by hazrmard on 1/18/23, 3:41 PM with 254 comments
What advice do you have for new grads in CS/EE fields looking for jobs? For example, I am finishing my PhD in AI-related work this spring. Colleagues I've talked to in several companies have told me about frozen hiring. Is this true in your experience?
Is it better to get any job than keep searching for the job I'd be most suited for? Should I reach directly to managers in different teams? Who are the best people/kinds of firms to reach out to when the industry is slowing hiring?
[1]: https://layoffs.fyi/ [2]: https://news.stanford.edu/2022/12/05/explains-recent-tech-layoffs-worried/ [3]: https://www.cnbc.com/2023/01/05/tech-jobs-hit-the-hardest-by-layoffs-last-year-report.html
by mooreds on 1/18/23, 4:11 PM
I also wrote something here on how to stand out: https://letterstoanewdeveloper.com/2022/09/19/ways-to-stand-...
Finally, you ask:
> Is it better to get any job than keep searching for the job I'd be most suited for?
That depends on your financial situation and emotional runway, but my advice would be that in general it is far easier to get a job once you have a job. I wouldn't advise taking a job digging ditches (unless you need the $$$), but if you can find something that is related to your chosen profession, isn't clearly toxic, and is a full time paying job, take it.
If the company is good, you'll have the ability to grow internally and you'll be a known quantity.
If the company is not great, you'll at least have some experience to put on your resume. You may even be able to help improve the company. At worst you'll have a salary and title and be able to job search from there.
by ryandrake on 1/18/23, 4:16 PM
I ended up close to insolvent during the 2008 recession, and I bit the bullet and took a terrible job just to get by. Be willing to swallow your pride and do the same if that's what it takes. That little voice in the back of your head that says "Well I just graduated from Stanford! Surely I can do better than this!" Ignore it for now.
by micro_cam on 1/18/23, 4:06 PM
Reaching out to managers at big cos won't get you much. They are getting a ton of twitter/etc candidates and have stricter hiring policies and rubrics to prevent nepotism and favoritism. If you can network and ask for referrals through your friends / professors that can work better. Or reaching out to early stage startup cofounders can work really well.
ML/AI is less frozen then some other areas so that is good. Most really competitive new PHDs will have either a couple of internships, strong academic contributions or previous engineering experience demonstrating strong coding ability.
You should also consider post docs or academic engineer postings. The grant cycle insulates these a bit from the economic cycle and they can be a good place to gather some experience while you ride out the cycle.
And definitely consider very early stage start ups. A startup that just raised and has 2 years of runway is probably one of the safest places to be at the moment as they are still focused on growth. A lot of great companies proved themselves as startups during the 2008 cycle and grew rapidly after. Networking can mean a lot more here as early stage founders often literally just hire their friends or people they get along with without a ton of process.
by ptero on 1/18/23, 4:20 PM
For BS CS/EE (or any engineering field): do not overthink the "recession is coming" news. US employers always want young engineers, as they consider them energetic, willing to learn and work for less salary than late career staff. Look up and polish the in demand skills. Brush up on the basics (Python, databases, git) at least to the extent of being able to solve "one step up from fizzbuzz" problems. And apply. You might get less generous terms and no sign-up bonus, but you are almost certain to still land something that you can use as a springboard 2-3 years later.
For PhD in AI: I would apply to good companies only and consider deferring graduation for a year if your fishing turns up nothing. This requires both your mental readiness and your advisor's physical/financial one, but in general your advisor should be thrilled to have you work for him another year for a relative pittance of a graduate stipend. It should not come to this (the market is not dead), but I would personally take it easy and focus on the job search for another year in grad school over taking some soul-sucking job at a company no one has heard of.
My 2c. And good luck!
by indymike on 1/18/23, 6:12 PM
... So my advice is to look at non-tech companies. Reality is that most companies really have become "tech companies", they don't make software or hardware, but have physical products and services -- and often are very technology dependent for operatiions.
by kypro on 1/18/23, 9:14 PM
Late 2020 to earlier 2021 was nuts for tech jobs. Companies were hiring people who were massively unqualified just because they needed someone. During that time I was getting calls from recruiters weekly practically begging me to quit my job for some new opportunity they were recruiting for and unable to fill. Imo there are a lot of devs out there right now who only got hired because the market during 2020-2021. I worry a little for those guys because they were punching way above their weight to begin with and I think they'll probably struggle to find something as good should they get laid off.
The other people who might struggle are those looking for jobs specifically in the tech industry or tech startups. As someone looking for work right now I have noticed there are fewer jobs from tech companies out there, but there's still plenty of tech jobs in industries like travel, finance, and retail. Everyone needs tech workers these days so a tech industry slow down isn't necessarily the end of the world for someone with tech skills.
by zetazzed on 1/18/23, 6:47 PM
by gabereiser on 1/18/23, 3:50 PM
by iceburgcrm on 1/18/23, 4:16 PM
To get my first position involved applying everywhere no matter the skillset asked. When I finally landed an interview we had to create an application. I created an application an hour after the interview was complete emailed it over and that sold me. They didn't believe I did this myself so quickly I had to provide some of my db scripts. The other candidates were stronger on paper (finished a 4 year computer science degree) but none could finish or finish as completely as I did.
