HN obviously has a large bias toward content that is relevant in Silicon Valley (understandably so). This makes it fairly likely that the content that is only relevant to SV still makes its way to the top of the front page from time to time.

It may be counter-intuitive, but I find it easier to apply these types of articles to my non-programming work. My wife and I own a gym, and we need to hire personal trainers from time to time. There's a certifying body for that, so it's easy to know if someone is trivially "qualified" for the job. Are we trying to hire the top 1% of trainers in the country? No, we're at best a medium-sized ___location for our area. Largely what we look for when hiring is how they will fit in with the existing coaching staff, how they will fit in with our existing clientele, and how likely they are to attract new clientele (or bring with them).

You also highlight that there are a lot of jobs out there where you're basically hiring for competence (which includes being dependable, not being difficult to work with) at the right price. There are a lot of professions where, for the mainstream jobs, there really isn't a lot of payback in "greatness."

Yep, me too, midwest huge insurance company. From what I've seen, there are very few people in mid to upper management that think developers are anything more than a cog in the machine (and only 1 who's ever stated that 'publicly') - I'm looking to leave after 11 years - I've given up on it changing.

I tried the midwest large insurance company job, and it was not a fun experience. I often had full weeks where I was waiting on something from other slow-moving departments and had literally nothing to do, and my boss knew and didn't really care, although I still had to show up and sit in my desk for eight hours a day.

And I was a developer but had to ask permission and make a case for every single program I wanted to install to help do my job, which isn't necessarily bad (there are understandable security concerns with downloaded software from the internet), except when Net Ops rates it a low priority and takes weeks to give you the permission. I eventually just stopped asking.

The atmosphere was also the most subdued environment I've ever been in. Most people not talking to or acknowledging each other unless their cubes were near, very few jokes, I almost got the feeling I'd get in trouble if I ever showed exuberance.

Not that I ever felt like it anyway. The lighting didn't help with that either, since we were in a room with very little natural light and soft florescent lighting that made it difficult for me to even stay awake there.

I did learn some new things there, and people were polite and friendly, so it wasn't all bad, but I'd never go back.

> The atmosphere was also the most subdued environment I've ever been in. Most people not talking to or acknowledging each other unless their cubes were near, very few jokes, I almost got the feeling I'd get in trouble if I ever showed exuberance.

I know exactly what you mean! It is suffocating! Currently struggling with this right now. I can't stand it because it just feels so fake and phony. To me work is easier and more manageable when you are getting along with colleagues, not when it is overly formal, and corporate, etc.

Idk, that's just my perspective.

Yeah, fake and phony, I definitely got that feeling. Like people were putting on a mask the entire time they were there.

I don't even mind corporate necessarily, as long as it's relaxed. My current place people will talk about pretty much whatever, help each other out, tease each other about things, the boss will join us for lunch and talk about Star Wars and Deadpool, team leads are willing to admit that they can make mistakes, you feel like you can be more open and honest around your superiors, no one gasps or blinks an eye when you casually curse, etc.

And yet it's not quite no-holds-barred like a previous job that erupted into nerf gun battles and openly (but not seriously) insulting each other on an almost daily basis.

Relate to both of your points. Being disrespectful and straight up insulting others shouldn't be acceptable, but having too stuffy a working atmosphere creates this feeling like you are walking on egg shells which in my opinion is not conducive to effective and productive work.

But I wonder who it is that sets the culture or tone of a workplace. Is it every employee in concert or more management / the team leads / bosses etc?

It's not necessarily being phony. It's just being dead inside.

After graduating and being thrust into the working world, I've become very disillusioned and wish to avoid this "deadness" inside.

As stated several times over the years, particularly on HN and by patio11 (edit: or was it Joel on Software? Perhaps both?), work for a profit center not a cost center. The internal software to run insurance companies is a cost center. It is in managements interest to reduce and keep costs down... that's detrimental to what you do. Working on a software product or Saas is a profit center. What you are making is to be sold. It's an asset. An asset management wants to make as valuable and profitable as possible so they are willing to invest in it. That works to your favor if you're developing that asset.

