Tech Talent Is Flooding the Job Market

https://hbr.org/2022/11/tech-talent-is-flooding-the-job-market

by 727374 • 4 years ago

18 28 4 years ago

Lind5• 4 years ago

Software engineers looking for a job should consider the chip industry, which is not just about hardware engineers. Plenty of software engineer openings https://semiengineering.com/jobs/ and many are remote

anon501188105• 4 years ago

Are you speaking from experience? Almost all of the jobs at the page you linked are either not in the U.S. or require hardware education or experience. Most are not remote. Could you please describe the actual steps and timeline for, say, a frontend or backend web developer without an engineering degree to transition into one of those jobs?

amusedcyclist5• 4 years ago

Do you have strong CS fundamentals (generally acquired through university education) ? Because that stuff really matters if you want to work on stuff related to hardware

FrontierPsych2• 4 years ago

Software engineering in the chip industry always seemed like a completely and totally different thing to me. Knowledge of physics and nanoscale architecture and calculus and all kinds of stuff that I don't need to know just to create an online form on my webiste for people to fill out.

I don't know, maybe I have the wrong view, but it always seemed like that to me. I just do business software development because all it has is addition, subtraction, division, and muliplication, and percentages every once in a while. No way could I create a program for a hardcore physics app. Because you have to know physics. To some extent, anyways. Anything more than basic math, forget it. And I think most people at organizations like facebook, netflix, etc are more like me. Maybe I'm wrong, but that would be my bet.

claudiulodro• 4 years ago

No data to back up the headline? Anecdotally, sure there are a lot of layoffs, but what percentage of the total tech workforce is it? And how does the number of laid-off people compare to the number of existing open positions for devs?

According to this[1], there are 3.85mm tech jobs and 193,900 jobs added this year, so overall the industry grew. It reminds me of the people expecting house prices to fall 30% because interest rates went up a little -- there is still a ton of demand compared to the slightly increased supply on the market, so prices won't shift that much.

[1] https://www.computerworld.com/article/3542681/how-many-jobs-...

Ancalagon3• 4 years ago

Same question I had before: where are the numbers?

Seems like some companies are hoping to get great talent on the cheap (and pieces like this are trying to fan the flame of reduced employee costs), but I don't believe most of these layoffs affected large numbers of software engineers.

Would love for some numbers regarding this, but until I see stats on number of now-available software engineers I don't see any reason to believe this piece.

anon501188105• 4 years ago

The problem is downstream effects. If tons of employers pause hiring because they're hoping to get FAANG alumni for cheap, maybe because they read articles like this one, that will cause disruptions in the market. It may eventually work out but eventually can be a long time to people who really need a job.

Ancalagon3• 4 years ago

Pieces like this are trying to accomplish just that.

It's the whole "people think there's gonna be a recession, which causes a recession" thing all over again.

Although in this case tech talent is still a supply issue in the US. I don't think 10k (albeit exceptional) software engineers on the market will sway it when there are 4 million positions in total, and the market grew by 100k in the past year alone. Just my 2c.

TechBro86153• 4 years ago

For moral reasons, I don't want to hire someone who worked at Facebook. For business reasons, I don't want to hire someone who was one of the worst performers at Facebook.

I expect many of these candidates will be laughed out of the room during the negotiating stage for asking for $300k total comp. The good times are over!

sverona• 4 years ago

For moral reasons, I don't want to hire someone who worked at Facebook.

No ethical consumption, etc.

brundolf• 4 years ago

It's also giving these companies way too much credit to assume they managed to only lay off their worst performers

bergenty2• 4 years ago

I’m not sure why you’re celebrating that high paying jobs for workers are over.

TechBro86153• 4 years ago

Because they never really existed in the first place, except for at a few major corporations that basically monopolized the labor market and forced a choice between morality or high pay.

Meanwhile, the workers who took those jobs deluded themselves into thinking they deserved those salaries based purely on merit, and that their salary would keep increasing throughout their career.

amusedcyclist5• 4 years ago

lol people will be lining up to offer them jobs so I think they'll be just fine

Dirak• 4 years ago

That's a two way street. I equally wouldn't want to work with someone who makes sweeping generalizations.

For moral reasons, I don't want to hire someone who worked at Facebook.

That's quite a hostile and closed minded take, but an understandable cope for someone who could never hire a FAANG engineer in the first place.

cozos• 4 years ago

Agree. Sounds like a very biased hiring manager. And they seem to have fantasies about laughing prospective employees out of the room. Doesn't sound like a great place to work - doubt anybody good would be interested to work there in the first place.

FrontierPsych2• 4 years ago

I don't want to hire someone who was one of the worst performers at Facebook.

I get what you are saying, but the worst performer at Facebook is most likely going to be a MUCH better engineer/programmer than a mid-level or low-level technician at YOUR company. Maybe it is true that they don't measure up any more at Facebook, but they might not measure up by 1 or 2% so they got cut. But that is still WAY better than anyone at someone else's company. The workers that get cut are the "A-" GPA employees. The ones with a 4.0 stay.

What is going to happen is that the high-end "A-" employees at the "A" companies are pushed down to the "B" level companies, and the "B" level employees will now be pushed down to "C" level companies. And the "C" level people are going to be pushed out the door. The lowest level workers are going to have the toughest time overall and especially "C" level new hires most of all.

As the saying goes, shit flows downhill, and "C" level employees and new hires are always at the bottom of the totem pole.

Tech Talent Is Flooding the Job Market

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