It turned a little rough. One of the other candidates came in for lunch a week after I was hired. The founder and this person became friends during the interview process. She literally brokedown and cried that day because she wanted the job so badly. I'm surprised they didn't hire her just based on culture fit but this was a nonprofit with one 6 month contract available and tons of challenging problems to tackle.
My advice is to grind it out and pry that first job out however you can.
by difflens on 1/18/23, 5:36 PM
I do empathize with your position and wish you luck :) I'm ever grateful to the first manager who hired me. He changed my life forever and that of my family.
by jstx1 on 1/18/23, 3:53 PM
Maybe startups specifically look worse than other companies right now? But I never got the appeal of startups anyway (more likely lower pay, less stability, more likely to have poor work life balance and have to deal with inexperienced management).
by AviationAtom on 1/18/23, 3:55 PM
Beyond that always keep looking at what's out there and network, network, network.
Starting out is hard, but after you put a bit of time in your resume will begin to speak for itself. For what your resume can't do for you that is what your contacts within desired companies are for.
Also, contributing to open source projects is great material for the resume!
by Bayko on 1/18/23, 3:55 PM
by jabroni_salad on 1/18/23, 5:25 PM
* It's easier to get a job if you already have a job. It's okay to take a shitty job as long as you don't get complacent about it.
* Gaps get stressed by job seekers in advice requests because it is a question that can make you look bad. However, if you are actually at an interview, they are fishing for bad dealbreakers not minor imperfections. Don't worry to much about it.
* If you get hired via a staffing agency, you could be cut at any time arbitrarily. I once got laid off 24 hours after signing a contract renewal. Keep as good an emergency fund as you can manage.
* Unemployment benefits are not charity, it is insurance that you pay for out of your wage. Dont let pride or shame convince you not to use it.
* Network aggressively and be likeable. You never know when that linkedin connection from a shit job 3 years ago will throw you a bone. I know everybody on HN really likes their leetcode but if you have an inside reference, the interview is reduced to just a vibe check.
* There are grades of recruiters and higher grade jobs tend to be assigned to higher grade recruiters. The guys sending you irrelevant callcenter gigs on the other side of the country can be ignored as they are just playing the numbers game too, but if a recruiter advertises something decent to you the least you should do is reply with a "not right now but thanks". This results in a higher quality recruiter keeping you in their rolodex for later.
* Hire a professional resume writer for you. This goes not just for noobs, but also people who have been at the same gig for awhile and have not been through the hiring game recently.
* Cold applications are just a numbers game. Managers get 1000 applications for 1 seat. Yes, tune your resume/letter for the job, but don't spend too much time on it.
* If you are offboarding, just plagiarize Nixon's resignation letter if you can't write anything nice at all. In a fiery departure, your best case scenario is that nothing happens and your worst case is that somebody who likes you will no longer want to be your reference or whatever. Your first one will always feel bad, but people coming and going is just part of life and doesnt have to be a big deal.
https://www.archives.gov/historical-docs/todays-doc/?dod-dat...
by MandieD on 1/18/23, 11:05 PM
Not only the amount of your starting salary (it was about a 30-50% decrease for those of us in Class of 2002 vs our friends in Class of 2000), but also the coolness of the job (Them: web startups. Us: government contracting.)
I also watched some of those slightly older friends struggle with car and/or condo payments taken on the presumption of salary and stock options going nowhere but up. Ouch.
If you get a job offer you can stand in a place you wouldn’t mind living even if the job went away, you should probably take it. As others have said, it’s a lot easier to get a job if you have one. You’re a lot less likely to become desperate and have to accept something awful if you’re already in an ok job.
As for pay expectations, look at what similarly-educated mechanical engineers in your region make.
by anthomtb on 1/18/23, 4:13 PM
Since you are a high achiever in an in-demand field, you should still have good leverage during the job search. I would hold out for a role or company which you believe will suit your skill set.
I would not, under any circumstances, hold out for a "perfect" fit. It is unlikely to exist and if the company/recruiter is making it seem perfect they are almost certainly lying to you. A former colleague of mine was burned by this not long ago.
by justapassenger on 1/18/23, 9:24 PM
2 reasons: 1. Less competition. 2. (More important one IMO) For people starting their career, in person interactions are extremely valuable. You’ll learn a ton from hallway/lunch conversations. In your first few years, likely even more than from your job. YMMV, of course, but all those chats shaped me as an engineer.
by gwbas1c on 1/18/23, 6:40 PM
If you choose to graduate, remember, you're going to work for the rest of your career. Don't feel bad about taking some time for yourself! (Assuming this is the US,) it's going to be nearly impossible to take consecutive 2-4 weeks off, or longer, while you're employed. Do it now.
