Episode 16: Decision.
Suppose MSFT follows through with a good TC: what other dimensions should be considered in the decision? Are there any biases that I am falling a victim of?
Is my impression of .NET based on potentially outdated 10y-old good old memories? I called my old .NET friends and they told me that .NET got even better, and that C# is way ahead of Java as a language now (hopefully this will not cause a holy war in comments), but of course there may be selection bias here (these are .NET friends). I also learned that many switched from Visual Studio to JetBrains' Rider, but selection bias again — my friends speak Russian.
Am I just clinging to my past too much, trying to achieve college dreams, being afraid of stepping out of my comfort zone, and thus limit myself? Sure, stdlibs, runtimes and GC always fascinated me, but maybe its just my thinking got stuck in the previous decade, while the world and new generations have moved on to the Cloud. Am I falling a victim of Availability bias? For a true leap (episode 1), one must be ready to jump to something completely new, no?
To challenge the potential availability bias, on Thursday last week I spontaneously drove to the AWS building in Seattle. It is a gorgeous set of skyscrapers and huge beautiful receptions. I've been missing the city vibe since I left Tashkent — other than SF, Silicon Valley is pretty flat; and so is Redmond. I tried to picture what would day-to-day life be if I work here. The commute was fine, and also there as Amazon shuttles — I hate sitting in the traffic doing nothing, while I can work on a shuttle.
And then I spontaneously called my Amazon recruiter and took him to lunch to his favorite local restaurant. We talked about all kinds of stuff. He shown me various Amazon buildings and who sits where. Jokingly I asked him where the Infinidash team sits and we talked about Corey Quinn, and how one of the buildings is named after users that pay $0.05/y, but provide feedback worth millions.
When I asked how much time he has, turned out he is done for the day and will go pick up his kid. I was surprised because it was only 3pm — quite a contrast with what I read about Amazon's stressful culture where people work night and day, and one of my concerns for the first few years in Amazon. Apparently he picks up his kid everyday at 4pm. He then proceeded to give me other examples of how high-level engineers work, how EC2 co-creator didn't miss a single football game of his son, and about the art of not stretching yourself thin. I kept our conversation light, but in the end I told him that Google made a counteroffer, because I figured that MSFT. He responded that if it helps me to make the decision faster, he can take the counteroffer to the compensation team.
On Monday this week MSFT recruiter called me. Apparently my case was exceptional because I applied for one job, but then they were trying to make me an offer for a different job without making go through another interview loop. They had to jump through a series bureaucratic hoops to make it happen. In fact, she still didn't have approved TC, but because I've been pressuring them to hurry up, she was willing to share an approximate number that could get approved.
She said they cannot offer level 67, but only 66. Accordingly they offered the TC of ~1.28C where C is my current Google TC. Its better than my current pay, but the latter is no longer relevant given the offers; and MSFT TC is 30% less than AWS TC. I love .NET, but not to that extent. A few more email exchanges made it clear that MSFT isn't low-balling me, but they just don't currently have a job in DevDiv that would justify level 67.
Well, I really tried, but MSFT left me no choice. AWS it is! ☁️✅
There was just one thing left to do: use the Google counteroffer as a leverage to potentially bump the AWS TC even further. I mean, 1.83C is a ton of money, but still it is silly not to even try using a leverage when you have one. Till the next episode 😉
Suppose MSFT follows through with a good TC: what other dimensions should be considered in the decision? Are there any biases that I am falling a victim of?
Is my impression of .NET based on potentially outdated 10y-old good old memories? I called my old .NET friends and they told me that .NET got even better, and that C# is way ahead of Java as a language now (hopefully this will not cause a holy war in comments), but of course there may be selection bias here (these are .NET friends). I also learned that many switched from Visual Studio to JetBrains' Rider, but selection bias again — my friends speak Russian.
Am I just clinging to my past too much, trying to achieve college dreams, being afraid of stepping out of my comfort zone, and thus limit myself? Sure, stdlibs, runtimes and GC always fascinated me, but maybe its just my thinking got stuck in the previous decade, while the world and new generations have moved on to the Cloud. Am I falling a victim of Availability bias? For a true leap (episode 1), one must be ready to jump to something completely new, no?
To challenge the potential availability bias, on Thursday last week I spontaneously drove to the AWS building in Seattle. It is a gorgeous set of skyscrapers and huge beautiful receptions. I've been missing the city vibe since I left Tashkent — other than SF, Silicon Valley is pretty flat; and so is Redmond. I tried to picture what would day-to-day life be if I work here. The commute was fine, and also there as Amazon shuttles — I hate sitting in the traffic doing nothing, while I can work on a shuttle.
And then I spontaneously called my Amazon recruiter and took him to lunch to his favorite local restaurant. We talked about all kinds of stuff. He shown me various Amazon buildings and who sits where. Jokingly I asked him where the Infinidash team sits and we talked about Corey Quinn, and how one of the buildings is named after users that pay $0.05/y, but provide feedback worth millions.
When I asked how much time he has, turned out he is done for the day and will go pick up his kid. I was surprised because it was only 3pm — quite a contrast with what I read about Amazon's stressful culture where people work night and day, and one of my concerns for the first few years in Amazon. Apparently he picks up his kid everyday at 4pm. He then proceeded to give me other examples of how high-level engineers work, how EC2 co-creator didn't miss a single football game of his son, and about the art of not stretching yourself thin. I kept our conversation light, but in the end I told him that Google made a counteroffer, because I figured that MSFT. He responded that if it helps me to make the decision faster, he can take the counteroffer to the compensation team.
On Monday this week MSFT recruiter called me. Apparently my case was exceptional because I applied for one job, but then they were trying to make me an offer for a different job without making go through another interview loop. They had to jump through a series bureaucratic hoops to make it happen. In fact, she still didn't have approved TC, but because I've been pressuring them to hurry up, she was willing to share an approximate number that could get approved.
She said they cannot offer level 67, but only 66. Accordingly they offered the TC of ~1.28C where C is my current Google TC. Its better than my current pay, but the latter is no longer relevant given the offers; and MSFT TC is 30% less than AWS TC. I love .NET, but not to that extent. A few more email exchanges made it clear that MSFT isn't low-balling me, but they just don't currently have a job in DevDiv that would justify level 67.
Well, I really tried, but MSFT left me no choice. AWS it is! ☁️✅
There was just one thing left to do: use the Google counteroffer as a leverage to potentially bump the AWS TC even further. I mean, 1.83C is a ton of money, but still it is silly not to even try using a leverage when you have one. Till the next episode 😉