Honestly I think part of the problem is that we are telling ourselves repeatedly how good we have it and self censoring the problems.
"try working in a call center" says someone below in this thread in an effort to belittle concerns.
"They just raised time off from 15 days a year for the new hires isn't that great! Besides its not googly to complain" says the Google employee.
"Yeah it is an evil megacorp but the pay and conditions are amazing." Says the FB employee trying to demonstrate how they have the best job I'm the world while the social status of the job falls due to scandals.
There's a bit of a need among people in tech to highlight success. "I was bullied in school but look at my job! Isn't my job amazing!". They'll say this and defend it to death even if it's not quite true. They'll even attack others who ask "but are you really enjoying it or just letting yourself be worked to death for a small perceived boost in social status your job may bring?"
And don't get me wrong the pay here is good. But the work life balance is amongst the worst in all jobs I've ever held. By far. If I'm being honest im just holding out for as long as I mentally can to get a nice financial boost in life then I'm getting the fuck out of here. The free food and onsite gyms feels like a cynical ploy to get you back to the desks sooner and to keep you there before breakfast and after tea. Even second world countries will have more time off per year available and they'll have that for much lower stress jobs.
I think we've all got to be honest with ourselves here. I met a friend who works 9 days a fortnight in a different industry. "Yeah we get free food high pay and good benefits too. I really like spending 5 days in a row with family every two weeks too!".
I sometimes forget that we're waaay past the golden age where the big tech companies were growing so fast and were unique. The benefits in the industry are becoming somewhat of a norm in any big corporate environment in any industry. But the whip cracking performance management honed by tech company metrics isn't a norm.
If you find yourself exhausted day after day and miserable while your explaining to friends and family that you have a special unique job with soo many benefits realize that you've been manipulated. You're doing the thing we nerds do where we want to show how successful we are but in reality we're leaving ourselves wide open to exploitation as we fight to maintain the illusion to others. No one in other industries works like I've seen tech workers in silicon valley work. It's not normal and not healthy. The pay is high but the cost is higher.
Sounds like your experience is very different than mine. Do you work at faang, maybe Amazon?
I feel my work life balance is absurdly nice, I’ve actually worked in a call center, I could go on… but my theory is that when I am feeling mini-burnout, it’s (well, (a) legit need to better attend to other pets of my life, and counteract being a homebody from Covid… but also)
.. but also one factor is when I worked for a call center, I knew I could do better. Now that I’ve ‘made it’—relative to my old position-it’s like, now what?
"try working in a call center" says someone below in this thread in an effort to belittle concerns.
"They just raised time off from 15 days a year for the new hires isn't that great! Besides its not googly to complain" says the Google employee.
"Yeah it is an evil megacorp but the pay and conditions are amazing." Says the FB employee trying to demonstrate how they have the best job I'm the world while the social status of the job falls due to scandals.
There's a bit of a need among people in tech to highlight success. "I was bullied in school but look at my job! Isn't my job amazing!". They'll say this and defend it to death even if it's not quite true. They'll even attack others who ask "but are you really enjoying it or just letting yourself be worked to death for a small perceived boost in social status your job may bring?"
And don't get me wrong the pay here is good. But the work life balance is amongst the worst in all jobs I've ever held. By far. If I'm being honest im just holding out for as long as I mentally can to get a nice financial boost in life then I'm getting the fuck out of here. The free food and onsite gyms feels like a cynical ploy to get you back to the desks sooner and to keep you there before breakfast and after tea. Even second world countries will have more time off per year available and they'll have that for much lower stress jobs.
I think we've all got to be honest with ourselves here. I met a friend who works 9 days a fortnight in a different industry. "Yeah we get free food high pay and good benefits too. I really like spending 5 days in a row with family every two weeks too!".
I sometimes forget that we're waaay past the golden age where the big tech companies were growing so fast and were unique. The benefits in the industry are becoming somewhat of a norm in any big corporate environment in any industry. But the whip cracking performance management honed by tech company metrics isn't a norm.
If you find yourself exhausted day after day and miserable while your explaining to friends and family that you have a special unique job with soo many benefits realize that you've been manipulated. You're doing the thing we nerds do where we want to show how successful we are but in reality we're leaving ourselves wide open to exploitation as we fight to maintain the illusion to others. No one in other industries works like I've seen tech workers in silicon valley work. It's not normal and not healthy. The pay is high but the cost is higher.