3 ms·
When I was coming up a long while back, there were exciting employers that filled their ranks with ambitious recent grads and lavished them with ping pong table
by swatcoder 3y ago
When I was coming up a long while back, there were exciting employers that filled their ranks with ambitious recent grads and lavished them with ping pong tables and soda fountains in the "war room" full of knock-off Aeron chairs and various configurations of conference tables. We'd work crazy hours and move fast with tools we didn't really understand. Most of us would get laid off multiple times as the companies we were working for evaporated, but a few would find themselves in the right place at the right time and win the lottery.
Only a few of those companies from era that remain, and most of the people who stayed in that game ended up with a four page long CV with a dozen unknown or comically failed employers, with all sorts of inflated titles.
But there was this other set of companies that were obnoxiously boring, with middle aged engineers in goatees working sane hours in semi-private offices and cubicles with peers they'd been working besides for 10 and 20 and 30 years. They'd been around, they had a business model that was proven, and they had the institutional knowledge to sustain it.
Many of those companies are still around and many of them are still stocked up with middle aged engineers in goatees with short CV's spanning many years.
I think the proportions between these two company styles varies based on how how much money is being shoved into the industry, and I think it can be hard for an older engineer who dallied with the kids for too long to situate themselves at the more stable workplaces. They often don't really fit in with either culture.
- danielmarkbruce 3y agoaka, seemingly boring enterprise software is the place to go. Some of them are actually very good places.
- johnnyanmac 3y agoIt's a safe and stable place to go. Of course, if everyone wanted safety there wouldn't be so much rush into startups or entertainment industries, especially by young starry-eyed creatives.
- danielmarkbruce 3y agoInterestingly though.. there is a lot more upside than most folks realize. Look at the execs at some medium sized enterprise software shop - they are making a lot of cash.
- joquarky 3y agoStay away from boring government software jobs unless you like working with VBScript in Internet Explorer pinned to IE7 compatibility mode.
- elwell 3y ago> middle aged engineers in goatees This is a 2x'er; full neckbeard is 10x.
- decafninja 3y agoThe difference in comp can be substantial. If we’re talking about FAANG tier or similar, then a junior FAANG engineer can be making as much as an enterprise company staff engineer with decades of experience about to retire in their 60s. Even if we’re not talking about FAANG tier, interviewing around I’ve been given offers at tech companies that were up to 1.5x my enterprise senior SWE comp. Work life balance is gamble either way. I’ve seen enterprise companies paying 150k working their employees on death marches, and tech companies paying 500k where everyone leaves at five.
- bb88 3y agoUsually the cheaper the pay, the worse the death marches are. The company is either struggling to make a profit, or the managers are too greedy and saving up to buy a beach front mansion at your expense. A higher pay rate means the company is profitable enough to spread the profits around. It may not last forever, but it's good while it's there.