Looking for a job also doesn't have to be a grind. Even if you're playing the numbers game, you don't need to grind all day spamming out applications. Self-education in areas that you think you'll need are just as important. Don't feel bad about making every weekend a 3 or 4 day weekend.
Also, many people warn against being too selective. This is true. It's also important to have standards. When I really needed a job, over the past 20 years, I've turned down: A contracting gig where the contract came out of a nolo book (for hiring a contractor to do work in your home,) a (cough) job that came with a "stipend" that would hardly cover rent, a cryptocurrency gig run by a lucky hacker who had a few million dollars in the bank, but not enough common sense to have product-market fit... People talk about being "entitled." A lot of businesses believe they are "entitled" to your labor. Walking away from situations like this isn't being "too selective." It's having standards and looking out for yourself.
by stocknoob on 1/18/23, 6:38 PM
Build a raft instead of constantly treading water, and pursue FI.
If you like swimming, great! Doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have a raft right next to you. Swim for pleasure, not survival.
by topkai22 on 1/18/23, 4:22 PM
I would advise shifting expectations a bit, it’s likely offers will still be good but not quite as lucrative as last year.
As for accepting any job- just because you’ve accepted a job does not mean you can’t keep interviewing (in the US at least). Even starting at a company doesn’t mean you can’t keep interviewing. I ran a college hire onboarding program a few years back. Of the 20 people we had , 3 had new jobs within 3 months of hire. We weren’t happy about it, but they got legitimately better offers and we couldn’t match.
So, maybe say yes to a “safety job.”
Once you start, keep your expenses low, although you don’t need to live like a pauper. Living with a roommate (or SO), picking less expensive housing, limiting bar/club attendance, and driving a less expensive car really adds up.
That all being said, my impression is that the AI market remains one of the strongest in the tech sector for “real” practitioners. I think you’ll be ok.
by twblalock on 1/18/23, 10:47 PM
Most jobs are found through personal connections. Getting referrals from those people is a lot better than submitting your resume into hundreds of web forms, along with all the other applicants.
New grads have fewer connections than people who are established in their careers, but they may have contacts from prior work experience, internships, classmates, and friends.
Really the most useful advice would be to people who have not yet graduated: make sure you do some internships and build those connections while you are in school!
by KptMarchewa on 1/18/23, 3:56 PM
by tflinton on 1/18/23, 6:06 PM
Yeah most companies are still under hiring freezes, but backfills usually aren't frozen.
> Is it better to get any job than keep searching for the job I'd be most suited for?
Try and get a job remotely where you want to land eventually. Having some experience that's related to what you want to do will bode better than having nothing.
> Should I reach directly to managers in different teams?
If you know them, sure. Networking can be an incredible asset, go to meetups or other professional groups and get to know people in the industry, even if a manger isn't there employees typically are motivated to help you get a job because they may get a referral bonus.
> Who are the best people/kinds of firms to reach out to when the industry is slowing hiring?
In reality when you hear about large layoffs much of those layoffs are companies shedding full time employees and then outsourcing any work they needed from them via consulting or contract positions. So it stands to reason that perhaps contract companies / agencies may be a great place to get some experience. Some industries are somewhat immune to recessions like healthcare, utilities, government and a small subset of financial institutions.
by greyhound_7 on 1/19/23, 4:09 AM
I don't have a PhD in AI/ML, but I have delivered ML models into production. Doing so taught me that you must go about your modeling and science work with a practical urgency for results compared to the pace of academic research. Business applications don't require you to prove how smart you are (people just assume it), but they do require compromise to meet requirements and exceed stakeholder expectations. Where a lot of ML people lose the plot (and financial reward) is that they don't make enough tradeoffs for the operational or end user concerns for the model in its entire relevant context. I've seen this manifest a few ways, but a common one is getting fixated on the data you have, but never realizing you need to "close the loop" and make something actually useful for an end user in a measurable way.
Those are the practical, "productionize AI" jobs and there is huge interest in those now given the huge interest in LLMs. Who cares about the downturn, LLM start ups are the hot thing.
There are also industry research jobs, definitely worth applying for, but from my understanding they are very difficult to get.
by yellowapple on 1/18/23, 6:11 PM
When you're first starting out? Yes, absolutely. The job for which you'd be most suited (however that's defined) will in all likelihood toss your resume into the nearest trash can without some actual work experience on it.
> Who are the best people/kinds of firms to reach out to when the industry is slowing hiring?
