[al_borland]

I've been at the same company for close to 20 years, and didn't even hop around within the company... just a steady path up. I can still relate to a lot of this. The company used to not really have any job hoppers, people with 10-30 years was the norm, the people with less than 5 were the weird ones. Now, that's flipped, and I see that Game of Thrones stuff playing out and I have no respect for these people and it's hurt my motivation to do anything. We are told to "modernize", by someone who parachutes in from some other company, and will be gone in 3 years. They have no skin in the game. They just make a mess of everything we built over 2 decades, then leave us holding the bag. When you talk about engineers being resistant to change, that's where the resistance comes from. I used to jump in with both feet when something new came along, because I thought those changes were worth it. When it becomes change for the sake of change, and we are building the same stupid thing 4 times on 4 different platforms, because leadership keeps changing and wants to put their own stamp on things... I can't be bothered anymore. They are doing these things because they feel it is in their best interest, to get their next promotion, not because it's in the best interest of the business. All the re-orgs due to all this change also prevents that Seal Team 6-like synergy within the team. Just when a team starts coming together to function, they shuffle us up again and we're back to square 1 trying to build trust in a new team and understand what everyone can do. I came in as a direct hire. There were some good years in there, but the last 5 years or so has felt like a never-ending march up a mountain covered in oil. A direct hire alone won't save you. The company needs to be good, with sane leaders who aren't chasing the latest buzz words they read about in some industry publication.

[hnthrowaway0328]

Many companies fell into this trap. Basically the middle-high management is allowed, indefinitely, to use the company's resources to promote themselves. Then they hop ground in a few years with a glorified post on LinkedIn.

Due to this I found it extremely hard to stay in any company for longer than 2 years. Smaller companies are much better, but they don't survive that long.

Let me know if there is a middle-large company that does not fall into that BS trap. I really want to stay, learn and develop low level programming skills for the rest of my life, preferably in one company. I don't care much about FAANG pay because I bought the property before Covid hype.

[al_borland]

I want to fight against it and not give in. The idea of hopping to a new job every 2 years sounds like my nightmare. I also believe there is incredible value in having long-term employees. They've seen the success and failure, they know what's ben tried, what the deeper issues are, and they are invested in making sure things actually work, because they will be the ones who have to live with the decisions. I harbor so much animosity for the people who jump into a company, change a bunch of stuff they don't understand, and then leave while patting themselves on the back. I don't think I could live with myself if that were my life.

I've managed to keep my expenses pretty low. I'm hoping I can continue to save for a while, and then get a job at a library or something. Enough to cover ongoing expenses, with my previous savings being enough to have a conformable retirement. I don't like how transactional and self-serving work has become. Finding a place that isn't like that seems to be like winning the lotto, since it is so hard to know going into it... and it only takes 1 seemingly minor leadership change to shift the whole culture.

[hnthrowaway0328]

It's tough to fight against it if the culture is brought down from the C-level -- and usually that's the case. Fighting will always lose unless you are a very senior member, say a senior VP, and even that probably doesn't make any sense to fight a losing war. You gain nothing except frustration and less compensation. But it might as well worth the effort if you are looking forward to retirng in a few years so delaying the rot could be useful.

I'll have to keep hopping until I see something not so bad.

[chillinOverHere]

Yeah this is part of the problem. If you try to fight anything, you've immediately got a target on your back.

I tried setting boundaries with a CTO who was pressuring me everyday to work on an "optional" side project. I hated working with him because he wanted control over every little detail. On large projects it was easy to just do tickets. But something small, I had to listen to his bs thoughts and criticisms constantly. More so than working.

After I told him I didn't want to do it 100 times I finally gave in and said it was because I didn't want to work with him specifically. HR contacted me the next day and said some of my comments made someone uncomfortable. They couldn't say what, or who.

This happened 6 times over the next couple of weeks. At 3 I stopped talking to anyone, period. Just to test it out. Still I was saying nasty stuff to someone.

Needless to say I was fired without reason and never given a chance to talk about what was happening, because nothing was happening.

[hnthrowaway0328]

That was pretty bad, but I'm glad you at least got out. It's PIA to work with such a person. Is that an F500 US company?