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Ask HN: Plans for Weathering the Tech Recession?

by throwawaybbq1 on 1/8/23, 5:38 AM with 87 comments

Regardless of whether we end up being a technical recession or not, tech companies are clearly shedding jobs. It seems to be messed up with all the big names announcing layoffs or hiring freezes. Apart from startups, who is hiring in tech?

I read anecdotally that consulting firms are hiring. Seems yucky but a job's a job.

Any sectors that are immune? layoffs.fyi paints a scary picture.

  • by satvikpendem on 1/8/23, 7:18 AM

    One thing we must make clear is, is there actually a recession? Many companies are firing, but they've fired much fewer than they've hired in the past few years. Many companies are still hiring now. I don't think there is a recession, much as people might be scared that there is.
  • by willio58 on 1/8/23, 6:46 AM

    Tons of companies are hiring. Just the largest ones are using this news cycle as an excuse to trim the fat.

    If you’re interested in top-10 tech companies, just know it’ll be difficult to find a job. Otherwise there are still tech companies posting high profits out there.

  • by bryanrasmussen on 1/8/23, 9:19 AM

    I think it was Tim Bray who said (paraphrasing) that the people with the most successful careers in tech move to government work during recessions where they specify the standards and projects that they will then have consulting jobs on once the recession is over.

    It might not have been Bray but it was someone in the XML world circa 2006.

  • by dermesser on 1/8/23, 8:30 AM

    It almost feels like: the more you/we talk about a recession, the more likely/grave it will be. It's got a high potential to be a self-fulfilling prophecy, as recessions often are fear-driven.
  • by silisili on 1/8/23, 8:38 AM

    First, to answer your question, the best plan is to stash away tons of liquid capital. In this environment, cash.

    Secondly, I don't think we need to worry yet. We're seeing layoffs, but layed off people getting hired very quickly.

    Thirdly, in such an environment, don't be so picky. Doesn't matter if it's yucky if it pays the bills.

    Lastly, quit watching layoffs.fyi. Like most media it's by design only bad news. Breathe. Everything will be ok.

  • by DubiousPusher on 1/8/23, 8:38 AM

    > I read anecdotally that consulting firms are hiring. Seems yucky but a job's a job.

    Doubt you meant it to be friend but this is pretty insulting. I've worked in consulting for 6 years and much prefer it to the 5 years I spent in products. I get to learn at a very deep level about various production processes and the real problems that affect actual workers. I then get to collaboratively build solutions which help those people. Consulting isn't all figuring out how to upsell clients on some cloud consumption they don't need.

  • by berkle4455 on 1/8/23, 7:15 AM

    It’s going to get a lot worse. We’ve only see protective layoffs so far, wait til all the tit-for-tat SaaS revenue between VC-backed firms disappears and their runways come to an abrupt stop.

    So, look for jobs at companies with solutions that solve actual problems for people or companies.

  • by buf on 1/8/23, 8:36 AM

    IMO this recession is needed.

    1. there is company bloat everywhere. Too many people going to work and 'hiding' instead of working.

    2. tech is 10x better these days. You can do way more with way less.

    As for weathering it, tech is still the fastest growing sector out there. It won't be hard to find a job.

  • by pdwetz on 1/8/23, 7:24 AM

    There is a whole world of employers who need tech folks who aren't google and friends.
  • by josefrichter on 1/8/23, 7:48 AM

    There’s panic now. My approach is to work on my skills, maybe finish some training & certificates, finish some side project, and a couple of weeks down the road the situation will settle down.
  • by breck on 1/8/23, 6:17 AM

    > Apart from startups, who is hiring in tech?

    Defense industry is hiring big time.

  • by thdespou on 1/8/23, 11:06 AM

    If you are a solid engineer you don't have to worry about it. Keep polishing your skills and your resume.
  • by pyuser583 on 1/16/23, 2:52 AM

    Are there sectors immune? Yeah.