The more boring-looking, the better. You say you're about to be a PhD in AI? Find some small/medium business with leadership whose eyes gloss over at the mere mention of "neural nets" or "deep learning" or what have you, get into some boring technician or analyst role, and start using those fancy AI chops to blow their expectations for the role out of the water. If they don't rapidly promote you with the newfound success they're seeing, then you're in a much better position to pursue something that actually corresponds to your degree, with a resume item along the lines of "used machine learning to classify inventory by predicted velocity and rearrange inventory locations, improving warehouse picking throughput by 115%" or somesuch.
by l-portet on 1/19/23, 3:35 PM
1. Applying
- Reach out to a recruiter — or CTO if it's a startup — but do it only for the companies you're the most interested into as it's time consuming
- Write a good application message mentioning the technologies required in the job description
- Personal Branding is key: polish your Github, have a nice website — esp for front-end/full-stack devs — and update your Linkedin
2. Resume screening
- Make sure to have a clean, easy to read and updated resume
- Complete your skillset with high-demand skills (ex: AWS if you're back-end, React Native if you're front-end)
- Ask other for reviews
3. Phone screen
- Learn a bit about the company, their recent achievements
- Learn how to sell yourself, have your storytelling ready
- Ask questions (culture, role, product, etc)
- Prepare answers for common itwer questions
- Smile :) show you'd be the ideal coworker and not just a nerd who can code
4. Tech interview
- Most tech itws are bullshit and not even related to the skills needed but that's how the game is made so just accept it and practice LC
5. Final itw / Offer
- Learn how to negociate your salary
- Remember: Equity is cool but cash is king
- Congrats!
by gamesbrainiac on 1/18/23, 4:44 PM
1. Minimise your costs. If you can live with your relatives, do so.
2. If you cannot find a job, work on an open source project that is close to a field that you are interested in. Make sure that you do not have gaps in your resume that you cannot explain. This also allows you to keep your skills fresh and purpose to your day.
3. Invest in finishing the blind 75. These are set of interview questions that if you can understand, and master, you will be able to ace pretty much any technical interview.
4. Make sure you also are prepared for system design questions. There are many books on the matter. Although SDIs can be quite subjective, it is good to have an understanding of what you can do.
5. Do not limit yourself to your town/city/area. Apply for any and all remote jobs that apply to you.
by mathgladiator on 1/18/23, 3:53 PM
by lumost on 1/19/23, 1:44 AM
1. Take whatever you can get that’s closest to where you want to be. I worked as a sysadmin in a large financial firm as they were close to Linux distributed systems during the Great Recession. I’d advise sticking to something with a swe title, but taking a job as MLE for a year - or SWE - instead of a research position isn’t a bad strategy.
2. If you have lots of runway, start your own business! If it pans out, then you’ll be better off than your dream job. If it isn’t successful, you will have something to talk about in a year.
3. Stick to academia/research for a year. If you can hold off your graduation for a year, the market may be more favorable. Bear markets tend to be short.
4. Hike the AT/PCT/other bucket list activity. It can burn up the better part of a year, and will explain a resume gap well. Be mindful that employers will be concerned if they see an unexplained resume gap/and may not care about your fitness.
by collyw on 1/18/23, 4:17 PM
I was sending out a lot of CVs treating it more or less as a full time job. In the UK at the time the job center would pay for postage for applications, though these days paper applications are a lot less common.
Places that accepted CVs got a lot lower responses than big corporations with their long winded online forms that took a couple of hours or more to fill out, with the usual crappy questions of "give an example e of when you displayed leadership qualities" and the likes. Keep a note of your responses, as after a few, it becomes a lot less effort, as you have probably answered a similar question in a previous one, and can just copy paste with a little adjustment.
Get some interview practice and get good at that. Looking back I was pretty down after a while saying things like "I'll take anything at this point" when I asked why I wanted the job. True, but not what potential employers want to hear. Think of it from the employers point of view and what they want to hear. Again, practice helps and you get better with time.
I got a couple of temporary jobs one for pretty minimal wage but that made a huge difference actually having some real world experience on my CV in terms of getting invited for interviews.
Have some code that you can show people. Build some example projects. I would advise spending some time building a more comprehensive project one time to show that rather than doing a crappy throwaway project from scratch for each interview - something I still seem expected to do after 20 years of experience. The hiring process in this industry sucks and is very exploitative in this way, happy to waste candidates time like this.
by robgibbons on 1/18/23, 4:39 PM
Connect with recruiters, lots of them. They can mean the difference between never hearing back after a cold application, and getting your resume in front of the hiring manager.
by heliophobicdude on 1/18/23, 3:55 PM
Message hiring managers and recruiters on LinkedIn that say "hiring" in their bio. This should get the ball rolling a little bit faster.
Good luck and cheers!
by Callmenorm on 1/18/23, 8:20 PM
by cratermoon on 1/18/23, 4:17 PM
So, go out and grab the best job you can. Just be prepared for the life at the bottom of the hill.
by abeppu on 1/18/23, 10:18 PM
- on the one hand, I was in no position to negotiate the offers I received
- on the other hand, the modest (commensurate with my lack of experience) equity component in my compensation package was calculated based on current (low) prices. It didn't seem important at the time, but when the market picked back up, this seemed really fortunate.
