To know what's normal would require a review of statistics, I think. I'll skip that and just give my opinion instead.
Anecdotally, I was laid of 2x in the last 2 years. Plus I resigned one year before the big rounds of tech layoffs started.
By the way, I'm objectively a highly talented engineer (largely within a niche). It's been almost 4 months between jobs now and this honestly is the worst I have felt in a long time.
Each of my 2 recent layoffs was because a decently funded but unprofitable startup faced extreme pressure. Which actually was maybe smart because those companies were not performing at those times. But it still sucked. I knew I was joining risky businesses. I bounced back from the first one pretty fast, to the second one.
I don't think going to a big co is necessarily any more stable than going to a small co, based on reading about the last couple years' layoffs.
So I think the thing to do is focus on doing something useful, important, and profitable with one's abilities, ideally building on the capability set one has been building up for a while already.
In big tech cycles, I this is expected to go on for a couple more years at least , then I imagine a gravy train will run for 6 or 7 years or so then, more of this, etc. It's episodic, I think. Early '90s bad, mid-late '90s awesome, 2001+ bad, then mid-2000's awesome, then 2009+ bad, then 2010's awesome, then 2022+ bad, etc.
Fundamentally, to be blunt, the problem with the last couple years (or longer?) is stupid companies doing stupid things. So that's not necessarily going to be too stable.
So I think it would be best overall to create or participate in efforts that are not stupid. That is harder said than done, but I think it is possible and worth doing. This is partially what keeps me optimistic.
Looking at other careers, they all have their pros and cons. But there are multiple decent ones.
Anecdotally, I was laid of 2x in the last 2 years. Plus I resigned one year before the big rounds of tech layoffs started.
By the way, I'm objectively a highly talented engineer (largely within a niche). It's been almost 4 months between jobs now and this honestly is the worst I have felt in a long time.
Each of my 2 recent layoffs was because a decently funded but unprofitable startup faced extreme pressure. Which actually was maybe smart because those companies were not performing at those times. But it still sucked. I knew I was joining risky businesses. I bounced back from the first one pretty fast, to the second one.
I don't think going to a big co is necessarily any more stable than going to a small co, based on reading about the last couple years' layoffs.
So I think the thing to do is focus on doing something useful, important, and profitable with one's abilities, ideally building on the capability set one has been building up for a while already.
In big tech cycles, I this is expected to go on for a couple more years at least , then I imagine a gravy train will run for 6 or 7 years or so then, more of this, etc. It's episodic, I think. Early '90s bad, mid-late '90s awesome, 2001+ bad, then mid-2000's awesome, then 2009+ bad, then 2010's awesome, then 2022+ bad, etc.
Fundamentally, to be blunt, the problem with the last couple years (or longer?) is stupid companies doing stupid things. So that's not necessarily going to be too stable.
So I think it would be best overall to create or participate in efforts that are not stupid. That is harder said than done, but I think it is possible and worth doing. This is partially what keeps me optimistic.
Looking at other careers, they all have their pros and cons. But there are multiple decent ones.