People are always like "ask these questions to know about the job you're applying to, and if you're seeing red flags, you're dodging a bullet!" And that's great when you've got choice and are an empowered employee that has a few options, while a lot of the time you just need something.
I believe tech has been through the peaks and troughs. In the aftermath of the 2009 financial crash when every employee lost leverage, tech seemed to emerge as an industry that was rebounding well. Startups were beginning to pop up, people were doing their own thing and then shopping around for people to pick them up for their brains, portfolios and potential. Bootcamps and DIY were opening up the industry to people without formal training, and the big companies wanted them. Tech was gaining a great reputation as a workplace, they had campuses, perks, recreation at the office, their employees could dress casually and working at a giant corporation like Google or Facebook felt like breaking out of the rigidity placed upon banks and such. Their workers were high paid, and when they left or moved, other software companies were eager to have them. Tech workers probably achieved the highest leverage we've had in decades in 2020, when the pandemic make technologists moneymaking machines for companies. Everything tech-related raked in the dollars. Netflix, Amazon, Google services, Facebooks and social media companies, Zoom (my god, zoom BENEFITED). And for the first time, tech workers started talking about structuring their work life.
Tech unions were discussed for the first time. For years, white collar workers, and especially those in tech were convinced (by these corporations) that they were too good for unions. You work for love! Passion! A wish to improve the world! You're too good for a union that limits your passion project (job) down to decent hours. That's what stiff-collared office jobs do. Don't be silly. What happens if something breaks at Google HQ in the night? What happens if we're hacked! You're our rockstar developer, we need you at 2 AM! We're global and if something fucks up in Indonesia, who can we count on to fix it but you, our brilliant director of code in western California, USA? Don't let unions reduce your job to... a job. You're more than that.
Well. The 2 AM calls came during the pandemic. And a lot of people realised two things: 1. These companies would crumble without them 2. Your family isn't invincible. Your kids grow up, in your own house outside your home office, and you'll never know. Your grandparents and parents will have health scares, and you'll be on an office Teams call. People watched loved ones die during the pandemic. Many thought about the mythical "work-life balance" for the first time in a long time, and no, not in the sense of your tech 'campus' having a jungle gym or a table tennis room. Actual work-life balance. French work-life balance. The 'not contactable after stipulated hours' kind. The 'going on holiday' kind. The 'kid's recital is more important than taking a Saturday morning call' kind. Oh, and also the pay. Someone you rely on that much should make more. Your interns should be able to pay their rent. Fuck you.
The tech industry freaked. Two things happened in conjunction. In 2021, when countries first trialled ending lockdowns and allowed in-person activities to happen, people participated in in-person activities. In 2022, when the cinemas opened, people got together with friends to watch movies in halls. They went to concerts rather than attend a Fortnite or Roblox concert or whatever. They went out to dine rather than Uber Eats in. They met for coffee and pilates in person rather than on Zoom.
Netflix's predicted that since stocks had gone up in 2020 Q2 and then gone further up in 2020 Q3 and then skyrocketed in 2020 Q4, surely this just meant that 2021 was gonna stonk the fuck up? More Facebook users than ever? More hours logged on Reddit? Fortnight 17 hours a day? More Zoom subscriptions than ever before?
Wrong! And they probably knew that! But growth did not keep pace with 2020. But when have companies not been good at inventing crises to attach a fall guy to and burn some dead wood?
Tech companies were not happy with all this talk of tech workers demanding human working conditions. The game dev industry was irked. What do you mean people don't want to work 24 hour stints. What do you mean "don't set unrealistic deadlines we all know will fail". That's outrageous. If you can't stand the heat, get out of my kitchen. You know, the one where you cook for my customers and make me money and I don't pay you enough.
It was a convenient excuse to point to "falling" rates of growth. (RATES of growth. They were worried they weren't growing fast enough. THEY WERE GROWING. Just NOT FAST ENOUGH. Pay attention to language.) They laid off large swathes of staff between 2021 and 22. Not really for money reasons. Just to put the fear of god back into tech workers. You have no stability. What makes you think you can demand competitive hours? Again, it's about creating artificial scarcity.
I was in my final year in 2023. What a brilliant time to be close to graduating. 2023 was the first year I saw the new grad job pipeline dry UP. NO jobs posted. New grad pages on company websites saying "we usually open postings in September" bitch where is it.
It's been delayed because the budget is uncertain. Check back in January. Check back in May. We're on a hiring freeze. We only really want a handful of really senior staff. We've no room for new grads. We're just bringing back some of our past interns as full times, there are no real full-time roles, if you see any I advise you not to waste your time applying to them because we're just posting them as we're legally required to, to say people aren't being frozen out. Someone with an inside connection got the job. The guy we hired wasn't even actually a new grad, we just need someone who can do the job quickly because sales are down. He has 4 years of experience. Yes, he's taken a pay cut. The job market is tough right now. I know, it's hard to expect a new grad to compete with him for a new grad role. Keep trying, it's not your fault, just... job market's tough.
Companies are posting record growth in 2024! Companies are in hiring freeze! There have never been so many jobs posted to LinkedIn! There have never been so many applicants to jobs posted to LinkedIn! Posted 4 hours ago, received over a 100 applications. They're using AI to auto-send their applications. Hiring managers don't read applications anymore. They humanly can't. They're screening with AI. Everyone's resumes are going straight into the bin. They're ghost jobs. We need to post them to show our investors we're growing. There are massive layoffs coming. I have 10 goddamn years of experience! I should be way, way more senior right now.
Tech workers were systematically stripped of all leverage because they dared to think about unionising. No one unionised. It was merely a conceptual idea discussed in the tones of "we should get to see our family more often". This is not a cautionary tale, people should be angry as hell that in a time when company growth could not be higher, jobs are more uncertain and people are forced to ignore red flags and horrible jobs just to pay their rent.
Housemate and I were talking about toxic workplaces - "I didn't know yelling at coworkers was a thing in the modern day!" It isn't, housemate tells me. It shouldn't be. You've got to move. Coworkers can't be yelling at you, who the fuck are they? But I know my boss didn't like me from the day he interviewed me. I clocked a lot of red flags in my first week. What was I to do? The job wasn't even in my wheelhouse, it's just that tech workers are expected to be versatile enough to switch streams entirely. But you take what you can get. People aren't missing red flags, they're just weighing up whether they're ignorable enough to take the money and go home at the end of the day or if they're unbearable. I didn't contest losing my job at the end of the day, because I know with the kind of fighter I am, I wouldn't have quit until I had a job in hand. But my place was a unique psychological game of chess, and I am glad to have left because it would've driven me CRAZY to have to cover my tracks for every single thing I ever do there. It's a blessing I was let go. I hope I find something better, but I also know that anything I find will be better than this. Fuck them.
