• ameancow@lemmy.world
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    23 hours ago

    I lead and manage a financial/tech team in a critical, well-established company.

    I haven’t had a pay raise in 2 years and still work hourly.

    It wasn’t always like this, the last several years have really, really escalated the global undercurrent of hate towards employees. I feel like every single meeting in not just this company but many others (I have eyes in other places) always report “exceeding financial projections” while at the same time scaling back benefits, hiring and wages. Many other companies I’ve watched get digested by private equity after faking their own value, so it’s basically every business-owner’s goal right now to get bought out for millions and leave the employees stranded.

    For that matter, I have years of experience in this industry as well as experience managing, using the tools and software, and doing somewhat specialized analysis work, and it still took almost two years unemployed after my last position got gutted just to land this job and it took twisting the arms of contacts and acquaintances.

    During those two years I exhausted every avenue and encountered more scams and ghost-jobs than I can count.

    Lemmy, I know you really don’t want to hear this, but if you’re not actively making contacts, playing the game and being social, your chances of getting a job that doesn’t involve a you wearing an apron and name-tag and cutting you off at 39 hours a week is fucking abysmal. You have to exercise muscles you didn’t know you had if you want to land a stable job even adjacent to your actual qualifications.

    Degrees, certifications, etc. are still important, but it’s bare-minimum, hiring managers broadly are looking for people with enough experience (or can fake having experience) that they don’t need as much training and people who are social and friendly enough that they feel “at ease” bringing new people in, because so many of them have been directed to keep costs as low as possible. So much of this shit is vibes-based right now.

    • theneverfox@pawb.social
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      21 hours ago

      I think a better takeaway is this… Hiring runs on nepotism. It always has, but for a while you could go through an application process and land a decent job

      You have to work your social connections to find a job these days. People are just way more willing to put in the energy to evaluate you if they have someone vouching for you

      Especially now with remote work and AI… The screening process has devolved into nonsense. If they’re not pulling your resume out of the stack, it’s very likely no human is looking at it

      • ameancow@lemmy.world
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        21 hours ago

        The process is weeding out everyone who feels awkward about self-promotion or being pushy, which is a shame since that also weeds out a lot of fantastic candidates. I’m sure upper-level management doesn’t care, but in the trenches I much rather have people who are experts at their work or are smart and can get the work done than outgoing business-speakers who like to be seen and heard.

        But that can’t be changed. We have to adapt and learn to be at least a little pushy and get out of our comfort zones.

    • Buddahriffic@lemmy.world
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      20 hours ago

      RAM is a resource that works best when you have more than you need. I always want there to be some unused RAM because then my system can do anything it needs to without spending time swapping out the least recently used pages before it has any free ones to use.

      Shitty programs that take GBs of memory to do things that should only need MBs or KBs of it isn’t “getting my money’s worth out of my computer”.

      • OR3X@lemmy.world
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        20 hours ago

        I agree, having a bit more memory than you typically use is a good idea, there is a point of diminishing returns though. If you typically use less than 16GB of memory, buying 64GB isn’t really giving you much of an advantage because the majority of that memory will sit unused. You could argue future proofing, but the fact is you would be better off waiting to purchase that extra memory when you actually need it as it will (usually) be cheaper by that time.

  • python@lemmy.world
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    23 hours ago

    This hurts, I finally decided to build my first own PC like 2 months ago, got everything planned out but decided to wait for black friday to actually order all the parts. Now I have everything except RAM and an SSD, because I refuse to pay those prices 🥲 Maybe I’ll buy a single second hand 8GB stick just to find out whether my system even boots…

    • Geth@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      22 hours ago

      My current PC is decently specced today but it’s definitely a very ship of Theseus situation. Everything apart from the ram and motherboard has been changed over the years as new deals sprung up and I could afford better parts. You can definitely make due with less until either the shit floats away or you end up in a better financial situation.

      • python@lemmy.world
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        21 hours ago

        Yeah, that’s what I’m hoping to do with my system too! I’m not even in a bad financial situation rn, I just don’t really need that PC asap and don’t want to encourage the current market by actually buying at those inflated prices. It’s gonna be a very cool setup once DDR5 RAM goes back to being affordable, but in the meantime it’s just a very expensive adhd pile on my floor xD

        • Geth@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          21 hours ago

          Looks great. Grab that 8GB stick and finish the build. You will be very happy you finally did it.

  • tiramichu@sh.itjust.works
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    20 hours ago

    You shoud definitely build it soon, even if just to test it.

    If you don’t, it will invariably be your bad luck that a component doesn’t work and you are then past the return window…