7 ms·

Could also be why you can't find a job. You may be too expensive, and they're looking for engineers in the sweet spot of cheap/can keep the machine running.

rcarmo 4y ago
There is always an element of "let's see how low we can get" in mainstream IT, since people outside tech view tech as a cost center and not a profit center, which devalues candidates.
- red-iron-pine 4y ago
  There is IT and there is Dev, and much of the latter drives profits. Most of IT is there to support business ops, and is basically there to do what a secretary pool did 60 years ago.
dathinab 4y ago
FANG like companies also do a lot of things different then most other, especially smaller companies, so it's not that uncommon for small companies to hesitate to hire someone directly coming from FANG. Then for lower paying jobs a lot of people are hesitant to hire "overqualified" people as they expect them to jump ship the moment they find something better, i.e. no FANG people. Then team leads no matter which job/industry often avoid hiring someone perceived more qualified then them, like e.g. from FANG. Or in other words in an economy where you might need to be happy with a less well paying job which you also might be perceived to be overqualified for having a long term FANG employment without an employment afterwards isn't necessary a good thing...
- jghn 4y ago
  > FANG like companies also do a lot of things different then most other, As a hiring manager, this is a factor that weighs heavily in my mental math. My experience with ex-BigTech engineers has been that they tend towards wanting to make everything to match their BigTech experience. But they often don't have the pragmatism to understand that X is a good pattern at BigTech because *of the size of BigTech*. Have had way too many conversations of the form, "Yes, that is objectively better. But at our scale, the value add does not warrant the effort involved". Or "there's no need for these 15 layers of indirection because there's 5 of us, not 5000". Obviously this is a stereotype and doesn't apply to everyone. But that's no different than how people have a positive stereotype of ex-BigTech employees being sharp.
  - inconceivable 4y ago
    i got into an argument with a bigtech employee (outside of work, in a social setting) that senior engineers should spend 25% of their time mentoring junior hires. he literally could not understand that a small company can't afford to do this. not only that, he also could not understand that small companies doesn't even make junior hires. there's nobody to mentor! and i would guess this guy has like a top 1% iq, whatever that is.
    - dathinab 4y ago
      IMHO the whole Software Enginer training pipeline is fully broken for a lot of overlapping reasons and I have no idea how to fix it.
    - granshaw 4y ago
      High IQ, low EQ
    - tayo42 4y ago
      that makes no sense, big tech companies are expected to be training small company employees? who is supposed to hire juniors?
      - inconceivable 4y ago
        see, everyone? these people exist. i'm not making things up.
    - mixmastamyk 4y ago
      Sounds like a lack of experience, aka knowledge... orthogonal to IQ. Boils down to not realizing most companies don't have buckets of money raining from the heavens. Inconceivable!
    - fsociety 4y ago
      If you can’t afford ~25% of your week educating junior hires, then you shouldn’t have junior hires. It is a sin of the industry to not train new folks, and I would argue that many “senior engineers” do not know how to mentor juniors because they don’t see it as a priority. I was heavily mentored during my time in small businesses with limited resources and profit. I hope others get that experience too.
Beaver117 4y ago
It's funny because for 10 years people were saying "get this big company on your resume and you can just walk into any job!" Clearly not the case anymore
- lesuorac 4y ago
  I mean severance was basically a year's wage. I doubt any of them are in a rush to be re-hired.
  - varjag 4y ago
    Well we're now half a year in to the first rounds of layoffs. Time flies.
- TheHappyOddish 4y ago
  You can, just not jobs at the price level you're expecting. I'm sure there are plenty of jobs in your field you can get with your resume, assuming you're willing to face reality.
  - granshaw 4y ago
    Not true if you’re reading many of these comments - managers view these hires as risky even if they agree to the lower salaries
    - TheHappyOddish 4y ago
      I know people on HN seem to think it is, but the people here are a tiny subset of the people in the real world, even in the tech area of California. I really doubt it's a representitive view.

rcarmo 4y ago

There is always an element of "let's see how low we can get" in mainstream IT, since people outside tech view tech as a cost center and not a profit center, which devalues candidates.

red-iron-pine 4y ago
There is IT and there is Dev, and much of the latter drives profits. Most of IT is there to support business ops, and is basically there to do what a secretary pool did 60 years ago.

dathinab 4y ago

FANG like companies also do a lot of things different then most other, especially smaller companies, so it's not that uncommon for small companies to hesitate to hire someone directly coming from FANG. Then for lower paying jobs a lot of people are hesitant to hire "overqualified" people as they expect them to jump ship the moment they find something better, i.e. no FANG people. Then team leads no matter which job/industry often avoid hiring someone perceived more qualified then them, like e.g. from FANG. Or in other words in an economy where you might need to be happy with a less well paying job which you also might be perceived to be overqualified for having a long term FANG employment without an employment afterwards isn't necessary a good thing...

jghn 4y ago
> FANG like companies also do a lot of things different then most other, As a hiring manager, this is a factor that weighs heavily in my mental math. My experience with ex-BigTech engineers has been that they tend towards wanting to make everything to match their BigTech experience. But they often don't have the pragmatism to understand that X is a good pattern at BigTech because *of the size of BigTech*. Have had way too many conversations of the form, "Yes, that is objectively better. But at our scale, the value add does not warrant the effort involved". Or "there's no need for these 15 layers of indirection because there's 5 of us, not 5000". Obviously this is a stereotype and doesn't apply to everyone. But that's no different than how people have a positive stereotype of ex-BigTech employees being sharp.
- inconceivable 4y ago
  i got into an argument with a bigtech employee (outside of work, in a social setting) that senior engineers should spend 25% of their time mentoring junior hires. he literally could not understand that a small company can't afford to do this. not only that, he also could not understand that small companies doesn't even make junior hires. there's nobody to mentor! and i would guess this guy has like a top 1% iq, whatever that is.
  - dathinab 4y ago
    IMHO the whole Software Enginer training pipeline is fully broken for a lot of overlapping reasons and I have no idea how to fix it.
  - granshaw 4y ago
    High IQ, low EQ
  - tayo42 4y ago
    that makes no sense, big tech companies are expected to be training small company employees? who is supposed to hire juniors?
    - inconceivable 4y ago
      see, everyone? these people exist. i'm not making things up.
  - mixmastamyk 4y ago
    Sounds like a lack of experience, aka knowledge... orthogonal to IQ. Boils down to not realizing most companies don't have buckets of money raining from the heavens. Inconceivable!
  - fsociety 4y ago
    If you can’t afford ~25% of your week educating junior hires, then you shouldn’t have junior hires. It is a sin of the industry to not train new folks, and I would argue that many “senior engineers” do not know how to mentor juniors because they don’t see it as a priority. I was heavily mentored during my time in small businesses with limited resources and profit. I hope others get that experience too.

Beaver117 4y ago

It's funny because for 10 years people were saying "get this big company on your resume and you can just walk into any job!" Clearly not the case anymore

lesuorac 4y ago
I mean severance was basically a year's wage. I doubt any of them are in a rush to be re-hired.
- varjag 4y ago
  Well we're now half a year in to the first rounds of layoffs. Time flies.
TheHappyOddish 4y ago
You can, just not jobs at the price level you're expecting. I'm sure there are plenty of jobs in your field you can get with your resume, assuming you're willing to face reality.
- granshaw 4y ago
  Not true if you’re reading many of these comments - managers view these hires as risky even if they agree to the lower salaries
  - TheHappyOddish 4y ago
    I know people on HN seem to think it is, but the people here are a tiny subset of the people in the real world, even in the tech area of California. I really doubt it's a representitive view.