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Comment by ryanSrich | Hacker News Reader

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ryanSrich

> Work / life balance

Disagree here for one specific type of startup...remote (which I know you mentioned).

Here's an example day at BigCorp:

- Rise and shine at 5am to work out early enough

- Leave the house by 7am

- 1+ hour commute into work

- Start work at 8am

- Stay until 8pm

- Get on/in the car, train, bus for a 1+ hour commute home

- Late dinner around 9pm

- Veg out because you're exhausted and go to bed by 11pm

Here's an example day at RemoteStartup:

- Rise at 7am to work out

- Make breakfast at 8am

- Standup at 8:30 while eating breakfast

- Work until 5pm

- Spend some family time and eat dinner until 8pm

- Work another 2 hours before bed around 10pm

The work life balance in scenario #2 is far and away more desirable to most people.

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Who the fuck works 12hr/day at bigcorp? I work at bigcorp and I think most people are probably working an average of 7 hr/day working generally any hours that have them in the office during core business hours

I know ~10 people that work at Google and 20+ that work at Amazon. I haven’t asked every single one, but the consensus is that around principle level your work days are pretty much always 12+ hours.

What an absolutely ridiculous strawman. Anyone can come up with lopsided scenarios to make one seem better than the other.

Here's an example day at BigCorp:

- Rise at 9am because standup isn't until 10am

- 10 minute commute since you're paid well enough to live near the office

- Arrive at work at 10am

- 1 hour lunch break at 12pm

- Leave work early at 4pm to miss the gym rush

- Get home by 6pm, enjoy the rest of the day until midnight

Versus RemoteCorp:

- Rise at 6am, immediately start working since you're online

- Work through lunch and eat your desk because you don't have a separate space

- Don't clock off at 5pm because you're always on. Keep checkin in on emails until 10-11pm

- Don't go outside at all because you never changed out of your pajamas. Sunlight seen: 0. People talked to: 0.

I definitely know which I prefer.

I don't see the argument here. Strawman or not, the case I made is fairly common (ask around). The case you made is not.

many of my friends have that schedule. It's kind of what you make it (and to an extent your team at BigCo). But definitely fairly common in my friends' cases.

You can have an unhealthy work life balance in any job, whether on site or remote.

Some of that is undoubtedly controlled by the job itself, but some is usually also controlled by you and the boundaries you choose to set for your job.

You're being downvoted, but I agree.

I worked at a BigCorp and it was one of the worst years of my life. The work/life balance was awful, and the pay was shit compared to the hours I put in and satisfaction I got out of the job. All other experiences I've had have been much more satisfying.

On top of this, people think BigCorp is a safe bet where a startup is not, but BigCorp lays people off in large swaths all the time because their stock price moves a millimeter in some random direction.

Can someone tell me what letter "BigCorp" starts with? I'm scared because I'm looking at a job at a big corp., but I was under the impression that I could leave the office at 5pm.

I've worked at Uber and Salesforce, and put in very normal hours at both. 8 hour days were standard for devs.

I was at AOL.

My team was acquhired as a "startup within a larger company!!1" which ended up meaning: lower pay, longer hours, no equity, no actual autonomy.

But I was young and foolish and, caving to peer pressure, decided against my better judgement to take the gig. After my 1 year cliff (and successfully launching the Editions app that they soon after shitcanned) I got the fuck out.

EDIT: keep in mind, my hours were a product of my specific team, and the fact that I was commuting from Santa Cruz to Palo Alto. It would have likely been a regular 9-5 on other teams, and I'm pretty sure most of the other people there had regular hours.

It all depends on the team you are on. When I worked at IBM I knew lots of people who were 8 to 4. My team was pretty much 60 hour weeks minimum. Though it was because of the asshole management I had.

I once got a dressing down from my director because I took a PTO day after working 20 days straight. I am so glad I don't work there anymore.

Most people work around 7-8 hrs/day at big corp. It is also possible to stay inside of 15 minutes from work (A lot of Boston, Seattle people I know do this)

I know some people who go back home for a quick lunch or disappear for an hour in between. Many of these companies only care about you getting your work done and being present for all the meetings.

Ofc, there are just as many where your case applies. But, it is certainly not the norm for FAANG-eque companies

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