New Software Engineer Rejected 357 Times Before Receiving a Job Offer(businessinsider.com)
businessinsider.com
New Software Engineer Rejected 357 Times Before Receiving a Job Offer
https://www.businessinsider.com/software-engineer-job-hunt-357-rejections-talent-labor-shortage-tech-2021-10
6 comments
Let me fix that, "An applicant with a bachelors degree in business administration and 13-week software-engineering boot camp actually got a job after a lot of hard work looking."
There are cases when an applicant with years of professional experience takes longer to find a software engineering job, after similarly focused efforts, so I'd say it's inefficient job market.
Any links to those cases? Just curious.
Me.
Computer science background, but I had to get a job really quick post graduation and with no SWE internships, I had to fall back on my experience working part time in my university’s IT department and get an IT consultant job so I could pay rent.
I have open-source projects, I’ve released iOS apps with non-trivial code, I’ve placed top-5 in a dev challenge hosted by a social network with tens of millions of users. I’ve owned production support working for startups while also owning their helpdesk, and I’n general I’ve been able to leverage my background to solve problems that none of my IT colleagues were equipped to solve.
However, this experience with writing software still comes from the context of “IT” and I’ve been struggling to shake that stigma.
I’m not saying I’m not making progress. Just got turned down at the final stage (4/4) of a SWE position for a better candidate, but that’s one of probably a hundred applications I’ve submitted over the course of two months.
Computer science background, but I had to get a job really quick post graduation and with no SWE internships, I had to fall back on my experience working part time in my university’s IT department and get an IT consultant job so I could pay rent.
I have open-source projects, I’ve released iOS apps with non-trivial code, I’ve placed top-5 in a dev challenge hosted by a social network with tens of millions of users. I’ve owned production support working for startups while also owning their helpdesk, and I’n general I’ve been able to leverage my background to solve problems that none of my IT colleagues were equipped to solve.
However, this experience with writing software still comes from the context of “IT” and I’ve been struggling to shake that stigma.
I’m not saying I’m not making progress. Just got turned down at the final stage (4/4) of a SWE position for a better candidate, but that’s one of probably a hundred applications I’ve submitted over the course of two months.
Not sure if you want this feedback or not. You sound vastly more qualified than a current team member who is contracting for us.
Reading your statement I don’t hear anything about what you have done for other people. Instead of saying I open sources projects, say my open sourced projected were used by X many other people. Or I used my IT experience to cut downtime by 50% so my coworkers didn’t have to come in on the weekends. Maybe tell us why the non trivial code made your iOS app more successful.
Reading your statement I don’t hear anything about what you have done for other people. Instead of saying I open sources projects, say my open sourced projected were used by X many other people. Or I used my IT experience to cut downtime by 50% so my coworkers didn’t have to come in on the weekends. Maybe tell us why the non trivial code made your iOS app more successful.
What type of companies are you applying to? I'm a high school dropout and I had zero problem transferring the Software Engineering skills I built in an unrelated discipline into Software Engineering as a career.
A resume is a presentation, it's a communication medium: if you're applying for Software Engineering roles, and you have Software Engineering skills used in a professional context, then that's what your resume should present. My resume is focused exclusively on what I've done and the value I've delivered, my resume makes no mention of job titles. I'd say my application to interview rate is at least 50%... and I'm an idiot, there's nothing remarkable about me.
I'm sure there's a significant difference between us, whether that's the markets we're operating in or our skillsets, but I am confident that with the experience you've described, I could get a Software Engineering job within a week because the market is so desperate for candidates who can deliver. If you've shipped code, no matter the context, you're hireable.
Have you had any sort of feedback / mentorship from people in the industry? Do you have any relationships with Engineering Managers that you can lean on to understand where your issues lie? I'd be very very surprised if the issue isn't entirely with how you're presenting yourself through your resume. The fact that you've got quite far in one process speaks to your suitability as a candidate. If you post your email address here I'm sure some people will be happy to reach out with personalised, actionable advice.
A resume is a presentation, it's a communication medium: if you're applying for Software Engineering roles, and you have Software Engineering skills used in a professional context, then that's what your resume should present. My resume is focused exclusively on what I've done and the value I've delivered, my resume makes no mention of job titles. I'd say my application to interview rate is at least 50%... and I'm an idiot, there's nothing remarkable about me.
