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Ask HN: Working at Google or working for a famous hedge fund

1 points by durianrider 12y ago

Dear HN community, I'm currently about to finish my PhD in CS, focusing on machine learning applied to natural language processing. I started my job search "just for fun" when interning at Google last year. This eventually lead to an onsite-interview (while interning) and now to an offer to work for Google. At Google I would have the chance to join a rather small team that is starting to build a new product---so I see some exciting opportunities there. Then---just to see what happens---I sent an application to a very famous hedge fund (they claim to have 50% PhDs working for them, and they have a pretty famous fund...) and I just received an email that they want to talk to me about opportunities at their company. So before going into any details with these guys, I would want to ask you guys: All salary differences aside (maybe you still have a comment on that?)---how is the lifestyle working for a renowed hedge fund? I know that the company is small, compared to Google, so does that make a difference? Do you think I could learn a lot from these people, or will I end up trapped in this "secret hedge fund society" and end up being pretty sad, cocaine snorting, with some amount of money in the bank? Any comments are very welcome! Thanks!

tmaly 12y ago
I work at an automated trading place. A friend of mine that I worked with left to work for Google. I had chatted with him a few months later. He said he did not get to code as much new stuff as he did when he was my place. That being said, he does not have a PHD in machine learning. I think if you went to work in the robotics division of Google, that would be way more rewarding than staring at securities prices all day long.
- durianrider 12y ago
  cool, that exactly fits my case ;-) does looking at stock prices all day make you feel dull in the end, or is this really not that important to you? Is there a lot of pressure build upon you in this field? I guess that would be one of my biggest concerns...
mswen 12y ago
Everyone will be different ... but my experience was that when I went to apply my statistical skills to securities trading it ended up boring me. I keep thinking that it is a good idea because where else can being "correct" lead so directly to measurable spendable success. However, when I actually spent some time doing it with my own capital I just didn't find my mind really energized by the challenge. And, I found that active trading really requires time and energy commitment that a buy and hold approach doesn't. This was many years ago and the automated trading tools were too expensive for the amount of capital that I had available. Maybe today would be different. Maybe a hedge fund environment rather than solo trader would be better.

1 points by durianrider 12y ago

tmaly 12y ago

I work at an automated trading place. A friend of mine that I worked with left to work for Google. I had chatted with him a few months later. He said he did not get to code as much new stuff as he did when he was my place. That being said, he does not have a PHD in machine learning. I think if you went to work in the robotics division of Google, that would be way more rewarding than staring at securities prices all day long.

durianrider 12y ago
cool, that exactly fits my case ;-) does looking at stock prices all day make you feel dull in the end, or is this really not that important to you? Is there a lot of pressure build upon you in this field? I guess that would be one of my biggest concerns...

mswen 12y ago

Everyone will be different ... but my experience was that when I went to apply my statistical skills to securities trading it ended up boring me. I keep thinking that it is a good idea because where else can being "correct" lead so directly to measurable spendable success. However, when I actually spent some time doing it with my own capital I just didn't find my mind really energized by the challenge. And, I found that active trading really requires time and energy commitment that a buy and hold approach doesn't. This was many years ago and the automated trading tools were too expensive for the amount of capital that I had available. Maybe today would be different. Maybe a hedge fund environment rather than solo trader would be better.