
How the Other Half Works: an Adventure in the Low Status of Software Engineers - greenyoda
https://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2014/07/13/how-the-other-half-works-an-adventure-in-the-low-status-of-software-engineers/
======
x0x0
This is bloody depressing to read, and rings true in my experience.

One of my pet peeves is relocation costs. Companies in nyc try to hire me at
least every six months, particularly since I used to live there. You can tell
who is an asshole by asking about relo packages. If they start at $5k my
wanker detector goes off. Assholes offer maybe up to $10k, often as a hiring
bonus, so it's taxed; maybe $6k might land in my checking account. That's a
joke for a mid-30s data scientist. A trip to nyc for me plus partner to shop
for apartments alone is $2.5k (2 airline tickets, taxis, meals, boarding a
dog, 3 nights in manhattan hotels). Then the costs of apartment rental, job
search for partner, winding down an apartment lease here, selling a car, and
moving a grown up apartment -- ie I own a real bed and dressers and a couch
and a table -- across the country. A relocation would cost me on the order of
$15-$20k after taxes.

Yet ceos whine endlessly about the lack of good employees. You never see them
in a bwm dealership bitching they won't sell a 5-series for $30k though.

~~~
yuhong
Michaelochurch has another blog post about exactly this.

~~~
greenyoda
It's called "Never relocate unpaid", and I posted it on HN a few days ago:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8003073](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8003073)

------
incision
As I move further and further beyond 30 I encounter the assumption or at least
question as to whether I am or am aiming to be a manager more and more often.

I've actually been thinking about whether I should try and remake myself in
the same way for the same sort of reasons related.

For instance, bits like this...

 _> '...praise for doing things that would just have been doing his job if he
were a managed person.'_

...and...

 _> 'It’s far better, unless you’re applying for a junior position, to start
at 70 and get credit for everything you do know, than to start at 90 (or even
100) and get debited for the things you don’t know.'_

Read as pure truth in my experience.

Coming off a period where my final title was 'Program Manager' my technical
credentials seemed to be treated as gospel and an incredible bonus. Later,
with a purely technical 'Engineer' title and no less responsibility those same
credentials are heavily scrutinized and interviewers seem puzzled by an
inability to fully categorize my experience.

I've come to think there's a lot to be said for and gained by properly
managing titles / signals of status and managing the sort of interactions that
are easy to dismiss or deride as 'playing the game'.

------
badman_ting
> Instead of being a programmer auditioning to sling code, he was already
> “part of the club” (management) and just engaging in a two-way discussion,
> as equals, on whether he was going to join that particular section of the
> club.

Hmm! The latter is typically how I approach interviews (I'm a developer). I
feel that if that's not the case then why am I here? Sometimes you get people
that are smart in a dumb way, like the last interview in the story here. Just
looking to be intellectually dominant, the "winner". But you just have to
recognize those situations for what they are and not get discouraged.
Developers are in demand, we get to act like it. And sometimes people get
treated like shit because they allow it to happen.

------
dwd
Most programmers seem to avoid conflict at all costs, which is a bad trait in
a corporate environment. But you can minimise the discomfort by standing your
ground at the right times.

The best time is when accepting the employment offer and not signing anything
that will put you in a position of having to stand your ground against shitty
conditions later. Things like non-compete clauses (and relinquishing all IP
rights), no side projects (because you have to be 110% for the job) or
mandatory overtime with inadequate or no compensation shouldn't be accepted
as-is.

Otherwise you will have zero status because you signed it away at the start.

~~~
PeterisP
Conflict avoidance is pretty much always a losing strategy and a very bad
habit. It makes you less efficient in a company (as flawed decisions aren't
challenged until to late), but more importantly, it makes you vulnerable and
ensures that you often get unreasonably bad deals.

It can be fixed, as almost everything else, it's a trainable skill/habit.

~~~
dwd
It's a better skill to be teaching our children than simple conformity to
authority that seems to be core to school curriculum.

------
webmaven
A fascinating analysis. Anecdotal, of course, as a controlled double-blind
test is hard to do for in-person interviews on behalf of a single person, but
this presents some interesting possibilities for further research, along the
lines of these:

[http://www.nber.org/digest/sep03/w9873.html](http://www.nber.org/digest/sep03/w9873.html)
[http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2012/09/14/1211286109#aff-...](http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2012/09/14/1211286109#aff-1)
[http://mpra.ub.uni-
muenchen.de/49392/2/MPRA_paper_49392.pdf](http://mpra.ub.uni-
muenchen.de/49392/2/MPRA_paper_49392.pdf)

