incognito_limey

This really hits home.

I work at a recently IPO'ed unicorn that is doing extremely well and can confirm that in the early days (sub 100 employees when I started) we were more concerned with people who could ship software/solve real problems and had data/experience to confirm this. Now that we are public and growing, it's all leet code style questions to get hired, and I can say first hand that the velocity of development, as well as innovation has dropped off a cliff.

It's to the point that I've stated to leadership that I would fail the interview for the job I've been a top performer in for the past 5 years as the interview format doesn't actually focus on real world skills, but memorising algos.

We've essentially imported this culture into what was once, one of the most dynamic companies I had ever seen. It's awful and I can't wait to leave. Most of the older timers are already going for similar reasons.

More of a rant then a comment I guess, but I just really related to your experience.

I'll just leave this here:

https://twitter.com/lizthegrey/status/1464109933390036996

I currently work in a unicorn which recently IPOed and can confirm that I have the same experience as the author of this article.

I also had a very similiar experience at my previous employer which was also a valley based company which IPOed.

I have multiple colleagues who are in the same boat, both current and former, and while I realize this data is anecdotal, from my perspective, work culture in the valley is just plain broken.

People are not robots, they need time to rest and adjust.

This also reflects how broken hiring is in tech. Leetcode and algorithm memorisation has very little to do with being a "good" developer. Can you communicate your ideas well? Can you understand and follow up when requirements are not clear? Are you able to work with others well? This last point in particular is where I find a lot of candidates fall down. They maybe able to invert a binary tree, but if they have to have an actual conversation with say an end user to help resolve/understand a problem, many of them can't.

So I guess pay as you go is too expensive for your org? Be curious to understand why you feel it's too expensive when it completely extrapolates any kafka management.

What a beautiful soul.

We should all be so lucky to be remembered this way.

I didn't know the man, but very grateful for DirectX and all the amazing experiences it's allowed myself and others to have. For many of us, games are an escape from things that are not so pleasant. As a kid/young man, they definitely got me through some tough times.

I can still remember playing Pitfall on Windows 95 like it was yesterday, due to DirectX.

Thanks Mr. Engstrom, for being one of the crazy ones.

As someone who is in another high growth start up, one of the fastest in the world (not hyperbole) I wish I could upvote this specific comment more: "The problem with growing as fast as Amazon has is that their talent bar couldn’t keep up. I can’t imagine this design being okay 10 years ago when I was there."

I came to the realization about a year ago, that there are definitely talent tiers and unless you are working super hard at recruiting and paying top dollar, the cliff edge approaches fast and is very very steep.

Because I've experienced a lot of number fiddling to describe total comp. For example we offer you X equity at Y valuation, when the valuation is something they have made up internally etc. I want to know how much cash in hand I can expect. Also, offering private health insurance, when you live in a country with a decent public health care system is not much of benefit and generally not worth what the company says its worth. If it was the US, I could see how that would be valuable, but in most of Europe, it is not.

I think an additional piece to this, is to tell candidates what level they are interviewing for and the possible salary ranges, not total package, but actual base salary ranges.

I just went through an interview process with AWS that wasted a lot of time for both sides due to them not being up front about the potential package. I had to push a fair bit to get any info, and finally had to politely tell them if the it's less the X I don't think it makes sense to move forward.

Edit: -----

Additionally, they were unable to explain how after two interviews, what an additional 7 interviews in an onsite capacity would add/build on top of the first two.

It felt like they were just putting me through a gauntlet without really understanding why.

It saves both sides effort if you can make sure you are in general alignment before going too far into the process.

What makes it difficult to look after? Genuinely curious. I've run it in production for years and its been pretty solid.

Not sure I understand the "large" comment. Painful to configure.. have you looked at CP-Ansible: https://github.com/confluentinc/cp-ansible

High Latency: Kafka's latency depends on your configuration and infrastructure. It has some of the lowest latency out there when configured correctly.

Curios to know why you find it difficult to look after? It's super stable, and is pretty easy to monitor via JMX.

Why is (no, kafka is never the answer)?

Myself and the Mrs. took free cycling lessons from the council a few years back with the idea we wanted to start cycling to work etc more. We decided it was too risky due to the terrible traffic. As a regular pedestrian, I've almost been run over multiple times in the last few years. I think the city really needs to look at banning non delivery vehicles from zones 1 and 2, or something to that effect.

I realise this anecdotal, but as a Londoner living in Zone2, I can actually see and feel the difference in air quality. The skyline is far clearer on average, and I definitely notice myself breathing easier, and I do not have asthma or any other respiratory or even allergy issues.

Thanks for the info. I recently discovered this by running folding at home on my 16inch pro overnight, and waking up to my battery being at 5%. I suspect running the CPU full bore over night was too much for the charger to keep up with.

It's not deliveroo.

Thank you for the incredibly insightful comment. It's given me a lot to think about.

This is what I aspire to. Thanks for showing this is possible!

It's something that I've been thinking about a lot lately, especially after reading "A company of one". That it's possible to make a good living with friends and not be the next X or Y hypergrowth company.

For some context, I am currently working for one of the hottest startups in the world (not hyperbole, we have the metrics to back it up), and I have been here long enough to remember when we could all fit in a small room.

The first 2 years were a dream, this last year has been pretty terrible, and coincidently, is when we started our crazy rapid growth.

It went from a place where you felt like you were working with your friends, and could have great conversations/humour and learn, to politics, arguments, poorly defined scopes on projects, process for the sake of process, or no process at all, but not knowing whom to ask, and not being empowered enough to sort it out yourself.

I realized, and I think I kind of knew this previously, that my happiest work was when I was working with a small team of smart people who could relate to each other. Basically, going to work with my friends.

I think after the IPO, it will be time to leave and find/start something similar to what you are doing.