed. Later, when I decided to try working for a couple of large companies, I was stunned to be treated as "you work in my organization and will follow my every whim". One example is attending endless pointless meetings waiting for the client to decide what spec they want, just because the manager wants to everyone on the team to be present (and silent). As a contractor, it becomes quite easy to say "it looks like I am not adding much to your project until the project spec gets settled. Please let me know when you are ready to implement (or have more detailed questions that you need to know to flesh out the spec) and I will be happy to help anytime". In my experience, it is quite common that they will have hashed out the requirements and be ready to start work after 12 months or so and were happy to talk then.
- Buttons840 4y ago
  > The nice side effect of being a contractor is that your CV now looks like you have been in the same position for 10 years instead of a series of 2 year stints. Can't you do this with W2 work too? "Oh, that was all private consulting work. No sorry, I'm not able to tell you who I was consulting."
  - em-bee 4y ago
    that's effectively what i did, but i listed all stints as if they were jobs, and my CV is rather lengthy as a result. some of them were contracts, some where were actual employment. we used whatever form was more convenient. sometimes employment was necessary for visa purposes. in the end i don't think it matters. consulting is consulting, and i may very well share who i was consulting for, it's still different from having a long term job. as a hiring manager i would still ask: "you have been consulting for the last 10 years, why are you looking for employment now?" the transition from independent consulting to long term employment is just as questionable as the one from job-hopping to long term employment. you'd have to be working as an employee for the same consulting company for multiple years to give the impression that you are willing to stick with the same employer for a longer period.

tokinonagare 4y ago

> It comes down to this: I hate being an employee. I want to work on my own projects on my own terms. This is the only way I can find work that is worth doing. Sounds familiar: after mild insuccess in academia I found a permanent job but quitted after 4 months. Didn't help that I was a not very well paid consultant with long commutation time. The job was easy but boring. I don't get how many people are able to endure this.

mathgladiator 4y ago

I hated being an employee too, but I found value in suffering the long game by focusing on TC (total compensation) to maximize my knowledge, skills, and war chest to start a business of my own.

hsn915 4y ago
Yea eventually that is the only path. Although I think you overestimate what is required (financially) to start an independent business. If you are single and you have funds to last you 6 months, you are probably good to do.
- WitCanStain 4y ago
  Depends heavily on what type of company we're talking about.
- mathgladiator 4y ago
  An argument for going deep on a career is that you can build relationships built on trust which let you climb the TC hierarchy. This then accelerates the warchest accumulation, and I'm looking ahead as a married man with decades available.
moneywoes 4y ago
What type of biz did you start
- mathgladiator 4y ago
  First, I'm building out my dream infrastructure platform. https://www.adama-platform.com/ https://www.adama-platform.com/ This is going to take a few years to mature. While it matures, I'm spending next year improving my UX skills and building a WYSIWYG editor for board games. My aspiration is to ship a single online board game next year, and then I'll open it up as a "roblox for board games" I'm doing this solo for a variety of reasons.

WatchDog 4y ago

> For one thing, I have relatives that got into the tech scene after me, but rack in much higher salaries than me. I'm not sure what it is, but probably staying in their jobs for more than two years helps. Interesting perspective, I usually hear the opposite advice. That it's easier to find a new job that pays more rather than get a raise through your existing job. I suppose at some point that can have diminishing returns, I imagine particularly in management positions.

PragmaticPulp 4y ago
Job hopping can have a high ROI for junior people who enter the industry at the bottom end of the compensation curve. Someone starting at a $60K entry-level job at a small, no-name company generally has no good options for significant salary increases other than changing to another job. On the other end of the spectrum, someone who joins a Big Tech company right out of college has a lot to gain by staying, learning how the promotion system works, and then working their way upward through the promotion ladder. I think the job-hopping advice has lost a lot of context after being reduced to a short aphorism. The companies that compensate toward the top end of the curve are actually great places to establish long tenures and move up the comp ladder. The longer you stay, the more allies you have within the company and the more knowledge you have of how the system rewards people.
hsn915 4y ago
> That it's easier to find a new job that pays more rather than get a raise through your existing job. Yes, but after you have spent 3+ years in your current job. It also helps to have the ability to put up with all kinds of bullshit - which I don't have. One time I quit a job because the "boss" talked to me in a bad tone. Two times I threatened indirectly to leave when someone tried to use their "authority" to talk bullshit to me. Everytime when the project was setup with complex/confusing maze of docker/k8s scripts, I simply refused to learn their config system because I viewed it as beyond bullshit. But my relatives who get paid a lot more than me are all just "suffering" this kind of bullshit to keep the job.
- mplanchard 4y ago

