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A "senior" engineer who has moved 5 times in 10 years staying less than 2 years in any company has five times the experience of a junior engineer. So, they have

by npalli 4y ago

A "senior" engineer who has moved 5 times in 10 years staying less than 2 years in any company has five times the experience of a junior engineer. So, they have no understanding of making longer term decisions and seeing things through. Absolutely a red flag if you want to do something longer term. A few < 2 year stints are OK, mistakes happen. Serial jumping is bad and was only possible in an environment of zero interest, free capital madness from 2009 to 2021. On the other hand, if you just want something done in a short term frame, might not be a bad deal. Don't pay "senior" salary or put them on strategic longer term projects, they are a very experienced junior engineer.

tester756 4y ago
I disagree. 2 years is often enough to see whether design/approach has failed and what were the implications. Unless you're doing very specific things like programming language design, operating system design, then why would you need e.g half of decade to figure out what went wrong? So, whether X years is enough is dependent on what are you doing. SpaceX? probably it isn't enough, web dev? probably it is.
- shalmanese 4y ago
  Yeah, but insights occur in parallel. Let's assume that you get the moment of insight 2 years after a initiative launch and you launch one new initiative every 6 months. After 2 years, you've seen one insight or 0.5 insights/year. After 3 years, you've seen 3 insights or 1 insight/year. After 5 years, 7 insights and 1.4 insights/year. 10 years, 17 insights, 1.7 insights/year. The rate asymptotes but there's still significant benefit for a tenure of 3 - 5 years.
HeyLaughingBoy 4y ago
> So, they have no understanding of making longer term decisions Disagree. Coming into a new company and seeing the results of decisions that were made before you started can be quite informative.
FredPret 4y ago
If companies want tenure, they have to pay up. But they don’t pay for it, because they don’t want it. Think about it from the owners’ POV: healthy turnover gives you a constant stress test for the system that is your business. You need systems that are able to hire, ramp up, and train people. Sure, you need a few key people that keep lots of detail and skill in their heads, but relying on that at scale is no way to run a business.
- tra3 4y ago
  You give owners more credit than they are due. There’s no planning there, it’s all a happy little accident. Also, let’s tear down our manufacturing plant and rebuild it from scratch every 2 years just to make sure we can.
jstx1 4y ago
> A "senior" engineer who has moved 5 times in 10 years staying less than 2 years in any company has five times the experience of a junior engineer. This doesn't make sense, new jobs don't reset your level. There's a difference between the responsibilities you get in your first year as a junior and the first year at a new company as an experienced hire.

by npalli 4y ago

tester756 4y ago

I disagree. 2 years is often enough to see whether design/approach has failed and what were the implications. Unless you're doing very specific things like programming language design, operating system design, then why would you need e.g half of decade to figure out what went wrong? So, whether X years is enough is dependent on what are you doing. SpaceX? probably it isn't enough, web dev? probably it is.

shalmanese 4y ago
Yeah, but insights occur in parallel. Let's assume that you get the moment of insight 2 years after a initiative launch and you launch one new initiative every 6 months. After 2 years, you've seen one insight or 0.5 insights/year. After 3 years, you've seen 3 insights or 1 insight/year. After 5 years, 7 insights and 1.4 insights/year. 10 years, 17 insights, 1.7 insights/year. The rate asymptotes but there's still significant benefit for a tenure of 3 - 5 years.

HeyLaughingBoy 4y ago

> So, they have no understanding of making longer term decisions Disagree. Coming into a new company and seeing the results of decisions that were made before you started can be quite informative.

FredPret 4y ago

If companies want tenure, they have to pay up. But they don’t pay for it, because they don’t want it. Think about it from the owners’ POV: healthy turnover gives you a constant stress test for the system that is your business. You need systems that are able to hire, ramp up, and train people. Sure, you need a few key people that keep lots of detail and skill in their heads, but relying on that at scale is no way to run a business.

tra3 4y ago
You give owners more credit than they are due. There’s no planning there, it’s all a happy little accident. Also, let’s tear down our manufacturing plant and rebuild it from scratch every 2 years just to make sure we can.

jstx1 4y ago

> A "senior" engineer who has moved 5 times in 10 years staying less than 2 years in any company has five times the experience of a junior engineer. This doesn't make sense, new jobs don't reset your level. There's a difference between the responsibilities you get in your first year as a junior and the first year at a new company as an experienced hire.