I'm sure there's a significant difference between us, whether that's the markets we're operating in or our skillsets, but I am confident that with the experience you've described, I could get a Software Engineering job within a week because the market is so desperate for candidates who can deliver. If you've shipped code, no matter the context, you're hireable.
Have you had any sort of feedback / mentorship from people in the industry? Do you have any relationships with Engineering Managers that you can lean on to understand where your issues lie? I'd be very very surprised if the issue isn't entirely with how you're presenting yourself through your resume. The fact that you've got quite far in one process speaks to your suitability as a candidate. If you post your email address here I'm sure some people will be happy to reach out with personalised, actionable advice.
Have you tried going to meet ups? If you have time, it's a great way to network with people who are doing similar things. One of the meet ups that I used to go to, would ask if anybody was hiring and if anybody was looking for work at the end of the meet up. Afterwards, we would go to a bar.
It's a great and efficient way to meet people in your area who are doing similar things and have similar interests.
It's a great and efficient way to meet people in your area who are doing similar things and have similar interests.
Fwiw, I've found that online application portals are nearly useless. Personal connections from your network are ideal; third-party recruiters can also work. But even something as simple as "my third cousin's college roommate can get me emailing with a real person at the company instead of bouncing off of an automated resume filter" can make all the difference.
Best of luck
Best of luck
That's from personal connections; I doubt they are documented publicly, as it's considered negative mark in the current environment.
To echo your comment, every time I see this discussion online, and someone brings up their negative experiences finding a job in this market despite their nominal qualifications, the discussion often derails into how they personally must have some sort of defect or constitutional failure on their own part, rather than the opposite party accepting it as a valid data point.
Exactly. She’d have had a better time looking for a product manager job in a food/restaurant related company due to her experience.
This was very similar to my experience. I had been writing code as a hobby for nearly a decade while working in TV production. In 2017, I attended Hack Reactor, an in-person bootcamp here in SF. I applied for engineering roles while practicing coding interview questions with probably close to 1000 applications netting about 40 follow-up interviews with around 10 or so on-site interviews. After eight months, I was offered a temporary role at a healthcare startup. Five months later that role ended, it was another couple of months before landing a role at O’Reilly Media where I now am a full stack software engineer working primarily in JavaScript and Python. I was elected “class president” by my bootcamp cohort. I was also the last person in my cohort of 30 people to be hired.
What would you blame/credit this problem too?
On the flip-side. Since I've had 3 or 4 years of experience on my resume, I've gotten interviews for about 1 in 10 applications I sent out. And been made offers for about 1 in 4 companies that I've started an interviewing process with. With me ending the interview process about half of the time with those due to the company being a bad cultural fit for me (excessive overtime, unorganized group, or low pay).
I have also specifically targeted companies that used the tech stack I had a lot of experience with. And I would say that I typically interview well
On the flip-side. Since I've had 3 or 4 years of experience on my resume, I've gotten interviews for about 1 in 10 applications I sent out. And been made offers for about 1 in 4 companies that I've started an interviewing process with. With me ending the interview process about half of the time with those due to the company being a bad cultural fit for me (excessive overtime, unorganized group, or low pay).
I have also specifically targeted companies that used the tech stack I had a lot of experience with. And I would say that I typically interview well
When I owned a consulting firm, I was also shocked at how low resume quality was. If you just spend a bit of time making your resume look good or stand out a little bit, it will go a really long way. There is a such thing as “too much information” or “too detailed.” I never had a problem of “too little information” because, as a human, I was able to fill in the blanks and if something didn’t make sense, I’d often interview them just to hear the story (and in a couple of cases, actually hire).
When I lived on a sailboat, it was often mentioned in my cover letter just to hopefully stand out. I’d get interviews just because I sounded like an interesting person (what these coworkers said later at company parties) and it would get my foot in the door.
When I lived on a sailboat, it was often mentioned in my cover letter just to hopefully stand out. I’d get interviews just because I sounded like an interesting person (what these coworkers said later at company parties) and it would get my foot in the door.
On the flip side, when I was on the interview for a small startup a while back, I started learning to distrust resumes that were too good. I eventually figured out that it's because they used a resume preparation service. They weren't lying about anything, but it's amazing how different the same experience can sound. (Ok, quite a few were telling some white lies, but the strength of the resumes did not depend on lying.)
