Is Silicon Valley the new Millenial? Seems like every article for either category is about them killing off an industry or being responsible for some societal decline. I won't comment on millenials but for Silicon Valley it seems a little egregious. Maybe it's because the media heaped praise on SV for so long that now that the tide is turning they are going in entirely the opposite direction but I feel like there has been a major shift in the way people talk about startups, not all of it warranted. Yes, there are a ton of weird, cultish, shitty things about startups, but (at least in my experience) this isn't new and almost every industry has their weirdness or downsides. I think the problem is more that the media (and tech co's certainly didn't mind and contributed to this) overhyped everything tech and didn't look at some of the glaring downsides. I think it's been pretty apparent for a long time that unlimited vacations are bad for workers, that equity is usually a shitty deal for most people that take lower comp for it, and that having 20 year olds as CEOs of 100+ person companies will lead to some stupid decisions and awful management.
But what are the other options - go to NYC and work in corporate finance or consulting? Go to DC and work in government? Every industry has downsides, but after trying government work, working for big companies, etc. I still would take working extra hours and for slightly lower pay for a mission driven startup (with a mission I actually care about) any day. *caveat is that this is just for the U.S. - working in Europe has been much nicer and people in every industry, except for the hardest charging people I met at Goldman and McKinsey and the like have lives outside of work.
The things described in this article mostly stopped after ~2014-2015 in my experience. Few, if any, of my co-workers (mostly new grad to 5 YOE) stay past 7PM. Calling people ninjas is cringeworthy, and wizards even more so. When previous employer did "quirky" stuff like spend $100,000 on a chrome panda it was the stuff of ridicule not pride. Open offices are a naked cost-saving choice that companies try to justify.
Speaking from the perspective of a Silicon Valley millennial this article comes off like the "why hello hello kids" meme.
But what are the other options - go to NYC and work in corporate finance or consulting? Go to DC and work in government? Every industry has downsides, but after trying government work, working for big companies, etc. I still would take working extra hours and for slightly lower pay for a mission driven startup (with a mission I actually care about) any day. *caveat is that this is just for the U.S. - working in Europe has been much nicer and people in every industry, except for the hardest charging people I met at Goldman and McKinsey and the like have lives outside of work.