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I personally don't care what FAANG does. They all sound like horrible companies to work for, and I don't care for the products they produce either. I was worki

I personally don't care what FAANG does. They all sound like horrible companies to work for, and I don't care for the products they produce either. I was working remotely before the pandemic and will continue to work remotely in the future. It's great that we have more opportunities now than before, but they always existed. So what the "mainstream" or "big tech" world does in current year is their own business. I won't judge anyone who works for them, we all have our reasons for making the choices we do, but I don't think it makes tons of sense to ascribe too much weight to what the largest tech companies do. They might represent a significant portion of the market but it's a big world and there's tons of smaller companies out there doing much "better" things in much "better" ways. My philosophy is that I'm going to live the life I want to and not worry about what companies I don't like do. I don't work for them and, with the exception of Amazon, I don't use what that they produce either.

TheArcane 3y ago
this is the way
noam_compsci 3y ago
Such a breath of fresh air to read this. I choose to work remote and only look at companies that do that. My first was Canonical. Since then I worked at a startup and when they went office first, I left even though I had not fully vested. I choose life over career and its a tough choice at times but I’m happy with it :)
bartwr 3y ago
Why do they sound horrible? This is a serious, non provocative question. :) I personally loved working for Google. Low workload, great work-life balance, amazing perks, mind blowing salary, potential to do really cool stuff that hundreds of millions will use, doing really cutting edge things that almost noone else can do, ridiculously good internal infrastructure and tooling so I can focus just on my tasks, kind and friendly colleagues, nice offices. Everything about my day job and things I worked on (at Google Research) was great. I disapprove of many other things company does, but they were completely separate from my work. I have many friends at Meta, company I disapprove way more - but their sentiment is exactly the same.
- dartos 3y ago
  Many people would not like the cognitive dissonance of working for an organization that does many things they disagree with. But from what I hear, it really depends where in google you work. I hear juniors/new grads are worked to the bone
  - bartwr 3y ago
    I agree with both your points. The experience varies and depends a lot on the manager. And about the cognitive dissonance - but to me, personally, it's not like there is one Google, but it's many companies with completely separate goals and ways of acting. And it's not just a metaphor; different orgs really do operate on sometimes opposing goals (like Android vs Pixel vs Research - I was in the middle of that, but won't elaborate publicly). I think long term it should be broken up by regulators, but that's a different and polarizing/political topic. But back to my original point - a lot of people have amazing experiences there, so my question to the person posting it remains - how is everything about those jobs horrible? This brings me a huge cognitive dissonance, as it's so different from my and my colleagues experiences.
  - VirusNewbie 3y ago
    >But from what I hear, it really depends where in google you work. I hear juniors/new grads are worked to the bone The workload is not too much, but there's a lot of ambiguity and very little hand holding. Even as a newer senior engineer, my work is hard. Not 50+ hours a week hard, but a somewhat stressful 45 hours a week. But it's fun and interesting so I'm happy, plus the comp is extremely good (not quite Netflix or JS/TGS level, but pretty great). I'd rather be a little stressed than a lot bored.
- Justsignedup 3y ago
  to echo your response: I know people who worked at Amazon and hated it. And facebook and loved it. Google people did the google world tour (transfer offices every 6-9 months and live everywhere in the world). Pretty great experiences at Dropbox. The life-changing salary is also pretty great. I also know people who got so bored at those jobs working on the same one tiny thing all day long. So many varied experiences. To say they all suck would be quite disingenuous.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
lr4444lr 3y ago
> I personally don't care what FAANG does. They all sound like horrible companies to work for, and I don't care for the products they produce either. They're still market movers: if they dump a lot of talent, that will affect wages, and the people who work at those companies learn habits that they bring to other companies. I don't particularly "like" them, but I'm very concerned that they slowly fizzle out rather than make sudden moves.
q7xvh97o2pDhNrh 3y ago
The reason it affects all of us is because those firms have been defining the high-end of market compensation. And, for clarity, compensation isn't just the money — which they generally do max out — but it's also all the intangibles. It's the free gyms and laundry services, the vast campuses with endless free restaurants and kitchens, and, yes, the formerly-free-wheeling remote-work policies and location strategies. Once these firms start slashing comp [1] and their stock prices are unaffected (or even boosted), it "inspires" everyone else to start looking around and seeing how they can pay their own engineers less. Today, it may just be FAANG that's slashing remote perks — tomorrow, all the other companies will follow, and maybe they'll be "inspired" to "adjust" their health insurance benefits at the same time, too. [1]: It is also a fascinating coincidence to me that all these firms declared RTO around the same time.
- meiraleal 3y ago
  > Today, it may just be FAANG that's slashing remote perks — tomorrow, all the other companies will follow, and maybe they'll be "inspired" to "adjust" their health insurance benefits at the same time, too. If they do it, it means the market doesn't value software engineers as much anymore so what could you do? That isn't what is going to happen though. But all of those big techs can become next IBMs, HPs, Yahoos.
red-iron-pine 3y ago
> I was working remotely before the pandemic and will continue to work remotely in the future. It's great that we have more opportunities now than before, but they always existed. So what the "mainstream" or "big tech" world does in current year is their own business. I've been remote since 2015 and, arguably, it's made it harder. Before COVID it was mostly a niche thing, but now the cat is out of the bag and I'm competing with a lot more. The RTO backlash is also in force, so the big F500 companies I used to snipe roles from are now fully owned by corporate overlords.