I'd say that the bottom 20% and the top 20% of resumes (that made it past the HR screen) were disappointing during the interview. The best people usually had decent but somewhat awkward or unclear resumes.
I'd say that the bottom 20% and the top 20% of resumes (that made it past the HR screen) were disappointing during the interview. The best people usually had decent but somewhat awkward or unclear resumes.
I think this is really down to the few companies that have "taken a chance" on a bootcamp grad in the past and are able to see past the lack of experience after one or more good experiences - which feels like something large companies can do more (and more often) than smaller ones.
It's also a product of my inability to really and truly master interview coding challenges and the pressure of whiteboarding. It's absolutely nerve-wracking and I've choked every single time regardless of how well-prepped I was. At a Google on-site, I was asked to traverse a binary search tree on a whiteboard and then, after doing it successfully, I was challenged to do it without recursion and I was unable to reason about how to do it and I choked completely and utterly. The rest of the interview went pretty well, so I would guess that my whiteboarding fail was the main thing that prevented me from getting hired there.
O'Reilly's interview process did not involve whiteboarding or things like trick questions, toy problems or algorithm stuff. It was a straightforward coding challenge and then a fairly low-pressure conversation about my code, the decisions I made and how I might modify what I implemented if I had more time, or was confronted with a specific challenge.
I think if I now were to enter the job market with the experience I have, I hope that I wouldn't be immediately confronted with things in an interview like traversing binary search trees, or implementing a Fisher Yates shuffle on a whiteboard.
It's also a product of my inability to really and truly master interview coding challenges and the pressure of whiteboarding. It's absolutely nerve-wracking and I've choked every single time regardless of how well-prepped I was. At a Google on-site, I was asked to traverse a binary search tree on a whiteboard and then, after doing it successfully, I was challenged to do it without recursion and I was unable to reason about how to do it and I choked completely and utterly. The rest of the interview went pretty well, so I would guess that my whiteboarding fail was the main thing that prevented me from getting hired there.
O'Reilly's interview process did not involve whiteboarding or things like trick questions, toy problems or algorithm stuff. It was a straightforward coding challenge and then a fairly low-pressure conversation about my code, the decisions I made and how I might modify what I implemented if I had more time, or was confronted with a specific challenge.
I think if I now were to enter the job market with the experience I have, I hope that I wouldn't be immediately confronted with things in an interview like traversing binary search trees, or implementing a Fisher Yates shuffle on a whiteboard.
I think I've been pretty lucky with the jobs that I've had so far in my career where none of them have required extensive whiteboarding for their interview processes. I completely empathize with you though, as I feel like every time I've encountered whiteboarding in an interview, I must've seemed so incompetent to the interviewer.
It's definitely possible to find jobs that don't require whiteboarding for their interview process - best of luck when you look again!
It's definitely possible to find jobs that don't require whiteboarding for their interview process - best of luck when you look again!
The person in the article also attended Hack Reactor. I myself am currently on track to start the SEI at hack reactor in January. You aren’t the first person to mention similar results from HR. This is certainly concerning to me. Is HR really not as good as it’s reputation implies?
Hack Reactor was excellent and most of my cohort was hired within three months.
The amount I learned in the compressed time frame was everything I needed to do the job as a jr. front end dev.
Unfortunately, the coding interview is a whole other beast and HR spends the last week of the session focusing on the job search and interview skills. They do offer job search support for up to six months post graduation. The job market was competitive in 2018 and I also believe I, a 40-something white man, was demographically challenged in the marketplace. I was also looking for work in the Bay Area, the most competitive location possible - where others of my cohort could be more flexible with regards to location. That, plus my interview skills are weak and I was counting on getting lucky or a fair interview.
Now that everything is remote, I think you can widen your search net to companies outside of SF, leading to hopefully better odds.
I would still highly recommend Hack Reactor but expect your job search may take up to six months (in my case eight!)
The amount I learned in the compressed time frame was everything I needed to do the job as a jr. front end dev.
Unfortunately, the coding interview is a whole other beast and HR spends the last week of the session focusing on the job search and interview skills. They do offer job search support for up to six months post graduation. The job market was competitive in 2018 and I also believe I, a 40-something white man, was demographically challenged in the marketplace. I was also looking for work in the Bay Area, the most competitive location possible - where others of my cohort could be more flexible with regards to location. That, plus my interview skills are weak and I was counting on getting lucky or a fair interview.
