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Need more details to give you a more accurate feedback. How long you have been working/in the industry in general ? It seems like you have done a few things over the years but don't really seem to have stuck to something that made you a specialist or someone worth hiring. Being brutal here but making assumptions. Do you quit a lot ? Do you have any criminal records that you are not aware of ? Are you too opinionated or argumentative in interviews even before understanding more about the team/product/company etc ? Are you that person who "knows everything" ? Lot of factors could be causing you to lose out.

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I've quit a lot. I haven't lasted anywhere longer than 2 months. I contribute a lot and then quit after I feel like I'm not getting appropriate compensation. Though I certainly agree that I need to stick with a job. I think ageism, and other biases are in place though. More years of experience I get the less disdained I will be I think.

I don't think I'm a know it all. I'm only in my early 20s. I definitely have a lot to learn, and I'm receptive to new stuff.

This is 100% your problem. If I worked someplace for two months I wouldn't even put it on my resume. On the flip side of that if I got a resume with only a bunch of 2 month jobs on it I wouldn't likely interview you.

As other comments have mentioned you have to stick to something for a while. You didn't even finish school so you cant even say "At least I stuck with my degree". The way you read to me is that you will jump ship the moment you aren't liking something.

> I contribute a lot and then quit after I feel like I'm not getting appropriate compensation

Two things about this:

If you don't feel the compensation is appropriate you shouldn't take the job in the first place. If you've been somewhere for a while and been a high contributor then ask for a raise. Two months isn't nearly long enough to make that assessment.

Also you say you contribute "a lot" but I'm betting that it's not as much as you think. It probably only feels like a lot because you haven't ever stuck around anywhere long enough to see what "a lot" looks like. Hint: It's a marathon, not a sprint.

Seconding this. The advice I've always heard is that if you quit a job in under a year, it's a red flag. Generally you get one freebie where people will understand if you had to quit because of a bad fit or a toxic situation or whatever - though you'll probably have to talk about that in your interview - but if there's a pattern of it happening over time, that's a huge red flag.

If I were you I'd try and get one solid year of a job on my resume, to start with. You said you're worried about becoming homeless anyway- why would you quit a $15/hour job if you don't have anything else lined up? Unless it's just a really toxic/destructive situation, that seems like a mistake. Paying the bills for the time being and building up some solid work experience seem like aligned goals right now. The healthcare thing is unfortunate (it's unfortunate that anybody in our society has to be in that position), but I don't think quitting without another offer is going to help.

Best of luck.

Just chiming in to say, while this is mostly true, it is not always true.

I had a stint of about 2 years of job hopping every 3-6 months at the beginning of my career. Worked great for me every time.

The trick is to get the new job while you still are employed, not quitting and then looking for something new. Employed = attractive to other employers, but still a bit of a red flag. Unemployed = just a big red flag.

when you're working you can always toss it off as "exploring my options". I had a period of 4 years where I traded jobs every 1.5 years. This strategy works well if you're starting at a company with a low bar and are working towards a top firm. Companies don't usually question it as long as you are moving up with each switch.

Once you cross the 5-7 years of experience mark companies will start to ask the question more pointedly as 1.5 years roughly corresponds with a performance review cycle. We all know engineers who have failed upwards or outwards for years but are competent enough to pass an interview and personable enough not to be fired. Senior level positions also tend to involve multi-year commitments that the company needs to know you're onboard for.

Almost no company has the internal processes to adjust someone's compensation within two months. If you don't feel like your compensation at signing is appropriate, you need to figure it out then. Otherwise, your best shot is when the company's standard process is - end of year reviews, after one year at the job, whatever.

Also, at least in tech, almost no company will have made any serious attempt to evaluate your contributions after two months. It's assumed you're still figuring things out (both technical and social/political) and not making meaningful contributions until well past that point, and the nature of things you'll do even two years into a job are qualitatively different from those you're doing two months in (even if you are finding things that are valuable to do). So they don't have the data to re-evaluate you two months in, even if they had the process.

It is of course technically possible for someone sufficiently senior at the company (like, head of HR, C-suite, etc.) to override the standard process. But why should they do that for you? It's generally not in their interest, because it will endanger their own relationships with all the people under them implementing the standard process, even if it's the right decision, and they have no reason to be confident that it's the right decision.

I think that's something you need to figure out. What happened with the SVP/CISO phone calls that you mentioned in your post? What did you tell these people, whose job isn't recruiting candidates (there's a whole different department for that), to convince them to bypass the usual process and stick their own necks out and risk their own position to get you into the system? What did they say in return?