Ancalagon 4y ago

TBH if this is your anecdotal experience it is completely opposite to what I've seen. I've seen CS grads that could not code very well, 5 years later make >500k working as Senior SWEs for AirBnb by switching jobs every 1.5-2 years. My own tech lead left his last two jobs in < 8 months. He's a staff eng now making similar cash. And before my current position the other staff/principal engineers I saw had similar tenures.

rr888 4y ago
Sounds like we need a proper recession

kamaal 4y ago

>>It comes down to this: I hate being an employee. Why should anybody hire you to do a thing, you hate doing it?

cpsns 4y ago
I’m not speaking for myself on this one, but don’t most people profess to hate their jobs? I’ve met very few who love working.
- dijit 4y ago
  Given the choice though, between someone who loves their job and someone who simply tolerates it (because they hate being told what the priority is): then most people will choose the former. Personally I am similar to the parent, I have a strong anti-authoritarian streak and I work hard to curb it; what helps me is trying to maintain an open dialogue with my managers and try to get on board with how they prioritise so that I'm invested in solving the same problems as they are. Being equals in my own mind helps me curb my anti-authoritarian tendencies.
hsn915 4y ago
Did I say they should?
hansel_der 4y ago
i feel you but the obvious answer is: because the alternatives are worse

fasterik 4y ago

"I hate being an employee. I want to work on my own projects on my own terms." Is there a word for people like this? A philosophy? I feel like most people either don't care about their work and find meaning in other areas of life, or are invested in playing the corporate game and enjoy being in that environment. If you tell them that you don't want to be an employee at a company, they look at you like you're speaking a foreign language. The problem is there isn't any identifiable group of people who are like this. It's not "anti-work"; I can work just as hard as or harder than anyone given the right circumstances. It's orthogonal to any specific political view. "Independent" is too broad. "Anti-establishment" is focused on external factors rather than intrinsic motivations. It would be useful to have a term where you could say "I am X" and it would immediately bring up all the right connotations.

hsn915 4y ago
That's interesting. I never thought I was in a weird minority. I thought most people hate their jobs but do them anyway because they can't think of an alternative. Maybe that is true. Maybe the degree to which I hate being an employee is just much larger than it is for most people? The problem is with programming it's really hard to leave your job at the office. It's a deep thinking job so it comes with you to bed whether you like it or not. Jon Blow has previously (8 years ago) left a comment elaborating how working a job robs you of your potential. I have it saved in my favorites. I read it often to remind myself the importance of going independent. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7789438 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7789438 There's also this essay by Palladium editor in chief about quitting your job. It was posted a while ago to HN to a mostly negative reception because apparently it's too elitist. It's also one of the pieces I keep re-reading periodically. https://www.palladiummag.com/2022/01/06/quit-your-job/ https://www.palladiummag.com/2022/01/06/quit-your-job/
- fasterik 4y ago
  Maybe I was being a bit melodramatic. More realistically, a lot of people hate their job and exist somewhere on a spectrum between accepting it and trying to change it. I just happen to be biased toward making more radical changes when things aren't motivating me. That Jon Blow comment resonates with me a lot. Definitely saved for future reference.

ar_lan 4y ago

> and frankly I can’t understand people whose goal in life is [to find stable employment] I grew up lower middle class - first to graduate college in my family. Dad could never hold down a job for long. It was a very pressing need for me, for a long time, and still is, to be able to keep gainful employment. I’m at a stage in my career now where I should not worry about that - I’m skilled enough that if I put in the 3-6 months of leetcode practice I can probably land whatever job I really want. So therefore, my skill and career experience should theoretically land me “stability” and should no longer be the goal - but I resonate with folks that do share that goal. I think upbringing and seeing others not be able to hold a job, let alone a dream job, brings out some conservative sides to folks. I don’t know your story, but most of my friends that did startups for a long while out of college were almost all from wealthy families. That just never really felt like an option for me.