Now that everything is remote, I think you can widen your search net to companies outside of SF, leading to hopefully better odds.
I would still highly recommend Hack Reactor but expect your job search may take up to six months (in my case eight!)
Person in linked article also went to Hack Reactor. Do they not provide placement help? I'd be interested to know their reaction to the story.
They did not really offer ‘placement’ per se, or anything like a job fair with companies lined up to hire new grads.
They do focus on interviewing skills and the job search in the last week of the program. After that, they offer job search support/counseling for up to six months after graduation.
We had daily check ins with a job search counselor to keep on task and could use the HR support network of instructors and alums for feedback on take home coding challenges and general interview prep. It’s as good as it could have been.
After three months, I would guess about 80% of my cohort had been offered positions. But don’t count on being in that 80%. You’ll need to budget for six months of job searching.
I understand they now have a whole other course just for dealing with the coding interview, but that was not available to me at the time.
They do focus on interviewing skills and the job search in the last week of the program. After that, they offer job search support/counseling for up to six months after graduation.
We had daily check ins with a job search counselor to keep on task and could use the HR support network of instructors and alums for feedback on take home coding challenges and general interview prep. It’s as good as it could have been.
After three months, I would guess about 80% of my cohort had been offered positions. But don’t count on being in that 80%. You’ll need to budget for six months of job searching.
I understand they now have a whole other course just for dealing with the coding interview, but that was not available to me at the time.
Interestingly enough, a close relative of mine paid 17k to do Hack Reactor and didn’t get a job. They eventually hired her to be a TA.
Overall, if I notice a company hiring a lot of boot campers, I try to leave and let them have mostly entry level workers. Their product and codebase eventually reflects their staff (inexperienced). If you stick around and shepherd them, you more or less undervalue yourself in the long term. Just let them run wild until the company decides ‘this was a mistake’.
It’s nothing personal, it’s just business. This is a lesson I learned the hard way early in my career where I literally trained my future replacements. Literally went out of my way to train them. This is a seriously amateur move, and a tough lesson to learn since no one wants to be a jaded asshole, but that’s just how the business is.
Overall, if I notice a company hiring a lot of boot campers, I try to leave and let them have mostly entry level workers. Their product and codebase eventually reflects their staff (inexperienced). If you stick around and shepherd them, you more or less undervalue yourself in the long term. Just let them run wild until the company decides ‘this was a mistake’.
It’s nothing personal, it’s just business. This is a lesson I learned the hard way early in my career where I literally trained my future replacements. Literally went out of my way to train them. This is a seriously amateur move, and a tough lesson to learn since no one wants to be a jaded asshole, but that’s just how the business is.
I get the strong impression you're over-projecting your personal feelings, which are rooted in a bad experience you had.
I've worked with probably a dozen bootcampers over the years and all but one have been great. Some of them were junior at the time, some of them were not. The junior devs were junior devs; nothing wrong with that. If a company is hiring nothing but entry-level/junior devs then yes, they will have problems. But that has nothing to do with bootcamps. And I'm not sure what "try[ing] to leave and let them have mostly entry level workers" accomplishes.
I've worked with probably a dozen bootcampers over the years and all but one have been great. Some of them were junior at the time, some of them were not. The junior devs were junior devs; nothing wrong with that. If a company is hiring nothing but entry-level/junior devs then yes, they will have problems. But that has nothing to do with bootcamps. And I'm not sure what "try[ing] to leave and let them have mostly entry level workers" accomplishes.
Again, it’s not personal. I’m simply saying I don’t want to facilitate the macro-level game. The same way I don’t support out-sourcing. I am well versed with the gauntlet interviews they throw at mid/senior level, and the cost-cutting they do with entry-level/out-sourcing. They run a very economic game on both ends, and it’s simply not in my interest (and many people’s interest, even the new bootcampers who will one day not be new anymore) to help these processes. Bootcampers are really going to love the new bootcampers in a few years that will make their 3 months of training look stupid in the eyes of the business. This system will come back around and haunt those who it helped, nothing is that easy.
