Ask HN: How do you prioritize Job offers by money and interest?

[meowmiau]

I recently got into the 'problem' of having to decide between two job offers.

* One pays significantly more (double~trippel leftover money after Tax/CoL), but the job is less interesting (java, spring-boot, transaction systems). * The other pays good/acceptable, but works with more interesting technologies (ML and embedded software)

Note: Less interesting != boring, I don't apply for jobs I know I won't like for sure. Although I wonder if the java ecosystem and development approach is something I like long term.

I usually follow my interests, but there was never this steep a difference in payment.

Pondering this decision made me wonder, what various groups think about this - my friends don't have a clear opinion, I can guess what the FIRE crowd considers, so I wondered how HN prioritizes their offers.

So, how do you prioritize?

[asyncscrum]

Usually I determine the money range required to live the lifestyle I want. Once competing offers hit that threshold, then I take money off the table as a evaluation criteria.

Usually it comes down to a single question for me. How likely is it that this job ruins a family vacation? I've had that too many times, and I'm not doing that anymore. If I catch at least a hint of that likelihood, I'm out. Quality of life outside of work is the most important for me right now.

[sircastor]

I strongly favor interest over money.

A few years back I was offered a job at a place that was nice, fine, but ultimately boring. I turned it down because in spite of the substantial pay increase, I just could not picture myself being interested in the work.

Last year, I accepted a job that was a bit less than the aforementioned job (though a step up from where I was). I am super happy. I work with great people, doing interesting work, and get to dip my toes into a lot of cool stuff.

If the first place had offered me a pile more money or something, I’m still not sure I’d have taken it. It was just not the right thing.

Money can get you a lot, but it is not an indicator or substitute for fulfillment. Once you’ve met your basic needs, optimize for personal fulfillment and happiness.

[iancmceachern]

I usually choose by choosing who I want to work for and with, the other factors are typically so close it doesn't matter. If one offer is 30% less, yeah don't take it, but if they're all within 10 or 20% of eachother, choose who you want to work with and for.

[anotheryou]

I'm in the safety of a job, but wanting to switch. With time on my side I mostly select binary, but shooting high and being picky.

must haves:

- no evil, no bullshit: biggest filter as that rules out: marketing/ads, surveillance, crypto/web3, e-commerce, gig-work economy (if not really evil, they are at least not interesting to me)

- interesting topic: one of these: AI, knowledge management, curation, science, audio, possibly engineering, interesting voting and recommendation systems

- career level same or above, but attempting to get something above

- decent work/life balance, preferably mostly remote (but willing to go to 5 instead of 4 work days)

- payment: same or above (unless I'm super super convinced with everything else)

Ideally

- remote beyond EU

This means I probably write just 1-3 applications a month and expect to do so for a while.

[dcminter]

I've worked on dull software with interesting people and interesting software with dull people. The people are easily the deciding factor for me.

[MikeTheRocker]

By what criteria and methods do you appraise the people? In my interviewing experience, it's very challenging to draw any meaningful conclusions about potential coworkers in the 45-60 minutes I get to speak with them.

[tomatocracy]

It's very hard to do from an interview process in most places in my experience. The best way (if you haven't worked with them before) is to speak to someone trusted (outside the interview process) who has experience working with or in the team. If you don't know someone with personal experience then (depending on the role/seniority) an option is to try calling a headhunter who isn't involved in the process and ask their perspective.

In an interview the best you can probably do is to pay close attention to how they describe the role and the team, especially non verbal cues. You can try to ask some questions which give some insight (what's the team culture like, what's the worst part about working here, etc) but a lot of interviewers will give non-answers to those sort of questions.

[dcminter]

I wish I knew. I just wing it and try to guess from whatever signals I'm picking up. Sadly I don't always get it right.

[meowmiau]

That's a good point.

[pickitupsnake]

This is very simple, take the money for the "less interest != boring" job. Save/invest the money for when you CoL is higher (kids, eldery parents, illness, ect.).

[RonaldOlzheim]

Simple:

Quotes 1: 30 Put Yourself First Quotes (https://www.wow4u.com/putyourselffirstquotes.html)

Video 2: Up in the Air (3/9) Movie CLIP - How Much Did They Pay You to Give Up on Your Dreams? (2009) HD (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TkX-TPaodoM)

Music 3: Without Me · Halsey (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tk7WFyHUr1E)

Contact me through linkedin if you need more inspiration.

[firstfewshells]

I go with the one offering the best WLB, pay and cool coworkers. Most of the times, you can take up interesting initiatives at even seemingly boring places.

[tsewlliw]

Which boss / coworkers / company did you vibe with?

[meowmiau]

In both cases, the people I met were pretty cool, but in the high paying one, I didn't met the people I would actually work with.

[halfdan]

Why not ask to meet some of them? You are interviewing them just as much as are interviewing you.

[joshxyz]

easy. take the first one then use the money to dabble on your favourite tehnologies on the side. you can also use that money to create additional cash flows.

[dontbenebby]

I've never had competing offers. It was my perception that some folks in or adjacent to law enforcement repeatedly abused their access to try to nudge me into some kind of "public service".

I've considered emigration, but every time I look into it, the rash of illegal behavior that follows usually takes six months to two years to recover from.

In fact, I'm putting off looking into getting into one email account at least another day because someone annoyed me so badly -- they keep making a show of setting me up with these "job interviews" that are basically free consulting sessions.

Now to be fair, I used to be kind of a narcicist, but I've learned to code, learned to hack, and gotten my health issues under control -- I lost about sixty pounds, but I keep having a string of folks either treat job interviews as free consulting sessions, or dates as chances to fish for information for... journalism or whatever?

It's a weird and frustrating pattern, so I sold some stock out of my IRA and am gonna just wander around in one of my favorite tshirts trying to brainstorm some way I could get a job.

(But until Halloween I guess I'll be... on vacation? I sometimes can't tell if people are being serious on this website, I'm having a surreal day.)