- I joined a team of people who, having seen their unvested equity take recent hit, were less than exuberant in their outlook about the near term. I did not realize: their problems were not my problems.
If you do land a job at a company which can survive and even grow, now could be an great time to start your career.
by 2sk21 on 1/18/23, 9:01 PM
Anyway, I was completely out of the machine learning field for nearly 15 years until the late 2000s when interest in the field started to pick up again. The main advice I can offer is to be flexible and bide your time.
by bryanlarsen on 1/18/23, 4:03 PM
In general I'd say no although I'm not sure it applies to you. I know some people who graduated into the Internet apocalypse of 2002. They picked up crappy jobs and then got pigeon-holed into that crappy job for a very long time. It's a lot easier to get a job in a cool field as a new grad than it is as someone with experience doing manual testing or another crappy field.
Normally I'd recommend someone in your position to go for their Master's or Ph.D rather than getting a crappy job, but you already have your PhD so I'm not sure how much of my advice applies to you. PhD signals a deep specialization which may overcome the stigma of a crappy job.
by autodev1 on 1/18/23, 4:31 PM
"Software Developers, Quality Assurance Analysts, and Testers"
Job Outlook, 2021-31 25% (Much faster than average)
https://www.bls.gov/ooh/computer-and-information-technology/...
"Information Security Analysts"
Job Outlook, 2021-31 35% (Much faster than average)
https://www.bls.gov/ooh/computer-and-information-technology/...
by renierbotha on 1/18/23, 9:40 PM
So one way to avoid being hired into a team like this is to ask a many questions centered around the impact of the team.
For example, - “what are some of the main accomplishments this team has had in the past?” - “what is the mission & vision of the team, and how is it aligned to the business operational plan?” - “what will happen to the company if this team fails on its biggest bets?”
This is naturally aimed towards bigger companies.
by passwordoops on 1/18/23, 4:21 PM
The one thing I'd add is look beyond "tech sector" companies. Your skill set can be translated and refocused for any number of industries that will thrive in the coming years (e.g. food producers, energy, natural resources, healthcare, etc).
One way to do this is if your institute has a co-op program, reach out to the head and express interest in industries that could be interesting to get into. They'll likely be happy to help and connect a Top AI Expert with companies the university already works with. Of course you'll be doing more applicative work than theoretical
by angarg12 on 1/18/23, 7:47 PM
During and after the recession unemployment rate soared past 25%. 2/3 of my company got laid off during that period. At some point more than half of my friends were unemployed. Having a stable job you can count for years to come was an incredible perk.
However this security bred both complacency and toxicity. My boss started saying things like "you are lucky you got a job", "we are doing you a favour letting you work here" or "there are no jobs out there" (BTW I'm seeing echoes of this in some managers these days). Although the job was terrible, I was conditioned to have extremely low expectations.
At the end I spent the first 7 years of my career in a low performing and toxic organization. I was so severely underpaid that when I finally changed jobs, I 4x my pay without trying too hard. The rest is history.
So if I had to capture my lessons in a tip is: do whatever you need to "survive" the recession, but keep an eye on the market and be quick to jump when the tide turns.
I'll never know how much I would have turbocharged my career if I had jumped at the beginning of the longest bull market in history rather than languishing in a career dead end.
by mullingitover on 1/18/23, 6:34 PM
I had a college job that paid the bills but wasn't anything related to tech. I looked for jobs but the job market in Portland, Oregon was the Sahara desert. There wasn't an entry level job in sight, and if you didn't have a decade of experience you could forget about getting a foot in the door.
Eventually I took a customer service job at a call center that did work for Adobe, and after a year there I switched to one of their other contract customers, Disney. I did tech support for Disney's Toontown, one thing led to another, and Disney ended up hiring me direct and moving me down to LA.
I stayed at Disney far too long in a junior position because I had no confidence in my ability to get a better job, the experience of being shut out of the market for years after graduating broke me. Eventually I got laid off from Disney, and what followed was all the best years of my career because it forced me to shop my skills around more.
If I had to do it all over again, I would have immediately taken that tech support job, and when I made it to my first real engineer job I would have jumped after two years if I wasn't promoted. I would've kept jumping every 2-3 years. Like a lot of people there I felt a loyalty to the company that was 100% one-sided.
tl;dr get something, anything in your field as soon as you can, and promote yourself to another position as soon as you can and keep doing it. Only stay in a place if you have immediate and ongoing career growth.
by CyanLite2 on 1/19/23, 3:46 PM
2. Get as much professional experience as possible. There's an entire world outside of the startup/HN crowd where you can thrive in a great career at an enterprise company doing .NET/Java. These are your name brand mega insurance companies or health care organizations that are just trying to get line-of-business apps created for internal use. It's not the brand name cachet as a popular SaaS. These mega corps often don't go out of their way to advertise for new positions, so just checkout linkedin or look at their job boards on their corporate website. These companies often have the large internal development team to pair you with a senior developer and train you up.
