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I'm not sure that this is sustainable anymore. I've definitely done the job hopping game, and it generally led to a substantial increase in salary each time, b

I'm not sure that this is sustainable anymore. I've definitely done the job hopping game, and it generally led to a substantial increase in salary each time, but eventually that comes back to bite you. I got laid off three times last year, and that already looks pretty bad on a resume, but then seeing a bunch of jobs beforehand where I was only there for two years makes a lot of employers really hesitant to move forward, especially in 2024 (ten years after this was written). At this point I'm happy enough to just sit my ass down and stay at my current place; I didn't realize how much I valued stability over anything else until 2023 came along and became the worst year of my life.

gamepsys 2y ago
Did you leave positive impressions on your coworkers? Did you maintain contact? Part of the advantage of moving every few years is that you work with more people, which means more people are willing to recommend you for open positions. In those three jobs you were laid off from did any of your coworkers also get laid off? Where did they go to, and can they give you a recommendation? No matter what story your resume tells, social connections will usually be a louder signal.
- tombert 2y ago
  >Did you leave positive impressions on your coworkers? Some of them, though it's hard to become really good friends with a coworker after only three months of a remote job. At the jobs that I stayed two years at I definitely made lots of friends > Did you maintain contact? For a few of them, the ones that I got close to (generally the people that were as geeky as I am about bizarre CS concepts). That was immensely handy to get job referrals, and it's in no small part why I was able to land my current (very decent!) gig. In most places I've worked, people generally like me ok (I hope), and usually I will develop one or two pretty close friends as a result if I've been there sufficiently long. > In those three jobs you were laid off from did any of your coworkers also get laid off? Yes, though in the more recent laid off jobs I sadly didn't know people well enough to get them to give me referrals or anything. > No matter what story your resume tells, social connections will usually be a louder signal. I mostly agree, but only to a certain extent. If you can make it to the interview stage, a good referral and social contacts can be great and really helpful, but the problem with short stints is that you're considerably more likely to fail the initial screening by the internal recruiter. I get it, I don't really blame them, you can't go into super thorough detail on every resume that's submitted, so they have to look for red flags to immediately filter out stuff.
  - gamepsys 2y ago
    > the problem with short stints is that you're considerably more likely to fail the initial screening by the internal recruiter. That's exactly why I was trying to guide you into a back door.
- samspot 2y ago
  I don't know that it's true that moving a lot means you work with more people. I'm at my current company 10 years. From being here 10 years I now know tons of people who came here for 2 years and left. Not to mention all the relationships with people still here.
  - gamepsys 2y ago
    > I don't know that it's true that moving a lot means you work with more people. It's generally true that you meet more people switching jobs every 2 years. You work with all the people that stayed and all the people that also left after 2 years. You end up on more total teams. It's not universally true. If you stay in a place with higher than average turnover, constantly working with new people then you would be in an position to work with more people. Additionally, if you worked in a very centralized team in a very large software company you could end up working with more people. Finally, the quantity of people you've worked with isn't the key metric you should maximize your professional network for. You ideally want in any 3 month period multiple people in your professional network whose recommendation will carry a lot of weight for an open position you would be interesting in taking that would give you a strong recommendation. After you've reached that level of baseline employment security then you want to maximize for people that will recommend better and better positions.
kartoshechka 2y ago
for the sake of being marketable to recruiters and other hiring people, I think being honest won't do much good. I'd leave a handful of jobs, not necessarily the most recent, but for example ones where impact was the most salable, and the rest just throw under the rug, make up some dates if needed. I think it is very reasonable thing to expect from senior people, to highlight the most relevant experience from their long list of jobs
- tombert 2y ago
  Well I have a job now that at least seems pretty stable, so hopefully it won't be an issue because I'll be here for a long while anyway, but yeah, being honest kind of seems like a losing game. It's extremely hard for me to lie (or even do anything even remotely dishonest) during job interviews. I believe that omitting important details is still a lie, plus I think I have a mild form of autism that makes it so I have to be overly precise in my language which means that I get into really specific detail when it's really not called for (as I'm sure anyone who's read my longer HN comments has figured out). I'd probably be better off if I just shut up more during interviews and let them assume things.

gamepsys 2y ago

Did you leave positive impressions on your coworkers? Did you maintain contact? Part of the advantage of moving every few years is that you work with more people, which means more people are willing to recommend you for open positions. In those three jobs you were laid off from did any of your coworkers also get laid off? Where did they go to, and can they give you a recommendation? No matter what story your resume tells, social connections will usually be a louder signal.

tombert 2y ago
>Did you leave positive impressions on your coworkers? Some of them, though it's hard to become really good friends with a coworker after only three months of a remote job. At the jobs that I stayed two years at I definitely made lots of friends > Did you maintain contact? For a few of them, the ones that I got close to (generally the people that were as geeky as I am about bizarre CS concepts). That was immensely handy to get job referrals, and it's in no small part why I was able to land my current (very decent!) gig. In most places I've worked, people generally like me ok (I hope), and usually I will develop one or two pretty close friends as a result if I've been there sufficiently long. > In those three jobs you were laid off from did any of your coworkers also get laid off? Yes, though in the more recent laid off jobs I sadly didn't know people well enough to get them to give me referrals or anything. > No matter what story your resume tells, social connections will usually be a louder signal. I mostly agree, but only to a certain extent. If you can make it to the interview stage, a good referral and social contacts can be great and really helpful, but the problem with short stints is that you're considerably more likely to fail the initial screening by the internal recruiter. I get it, I don't really blame them, you can't go into super thorough detail on every resume that's submitted, so they have to look for red flags to immediately filter out stuff.
- gamepsys 2y ago
  > the problem with short stints is that you're considerably more likely to fail the initial screening by the internal recruiter. That's exactly why I was trying to guide you into a back door.
samspot 2y ago
I don't know that it's true that moving a lot means you work with more people. I'm at my current company 10 years. From being here 10 years I now know tons of people who came here for 2 years and left. Not to mention all the relationships with people still here.
- gamepsys 2y ago
  > I don't know that it's true that moving a lot means you work with more people. It's generally true that you meet more people switching jobs every 2 years. You work with all the people that stayed and all the people that also left after 2 years. You end up on more total teams. It's not universally true. If you stay in a place with higher than average turnover, constantly working with new people then you would be in an position to work with more people. Additionally, if you worked in a very centralized team in a very large software company you could end up working with more people. Finally, the quantity of people you've worked with isn't the key metric you should maximize your professional network for. You ideally want in any 3 month period multiple people in your professional network whose recommendation will carry a lot of weight for an open position you would be interesting in taking that would give you a strong recommendation. After you've reached that level of baseline employment security then you want to maximize for people that will recommend better and better positions.

kartoshechka 2y ago

for the sake of being marketable to recruiters and other hiring people, I think being honest won't do much good. I'd leave a handful of jobs, not necessarily the most recent, but for example ones where impact was the most salable, and the rest just throw under the rug, make up some dates if needed. I think it is very reasonable thing to expect from senior people, to highlight the most relevant experience from their long list of jobs

tombert 2y ago
Well I have a job now that at least seems pretty stable, so hopefully it won't be an issue because I'll be here for a long while anyway, but yeah, being honest kind of seems like a losing game. It's extremely hard for me to lie (or even do anything even remotely dishonest) during job interviews. I believe that omitting important details is still a lie, plus I think I have a mild form of autism that makes it so I have to be overly precise in my language which means that I get into really specific detail when it's really not called for (as I'm sure anyone who's read my longer HN comments has figured out). I'd probably be better off if I just shut up more during interviews and let them assume things.