[bruce511]

Job searching, or the reverse Hiring, is always broken, depending on the market mood. This is baked into all industries and comes down to supply and demand.

At this point in the cycle, the supply overwhelms demand. So naturally lots of people are not having success, and so the system is broken in that direction.

The best advice I can give is that in an up-cycle find a place that you like to work at, that likely pays less than big tech, that hires slowly and fires slower. Dig in, and build a long career there. Stop job hopping. Job hoppers are very vulnerable to market mood.

Of course that's useless advice now and will be mostly ignored in an upcycle when FANG is throwing FANG money around.

In a down cycle my advice is to stand out from the crowd. Do something that gives you a leg up. Show an employer some initiative, creativity, work ethic etc.

[scarface_74]

That doesn’t work either. The market changes and eventually when they need to lay you off then what? Those slow growth companies either die or get taken over by private equity or sold off.

I would much rather make $300K for two or three years, live like I’m making $150K, bank the rest, get laid off with a fat severance and then look for another job after a period of unemployment than make $150K, stay at a job too long and then stil get laid off after a few years.

I’m 50, started really job hopping in 2008 and have 8 jobs since then after stating at my second “stable” job for 9 years getting 3% raises and seeing my bonuses decrease.

When I was looking for a job not by choice last year and the year before it took three weeks.

It was much easier finding a job based on my experience in BigTech than it would have been if my experience had just been a regular old enterprise CRUD developer like I was before 2020.