Not sure it's that simple. For example, in many places banks pay the most. Sure, they pay even more to their earners (traders, dealmakers etc.), but they make so much money on their business in general that they can shell out top dollars even for their digital janitors. Contrast that with places where you work on products such as computer vision-based gizmos, CAD software etc - even though you're bringing in the profit there, the pay is not that great.

They might pay well but the work environment and "culture" would probably leave many disappointed.

In addition to my previous comment, I'd like to hear people's thoughts on the "consulting" gig. It seems to rule here. You know the routine. Consulting shop places an individual at a client site and charges the client $100 an hour, and then turns around and gives the consultant less than half of it. I can see the argument of the consulting firm viewing their people both as profit centers and cost centers.

Why are they even called "consulting" firms? They are really just contracting agencies. And why are they so prevalent in the midwest and the insurance/banking/healthcare segments? Is it so that employers don't have to lay people off? Do they record the costs differently on their books versus full time employees? It just seems so obviously not in the interest of a company to use them with regards to culture, turnover, cost.

I use to be in the enterprise "consulting" gig. As a consultant its terrible. The only rate you know is what you are making, and thats just at the per year level. As the consultant you never know what is being changed to the client and so you never know your actual worth. Rates are probably the closest guarded secret for consulting firms. Plus you are a profit center to the consulting company but a cost center to the client. So there is the horrible pull between your management to "maximize the billable hour" and the client wanting to keep costs on the project down. Oh, and god forbid you are on a flat rate project where the only limit is time. Be prepared to work 80hrs and have no life.

I've seen two reasons why mega insurance company inc brings in "consultants." One is the consultant is specialized in an area of tech that is completely outside of the companies expertise. I did some of this being in a niche area of enterprise security. While those contracts still suck they suck a little less because you are at least advising the company and getting them up to speed on something. The other type, and the most common type is the "staff augmentation". I've been on those projects too and its exactly how they seem. The company has some in house knowledge (say a manager of infrastructure and maybe one full time employee for that tech) but the rest is really about throwing bodies at a project. From the client's perspective its all about workforce flexibility and not having the expense of a full time employee on the books. Even at like 100/hr its cheaper I guess for them vs having a full time employee. Plus its not their "core business" although in 2016 I'd argue if you are running a company it's insane not to think of tech as part of your "core business."

Overall, between the unsteady work, travel, etc being an enterprise consultant sucks. Most people that I know go into it because the potential to make a bit more money vs a traditional job at mega insurance company inc is there and they don't like the idea of working for mega insurance company inc for years. However, I've been on contracts where the project is like two years long so you might as well be working for mega insurance company inc anyway.

Honestly, there's a lot of confusion (and overloading, to use OOP parlance) with the term "contractor", and confusion with the term "consultant".

For instance, you can be a "contractor" as a software engineer, where you sign an employment contract to work for 6 or 12 months at a client site, working through an employment agency. At the end of that term, either your contract is renewed or it is not and you're now unemployed.

Or, in the defense industry, you can work as a "contractor" where you're a full-time employee of some company (called a "defense contractor"). That company signs a contract with the government to do some work for them somehow, and you're assigned to do this work. Your work does not have a defined end date (like the 6-month contract you might get to work at some big commercial company), you're just a regular full-time employee, but you still have to track your time (so it can be billed to that government contract), and if something goes wrong with the contract (like it runs out of money), then you can suddenly, with little warning, be furloughed without any pay.

Of course, there's many other kinds of "contractors" too, like the guy you hire to replace your house's roof. And there's all the people who are full-time workers, but are given 1099 forms as classified as "independent contractors" so their employer doesn't have to pay FICA and unemployment insurance for them.

Now, as for "consultants", that usually seems to be pretty much what I described in the part about defense contracting: you're a regular W-2 employee of some corporation, but you're sent out to client sites to do work for them, though there's no fixed-term contract with the client usually.

My last consulting firm accounted their consultant salaries as a cost center, despite our hours worked being directly billed to the client. I left about two weeks after finding out.

Does that affect you financially, or did you just think it showed the wrong perspective?