3. Bide your time until the market "re-opens". The market will come back, but in the meantime now is the time to build up your CV. If you still are having problems getting a foot in the door, then take on open source projects. Create a side-project. There's nothing worse as a hiring manager seeing a new grad with zero experience asking for $150,000.
by lastofthemojito on 1/18/23, 4:40 PM
Yeah, it'll be tough. Your first "real" job will likely be the most difficult job search of your life.
Feel free to try your luck at the same company multiple times. Now, don't be annoying - don't spam them with your resume every day. But the first job I ended up getting was with a company I contacted again a few months after hearing they didn't have anything for me.
I think the issue of take any job vs keep looking for the right job depends on your circumstances. After college I moved back home with my parents, took the summer off and slowly job searched, rent-free, while also enjoying my last summer of freedom. Some folks won't have that luxury.
I'd also recommend considering being flexible with your location. Sure, maybe you want to live in City A, and maybe you can one day, but if there are more jobs in City B (or remote work that will pay the bills in some places, but not City A), it won't kill you to live somewhere else for a couple of years and then try to make the move to where you really want to be.
by chriskanan on 1/18/23, 5:23 PM
That said, a lot of the big companies have frozen hiring in AI along with a lot of unicorns who focused on AI but haven't been profitable. Some of my own PhD students who are graduating soon are worried, but they have been able to get interviews at non-FAANG companies for doing AI research.
There are a lot of faculty openings for AI, and while they are competitive, it isn't nearly as competitive in the past if you have been productive during your PhD. You would have to wait until Fall 2023 to apply for them, so you would have to do a postdoc or something like that for a year.
I think money is going to flow into AI start-ups doing foundation models and generative AI, so if your AI-related work is in that space, you could be well positioned. It would be potentially risky if you are not a US citizen due to visa issues.
by c7b on 1/18/23, 5:57 PM
Will depend a lot on the individual situation, but as a broad blanket advice I'd generally say, yes. Especially if you come from an undergrad/master's. There are very few of those really big tectonic shifts in life like fully entering the workforce for the first time, and a lot of it has more to do with having some job (at least somewhat relevant to what you learnt) than having the perfect job (which, frankly, you can't really know what that would be for you at that stage anyway). I don't see much good coming from delaying this just for the sake of waiting for the perfect match.
That being said, if you have other reasons for delaying, like wanting to try a startup, that might indeed be a good reason to not start in a job. Or if you're a PhD graduate, you've had sort of a semi-job experience already, and you might have ways to stay a bit longer in academia doing meaningful things (post-doc,...), while looking for something that really fits with the highly specialized profile you've already built at that point.
by kaycebasques on 1/18/23, 4:45 PM
by davidthewatson on 1/18/23, 9:40 PM
by alisztha on 1/18/23, 7:25 PM
1. Build a portfolio of projects. Companies like to see that you're hands-on and problem-solving oriented. 2. Invest on your personal brand (via a website, LinkedIn or other social media). This helps put your name and what you do out there, so hiring managers can find you.
With those things at hand, you can make compelling applications and get noticed. I don't see a problem with reaching to managers directly, especially if you make clear how you can provide value.
About getting any job, it depends how much different it is from where you want to be in 5 or 10 years and what your immediate needs are. If you need the money, then you can go for it - any job will provide you learnings. But don't deviate too much from the future you want.
by geocrasher on 1/18/23, 4:28 PM
Focus on being the best version of yourself. Be passionate. Stand out not by being what they're looking for, stand out by being what they didn't even know they were looking for until they found you.
Focus on solving problems, not just being a warm body in a seat. Companies need problems solved, not seats filled. Identify the issue they are trying to solve before you even show up, and then make it clear you're the person to solve it.
Focus on being human. If you're not the most personable person (not everyone is, and that's fine) then spend time to make sure they know that you aren't their average applicant.
And if your prospective employer says "In 100 words or less, tell us what makes you different from the rest!" for the love of all that is recruiting, do not just paste in your cover letter. I've disqualified SO many applicants without even looking at their resume or cover letter because they couldn't bother to follow the most basic direction.
by time_to_smile on 1/18/23, 4:07 PM
Entering the work force now or in the next few years, a new grad will very likely have an easier time navigating the job market than people who have spent nearly a decade working for bubble-frenzied, VC backed companies.
In the years following the dotcom bust I new tons of software folks desperately trying to reconfigure their careers. It's not hard for a fresh grad to change course, most people don't end up working in a career that is directly related to their major.
