Ask HN: Why aren't you switching jobs?

  • Because it's not only a matter of salary, you have to put "all in the balance" when considering a potential move. Personally, I was giving a lot of value to the mobility within the company.

    I started as a computer scientist in a bank and became a trader a couple of years later.

    Outside of my company, it would not have been possible because I didn't study finance.

  • I can work fully remote, no bullshit meetings ever. 1 or 2 phone calls a week (15-45min), otherwise I can work on with no interruptions.

    Pretty hard to do better I guess

  • In order of importance:

    1. Sizeable retention package at 1 year of employment.

    2. My job is very undemanding at the moment and I get to learn a bunch of things in my spare time.

    3. The optics of leaving after a short period of time.

    4. Difficulties around finding a new job due to covid-19 and/or having to work fully remotely for a new company.

    So I'm hanging around until the 1-year mark and doing my best to level up my skills as much as possible in the meantime.

  • Short answer: Because I need to grind more leetcode.

    Longer answer: I like my team and manager, although not my company and org (non-tech company), and the work has become very unchallenging.

    But if I make a change, I want it to be to a company that will give me a significant benefit in terms of some combo of compensation, work, culture, and prestige. If I'm only going to get a 10%-20% raise but end up with a bad team or manager, I don't feel it's worth it.

    ...hence, I need to grind more leetcode, because all of the companies I feel worth jumping to are heavily gatekeeped by leetcode interviews.

  • * Already made a lot of jumps in the past 5 years -- don't want to get pigeonholed as a jumper or mercenary or "hard to work with"; I've already gotten the 20% raises by jumping a few times, time to chill

    * Apropos of the above, current salary and bennies are decent, bonus potential is great; no reason to rock the boat now

    * Work teams are a mess at times but are tolerable enough. Being 100% remote at this point is cool. Better the devil you know, etc.

    * Looking to buy a house and have a kid/kids soon, would rather focus on home life for now before creating additional wrinkles

    * Been using a lot of different technologies over the past 5-7 years, "jack-of-all" but no mastery. I'd like to specialize a little more and go deep into a stack/language/skill-set. Easier to be at one place and focus on getting fluency and skill then throwing more complications into things.

  • I don't think this is true forever. I've doubled my salary in my first five years in my career through job changes, but I don't think I can do it again. I guess I have one more 20k jump (if I'm lucky) and then I will have maxed out the salary for my position and market.

  • 45 days PTO (in the US)

  • Covid, childcare issues

    Actually Covid may make working remotely more acceptable, so may lead to more options, if the economy does not prevent it.

  • Based on your argument — taking it to an absurd extreme — you’d never stay in a job and be perpetually changing.

  • I like my boss, team and company culture. I also care about their end product (am a consumer myself) and have a lot of say in the technical direction of the company at large.

    I am likely making 1/2 of what I could be making if I moved to a FAANG and I am pretty OK with it. Is still plenty to live and save well.

  • Because I can't.

    There aren't a ton of open positions in my area right now.

    I've been in obscure/obsolete tech for too long (neoxam and filenet).

    I have a family to support, so I need the pay and benefits.

    Otherwise, I would probably leave tech for something like construction. I'm tired of the unrealistic expectations.

  • Because I've been in my career for 20 years and am in a good place. I have moved jobs, a lot.

    What I wish I knew back then was that being "staff" could (and likely should) be carried over to the next company.

  • I really like my boss, if the trade is a known great manager v rolling the dice plus more money, I’ll pick the manager. I haven’t always felt this way, but I value it now.

  • With all the uncertainty of COVID, it seems worth sticking around at BigCo for a while longer.

  • My salary has doubled in the last 4 years at my Big tech job through raises/promotions.