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Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by chrismcb on Saturday February 04, 2023 @12:38AM (#34651864)
Most jobs want you in the office 8 hours a day.
Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by cjbgkagh on Saturday February 04, 2023 @12:50AM (#34651915)
I think it’s the long hours of abuse, not that the long hours are themselves abuse.
Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by jedberg on Saturday February 04, 2023 @01:03AM (#34651983)
Yes but I think you're missing the point. It's not the eight hours, it was the specific eight hours regardless of any other work you did plus all the overtime that couldn't be done at home. ie. The complete lack of seeing one's family.
Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by Xenoamorphous on Saturday February 04, 2023 @01:24AM (#34652105)
Most of the jobs I can think have fixed working hours/shifts?
Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by jedberg on Saturday February 04, 2023 @01:27AM (#34652121)
Not most software engineering jobs. And it wasn't the fixed eight hours, it was the eight hours on top of that each day that was the problem.
Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by jack_pp on Saturday February 04, 2023 @03:58AM (#34652936)
how do you know for certain you'd be required to do overtime consistently? you've never worked in the field. I haven't either but I'm not assuming crazy stuff like being required to work 16h a day. your stance is completely unreasonable. There are other commenters who have worked in the field and said no one was expected to be in the office after normal working hours
Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by jiggawatts on Saturday February 04, 2023 @05:03AM (#34653246)
Not to mention that programmers consistently doing 16 hour days would get exhausted and burnt out within a week, making their productivity plummet.

No manager in their right mind would trust code from utterly exhausted people written after midnight to manage billions of dollars of capital.

Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by roundandround on Saturday February 04, 2023 @06:03AM (#34653518)
I met a banking C++ engineer years ago who was the only one left locally and spent his time teaching C++ to fresh offshore engineers in the form of code reviews. He was kind of a manager, though also his manager was probably rational.

1. It makes no correction in how an irrational institution is run that first level managers are rational. It just means they are stressed.

2. I met him at a language meetup for another language, he wanted out but would have trouble making half his salary.

(If you wanted me to trust code written by interns and reviewed across distance and language barriers, C++ wouldn't be my first choice, assuming I got a job in banking management, how likely would it be that I could change anything about that?)

Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by andirk on Saturday February 04, 2023 @07:41AM (#34654027)
I think it's safe to say that software development drains the brain fairly quickly. We've all slept under our desks a couple times and worked crazy hours for a few weeks, but anything beyond that doesn't sound humane or even possible. I straight up have difficulty conversing with people after those stints. Brain just shuts off. Stare at wall. Then again, there's astronauts and brain surgeons. Apparently trading desks need freaks.
Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by Xenoamorphous on Saturday February 04, 2023 @06:19AM (#34653581)
Well most software engineering jobs don’t pay $700k per tear either.
Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by tropicalbeach on Saturday February 04, 2023 @01:19AM (#34652071)
Yeah for real, I there is so many tech people are sheltered now days that if anything difficult comes there way they can't handle it. 700k for an 8 hour a day job and claiming to be abused is ridiculous. It's fine for someone to say they don't want the job but claiming abused is something else. People work months away from there families to provide for them and make 10% of that wage.
Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by jedberg on Saturday February 04, 2023 @01:26AM (#34652113)
It's not an eight hour job, you're completely misreading it. It's eight hours required plus another eight each day of overtime. Which is abusive for a software engineer.

And those people that work months away from their families -- they're being abused too. You'll notice that the owners of oil rigs aren't out there with them, for example.

Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by albntomat0 on Saturday February 04, 2023 @01:35AM (#34652166)
> But I would have had to work in their office in Manhattan, be in by 8:30am every day and not leave until after 5 at a miniumum.

That’s what you said originally, which reads as mostly normal work hours, plus maybe some overtime.

If it was 16 hours a day, then please say so.

Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by jedberg on Saturday February 04, 2023 @01:38AM (#34652186)
Read the rest of the comment?

> I wouldn't be allowed to take my laptop home, so if I had a hard problem to solve, I'd have to stay in the office the whole time. So basically they expected us to never see our family nor collaborate with anyone.

Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by albntomat0 on Saturday February 04, 2023 @01:53AM (#34652270)
I did. Myself and multiple other commenters all seem to be on the same page, that your original comment says the job required being in the office 8.5 hours per day, and does not allow work from home. Your follow up comments imply the expectations were an order of magnitude higher.