> I think ageism, and other biases are in place though. > I'm only in my early 20s

Do you mean ... ageism against young people? I think from what it sounds like your expectation of compensation might be a little inflated based on your experience. Straight out of university I took a junior grad job that paid peanuts, but stuck with it for about 2 years and that was a solid basis to move somewhere that was a much better work environment and paid better.

I think as another poster may have said, you probably just need to stick it out with something for a couple of years to get that solid basis. As you say, if you're in your early twenties you have plenty of time and it's just the start of your career!

I do some hiring for my company, and if I saw a resume with numerous <2 month positions it would be a red flag. Try lowering your expectations, find any position and stick with it. You can continue to apply for better roles while you have that job. Worst case you end up there for 6 + months which looks much better on a resume. Best of luck!

> more about the team/product/company etc ? Are you that person who "knows everything" ? Lot of factors could be causing you to lose out.

2 months each job? holy shnizzle nobody will hire you like that. Next gig you get better suck it up for 2 years. I don't care how you don't like it. 2 months is barely enough for a ramp up. Have the fortitude and tenacity to stay on something even if it sucks. Remember your parent's stories "back in the day i walked 10 miles to school barefooted blah blah blah". That's the equivaalent of staying 2-3 years in a job. Everyone knows a job sucks even at FAANG companies.

You know what your compensation is going to be when you get the job offer. You agree to that offer, then 2 months later you say "oh I contributed a lot so you need to pay me more"?

Why do you feel like if you do more they have to pay you more? You agreed to give an employer 40 hours of your time to perform the responsibilities the job requires in exchange for an agreed upon, fixed amount of money. That's what the agreement between you and the employer is.

If you have other expectations, you should negotiate them before accepting the offer. Don't like the offer? Don't accept it. Once you accept it though, stick to your word, don't change the terms 2 months in because you feel like it.

Corporations just don't think the way you seem to - you don't get rewarded for A+ grades. You get the same paycheck. That's the default for most people at your level.

Don't set yourself up for failure by going into a job thinking you'll do more and get more money. You won't at first, and definitely not within 2 months. Maybe after 2 years as a promotion, but that means you have to work at the same company in the same position for 2+ years.

You asked for brutal, so here is my take, with no sugar-coating.

I don't hire people to promote them in two months. If I thought they were going to be up for promotion that quickly I'd have hired them at the next level up to start with.

Similarly, how can you feel like you're not getting appropriate compensation when sixty days ago you agreed to that wage? Everyone contributes a lot, that's what they're paid to do. Most large orgs of the type you've listed have set promotion cycles and nothing you do short of buying the damn company is going to get you special consideration for that.

Also, ageism doesn't really work that way for lower-level jobs like you've described. People in tech are not afraid to hand responsibility to a young employee who has demonstrated responsibility. Related: you cannot possibly demonstrate responsibility in two months. Two months is essentially zero hours of tenure. I don't even consider an engineer fully onboarded before they've been here a year.

I think you need to focus on strategic thinking rather than ladder-climbing at your next job. Get a foot in the door and then start asking yourself how your contributions can align with the strategic goals of your org, then work along those directions. Keep your sense of entitlement tamped down, because most managers do not want to hear it, but pursue opportunities within the org as they come your way.

At this point you need to hold a job for at least five years just as damage control for your resume. By then I think you'll have a better sense of how to handle these places.

> I think ageism, and other biases are in place though.

I don't understand. Aren't tech jobs generally in favor of young people? I've heard ageism against old people, but not the other way around. I guess you're mistakenly associating people's negative reactions with your age?

There's definitely age-ism at both ends of the spectrum. Companies really love to hire starry-eyed juniors who will work overtime without asking for extra pay. They depend on their willingness to do this, and to 'prove themselves' because, well, they need to. It's very common for new engineers to fall for the sunk-cost fallacy of 'well I haven't been here long enough to quit yet, but I'm learning a lot and things are bound to get better'.

There's also a wealth of employeres who will hire people for below-market pay, and those are exactly the type of people who need to prove themselves and can't really afford to leave the job. It's kind of a catch-22, and hard to empathize with people in this situation once you've earned your stripes and feel you're past it.

The problem with OP is that they haven't been able to get the kind of job where they really respect your abilities. But they haven't gone through the grind to show prospective employers they're worth that.

I get it, that grind is really demoralizing, stressful, and stacked in favour of the employers. If you're actually capable of doing work that commands higher pay, but you don't have the network, the social skills, or the qualifications (including work history and references), I get why you'd feel jaded. I was in the same boat 6 years ago and still haven't fully shaken the mentality its left me with.