    It seems the exciting industries are falling apart, but the “old boring” industries are doing just fine.

    Insurance, medical tech, government, and defense are hiring.

    Come to think of it, insurance, medicine, and defense are probably the oldest industries around.

  • by jpgvm on 1/8/23, 8:35 AM

    As of right now? Do nothing.

    I have plenty of liquid capital to outlast a 2-3yr period of unemployment if the worst happens. Very unlikely but possible hence why I keep the cushion I have.

    If however there is a big recession and a big market downturn and I'm not laid off in the process I intend to aggressively buy securities with that big cushion I built up over the last few years instead.

    Not sure what else one can do when the bond market has moved so sharply of late. At this point a recession is priced in and the bond market while it's too optimistic sometimes is very rarely too pessimistic. So I would say it's coming no matter what because the forces that be have decided it will come.

  • by Hamuko on 1/8/23, 7:31 AM

    I think I'm second on the four-person list of "numbers to call when production goes down", so I'm hopeful that's all the plans I need.
  • by carabiner on 1/8/23, 9:06 AM

    I'm living off of credit cards right now. I've applied to 240 jobs and counting. If I can't make rent (should happen by the summer) because I max out my cards, I'm moving into my truck and yoloing it. I lived out of my truck by choice for a year before so it's not that bad, but still sucks to accrue debt. If I don't make it, I starve out in the cold.
  • by Cardinal7167 on 1/8/23, 7:57 AM

    I'm going to focus on my engineering chops, finish a couple side projects, and put as much as I can in my 401k. And hopefully get my project car running.
  • by adamnemecek on 1/8/23, 8:24 AM

    I’m launching a job board slash professional development community soon. Join the discord in the mean time.

    https://discord.gg/jFZFWBujJa.

  • by cableshaft on 1/8/23, 8:22 AM

    Supposedly Cleantech/ClimateTech is hiring a lot now[1], according to some articles I saw pop up recently.

    I did try to investigate Cleantech jobs last cycle, back in mid 2021, and didn't have a great experience, personally. Most of the jobs posted seemed to fall into one of two buckets:

    1 - Startups that "helped companies go carbon neutral", i.e. they accept money from the business, skim some off the top (for their business), and funnel it towards various clean initiatives, then send some certificate to the company showing they've offset X amount of carbon. It just doesn't seem much different than a grift to me, and there's various issues with carbon offsets that John Oliver goes into here[2]. Also regardless of whether it's a grift or not, that sounds like totally uninteresting tech to work on.

    2 - Startups that bill themselves as helping companies get more efficient, i.e. help improve their logistics or make their electric grids "smart" to save energy, etc. Problem with that is that already seems like something a company wants and tries to do anyway, and while yes in the short term it does seem like that results in wasting less energy and saves resources, in the long term, it just allows the company to ramp up further and use even more energy and resources. Like two companies with the most efficient logistics in the world are Amazon and Walmart, and that just let them become even more massive.

    So wading thruogh all that to find more interesting Cleantech companies I found to be difficult. I did go forward with a few recruiters anyway, and at least with the companies I went forward with they were terrible at scheduling interviews and also seemed to top out at fairly low wages compared to other companies anyway (like I was seeing 120k at the top of the range for even architect roles, and I wasn't super keen on working for that little).

    In the end the companies that extended offers were all consulting firms, so I ended up in kind of the opposite realm anyway.

    But hey, clean and climate tech are apparently hiring a lot right now, so they're an option if you're worried about your job elsewhere.

    Also if someone is in this field and has had a different experience than I have had, please let me know. I'd like to feel like I'm helping more than hurting for the world, just haven't found anything that sorta fits my skills (primarily web and games) that seemed worthwhile.

    [1] https://techcrunch.com/2022/11/05/laid-off-climate-tech-is-l...

    [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6p8zAbFKpW0

  • by mansoon on 1/8/23, 8:20 AM

    Death.