Also, yes, I have a perspective. I think the critique of projection generally dehumanizes anyone’s experience. Yes, of course, this is from my experience - why wouldn’t it be? Businesses drive prices down, create career choke points for anyone involved long term (cost-cutting via capping careers). Now why the hell would help with this?
Also, yes, I have a perspective. I think the critique of projection generally dehumanizes anyone’s experience. Yes, of course, this is from my experience - why wouldn’t it be? Businesses drive prices down, create career choke points for anyone involved long term (cost-cutting via capping careers). Now why the hell would help with this?
All I'm saying is that you were framing your experience as universal truth, instead of as just your experience. And it can't be universal, because it doesn't line up with my experience at all.
Parts of the original comment also dipped into reinforcing stereotypes about "bootcampers" that - again - don't hold up in my experience, and could be discouraging to new/potential devs here.
Parts of the original comment also dipped into reinforcing stereotypes about "bootcampers" that - again - don't hold up in my experience, and could be discouraging to new/potential devs here.
I've had the same experience.
Noobs are cheap but they write noob code. They can be useful if lead by a good senior engineer, but usually when companies start getting cheap, the senior engineers are already half-way out the door.
This literally happened at a start-up I was a foundational engineer at. They started hiring noobs, a year later the entire senior engineering team left after getting stiffed a raise.
They are still struggling to pay off the technical debt.
Noobs are cheap but they write noob code. They can be useful if lead by a good senior engineer, but usually when companies start getting cheap, the senior engineers are already half-way out the door.
This literally happened at a start-up I was a foundational engineer at. They started hiring noobs, a year later the entire senior engineering team left after getting stiffed a raise.
They are still struggling to pay off the technical debt.
How did this person do 1000 hours of full stack coding in 13 weeks while also taking school? That's more than two fulltime jobs.
This... sounds extreme. I've worked in tech since 2014 following the "trade route" method of starting in IT support in a small city in England, through QA, and then into software development. I've been a developer since 2017 and currently work as a senior developer in the bay area. In that time I've moved around quite a few jobs and think I've been not been offered maybe two jobs I've applied to from perhaps twenty that I've applied for - that's without a degree. Most of my friends apply to jobs and get them - it's quite a surprise to hear someone has been rejected. Are people just applying for the wrong jobs? Or bad at interviewing? I'd have quit the industry if I was rejected from 25 jobs in a row let alone 350. Maybe these are low effort one-click applications to roles with 1000s of applicants?
You got a job with a lower barrier to entry and then transferred to development. It's much harder to go straight to development with no industry experience. And once you have any amount of experience it's much, much easier to get a job.
Sure - if you go to other sites Overclockers you'll see this is the suggested route (and has been for years). "Pay your dues" in tech support. I don't know why more people aren't suggested this route - you're paid to do your job rather than paying crazy amounts to risk it through a get-rich-quick-scheme sounding bootcamp.
edit: It might be less sexy to get the A+ cert when you're a teenager and work up from there than to go to a good university and get a CS degree, but we've ended up at the same place but without crazy student debt.
edit: It might be less sexy to get the A+ cert when you're a teenager and work up from there than to go to a good university and get a CS degree, but we've ended up at the same place but without crazy student debt.
Not surprising. Here is the game now:
* Pick between high level and low level.
* Low level software appears far more stable and predictable in its hiring with a clearer set of expectations, but it also sets a higher barrier of entry. You can live here for the rest of your life carefully achieving satisfying challenges, but don’t expect any glamour.
* High level software is trend focused. The barrier of entry is low but then so are the expectations and so the work is more about using tools than actually engineering anything. Expect to be aged out of the job. If you aren’t chasing trends and toying with tools your career mobility will erode into nothing.
It didn’t use to be like this, even just a few years ago.
* Pick between high level and low level.
* Low level software appears far more stable and predictable in its hiring with a clearer set of expectations, but it also sets a higher barrier of entry. You can live here for the rest of your life carefully achieving satisfying challenges, but don’t expect any glamour.
* High level software is trend focused. The barrier of entry is low but then so are the expectations and so the work is more about using tools than actually engineering anything. Expect to be aged out of the job. If you aren’t chasing trends and toying with tools your career mobility will erode into nothing.
It didn’t use to be like this, even just a few years ago.
> You can live here for the rest of your life carefully achieving satisfying challenges
"rest of your [professional] life" suggests at least 30 years.