It was many. The numbers the company provided to me failed to account for a significant portion of my billed revenue. Presumably the missing money made it to the top level in some way.

I also objected to the idea that someone who directly generates revenue was being labeled a cost center. I left, as did my junior consultant, and shortly after the company failed to gain ongoing contracts at the very large financial services corporation they were trying to break in to.

My main problem with that job however, was that they recruited me as a greenfield .NET developer, but then had me analysing some 800 columns over dozens of tables looking for software errors that were causing incorrect results in the 401k accounts for which our client was the steward.

As a midwesterner who's working as a "consultant", one thing I can say is I don't get benefits, so that's an obvious plus for them.

Yeah, hear ya. Anyone know of any opportunities that match this criteria (profit center) in the Columbus, OH area? I've recently moved here for family reasons, and while there seem to be plenty of opportunities, they are all within the banking, healthcare, insurance verticals, or they are shrouded in mystery behind middleman tech agents. I have not found an easy way to do a search on indeed.com to bring the "profit center" jobs to the forefront.

The majority of "profit center" software and software jobs are on the west coast surrounded around the tech giants and the bustling startups. I believe Austin Texas has a few and so does New York. As for the rest of the country... it's hit or miss. Some of the large(r) Midwest cities will have a software company that has "profit center" software and jobs. I'm further West than you but I know some companies in Madison, Des Moines, La Crosse, Rochester, Decorah exist. Being in smaller markets they don't tend to pay as well $ for $ but when you factor in COLA and QOL they are hard to beat. I know some people that live near me that work remotely for Walmart Labs and make a substantially lot more money. Appleton/Green Bay/Wausau have a lot of insurance software jobs too... the type we seem to want to avoid. I'm not sure what the rust belt has to offer. The best place to look for "profit center" positions is the monthly "Who's Hiring on HN" lists and if you can't/don't want to relocate look for ones that allow remoting. Good luck.

This is how I evaluate job opportunities once I understood that: if the software is not the profit center or the competitive advantage then run away!

Wow. 11 years before you gave up on them changing. That's both impressive and depressing. I lasted about 2 and half years last place I worked.

I moved around in the company, trying to find someplace that was different (e.g. more like a software company) - and I finally did, about 4.5 years ago. The department was outside of the official IT department, because we are vital to the business and have legal reasons to need to move much faster. It was good for a couple of years, but recently, the area I'm in has been getting more like the IT department I left (they are pushing me and other leads to start taking on more "leadership" responsibilities - meaning management type crap, not lead developer) - so I think it's time to move on.

And I should mention that I've looked for other jobs in the area (trying to stay local because of family) - and almost no one pays as good as where I'm at. I'm making a bit above average according to Glassdoor (for my ___location).

2 and a half years also feels too long to me. But in order to not look like a "job hopper" is that the standard time I should expect to stay at a place or is 1 year good enough.

It was too long but of course I didn't realize it at the time. From what I've gathered, as long as it isn't with every job, you don't have to stay that long.

But don't take my career advice. I only really know what not to do at this point.

Where are you looking to go? Are you interested in working remotely? My company is hiring -- [email protected]

Almost everyone working in enterprise software is in your same boat. In fact, I'd argue the great majority of software developers outside Silicon Valley are either working for or with enterprise stacks and products & services. Sure, there's indie game developers and some boutique software shops working on small sites, but fundamentally most of their customers are businesses involved in FIRE (finance, insurance, real estate) business verticals or healthcare.

I had a job like that once, and it was clear to me I didn't fit there for a variety of reasons so I left because I wanted to make a difference at my job and not be a "resource". I then got a job at a "stable" startup working remotely for twice the pay that the boring industry would pay.

No need to create a throw-away account to share your personal experience.

I've worked in traditionally boring industries that treated programmers as resources to be allocated (healthcare, logistics). Sometimes it's still possible to make a difference. For example the logistics job I had, we were often the only development resources our clients had, so when they wanted to run a promotion or do something like that, our execution could literally make or break their business.

"was_boring" is a pretty good general-purpose handle IMO. I think they should keep it.