Anyway, just wanted to remind those of you who have distanced yourselves enough from that period of your lives, or who maybe skipped it altogether with recognition in the form of a degree or open-source contributions, that ageism definitely swings the other way as well.

> I haven't lasted anywhere longer than 2 months

You need to work somewhere, literally anywhere, for at least a year.

Hiring and on boarding is expensive, such that virtually no software companies are getting any ROI for someone who is there for two months or less. I get you may have had impact early on at these places, but I guarantee they all still lost money on you.

tldr; on paper you're a losing bet, build a history of being a winning bet and more companies will come around.

> I contribute a lot and then quit after I feel like I'm not getting appropriate compensation.

Compensation is a negotiation game, so go and learn to negotiate well. One key aspect is to understand the perspective of the other side. In this particular case, you would learn that giving pay raises "out of cycle" is a pain for all involved, and a manager doesn't want to discuss salary every time a report of his does something great.

If you want something, make it easier for others to give it to you.

Another thing is you may think you contribute a lot, but if you put in your 2 weeks and your boss does not try to keep you (counter offer or whatever) then they obviously don't think the same thing about you...

If you spend less than 2 months on the job before you put in your 2 weeks, no boss will try to keep you.

I once gave notice before the 2 month mark because I had a major life event change, boss was flexible and talked me out of it and I stayed there for several more years.

Sure, but you had a good justification.

> I haven't lasted anywhere longer than 2 months.

Friend, this here's the problem. Consider that a working environment _when it's going well_ is a mutually supporting cooperation of individuals to some basic end. Could be you're creating something new, could be you're maintaining something but, the big thing to understand is, you're doing it with other people and you're all relying on one another _to do your share_. Ageism, Southern accents (hidy, fellow Southerner) and other biases haven't got anything on this one problem: you quit. Two months in isn't anything, even if you are talented and, to be blunt about it, two months isn't enough time to develop anything but a surface level understanding of something. There's no way to look at a resume with a string of 2-month stints and think that you'll be around to _do your work_ and that'll impact the team.

Hell, a few years ago I did a very short stint -- something like six months -- at Unity, moved on to Dropbox with my team from Unity and then got fired from Dropbox within four months. At this point I had 15+ years in my career and when I was searching for jobs _everyone_ asked me to explain why I'd switched jobs so rapidly. It's just a big red flag, even if you're someone that has shown they'll come and do the work all the rest of your career.

> I contribute a lot...

This contradicts you working no more than two months. _You_ might feel like you contribute a lot but I would suggest that if you stuck out a job for a year and then considered what you'd got done in that year what you see as "a lot" now won't seem like much.

> and then quit after I feel like I'm not getting appropriate compensation.

Tell you what, in my heart of hearts I feel like everyone ought to make a living wage no matter how unstable of an employee they are and no matter how inflated their sense of their work is. But, in the US that's not the system we have. Your compensation is some function of the employer's sense of your worth derived from your past work history, what you negotiate for and a discounting based on your perceived risk to the employer. Someone that will not work for more than two months is a _very_ risky employee and will get a heavy discount on their compensation for the first year because of it, at least. You probably are getting appropriate compensation in this system of ours based on how unreliable you are.

It seems to me from what you've said here that you've dug yourself into a very deep hole. I don't know why you have done this, friend, but you have. If you're near homeless suggestions to do Bootcamps or finish schooling -- while _extremely_ valid, you should eventually do one of these things -- are probably too late in the game for you. I second recommendations to reach out to headhunters and land yourself any kind of gig and then stick with _whatever_ you get. Pay's going to be shit because you're a risky hire. Don't prove to be a risky hire. Keep doing good work, consistently. After a year, ask for a raise. See about finishing your schooling but DO NOT QUIT YOUR JOB. After a _few years_ start interviewing for another gig without quitting your job first. People are going to ask you about your resume of 2-month stints and you'll have to explain it as a thing you've grown out of, because if you get to this point you will have done.

Godspeed. My email's in my profile if any of this has struck a chord and you'd like to talk or what not.

Hey, just wanted to say that the tone of your comment is great. Supportive, but honest, and even though I'm very far from a US southerner (midwestern asian american), somehow very culturally relatable. I hope it strikes a chord with the OP as it did with me.

I appreciate that danans, thank you.

In addition to the other feedback, don't leave a job without another job lined up. Later in your career, once you're confident in your ability to get a job quickly, it's fine. Until then, don't leave until you have something to go to.

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