BRAIN DRAIN:
Historically, big tech has been the go to destination for some of the smartest software
engineers, data scientists, and product managers in the world. With bleeding edge projects and top of the
line salaries, it’s no wonder why super stars are drawn to these companies or at least
they used to be. It turns out that more and more, super stars
don't want to join big tech companies. In fact, just recently Facebook was having
a bit of a hiring crisis where only half of top tier job offers were being accepted. A large reason for this is that many of these
applicants weren’t actually looking to work at Facebook or any other big tech company
at all. Rather, they simply applied and went through
the interview process in order to get a strong anchor from which they can negotiate with
the companies that they actually wanted to join. It’s not much different with the people
who did end up joining these companies either. Many of them only see these companies as a
means to an end. A way to gain experience, build a strong resume,
and climb the corporate ladder before starting their own company or joining a project that
they’re actually passionate about. This isn’t a new trend either. For decades, the startup scene has been dominated
by ex-big tech employees. But this trend has vastly accelerated over
the past couple years. And who could blame them? They’re just looking out for themselves
and making the best choices for their careers, but this brings up the question of: where
does this leave big tech? As they slowly lose their status as being
the destination for super stars, what will happen to their flagship products like the
Metaverse and Google Bard? Also, what will happen to the culture of these
companies as they slowly devolve from being an engineering playground to being just another
corporate office filled with politics, antics, and egos? Well, likely nothing all that great. So, here’s an in depth look at the big tech
brain drain what this means for these companies and the tech industry at large. THE GREAT MIGRATION:
Starting off with the biggest question: why in the world are people not accepting these
job offers? Is the compensation just not high enough? What’s going on? Well, this breaks down into 3 major reasons
starting with big tech offers not being all that hard to come by. That’s probably quite a controversial statement
because for you or me, scoring a big tech offer might be borderline impossible. But, for the people who actually end up getting
these offers, it’s often not all that crazy. In fact, it’s not uncommon for them to apply
at 5-10 companies and get job offers from all of them if not most of them. If you’re wondering who these people are,
I would recommend checking out teamblind.com. Over there, they’re everywhere. Literally half the posts on blind are something
along the lines of: Should I take $667 at Meta, wait for an L7 offer at Google, or keep
my L7 Amazon job, let me know. This is especially true once you already have
your foot in at one of these companies. After that, you don’t even have to apply
to other FAANG companies. Instead, recruiters from these other companies
will basically beg you on a weekly basis to come interview with them. So, the reality is that for a lot of super
stars, once they’re already in the industry for 5 or 10 years, scoring another big tech
job offer isn’t some sort of holy grail. In fact, they’re often over the whole idea
of working at big tech which brings us into reason number 2: the compensation isn’t
enough. With slowing growth and high interest rates,
big tech companies have largely cut compensation, especially stock comp which is the most lucrative
part of these jobs offers. But, that’s not what I’m referring to
when I say that compensation is not enough. Rather, what I mean is that higher compensation
alone is not enough to convince super stars to join. The reality is that they’re often already
multi millionaires. Because of how expensive these cities are,
it’s often the case that they’re not able to retire even with $2 or $3 million in savings. But while, they may not be able to retire,
they’re definitely well off and never need to worry about money again. As such, they don’t make their next job
decision purely based who is offering the biggest salary. They’d often much rather take a lower job
offer with a lot more scope and growth opportunities. I mean, just think about it, while it might
sound cool from the outside to say that you work on the YouTube iOS team, what does that
actually entail? It’s not like you’ll be coding out the
new shorts feed or the new recommendation algorithm from scratch. Rather, you’ll probably be working on fixing
bug #2001 regarding community posts or debugging some issue with dark mode. And that’s not Google’s fault. That’s simply the reality of joining any
project that’s as mature as YouTube. Now, I can already hear a bunch of you saying
that you’d love to fix some bugs and earn that much, but that’s not exactly how the
high achievers that these companies are targeting think. They’d much rather join a smaller fintech
company or AI company where they can actually play a larger role in product development
even if the compensation is slightly less. And that brings me into the 3rd reason that
superstars are no longer interested in big tech which is compensation potential. Sure, compensation at smaller companies may
be lower because the cash portion is lower but they have far greater growth potential. For example, would you rather have $100,000
worth of Google stock and work on Google Bard or $100,000 worth of OpenAI stock and work
on ChatGPT? From that perspective, the answer is obvious. So, whether you’re in it for the money or
the role itself, big tech offers simply aren’t all that appealing especially when they’re
“not hard to come by”. But if super stars are no longer joining big
tech, who is? THE OPPORTUNISTS:
Ironically, the question of who is getting into big tech today is extremely easy to answer
