23 ms·

Here's the flip side: I was hiring (at a stealth vc-funded startup). I reached out to every designer and coder laid off from Twitter and Amazon (one of my inve

• biinui 4y ago
  May I know what these eng message boards are? :D
• kirso 4y ago
  How was your experience with job boards compared to LinkedIn? Was it effective?
• itstyebaby 4y ago
  Is there anywhere I can get more information or how may I contact you for a job position if you are still hiring.
• exitb 4y ago
  I just want to point out that it’s quite horrible that this sort of lists are floating around. EDIT: As other commenters are pointing out, this appears to be a list of voluntarily added people. In such case the lack of replies is indeed puzzling.
  • lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 4y ago
    > that those laid off folks added their contact info to Hopefully that's actually true but, regardless, it seems to be what's believed. If it is true, it's reasonable to assume they knew what the list would be.
  • didip 4y ago
    There is a list that can be bought for literally anything you can imagine.
  • patricklorio 4y ago
    why? > that those laid off folks added their contact info to They seem to have added their info to the list for it to be floated around.
• gowld 4y ago
  > stealth vc-funded startup If I just got laid off, I might not want to take another huge gamble like this.
  • switchbak 4y ago
    Especially in this economic / VC climate. We're not where we were a year ago, and credit/investment is a much different proposition.
• dixie_land 4y ago
  My observation is that recent layoffs affect engineers with different seniority very differently. Senior devs I know who got laid off are just enjoying their time off (with pay! if you consider the severance) after the rocketing market in 2021 (and maybe even H1 22) made them whole and financially secure. And they won't be entertaining a startup unless significant equity or big leveling up (eg Principal or Director). On the other hand, fresh grads who got laid off are in such a panic mode (esp those on visa) they'd be willing to take anything.
  • ryandrake 4y ago
    Furthermore, some very senior employees are in this boat: They kinda have enough savings to just retire, but were hanging on to their jobs to save maybe 10% more or whatever. Now that they're out of a job they are simply saying "Whelllp, I guess I'm now retired." and not really feeling the need to look anymore. I know someone who refused a forced return to office, and when his company tried to call his bluff, he just said "I guess I'm retired now!"
    • timtas 4y ago
      Moreover, the typical interview process is so ridiculously energy sapping (and poorly predictive), many of us senior devs are just done with it. When I bail (or get axed) I’m gonna just do some indie hacking or maybe scratch up some 1099 work.
    • ghaff 4y ago
      I've definitely seen some of that. Drag their feet through another vesting event. Maybe see if they can snag a severance package.
    • georgeecollins 4y ago
      >> were hanging on to their jobs to save maybe 10% more or whatever The amount of wealth all people need is constant. It is 1.5 x whatever they have today.
      • badpun 4y ago
• hackernewds 4y ago
  Does that say more about the hiring market, or about your startup though?
  • therealdrag0 4y ago
    The point is if the market is bad enough than people can’t have standards. And people still have standards so the market isn’t that bad.
• tayo42 4y ago
  How much are you paying? I might have been in that group, most of these companies I find don't have an interesting problem or aren't paying enough. Maybe don't allow for remote work.
  • Yoric 4y ago
    Indeed, not allowing for remote work is a considerable blocker for many candidates.
• shmatt 4y ago
  Wild guess says you're not paying Amazon/Twitter compensation. And thats fine, they shouldn't be your target It would not be smart of them to accept a lower paying job immediately. A lot of them have life expenses directly tied to the amount of money they're making. Maybe those who haven't found anything for 3 months can join your company, move to a new place, change their childrens' daycare, and do a lot of life changing decisions based on their new income
  • bradlys 4y ago
    It’s wild that this isn’t the top response. I get a ton of emails from random startups in stealth mode, early funding, whatever. You know where they all go? Spam folder. As far as I’m concerned, they pay the equivalent of dog shit and are mostly full of extremely entitled founders. They rarely offer equity that’s even remotely worth the risk. I’m way better off joining a company at Series B/C. I can often get a very similar amount of stock that even seed or series A folks have with having avoided a huge amount of risk. Tbh - I find joining pre-IPO probably has close to the best reward+risk for non-public entities. There’s just no benefit to joining early startups as a non-founder. Maybe when founders start offering serious percentages of stock that isn’t going to be diluted into nothing - I’ll be more inclined. Until then - no way!
    • gen220 4y ago
      It depends a lot on the company. Pre-funding/pre-pmf is hard to judge. But there are plenty of companies with arguable PMF at the seed stage, for whom raising an A vs going alone is an actual choice. If you're filtering for B/C, you're filtering for companies that need investor money post-supposed-PMF (A is generally considered the anointing of PMF). That behavior was fine pre-2021, but it's a bit more suspect in 2022. Joining the median pre-IPO tech company within the last year or two would have left your initial option grant completely in the red, today. In short, there's a continuum between "stealth mode" and Series B that's more lucrative than you're giving credit for, provided one chooses them wisely. The problem is it's hard to choose. There aren't good incentives for educating people on how to choose well.
• Yoric 4y ago
  > Being real for a minute: There is definitely a perspective among hiring companies that regular lay offs are sometimes packaged alongside bottom performers, but I think that is something they would just do diligence on during an interview process. Not sure what you mean here. I know of companies that lay off entire teams, irrespective of performance. I suspect that it's the same everywhere.
  • the_jeremy 4y ago
    If you're laying off people, you're going to also get rid of the low performers. Maybe you don't have enough low performers (or just don't know who they are) to make up the quota and you have to remove whole teams or use arbitrary metrics, but there will be an overrepresentation of below-average workers compared to the survivors. Source: wife is a manager at a company that had single-digit percent layoffs.
