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Comment by darknavi | Hacker News Reader

As a low-ish level MSFT employee I laughed at this line:

> The move promises to bring Amazon’s base pay more in line with other big tech companies, including Google, Facebook, Apple and Microsoft.

As a ~62/63 (almost senior or senior) at Microsoft my peers at Facebook, Google, and Amazon can easily make literally twice as much compensation a year in salary, stock, and cash bonuses.

Microsoft isn't even in the ballpark. If I didn't absolutely love my job there would be zero reason to stay at Microsoft.

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I always thought about MSFT as like working for the government: A somewhat boring, stable, 9-5, predictable workplace, but you're exchanging that for lower total compensation. But you can stay there for an actual career, family and all that.

Whereas the more "fun" companies like Google/Facebook/Amazon will chew you up and spit you out, and you just have to make as much money as possible in your 20s/early 30s before you burn out.

This could be a slightly unfair stereotyping of these companies, but from the people I've spoken to it rings true.

> I always thought about MSFT as like working for the government: A somewhat boring, stable, 9-5, predictable workplace

That obviously wasn't true in the 90s (see the famous Microserfs book), but might be true today, so I would argue against the "always" for those of us around then.

To be clear: working at Microsoft is a hell of a lot better than working in government. You're generally fulfilled creatively and paid extremely well - at least in comparison to everywhere but the very top paying tech firms.

What the commenter is saying is true though, Microsoft is a place where you can have an actual career and great work-life balance. It's been that way for at least a decade now.

I can't really judge that, I mean, I've worked for Microsoft but not the government. Just that...the "work-life balance" thing wasn't anywhere near the stereotype when I was school in the 90s (but I did not work for them then either).

One thing I liked when I was there, which was wow, 15 years ago, now... everyone[1] got their own closed-door office. It was a lot more like academia or how I might envision a Japanese corporation.

[1] Depending on your department and logistics, the definition of 'everyone' occasionally varied.

You can stay at Google or Facebook forever, it's just a matter of finding yourself on the right teams with the right work-life balance. If you chase the most exciting projects at any company, it's a recipe for burn out because you'll be working a lot more than you would be on a "necessary, stable, boring" project/system.

I agree! I have not had the opportunity to work at Google or Facebook but at my current job I always take up forsaken projects as that usually has a lot of up potential and very less down potential. Everybody wants to work on the shining new tech but no one wants to work on that maintenance project which is actually is creating those new tech opportunities in the first place.

That hasn't been my experience at Google. I feel like the work life balance is pretty good, and I typically work under 45hr/wk.

Google has pretty good work/life balance - it's much more of a "lifestyle" company now than Apple/Facebook/Amazon. I get the sense Netflix is heading in that direction as well.

You're still working on pretty complex codebases and tough technical problems though, so while you usually do not need to pull extra hours outside of business, you really do need to concentrate intently while working.

64 here. I do occasionally dream about going elsewhere for beaucoup bucks (not that I'm complaining about my TC), but also, I do really love what I do, who I work with/for, etc. So I acknowledge the trade-off I'm making -- good W/L balance, very low stress, but not as much money as as my principal engineer friend @ Amazon makes.

I was a 63 being considered for 64 during my time at Microsoft. I loved it. Great W/L balance. Interesting work. Great coworkers. Was really looking to make that a long term gig.

But my org got disbanded, and I got rolled into Mobile (circa 2008/2009 when Ballmer was using the economic conditions as an excuse to shutdown orgs). I was there building the first Windows phone. I hated that org. It was all schedule chicken and politics (you could have an iPhone, but you couldn't use it during meetings in front of GM or higher). I had code reviews rejected for "You aren't going to need that". I'd point them at what was coming in the next cycle and got lectured about "you should be focused on your current tasks not future tasks" in writing. But in person (i.e. no written record), I was told to write the code how the reviewer wanted (a 64 or 65 as I recall) and just keep the changes stashed for when the real work showed up. I hated working that way. So I got blackballed for a shitty attitude (and rightfully so. My attitude was shit).

With that said, I'm still friends with some people at Microsoft. And they love it. Just gotta find the right org (just like Amazon, Google, etc.)

Not really sure 65 = L7. Probably something closer to 66/67 is a better match for Amazon L7/PE. Apples to oranges comparison of compensation.

Source: Done both AWS L8 and MSFT Partner roles. Have hired and led teams with Principal+ in both places.

Don’t Microsoft have a weird strategy where they’re willing to match pay at peer companies but only if you have a competing offer (either as a candidate or existing employee), which means you’re encouraged to look around and see what else is out there if you want to be paid fairly? And you need to repeat of course because Microsoft won’t increase pay at a comparable rate.

Their offer matched my FAANG comp for a 63/64 position without hesitation. Maybe that's a recent change? I hear all the time on HN that Microsoft has lower salaries compared to other big corps, but it doesn't match my experience.

Is Microsoft a really cozy place to work? Shopify in Canada is similar with weak comp, but it is considered a great place to work.

Most teams at Microsoft these days have great work-life balance. Just stay away from the hardcore teams like core Windows development teams, compilers, Xbox.. The company will support you in any personal goals you have, you'll be able to find internal clubs for just about anything, and at least pre-pandemic, lecturers were frequently invited to campus to give talks on a huge range of topics that anybody could sign up to attend.

Personal opinion:

Not a spokesperson, but anecdotally, I’m part of a core Windows Development team and there is a healthy respect for work-life balance. Both immediate level and upper-level management regularly emphasizes the need for that.

It’s been quite a nice change from previous employers.

FYI, i work at MS (on a compiler team). The work-life balance is fantastic. I'm not sure where you got the idea that that isn't so. Thanks! :)

Compiler dev at MSFT. As others said, W/L balance is an actual thing at MSFT but your pay will depend on whether you are coming fresh into MSFT or have been there a while. In the latter case, you are probably being underpaid 2x but in the former case, you pay can be very competitive.

Considering Google/Facebook your “peers” is a common mistake people at MSFT make when they complain about comp. MSFT targets 67 percentile pay (which is actually above median, contrary to what everyone says), while GOOG/FB target > 95. They may be your competitors, but they are certainly not your peers (at least market-wise). Microsoft has managed to have great business results with 67 percentile SWE talent for a decade.

Google's official stance is they target 75 percentile pay, not > 95. So not too far off from MS. My guess is they use different peer companies.

Hmm I can't find the source but I thought Google targets the 85th percentile not 75 or 95.

But then again the market data that Google uses isn't public (and certainly isn't levels.fyi) so there could be discrepancies.

Well at least the confusion about what Google's target market percentile is isn't just limited to Google (all three of these comments are incorrect, the first one is the most correct, and 3-4 years ago it was more correct than it is now w.r.t. Google, and its correct in that FB targets a higher range than Google does).

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