[avgDev]

* Open office bonus points for adding "because we like collaboration"

* No remote or hybrid

* Unlimited PTO can potentially be a red flag depending on other aspects

* Dinners at the office

* Business model that is not generating any revenue

* Needing 5 references for a junior position and they had to be people I worked with(my team was 3 devs). So, I listed other people I knew. One of them a VP of a tech company, who worked for large tech companies. They called him and grilled him. He told me he did his best but not to take the job and maybe just come work for him.

* Another time, I was told my code was wrong and wouldn't compile during the interview, I said "I am certain it will", but the dev said unless I change the answer is wrong. I changed it, he was wrong. I got the offer, and did not take the job.

[kelnos]

> Unlimited PTO can potentially be a red flag depending on other aspects

The key on this one is to then ask your interviewers how much PTO they usually take per year. If the answers are below what would make you happy, then that's a problem.

At my last company with unlimited PTO, at my height I was taking ~8 weeks per year. I was highly productive and my boss knew that even losing me for two months out of the year, I was getting much more useful work done than most people who were taking 2-3 weeks. (At least I hope that was his thought process, and not just that he wasn't paying attention.)

> Business model that is not generating any revenue

Do you mean profit? Not generating any revenue either means they're very young and don't have a product yet (fair to not want to work on something like that, but every company has to go through that phase), or that they have a product but are somehow not charging for it at all, and don't have any other monetization strategies like ads (gross) or selling user data (even grosser).

But if you limit yourself to only companies that are turning a profit, you're essentially saying that you'll mostly only work for older, established companies, and for the most part nothing that's VC-backed. (Which, again: fair, but also pretty limiting.)

[paulcole]

Wanting to work for a company that doesn’t lose money is “pretty limiting”?

I also disagree with asking interviewers how much vacation they take in an unlimited PTO situation. Instead just ask, “What’s the limit?” Any company that offers an unlimited PTO policy should be able to answer this easily. The only objectively incorrect answer is “There is no limit.”