The part you highlighted says you cannot work from home. That’s unrelated to the number of hours they expected you to work.

Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by orf on Saturday February 04, 2023 @06:25AM (#34653606)
I think it’s fairly obvious to anyone who has worked in or around finance that while the contractual hours are X, the work requires 2X hours, thus being unable to take your laptop home requires 2X hours in the office.
Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by marssaxman on Saturday February 04, 2023 @09:54AM (#34654917)
Perhaps it would have been helpful to actually say that given that this is not a forum aimed at or primarily populated by people who work in or around finance. In a general context, "8:30 to 5 and you can't work from home" sounds like a description of the standard 20th century business schedule.
Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by orf on Saturday February 04, 2023 @09:58AM (#34654948)
Are you really, truly not familiar with the idea that the finance industry stereotypically requires long hours and values work over all else, at an institutional level?

OP could have spelled it out, but in any communication there is a level of shared knowledge.

When you read a comment that you understand to be complaining about making nearly a million dollars whilst working 9/5 in the office, a more charitable path would be to examine your own context and shared knowledge, rather than exclaim loudly that OP is a bad person.

Not that you did that, but others have.

Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by marssaxman on Saturday February 04, 2023 @11:28AM (#34655611)
I do know that finance people tend to be insane workaholics, but I was not aware that "software engineer who happens to work for a finance company" is a fundamentally different kind of job from "software engineer in the tech industry", with a different culture and harsher expectations.

A blind spot, I suppose; I have spent my whole working life in the West Coast tech industry - though discussions on this site generally share that cultural context.

Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by mort96 on Saturday February 04, 2023 @12:28PM (#34656207)
When OP wrote they were required to work in the office 8.5 per day, I assumed that they were required to work in the office 8.5 hours per day. I agree with the other guy, if OP meant to claim they were required to work 16 hours in the office per day, they should've spelled that out and not relied on people to guess.
Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by orf on Saturday February 04, 2023 @01:25PM (#34656711)
They are required to work 8.5 hours a day. They are unfortunately, like many other jobs, expected to work more.
Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by mort96 on Saturday February 04, 2023 @01:31PM (#34656764)
I understand that, yes. But that's not what the original comment says. If the complaint is that ~16 hours is expected, the comment shouldn't focus exclusively on the fact that 8.5 hours is required.
Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by msm_ on Sunday February 05, 2023 @08:50AM (#34664875)
> Are you really, truly not familiar with the idea that the finance industry stereotypically requires long hours and values work over all else, at an institutional level?

Not the person you're replying to, but I was not aware. I guess we have a different cultural backgrounds and some things that are obvious for most of this website are not for me.

Also this makes me even more confused. So OP actually expects being pressured into working overtime (irrelevant where - at home or in the office)? And that's not even their main issue?

What's the point of getting a double salary if you have to work twice as much? Can't they (as a great software developer with a strong work ethics and a good work-life balance they clearly have) just... refuse the overtime?

Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by r_hoods_ghost on Saturday February 04, 2023 @05:39AM (#34653406)
So go home when you get to 5.00. Think. Come back to office at 8.30. Work. That's what most people do.
Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by cm2187 on Saturday February 04, 2023 @03:03AM (#34652643)
16h a day is more like m&a hours. I don't believe a second that a quant, let alone a dev, in a hedge fund does anywhere near that time. Having to work late on rare occasions is a completely different thing though, and is not "never seeing one's family". M&A guys never see their family, they do those hours consistently.
Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by userbinator on Saturday February 04, 2023 @02:39AM (#34652510)
you're completely misreading it

Re-read your original description again. Nowhere did you say you had to work 16h a day.

Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by b4je7d7wb on Saturday February 04, 2023 @04:13AM (#34653010)
It is implied by not allowing to work from home. There wouldn't be a need to work from home if it was a 9-5 job.
Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by marssaxman on Saturday February 04, 2023 @09:16AM (#34654637)
For most of us, "work from home" means doing your regular work, during your regular hours, from your home office. No additional hours are implied.
Re:The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry by mort96 on Saturday February 04, 2023 @12:31PM (#34656224)
Before covid, working from home wasn't really a thing at the company I work for. That meant I arrived at the office some time before 10, was there for around 8 hours, then left. That's what "not being allowed to work from home" means to most people.