u/MinecReddit

Hey all,

Disclaimer: I am going to take this offer no matter what (life circumstances), so this is not a "which offer do i pick?!?" post.

I am in the process of moving jobs, away from gig (instacart/DD/uber) and into fintech (square/stripe/plaid), and I just learned that I passed the Senior interview and will be receiving an offer. I am fresh off of a very "hot" conversation with the recruiter where I held firm instead of succuming to any numerical pressure yet. When asked "is there a number that will make you say yes" or "what are you looking for," I stayed generic and non-committal. The only vibe I gave off is that, given my interview performance (he openly admitted that I was close to upleveling to Staff) and career history (have worked at Fintech extensively), I am expecting a strong offer.

He also quoted exact band values, denoting that 410 was the "cap" for Senior eng. I have a friend who works internally and was hired about 8 months ago, and I know that this cap is just completely false and that they are capable of going way above band. Now this has made me wonder how many times in my career I've let the notion of a "band" prevent me from negotiating for more comp... are these bands just not real at all? Do they use indecisive language to qualify for the laws about comp disclosure in the Big cities?

I am planning on pressing for an offer similar to what my friend got, but I feel like the entire notion of a "band" has just been fractured for me. What's the right way to think about bands? Are there any ramifications to getting hired above/below band? Would love to hear any experiences, thanks!

I joined my current company (FAANG adjacent, gig/fintech uber doordash stripe etc.) about 2 years ago, one of my coworkers is about to cliff so hard that his TC is going to drop below what it was when he was hired as a mid level eng. He is actively interviewing and will probably leave some time this year, he's made the final rounds at two other places and is a sharp guy.

What I don't understand is why it feels as though upper level leadership at these companies are just completely inflexible in situations where someone is getting paid way less than the offers that they are giving our new hires (at my company, levels.fyi filtered for new-only high CoL area is about 400-420k, which is around what I got too). My skip-level manager is awesome, very honest and candid and loves seeking the truth and helping people grow, and his two cents was that he agrees this engineer is absolutely pivotal to our new products (a lot of them are 0->1 where he is the clear leader), but that bigger copmanies just can't develop risky policies where everyone is suddenly fighting for money.

I understand his perspective, but let me just take a step back: I snap my fingers, and I am now the Tzar of my org permanently. Assuming I am working in a high trust environment where I am confident in my mid-level managers, what would I stand to gain for my org/my company by not even entertaining retention negotiations for senior engineers on my team? In this case, this guy is so incredibly valuable to our team and org, chancing it with some random new hire is just so obviously worse. He has a ton of domain knowledge and is just so ridiculously proven as an eng. What is the flipside of this discussion here?

I guess I'm just mad because him leaving is really going to slow down our projects, guy is a very talented engineer, and was clearly on the path to staff anyway (not enough business need sadly). Oh, and he's also so, so fun to work with and is a great dude

(NOTE: I understand that some places really do entertain retention offers for levels below staff, but I am trying to ask about the perspective of the ones that don't)

Sorta long story, but I just want to talk to all of you people that have never been fat so you get it through your thick skulls exactly what fatties who lose weight and keep it off have to go through. So many people just reduce it to "JUST PUT THE FORK DOWN, FATTY" which is insanely stupid.

I used to weigh like 300 pounds, and I lost 90 pounds and kept it off for good about 7 years ago. A huge part of that is behaving like a ridiculous athlete - marathon running, powerlifting competitions, hyrox, triathalons, you name it. I re-invented my lifestyle to be crazy active, with a ton of meal prepping and careful planning around food. Even now, a huge part of my time and energy is spent thinking about and planning around food.

I don't need to lose more weight and I haven't needed help maintaining weight, but just to see what the buzz is, I bought a 5mg vial of reta, and just take 2.5mg for two weeks (small dose)

What. THE FUCK.

This is black fucking magic, holy shit. Is this what it feels like to not have to think about food all the time? To just eat and be hungry and not feel the need to constantly keep watch on your food intake? Without reta, it doesn't matter how "pure" my diet is (and believe me, it's chicken, whole grains, veggies, and healthy fats and nothing else). I always have to restrict or pay attention to my eating in a way that nobody else in my fitness circles describes.

Is this what it feels like to not worry about food? Holy shit man. I don't plan on taking it long term, but now I feel like I have a much better feeling of what people are talking about when they talk about the difference in the brain/hormones of people that have been obese. It's not just "a matter of will" - there is something fucking wrong. This drug could fucking change the world.

L:5.6 G:4.5