How confident can you be predicting 30 years in the future? Note that 30 years ago was 1991.
"rest of your [professional] life" suggests at least 30 years.
How confident can you be predicting 30 years in the future? Note that 30 years ago was 1991.
> How confident can you be predicting 30 years in the future? Note that 30 years ago was 1991.
30 years ago, in the '90s, the company I now work for developed an important system for a very large customer. It replaced an older system that was developed along with the equipment it runs, introduced in the '60s -- another 30 years prior. My current project is developing a replacement for the current system. It's the exact same system, but written in C to run on a Cortex-M instead of Ada on an Intel.
In another 30 years, we'll probably be re-implementing the exact same system, but written in Rust to run on a RISC-V chip.
30 years ago, in the '90s, the company I now work for developed an important system for a very large customer. It replaced an older system that was developed along with the equipment it runs, introduced in the '60s -- another 30 years prior. My current project is developing a replacement for the current system. It's the exact same system, but written in C to run on a Cortex-M instead of Ada on an Intel.
In another 30 years, we'll probably be re-implementing the exact same system, but written in Rust to run on a RISC-V chip.
You can still make a serious dollar writing COBOL code. That was quite oldfashioned in 1991, and I'm honestly not certain we'll be rid of it by 2041.
I assume by low/high you mean skill level, not closeness-to-the-metal?
Isn't this to be expected, though? As software consumption becomes more commoditized and de facto standards arise (your basic lookalike business webpage), more and more people are able to easily replicate the feat, and it becomes less about creativity and innovation and more just a matter of rote implementation, like any other manufacturing trade. Interchangeable agencies pumping out cookie-cutter code on an assembly line, with some white-labeling thrown in. Code is just another commodity (you can already produce usable code after a short boot camp, not unlike any other corporate training program).
These days what sells isn't even software engineering excellence, but just advertising bubbles inside walled gardens, driven by divisive and sensationalized content. What little "innovation" there is seems to mostly be B2B-toolchain related, shovel vendors desperately trying to sell to the next big garden, all funded by speculative VC money. It's just another bubble.
On top of that, after COVID, with more companies moving remote, US workers now have to compete with not just each other from different states, but a global labor pool that typically works way harder than we do for much less money. And with income inequality getting worse and privacy concerns growing stronger, there's only so many dollars to be had chasing viral networks of peasants... that well isn't going to run forever.
Like any other maturing business, what gets you the big bucks ends up being charisma, manipulation, and personality... not engineering. Proper "hard" engineering still pays the medium bucks, but most coders aren't like that, just various shades of amateur pumping out mediocre code for other mediocre companies, the same mediocrity most of the world has always run on, no matter their line of work. It's definitely not the 80s anymore, where coding is some elitist white-collar thing. It's just another job.
Isn't this to be expected, though? As software consumption becomes more commoditized and de facto standards arise (your basic lookalike business webpage), more and more people are able to easily replicate the feat, and it becomes less about creativity and innovation and more just a matter of rote implementation, like any other manufacturing trade. Interchangeable agencies pumping out cookie-cutter code on an assembly line, with some white-labeling thrown in. Code is just another commodity (you can already produce usable code after a short boot camp, not unlike any other corporate training program).
These days what sells isn't even software engineering excellence, but just advertising bubbles inside walled gardens, driven by divisive and sensationalized content. What little "innovation" there is seems to mostly be B2B-toolchain related, shovel vendors desperately trying to sell to the next big garden, all funded by speculative VC money. It's just another bubble.
On top of that, after COVID, with more companies moving remote, US workers now have to compete with not just each other from different states, but a global labor pool that typically works way harder than we do for much less money. And with income inequality getting worse and privacy concerns growing stronger, there's only so many dollars to be had chasing viral networks of peasants... that well isn't going to run forever.
Like any other maturing business, what gets you the big bucks ends up being charisma, manipulation, and personality... not engineering. Proper "hard" engineering still pays the medium bucks, but most coders aren't like that, just various shades of amateur pumping out mediocre code for other mediocre companies, the same mediocrity most of the world has always run on, no matter their line of work. It's definitely not the 80s anymore, where coding is some elitist white-collar thing. It's just another job.