TheArcane 3y ago

this is the way

noam_compsci 3y ago

Such a breath of fresh air to read this. I choose to work remote and only look at companies that do that. My first was Canonical. Since then I worked at a startup and when they went office first, I left even though I had not fully vested. I choose life over career and its a tough choice at times but I’m happy with it :)

bartwr 3y ago

Why do they sound horrible? This is a serious, non provocative question. :) I personally loved working for Google. Low workload, great work-life balance, amazing perks, mind blowing salary, potential to do really cool stuff that hundreds of millions will use, doing really cutting edge things that almost noone else can do, ridiculously good internal infrastructure and tooling so I can focus just on my tasks, kind and friendly colleagues, nice offices. Everything about my day job and things I worked on (at Google Research) was great. I disapprove of many other things company does, but they were completely separate from my work. I have many friends at Meta, company I disapprove way more - but their sentiment is exactly the same.

dartos 3y ago
Many people would not like the cognitive dissonance of working for an organization that does many things they disagree with. But from what I hear, it really depends where in google you work. I hear juniors/new grads are worked to the bone
- bartwr 3y ago
  I agree with both your points. The experience varies and depends a lot on the manager. And about the cognitive dissonance - but to me, personally, it's not like there is one Google, but it's many companies with completely separate goals and ways of acting. And it's not just a metaphor; different orgs really do operate on sometimes opposing goals (like Android vs Pixel vs Research - I was in the middle of that, but won't elaborate publicly). I think long term it should be broken up by regulators, but that's a different and polarizing/political topic. But back to my original point - a lot of people have amazing experiences there, so my question to the person posting it remains - how is everything about those jobs horrible? This brings me a huge cognitive dissonance, as it's so different from my and my colleagues experiences.
- VirusNewbie 3y ago
  >But from what I hear, it really depends where in google you work. I hear juniors/new grads are worked to the bone The workload is not too much, but there's a lot of ambiguity and very little hand holding. Even as a newer senior engineer, my work is hard. Not 50+ hours a week hard, but a somewhat stressful 45 hours a week. But it's fun and interesting so I'm happy, plus the comp is extremely good (not quite Netflix or JS/TGS level, but pretty great). I'd rather be a little stressed than a lot bored.
Justsignedup 3y ago
to echo your response: I know people who worked at Amazon and hated it. And facebook and loved it. Google people did the google world tour (transfer offices every 6-9 months and live everywhere in the world). Pretty great experiences at Dropbox. The life-changing salary is also pretty great. I also know people who got so bored at those jobs working on the same one tiny thing all day long. So many varied experiences. To say they all suck would be quite disingenuous.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

lr4444lr 3y ago

> I personally don't care what FAANG does. They all sound like horrible companies to work for, and I don't care for the products they produce either. They're still market movers: if they dump a lot of talent, that will affect wages, and the people who work at those companies learn habits that they bring to other companies. I don't particularly "like" them, but I'm very concerned that they slowly fizzle out rather than make sudden moves.

q7xvh97o2pDhNrh 3y ago

The reason it affects all of us is because those firms have been defining the high-end of market compensation. And, for clarity, compensation isn't just the money — which they generally do max out — but it's also all the intangibles. It's the free gyms and laundry services, the vast campuses with endless free restaurants and kitchens, and, yes, the formerly-free-wheeling remote-work policies and location strategies. Once these firms start slashing comp [1] and their stock prices are unaffected (or even boosted), it "inspires" everyone else to start looking around and seeing how they can pay their own engineers less. Today, it may just be FAANG that's slashing remote perks — tomorrow, all the other companies will follow, and maybe they'll be "inspired" to "adjust" their health insurance benefits at the same time, too. [1]: It is also a fascinating coincidence to me that all these firms declared RTO around the same time.

meiraleal 3y ago
> Today, it may just be FAANG that's slashing remote perks — tomorrow, all the other companies will follow, and maybe they'll be "inspired" to "adjust" their health insurance benefits at the same time, too. If they do it, it means the market doesn't value software engineers as much anymore so what could you do? That isn't what is going to happen though. But all of those big techs can become next IBMs, HPs, Yahoos.

red-iron-pine 3y ago

> I was working remotely before the pandemic and will continue to work remotely in the future. It's great that we have more opportunities now than before, but they always existed. So what the "mainstream" or "big tech" world does in current year is their own business. I've been remote since 2015 and, arguably, it's made it harder. Before COVID it was mostly a niche thing, but now the cat is out of the bag and I'm competing with a lot more. The RTO backlash is also in force, so the big F500 companies I used to snipe roles from are now fully owned by corporate overlords.