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Googler... ex-Googler

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1114 points namuorg | 11 comments | 11 Apr 25 20:19 UTC | HN request time: 0.455s | source | bottom
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abdj8 ◴[14 Apr 25 05:08 UTC] No.43678249[source]▶
Layoffs are a difficult thing for employees and their managers. I have seen people (one was a VP of Engineering) escorted out of the building, sent in a cab to home along with a security guard (this was in India), not allowed access to computer or talk with other employees. But, recently have had a very different experience. The current company I work for announced 30% layoffs. The list was made public within one hour of announcement. The CEO detailed the process of selecting people. The severance was very generous (3-6 months pay) along with health and other benefits. The impacted employees were allowed to keep the laptop and any other assets they took from the company. They even paid the same severance to contractors.

After the announcement, the laid off employees were given a few days in the company to allow them to say good byes. I love the CEOs comment on this ' I trusted them yesterday, I trust them today'. This was by far the kindest way of laying off employees imo. People were treated with dignity and respect.

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apexalpha ◴[14 Apr 25 06:20 UTC] No.43678562[source]▶
Weird, as someone from Europe I've never experience anything else.

Layoffs here are always done in conjunction with the unions. People are moved to different jobs, helped with training etc...

Only in very critical jobs they'd walk you out immediately but then you still get the pay.

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Scandiravian ◴[14 Apr 25 07:42 UTC] No.43678984[source]▶
Having experienced layoffs in both US and EU companies, the difference is massive. In my experience there is very little respect for "the human" being laid off in US companies

People literally would just disappear day to day. I've had several instances where I only found out a colleague had been fired because I tried to write them on Slack only to find that their account had been deactivated

Personally I felt constantly worried working in such an environment and I don't want to work for another US company again if I can help it

There are of course bad cases in the EU, but in my experience it's way less common than in the US

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apwell23 ◴[14 Apr 25 08:48 UTC] No.43679327[source]▶
> In my experience there is very little respect for "the human" being laid off in US companies

its much easier to find another job in US because of this though.

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oblio ◴[14 Apr 25 09:22 UTC] No.43679532[source]▶
Is it, really? Aren't US tech interview notoriously difficult? Many rounds of interviews, background checks, etc.?

Most purely European companies don't do that. Actually, unfortunately, some of them do, because of American influence. But for sure they didn't use to.

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icemelt8 ◴[14 Apr 25 09:37 UTC] No.43679584[source]▶
What he meant is that the whole capitalist culture, less regulations, creates a more thriving economy which creates more jobs and hence more options to go to.
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hnlmorg ◴[14 Apr 25 09:56 UTC] No.43679660[source]▶
I've heard this type of comment a lot but in my experience there isn't any shortage of tech companies in the EU.

What EU regulations hamper isn't job creation, it's employee and customer exploitation. The distinction between "job creation" and "employee exploitation" is important.

What the former means in practice is that there is a massive contractor market in the UK and EU. So if companies need temporary staff, they'll hire a contractor. If they need permanent staff then they'll hire an employee. And contractors in the UK & EU are paid significantly more than their employee peers. In fact their pay is much more equivalent to US employees. So companies will make constant tradeoffs between more expensive labor for short-lived projects vs cheaper staff and knowledge retention but stricter employment laws. It's a fair trade most of the time.

So a more accurate way of comparing US vs EU businesses in terms of employees would be US employees vs EU contractors. Things then begin to look a lot more equivalent.

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scarface_74 ◴[14 Apr 25 11:03 UTC] No.43680008[source]▶
I doubt the tech workers making three to four times EU wages in the US feel “exploited”.

My job is purely transactional. I’ve worked for 10 companies in almost 30 years. I gave them labor and they gave me money. Whenever one side decided the arrangement wasn’t working, I moved on to another job.

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1. Spooky23 ◴[14 Apr 25 11:58 UTC] No.43680341[source]▶
Tech is always boom/bust. We’re lucky to have had a long boom.

I’m personally well acquainted with many people in tech, especially big tech. Many of them are doing little or nothing, certainly not justifying $300k+ salaries.

What you do has risk but is fundamentally more honest - your skills are around technology and output, not navigating corporate bureaucracy.

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2. margorczynski ◴[14 Apr 25 13:21 UTC] No.43680976[source]▶
Your post somehow suggests that when a bust comes European companies won't start laying off people. And in the same boom period the US dev will make much more money (and have a biggger safety pillow) than the European one.
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3. trelane ◴[14 Apr 25 13:31 UTC] No.43681055[source]▶
I am always skeptical of claims that some workers are just lazy bums skimming money.

I don't think most folks graduate college and think, "You know what sounds amazing? Sitting at a desk doing nothing five days a week!"

I expect most of the time they have good reason to be "unproductive," and would respond positively to those reasons getting addressed, or you're not capturing their contributions accurately with whatever metrics you're using to find "slackers."

