
AMD needs 1000 Developers with Linux Skills - Newky
http://career-resources.dice.com/articles/content/entry/amd_ramps_up_hiring_for
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bx_lr
Notice the following "AMD says it maintains a start-up mentality even though
it's a large company".

This is becoming a trend now, hardly the only company touting this. My current
company is doing the same. My old company approached me recently and told me
are going to start working in start-up mode in California, and this is an old
and rigid company.

I'm holding Paul Graham, Joel Spolsky and others accountable for this. They
have glamourized start-ups so much that these big and established companies
have started feeling bad about themselves. Or maybe they have finally realized
that big organizations and rigid processes don't work very well.

There are probably upsides to this. But the downsides are killing me.
Obviously for large company working in start-up mode means that engineers work
even harder, are more accountable and have to deliver to even more ridiculous
schedules. And the result is even more chaos and avoidance of work and
responsibility, more panic in QA, and so forth.

Personally I don't like this trend. If I want to work start-up hard, I will
join a start-up and potentially become rich in the process. Working in start-
up mode in a big company has so far meant that I work through weekends and
don't get paid for that.

~~~
Tautologistics
This is such an annoying new trend to claim one's company is in "startup mode"
when it is all just superficial or even straight out bullshit; it has become
quite the trend in NYC now.

One place I declined to work at claimed to be in startup mode yet their
offices looked like those of a financial company (which they were not),
everyone seriously dressed up, and the code base and infrastructure was pretty
big and inherited from the parent organization.

A place I used to work at is also going through the motions of "becoming a
startup" -- a company that has not been an internet startup for over 10 years.
Apparently being a startup means rewriting the whole codebase in Java,
offering free snacks and drinks, tearing down the walls from the cubicles (say
goodbye to ever getting "in the zone" when coding), and calling daily standups
and using JIRA "being AGILE". Sticking feathers in ones butt does not make one
a chicken...

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aphexairlines
What does jira have to do with it? It's just an issue tracker like any other.

~~~
Tautologistics
Nothing wrong with JIRA or Greenhopper but its use, by itself, does not make a
group "agile".

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hunterjrj
I do not work for AMD but am close friends with an AMD employee working in the
Markham (Toronto) office. They enjoy their position considerably, but complain
that the work-life balance isn't there. Just a note to those who are thinking
of applying, but who are also seeking that balance.

~~~
gst
As a European I always had the impression (from what I've read) that at most
US-based IT companies there's not really a work-life balance. I currently work
40 hours a week and get 5 weeks of holiday per year (+ public holidays +
sickdays) and that's already something where I think that the "life" part of
the work-life balance is somewhat low.

So home much time do you have for your "life" if you start at, e.g., at a
valley based company/startup?

~~~
aaronblohowiak
many valley startups expect six day workweeks and think that vacation is the
time you spend between jobs.

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ecaron
I wonder when this hiring is supposed to start, the jobs sure aren't on AMD's
site yet:
[http://www.linkup.com/results.php?c=Advanced%20Micro%20Devic...](http://www.linkup.com/results.php?c=Advanced%20Micro%20Devices%2C%20Inc)
(linking to my site instead of AMD's since our results are prettier than
[https://www.amd.apply2jobs.com/ProfExt/index.cfm?fuseaction=...](https://www.amd.apply2jobs.com/ProfExt/index.cfm?fuseaction=mExternal.searchJobs))

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callmeed
Interesting that they want to move into cloud & software products so
aggressively.

What large hardware companies have done similar moves successfully in the
past? (honest question)

~~~
icegreentea
Cisco is working pretty hard to get their enterprise stuff out there (though
really it's just part of a plan to drive more hardware sales).

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jswetnam
Beware of management employing 'impact' as a verb

~~~
dimitar
Well I guess HR dude probably told a lot more, but it was edited out. Its just
regular HR placeholder speech. He may have also been intentionally vague.

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hasenj
This is slightly off-topic but I hope they release decent Radeon drivers for
Linux. . My experience with their proprietary drivers wasn't very good. I
ended up switching to the open source driver, which (unfortunately) doesn't
support 3D very well.