brailsafe 4y ago
> I’m skilled enough that if I put in the 3-6 months of leetcode practice I can probably land whatever job I really want. It's a shame that your actual experience doesn't count for much in comparison to wasting 3-6 months of spare time on arbitrary brain teasers. Not a good place for hiring to be.

brailsafe 4y ago

> For me, that was never my goal in life (and frankly I can't understand people whose goal in life is that). That's unfortunate. Unless you're already rich, finding stable employment that pays well and reliably is an important goal to have. The opposite would be volatility, and that's not really good for much. There's something said against keeping the exact same job for 5-10 years perhaps, but securing a reliable is the only thing I care about when I'm an employee or contractor. Tech doesn't really have much virtue when you don't have that.

hsn915 4y ago
> finding stable employment that pays well and reliably is an important goal to have This is just your opinion and temperament.
- brailsafe 4y ago
  Because I'm not already rich. Instead, I could seek to spend the majority of my time working on something that may or may not actually pay for my rent, but why would I? Not to say that I wouldn't work for a startup, but if that startup can't pay me a sustainable income, they can get fucked.
  - hsn915 4y ago
    I'm not rich. I didn't grow up rich. It has nothing to do with growing up rich. I know people who are not rich, have held the same job for 10+ years, and think it's very important. This is my ideology: a bird does not feel safety from being on a sturdy branch, but from his self belief that he can always fly to a new branch at any time.
    - brailsafe 4y ago
      > This is my ideology: a bird does not feel safety from being on a sturdy branch, but from his self belief that he can always fly to a new branch at any time. and maybe that's always been true for you, which is an aspect of being, if not rich, certainly quite fortunate in some way. I felt that way when I was 22, but I had a naive view of the market and my own place in it. There will very likely be a time where that's not true, but if you don't believe that, then the smart move would be to buy the most expensive house you can with debt; you'll never miss me a payment. Getting new jobs has never been easy for me, and it's getting harder every year, because of ludicrous hiring processes and not choosing to live in any arbitrary forest with flimsy branches. The problem as well with the analogy is that you'd be stupid to intentionally choose to work for companies that can't pay you, if you need to be paid. It's more likely that you can weather this if you've already been paid, and therefore it's more wise to jump from flimsy branch to sturdy branch until you feel like the risk of the flimsy branch is tolerable. Therefore, unless I have hundreds of thousands of dollars lined up, I won't be quitting my job before looking for a new one, and that new one will be scrutinized heavily to ensure it can hold my weight.

BerislavLopac 4y ago

Have you ever considered contracting?

nsgi 4y ago

If you hate being an employee, is applying for a full-time job really the best move? > and frankly I can't understand people whose goal in life is that Not sure I'd call it a goal in life since most people in tech are in-demand enough to take it for granted, but providing the job has good work-life balance and isn't too stressful it's the best way to work to live. Also, not everyone has the luxury of not needing stable employment

bravetraveler 4y ago

I think you're underselling yourself/your ability to sell the story. Up until my current employer, I couldn't hold a place more than three years. I'd get bored, my edges would fit the shape of the company, and I just couldn't move. I did this... at least a dozen times? It's come up surprisingly little! Whenever it did, I'd usually say the kind of trite things you'd expect from an early 20-something. "I want new opportunities to grow", whatever. I've had more offers (and turned many away) than outright rejections. I don't think hopping is perceived that poorly, but there's probably a rather severe grade for someone averaging say, less than a year compared to two or three. However, this was before the pandemic and the relationship between worker/employer seems more strained now...

willio58 4y ago

> As if you're affirming an anxious person. Honestly I'd be willing to bet most (> 50%) readers of HN including myself fit in this description.

hsn915 4y ago
I'd be really surprised if the majority of HN readers are anxious people with low self image who need external affirmation. I do think it applies to reddit (probably ~80% of them are like that), but for HN I don't think would apply to more than 10%.

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