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4. dmoy ◴[14 Apr 25 13:45 UTC] No.43681210[source]▶
I haven't seen it on any team I've been on. But also I don't think the implication is people doing literally nothing. Just people doing things that are not worthwhile at all, wasting other people's time, and kinda just puttering around.

Some of it boils down to ineffective management and lack of mentoring, for sure, and could be addressed in a better way. Some of it is people getting in way over their heads.

5. Spooky23 ◴[14 Apr 25 14:01 UTC] No.43681393[source]▶
It’s not the people, it’s the process. In a big organization you need to be actively managing your career to be in the right places.

And people are doing things, I’m not saying they’re sitting making paper airplanes — just things with no value or that drain their value. I had a high school friend who was brilliant, but his career got nerfed when he stuck with a bad tech/business unit.

If you’re the world’s premier expert in some peculiar process that only exists in one place, that’s no mas. Companies have been rolling in dough for a long time and some have way more people than they used to. One big company I deal with went from an account team of 6 to almost 50.

6. scarface_74 ◴[14 Apr 25 15:17 UTC] No.43682253[source]▶
During the first “bust” in 2000 I had four years of experience and living and working in Atlanta - far away from a tech hub. Boring old enterprise dev jobs at banks, insurance companies, etc weren’t affected and I was easily able to get offers.

I worked at a company where utility companies sent us data files and we created, printed and mailed bills.

In 2008 during the financial crisis the next time I looked for a job (my third), I had two offers relatively quickly - one programming point of sales systems and the other that I accepted programming ruggedized Windows CE devices for field service workers.

Fast forward to 2020 at the height of COVID, I got my one and only BigTech job working at AWS (my 8th job).

Unlike the author of the submitted article, when I got Amazoned 3.5 years later, I shrugged, my $40K severance was deposited in my account and I reached out to my network and targeted outreach to some recruiters in my niche and had four interviews and 3 offers within 3 weeks. Why would I waste time getting emotional about a company knowing that the CEO is 6-7 positions up on the career ladder and I’m just a random number to most of the organization?

A year later in 2024 around 9:00 PM I had a “1-1” with my manager invite for the next morning. I already had my suspicions and told my wife that I am probably going to be laid off in the morning. She said let her know how it goes and we went to sleep.

I woke up the next morning, was notified about my layoff asked when I would get my severance and responded to a recruiter that reached out to me about a week prior.

I started the interview process and three weeks later I had a job making the same as I was making at AWS.

I don’t need to “justify” what I’m making. I have a skillset and experience that are in demand and companies are willing to pay me for it because by employing me they get a positive ROI.

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7. Ancalagon ◴[14 Apr 25 16:34 UTC] No.43683132[source]▶
Until the US dev has a medical expense, that is.
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8. scarface_74 ◴[14 Apr 25 17:29 UTC] No.43683818{3}[source]▶
A cursory amount of research shows that the average premium for an insurance policy on the open market through the ACA is between $400-$2000 a month depending on options - family status, deductibles etc.

There is also COBRA that lets you stay on your employer’s plan. You have to pay the entire premium. I pay $600 a month now and my employer pays $1200 a month. That’s me + family.

9. margorczynski ◴[15 Apr 25 14:51 UTC] No.43693594{3}[source]▶
I think a lot of you guys from the US don't really get how high the taxes are here that pay for this stuff, especially for people that make more than the average.

If you would work non-contract here in Poland for an equivalent of ~$120k you would pay around $1k USD. If your wife is working she will also pay, of course this also covers all you kids.

So lets say both of you make around $120k here - so you would pay $2k monthly for "free" healthcare and its quality is atrocious. Even for serious stuff you many times need to wait 1-2 years for something, all hospitals are understaffed, the care quality is abysmal.

If you are ambitious and make good money the US is better. Europe in general is better for people that don't aim too high and want the state to enforce some minimum of QoL for them at the expense of the rest.

10. deepakarora3 ◴[15 Apr 25 15:51 UTC] No.43694597[source]▶
What skillset and expereince do you have which is in demand? Just curious to know.
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11. scarface_74 ◴[15 Apr 25 23:15 UTC] No.43699555{3}[source]▶
I’ve found my biggest differentiator over the last decade was soft skills - writing, dealing with stakeholders, knowing how to talk to normies, being comfortable in the room with decision makers, being able to do effective presentations and project management skills.

And knowing how to “deal with ambiguity” and focus on how to add business value. If you look at the leveling guidelines of any tech company, anything above mid level is focused on “scope”, “impact” and “dealing with ambiguity”.

Knowing AWS really well is just a tool and it doesn’t hurt that I have a stint at AWS ProServe on my resume

Notice “codez real gud” is not a differentiator.

There is no hard skill you can learn that thousands of of others don’t know that will set you apart.

Well except for some vertical market stuff that will leave you pigeonholed.

Sources:

https://www.levels.fyi/blog/swe-level-framework.html

https://dropbox.tech/culture/sharing-our-engineering-career-...