Entering the work force will be harder and harder but new grads will have less expectations and bad habits they have to overcome to find an occupation that works for them (they also won't have no-longer-reasonable comp expectations).
by crawfordcomeaux on 1/18/23, 10:39 PM
This will help keep cost of living way down so you don't have to give a shit of you're tossed on your ass without any notice or severance. Stop pretending the business landscape was made with your wellbeing in mind; if that were the case, your onboarding package (or interview?) would involve making sure you're aware of your needs and how to meet them. Any business unable to produce such a document is not designed with your wellbeing in mind.
by the_snooze on 1/18/23, 4:56 PM
My research supervisor had funding for someone who can work on ITAR-restricted projects, and I was the perfect fit for that. I made money earning my graduate degree. Afterwards, I used my research experience and connections to land a full-time job at an FFRDC [1], which only hires US citizens. I learned a lot from my group there, and it set me up for even more future opportunities. Those "unfair advantages" made life much easier for me during a tough market.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federally_funded_research_and_...
by nickd2001 on 1/19/23, 2:45 PM
by karmasimida on 1/18/23, 4:35 PM
To survive bad job market is not to enter a bad job market.
If you have to, then, due to supply and demand, you will have to adjust to
1. lower your expectation 2. work on area that is not your supposed expertise domain 3. other unfavorable conditions
by jamiequint on 1/18/23, 5:13 PM
by glitchc on 1/18/23, 6:22 PM
If the experience is positive, then great, stick around. If not, the name of a large company on your resume (ideally at least two years), will make it much easier to find your next gig, as large companies are easily recognizable for their products and branding.
by breck on 1/18/23, 7:17 PM
Look for something new and different that could change everything (https://scroll.pub/ https://breckyunits.com/oneTextarea.html https://longbets.org/793/)
by purpleblue on 1/18/23, 6:20 PM
1) Apply everywhere, literally in the hundreds. Different cities, different states, etc.
2) Make sure you are prepared. Do hundreds of Leetcode questions at least to the medium level. Do lots of systems design questions as well. The fact of life is that you need to show you can do coding questions and your competitors will all be at the top of their game here. If you don't match them, why exactly would you be a better candidate than them?
by hijinks on 1/18/23, 4:50 PM
My advice is learn to interview. What I mean by that is if you don't know something don't just say. No sure. Ask if you can try to walk your way through it with the person and if you get stuck or don't know something ask the interviewer for help. What that shows is you want to learn
by syntaxing on 1/18/23, 5:10 PM
by k3fernan on 1/18/23, 7:10 PM
I would say directly reaching out to hiring managers and recruiters is your path forward, but they get a lot of inbound, so the odds of a cold outreach getting read is low unless you have an intro.
by Ocerge on 1/18/23, 3:53 PM
by raydev on 1/19/23, 1:00 AM
Does this line up with anyone's real world experience?
by softwaredoug on 1/19/23, 4:00 PM
Not an option for everyone (college is more expensive now for sure!) but it worked.
by keeptrying on 1/18/23, 4:33 PM
Pay for something that helps you mass apply - I think there are tools out there. Unfortunately I've forgotten their names.
Put yourself in a strong situation - i.e. move back to your parents etc so money isn't a worry.
I never went to Grad School but a lot of my friends went to Grad school.
by Gortal278 on 1/19/23, 6:52 PM
I would do what you can to kill a year, sign up for post-doc work, spend a year teaching, go travel etc.
by alanfranz on 1/18/23, 5:12 PM
Try not living in an high-cost area or above your means, you can coast for a couple of years in some random corporate environment, then you could apply for some FAANG when positions reopen.
But they may not be closed for your role.
by _moof on 1/18/23, 5:27 PM
by chiefalchemist on 1/18/23, 6:35 PM
by twelve40 on 1/19/23, 2:34 AM
by lowbloodsugar on 1/18/23, 5:55 PM
by spacemadness on 1/18/23, 4:38 PM
by yellow_lead on 1/18/23, 4:00 PM
by odyssey7 on 1/18/23, 5:47 PM
by dman on 1/18/23, 5:56 PM
by marmetio on 1/18/23, 5:32 PM
by asow92 on 1/18/23, 7:12 PM
by LatteLazy on 1/18/23, 5:30 PM
by citilife on 1/18/23, 6:28 PM
They likely fired people not performing, they'll rehire "cheap" new grads. Make sure you get what you feel your worth.
by aiqq on 1/18/23, 11:09 PM
by neodypsis on 1/19/23, 1:51 AM
by maerF0x0 on 1/18/23, 7:57 PM
by dokem on 1/18/23, 6:16 PM
by notatoad on 1/18/23, 9:12 PM
by dzonga on 1/19/23, 12:29 PM
but OP has a PHD. if you connect with other PHD's from other departments not in tech, you can easily have a job or start a company.
by graymatters on 1/20/23, 12:18 AM
by noloblo on 1/18/23, 11:23 PM
by bradwood on 1/18/23, 7:30 PM
by getflookup on 1/19/23, 4:55 AM
by ravagat on 1/19/23, 6:09 AM
Below is additional notes that helps me through the game of hiring and looking for jobs. Take time to reflect and think about the pre-existing advantages you have. Then again reflect and think about the UNFAIR advantages you have. Unfair advantages are the very things you may take for granted that others would consider unfair. These things may, can and will be things that you will completely overlook so here's some examples:
- US Citizen, you should know this but if you don't there people going through laborous and painful undertakings just to have the same priviliges that you have as a US Citizen. Visas are dime a dozen and getting to a position to be given/apply for a visa is getting harder and harder.