>On top of that, after COVID, with more companies moving remote, US workers now have to compete with not just each other from different states, but a global labor pool that typically works way harder than we do for much less money. And with income inequality getting worse and privacy concerns growing stronger, there's only so many dollars to be had chasing viral networks of peasants... that well isn't going to run forever.
No they don't. Very few US jobs are remote-anywhere.
No they don't. Very few US jobs are remote-anywhere.
> but a global labor pool that typically works way harder than we do for much less money.
I'm getting really sick of this cliche. People in the US work their asses off, I've seen developers working long hours at literally every one of my jobs.
Also, time in seat != productivity, and actually time in seat can be extremely harmful to your productivity. We have the research, we have proven this.
Having someone perform "hard work" because:
- They are too incompetent to complete their tasks while also taking care of their health
- They are too economically terrorized to have any power in how much they work
is not a good thing and I am doubtful that it will produce good results.
The Enlightenment was a time of liberalism and leisure, and it was a great leap forward in technology. Hard times do not make strong people, it creates corruption and desperate living.
If "working hard" is such a virtue, why is Japan's economy constantly in the shitter despite their reputation for working long hours?
I'm getting really sick of this cliche. People in the US work their asses off, I've seen developers working long hours at literally every one of my jobs.
Also, time in seat != productivity, and actually time in seat can be extremely harmful to your productivity. We have the research, we have proven this.
Having someone perform "hard work" because:
- They are too incompetent to complete their tasks while also taking care of their health
- They are too economically terrorized to have any power in how much they work
is not a good thing and I am doubtful that it will produce good results.
The Enlightenment was a time of liberalism and leisure, and it was a great leap forward in technology. Hard times do not make strong people, it creates corruption and desperate living.
If "working hard" is such a virtue, why is Japan's economy constantly in the shitter despite their reputation for working long hours?
I think you're preaching to the choir here. I'm not defending workaholism, just pointing out that commoditized code makes wage-work development a race to the bottom. Working hard isn't a "virtue", it's just something that business owners can amplify in an effort to pit workers against each other, especially for online software that doesn't require geographic proximity. Imagine the same long hours but at 10% the current wages.
Manufacturing has gone through the whole outsourcing-to-reshoring rollercoaster, and that's only just starting to touch coding. Give it 10-20 years and it'll be much worse for American devs as domestic competition increases and the rest of the world catches up, all while the advertising bubble bursts and climate refugeeism increases.
I'm not glorifying back-breaking labor, I'm worrying about our future.
Japan is a perfect case in point... that's the kind of society I'd like to avoid, feudalism with perfunctory "pick your favorite lord" days. But as wealth increasingly concentrates in fewer and fewer hands and democracy crumbles, I think that sort of dystopia is unavoidable. Japan got to that point even with deeply entrenched racism and xenophobia, where labor immigration isn't a big part of their workforce... and they still developed those problems. In a society like ours, where capital is free to hire work from basically anyone and anywhere, it's going to be even more amplified.
Bad time to have kids.
Manufacturing has gone through the whole outsourcing-to-reshoring rollercoaster, and that's only just starting to touch coding. Give it 10-20 years and it'll be much worse for American devs as domestic competition increases and the rest of the world catches up, all while the advertising bubble bursts and climate refugeeism increases.
I'm not glorifying back-breaking labor, I'm worrying about our future.
Japan is a perfect case in point... that's the kind of society I'd like to avoid, feudalism with perfunctory "pick your favorite lord" days. But as wealth increasingly concentrates in fewer and fewer hands and democracy crumbles, I think that sort of dystopia is unavoidable. Japan got to that point even with deeply entrenched racism and xenophobia, where labor immigration isn't a big part of their workforce... and they still developed those problems. In a society like ours, where capital is free to hire work from basically anyone and anywhere, it's going to be even more amplified.
Bad time to have kids.
"global labor pool that typically works way harder than we do for much less money"
yes, we do, and we love the USA.
yes, we do, and we love the USA.
> You can live here for the rest of your life carefully achieving satisfying challenges, but don’t expect any glamour.
Don't expect much in the way of compensation either -- just offers from medical device companies willing to pay about half of what a Ruby Rockstar or Node Ninja makes in the enterprise.
Don't expect much in the way of compensation either -- just offers from medical device companies willing to pay about half of what a Ruby Rockstar or Node Ninja makes in the enterprise.