  • woofcat 4y ago
    I know many companies that do select whole teams, but it's also cleaning house time and the lowest performer from a previously non-impacted team will be included as laying off is easier than firing depending on where in the world you are.
    • Yoric 4y ago
      Regardless, in absence of information, you cannot conclude that someone who was laid off was an underperformer. It can just as well be a member of a team who was considered lower-priority and disbanded.
      • yCombLinks 4y ago
        He's describing a general bias that absolutely exists, whether it's always accurate is unrelated.
        • Yoric 4y ago
          Fair enough.
• time_to_smile 4y ago
  If I was laid off I would, unfortunately, avoid startups at all costs. It's not just the comp difference (though I do expect most people with severance are hoping to get something close to their old TC), but startups are notoriously fragile and at the same time wildly over optimistic about their futures in down markets. I've talked to a few startups about interesting roles over the past few months and no matter how obviously in trouble they are if the market continues the way it is, they all deeply believe that they have an infinitely bright future. A shocking number of post-seed but still awaiting series A startups have started reaching out to me and none of them have sane business models. On top of that it looks like VC funding is way down. Any senior engineers who just got the shock of being let go from what they thought was a very stable job with great comp simply aren't going to be excited to jump onto a high risk startup just to relive the whole experience again only this time with less severance.
• titanomachy 4y ago
  I’m a low-senior engineer recently laid off. I got lots of emails like that and politely declined. I have a bit over four months of severance pay. For the moment, I’m enjoying other fulfilling activities as well as spending some time upgrading my tech skills through independent study. I’ve considered some startups, but it seems like it’s often difficult to enforce boundaries on work… I benefit a lot from being able to go offline completely on evenings and weekends. That was always possible in my last job except during the occasional oncall and maybe one or two major launches per year. Also, the pay offered is usually half of what I made in my last job, or less. If the current market situation persists for another six months I’ll probably relax my standards. Or if I get contacted by a startup that’s especially impressive or interesting, or someone I trust tells me it’s a great place to work. Pay isn’t the most important factor, but I don’t want to get locked in at low comp and have to change again in six months. Also, I have a hard time getting objective information about the work culture at startups. With Google or whatever I can always find contacts who work there and ask them how they feel about their job; with startups every person I talk to is trying to convince me to join and is incentivized to downplay the problems.
  • JSavageOne 4y ago
    > Also, I have a hard time getting objective information about the work culture at startups. Yes this is a big problem as you have no idea what you're signing up with startups. Maybe the founder expects you to work 12 hours/day and constantly be available, maybe they will fire you a month before your equity vesting, or just randomly fire you one day despite having never given any negative feedback. I've seen all of this at startups, and there is zero accountability. Last time it happened to me I wasn't even offered any severance. If anyone is considering working for a startup, please do your due diligence. Do not be naive and think that because the founders are very friendly and their startup is backed by YC that they are a good place to work and won't fire you the second they have any doubts about you (personally I'll never work as a full-time employee for a startup going through YC ever again, but that's a story for another day). Going forward if I'm ever thinking about working for a startup, I will reach out to employees, and ideally ex-employees, to get the inside scoop on what the founders are really like behind the smoke & mirrors.
• pyrrhotech 4y ago
  Or they are looking at those juicy severance checks and deciding to take a 6 month vacation before applying anywhere again, using state of the economy as an excuse.
  • zem 4y ago
    why does taking a six month vacation that you can afford need an "excuse"?
    • unmole 4y ago
      Gaps in a resume aren't usually looked upon favourably.
• elamje 4y ago
  I saw this as well for most of 2022. Our company was hiring, and my founder friends would pass me the layoff lists, but I'd never hear back from the people I pinged. If anyone is struggling and is on the mid/senior/director side of their career (3+ yrs), I'm helping place people at my friends Seed and Series A companies. VC money is still there but pumping into Seed/Series A companies with more upside now rather than insane B, C, D companies that have no profitability in sight. email me at j{at}markovmanagement.com if interested :)
• jrib 4y ago
  what eng message boards did you post to?
• hankchinaski 4y ago
  Supposedly people have lots of savings and don’t need to rush to settle for a downgrade. Especially when coming from top tier places like faang
• sgwizdak 4y ago
  One note from personal experience -- it'll likely take about 12 weeks or so for a laid off dev to come back up to speed with interview prep to feel confident to start the interview grind again. One thing that can likely help is being upfront with the evaluation process.
  • FollowingTheDao 4y ago
    If they can afford to wait three months (!) to start looking for work because of "feelings" they they deserved to be laid off.
    • sangnoir 4y ago
      Not everyone lives from hand to mouth and need a job ASAP. Additionally, most people I know in (US) big tech do not take adequate time off from work - it appears the unspoken rule is to take substantive breaks between jobs, rather than annually like they do in Europe.
      • wyclif 4y ago
        I've found this to be true, looking at the course of my own career. Just told a German tourist over breakfast that some US workers get as little as two weeks' vacation when starting a job. You should have seen his reaction— his eyes bugged out and he almost choked on his eggs and sausage.
    • sgwizdak 4y ago
      It's an estimate based on both the average severances coupled with how long it takes to work through the Blind 100 LC grind with a bit of reset time thrown in. If you're in a position where you can handle 2 LC-hard questions in about an hour with near perfect execution, good for you! But most folks need to prepare for that.
• codegeek 4y ago
  Be careful because a lot of smart people from FAANG may not be a good fit for startups.they are more corporate types nowadays and are probably used to easy money with not much pressure. Startups on the other hand are nothing like that
• replwoacause 4y ago
  LOL. Yeah, I'm sure these people are enjoying their severance and unemployment benefits.
• faangiq 4y ago
  You’re not paying enough. Or maybe you are but people are of getting lowballed by shit tier startups that have raised at zero upside valuations.