- Alumni of university/college/high school that has any notoriety in tech, engineering, finance (or even any form of notoriety as long as its positive!)
- Network from university/college/high school/church/weekend rec league/hometown/current residence. Believe it or not a familiar face and name can lead into an interview and/or a job. There's probably people who like you for no other reason than the fact that they associate with you and remember you (vice versa applies too but we're talking positives here)
- Skill in highly specific niche that not entirely popular or "mainstream". If you have a skill and/or experience doing something in a niche this is beneficial for your chances as you can land an interview and form connections that can lead to more (network, interview, job, association, business)
- If you can and are willing to pack your bags and move across city/county/state/even country lines, you can increase your chances in landing an interview/job. If not disregard this
- There's a higher chance because you're a new grad, you'll be given leeway and are seen as a "cheaper" resource for the business. Understand this and use it. Shop your offers when you have them and if not say you do. Just cause its a downturn economically does not mean you need to experience a downturn in your personal economics
- Contact anyone and everyone you know and let them know you are looking for work. Mention it indirectly in communication for better effectivity
- Position yourself to be seen as high value.
Use every advantage you have.
by syntheweave on 1/19/23, 1:27 AM
1. Not all of the economy declines at once. Someone is hiring for something.
2. There is always a new trend spinning up. The trend may originate from the research sector, a government policy shift, or a large firm that has deployed a new business strategy. Those things result in new possibilities in the global supply chain, and therefore business formation and expansion.
3. When the trend is in its early stages - before it enters any hype cycle - you have to be on it and present yourself in a way that makes you "the person to seek out for x". If you get on and stay on, you get swept up in the resulting demand for skilled work.
4. Everything else is a continuation of that. Being a later hire means you're less central, and therefore less rewarded. When the trend ends you have to exit to a new one to have a continuation, otherwise the career is most likely going to have a gradual fade into obscurity.
All the more cosmetic stuff about whom to contact and how to contact them ranks beneath the macro trend positioning that makes you be near where the money is currently flowing, and part of the story of this recession is that the world's nations are all making big, strategic policy changes that redefine their economies.
What is probably going away: The leadership of the FAANG framework. The companies themselves will mostly stay around, but their scaling is done, and now it is about time for many of their products to be chipped away at by a swarm of new approaches, as has happened in past eras of software.
What is going to be interesting: AI, but not the nuts-and-bolts of machine learning. Those careers are made already, and you're way more likely to be acting as a consumer/integrator of their output. AI products and services in the larger view are still finding their way - approaches to integration, UX and so on.
Anything that deals with energy infrastructure and transport problems may be interesting. "ESG" is being pursued top down from Davos, and will change policies in many local governments. Software will be part of it, but it might be hard to find a niche that isn't occupied already. See Tony Seba's lectures for a sense of what might be opening up soon.
Crypto tokens have just hit another winter cycle. They are not dead at all; what the last cycle did is test the outer limits of schemes that misapply the tech, and a lot of "blockchain" companies were just that. The tech itself never broke in some fundamental way. It is ultimately another form of information system, one that indexes trades and valuations. The specifics of what is tracked in the system, the scale it should reach, and how secure it needs to be are still uncharted. It takes a creative mind to come up with experiments that reach beyond mimicry of traditional finance, but we're right around that point now. I'm following along with it; it could be interesting. Not one for finding a traditional job though, I think.
by what-no-tests on 1/18/23, 11:29 PM
by findthewords on 1/18/23, 4:35 PM
by keepquestioning on 1/18/23, 6:15 PM
by WhiteBlueSkies on 1/18/23, 7:00 PM
by jedberg on 1/18/23, 4:48 PM
If you're a grad student, maybe try to get a post-doc?
But assuming more academia is not for you, look for jobs outside of tech companies. Like apply for a job building the McDonalds app or writing software for John Deere tractors. The job probably won't be great, but you might get lucky and find a company that has realized that tech is the future and are investing in it (I recently met some guys from Ford who were doing some crazy cool stuff).
If you want to try to find which non-tech companies are embracing and investing in tech, look for old companies that have been featured in keynotes at re:invent or Google Cloud Next.
And of course use your network. Find friends who did get jobs and ask them if there are any more. While there are general hiring freezes, some companies will open up a few jobs to counteract attrition, and some will exempt new college grads from their freezes (because you guys are cheap and eager to learn their way of doing things without preconceived notions).
Good luck, and try not to get too down if you get ignored or rejected a lot -- it will happen to the best of people!