and breaks down into 3 categories starting with the sell outs. The people who have their eye on the ball
for increasing status, job title, and compensation. And I want to note that I’m not criticizing
these people by any means. They’re just looking out for themselves
as they should be. Moreover, these people are more than qualified
for these roles as they’re just as smart as the OG superstars. That’s why they were able to crush the interviews
and get in but their intentions are far different. They’re less interested in using their skills
to build the best products, and are more interested in using their skills to maximize career progression
and compensation. A good example of such an employee is quant
engineers. If you’re not familiar with quant engineers,
their jobs are to use their extensive knowledge in applied mathematics, data models, algorithms,
statistics, and calculus to create software that can trade the financial markets. Essentially, quant engineers are creating
insane algorithms and software just so that financial firms can regularly skim 0.5% on
natural gas futures or a few cents on bid ask spreads. Obviously, rather monotonous soul draining
work but it pays extremely well. After all, making 0.5% on a billion dollar
natural gas position adds up to $5 million in profit every single trade. And it seems that FAANG companies are heading
in the exact same direction, especially as they keep pulling back from moonshot projects. Eventually, all that’s left are monotonous
maintenance and refinement jobs who only appeal to people are really only in it for the paycheck,
but at least these candidates are highly qualified. The same cannot be said about our next category
of opportunists which are the game players. These people don’t necessarily have strong
engineering backgrounds or a passion for tech. They’re often stuck in a corporate job that
pays alright or a even a low paying job that they’re stuck in, but what they do have
is a massive amount of drive to change their situation. And that’s when they hear about all these
people in big tech earning massive salaries straight out of college with very little experience. Naturally, they decide to make the switch,
but their strategy usually has less to do with learning the skills required for the
job and more about learning the skills required for the interviews. You know, grinding out leet code problems,
crafting compelling stores to tell hiring managers, networking with as many people as
possible, and just playing the game in general. Honestly, this strategy is way more effective
than just being a good engineer. This is why a lot of great engineers are never
able to break into FAANG. They’re just not able to sell themselves
as well. But while this is a phenomenal strategy to
get in the door, the effectiveness of these individuals once they get in the door is a
lot more questionable. I mean, how much does solving leet code problems
really translate into building highly scalable solutions or new innovative products? Likely not that much, but atleast, these guys
are largely here by choice which cannot be said about our last category of oppurtunists
which are the groomed. Now, I don’t want to throw shade at Asians
but this is extremely common within the Asian community. Basically, starting from age 5, parents will
push them to join a bunch of STEM related ECs, coding camps, and take a bunch of CS
classes. This way, by the time the kid is 18, regardless
of interest, they’re pretty good at coding. From there, they’ll usually attend a top
public university if not an ivy league school where they major in CS before they crack their
way into FAANG. Putting the whole ethics of all of these aside,
this doesn’t exactly lead to the healthiest workforce. You basically end up with hundreds of thousands
if not millions of sell outs, game players, and groomed individuals across which brings
us into the question of: what happens next? THE REPERCUSSIONS:
How exactly each of these groups got here is vastly different but they tend to end up
having very similar individualistic motivations. Job security, maximum pay, and promotions
which again are not bad goals to have. They’re just not all that great for the
company itself. This sort of environment is what leads to
entrenched workforces with nothing but office politics. Much of these employees’ efforts don’t
go into creating the best products or efficiencies possible. Rather, they go into outperforming their teammates
and pandering to their bosses even if that doesn't lead to the best results for the company. The reality is that most of these guys don’t
give a hoot in hell about the company other than the status that it gives them and the
growing stock price. In terms of actually serving their users and
customers, a lot of them couldn’t care less. In fact, many of them don’t know how their
role is even linked with the end user. Most people would hate such a work environment,
but these guys thrive in this environment. Many of them have been dealing with such environments
for their entire careers and by the time they’re in their 40s and 50s, they’re masters of
managing politics and getting exactly what they want. This is how you end up with tech leaders who
have no formal tech background. Oftentimes, they’re from the marketing department
or finance department. And their playbook is usually just infinitely
cutting costs and increasing efficiencies, but this can only take these companies so
far as they veer further and further away from what initially made them successful. And soon enough, you end up with your next
generation of Intels, Ciscos, and IBMs. Meanwhile, the superstars who made FAANG into
what it was move onto up and coming companies with promising tech and help scale these companies
to new leagues far beyond what the previous generation was able to achieve and the cycle
repeats all over again. Not only is FAANG experiencing a brain drain
but they’re also reaching market saturation for the first time. Check out this video to learn more.
