Getting to senior shouldn’t be too difficult for any competent engineer.
And yet it is, by design. The big lie is that promotions are a meritocracy. In reality promotions are kept as scarce as they reasonably can be while keeping people from jumping ship. Not zero, but as low as feasible.
Also IDK where you worked but software industry layoffs have been around as long as the software industry. They’ve been higher the last several years than they were before, but there’s always a background level of layoffs in between the big waves, the latest of which seems to be cresting now.
A lot of startups are traps, but I’d agree that even the ones that aren’t traps / scams / obviously insane are pretty risky. I’ve joined 3 startups that had less than 5 employees and one of them was a trap that failed, which I learned from and would avoid today. The other two also failed, but for reasons that I don’t think I could have reasonably foreseen at the time of joining. I think they were pretty good ideas and good teams, they just failed for some of the many reasons that new businesses fail. Sometimes I think the risk is worth it, but it’s undeniably risky.
Also agree re: interviewing. It is astounding to me how bad we as an industry are at it, which I think is part of why we keep getting suckered by snake oil efficiency experts that claim to handle hiring for you. Like, if we really understood how to select for someone who would be a good engineering team member instead of someone good at interviewing (and/or worked to make sure those two domains overlap as much as possible), it would be obvious to all of us why these systems (which cost a shitload of money) make the process worse and make the outcomes worse, and then profit by how they made everything worse.
From the stats I’ve seen, the distribution is about:
SWE ~ 30%
Senior ~ 45%
Staff ~ 15%
Senior Staff < 5%
So the majority of employees are senior engineers with staff being achievable.
In terms of layoffs, the FANG companies really haven’t had any major cuts until after COVID. Although Amazon PIPs like 10% of their workforce every year or something.
The problem with interviewing is we haven’t found a better solution that’s scalable. I’ve got some idea for smaller companies but when you’re larger it’s a different challenge.
And yet it is, by design. The big lie is that promotions are a meritocracy. In reality promotions are kept as scarce as they reasonably can be while keeping people from jumping ship. Not zero, but as low as feasible.
Also IDK where you worked but software industry layoffs have been around as long as the software industry. They’ve been higher the last several years than they were before, but there’s always a background level of layoffs in between the big waves, the latest of which seems to be cresting now.
A lot of startups are traps, but I’d agree that even the ones that aren’t traps / scams / obviously insane are pretty risky. I’ve joined 3 startups that had less than 5 employees and one of them was a trap that failed, which I learned from and would avoid today. The other two also failed, but for reasons that I don’t think I could have reasonably foreseen at the time of joining. I think they were pretty good ideas and good teams, they just failed for some of the many reasons that new businesses fail. Sometimes I think the risk is worth it, but it’s undeniably risky.
Also agree re: interviewing. It is astounding to me how bad we as an industry are at it, which I think is part of why we keep getting suckered by snake oil efficiency experts that claim to handle hiring for you. Like, if we really understood how to select for someone who would be a good engineering team member instead of someone good at interviewing (and/or worked to make sure those two domains overlap as much as possible), it would be obvious to all of us why these systems (which cost a shitload of money) make the process worse and make the outcomes worse, and then profit by how they made everything worse.
From the stats I’ve seen, the distribution is about:
SWE ~ 30%
Senior ~ 45%
Staff ~ 15%
Senior Staff < 5%
So the majority of employees are senior engineers with staff being achievable.
In terms of layoffs, the FANG companies really haven’t had any major cuts until after COVID. Although Amazon PIPs like 10% of their workforce every year or something.
The problem with interviewing is we haven’t found a better solution that’s scalable. I’ve got some idea for smaller companies but when you’re larger it’s a different challenge.