Dodging tech industry red flags

Check if you have a competitive agreement. Go to the competitors faster. No, I'm just kidding. I'm kidding. Don't do that. Don't do that.

Well, I mean, they did call out that.

Yeah, they said they had well-funded competitors. See if you signed a competitive agreement and go there.

You're listening to Off the VPN, the show where two work besties get real about working in tech. What up?

What's up, Allison? How you doing?

Melting away here.

I was literally about to say that, like, it is so hot today. I am dying.

It's too much.

We got kind of like similar vibes going on today. Man, I just want to be at a beach right now.

Listen, listen, it's not too late. We can run through this real fast and then—

If you're listening, we're doing this real fast and then you want to— we're going to link up at the beach immediately. Maybe next episode we should do this at a beach.

How do we make that happen? I feel like that's the right move.

I'm going to look into this. That is an immediate action item.

Top priority, immediate action item.

Should we get Off the VPN sunglasses?

Yes. Put an order in now.

Immediately. Already sent the request. Good.

Yeah.

So what are we talking about anyway today? What are we actually talking about?

We're going to talk about some weird, sketchy stories. You know, when you like, you talk to someone or you're interviewing somewhere and you just like get bad vibes.

Yes.

But you're not sure. Like, it's not like overtly, it's not like 100% obvious. Like, okay, this is a sketchy situation. I need to get out of it. Sometimes you're like, is this really happening? Like, Is this real?

And you're trying to decide. Yeah. I think about like young Jasmine fresh out of college or even in college, like doing internships and having like no idea what was— I was, I was more focused on trying to get my code working. I didn't know what was going on outside of my desk. And then like looking back and being like, wait a second. Yeah. Or like stuff not adding up. Like the more you get in your career, you, you're more perceptive to things happening.

Yeah. You know that like, oh, that's not normal, or that shouldn't work that way. Whereas yeah, when you're, when you're sort of just learning and you're new to the tech industry, you, you don't know that yet. You're like, yeah, my code, my code works. It's all good. That's all you care about.

Craziness.

Craziness. Yeah. So on this topic, do you have any stories real quick? Any sketchy things you've encountered that maybe young Jasmine didn't?

I actually have a lot. I'll try to keep one.

That sounds awful for you. I'm sorry.

No, no, I'm telling you, like, early Jasmine, man, like, she was making some, some funny choices. I'll do one where I made a good choice, where I was interviewing for some company once and seemed cool, whatever. And the— there were several red flags throughout the interview that I was like, Something seems wrong. So I went to go do the coding interview within, all within the same day, and their IDE and thing was not working to actually set up the coding interview properly. And the woman giving me the interview just gave up. Like she gave up trying to give me the question and she's like, yeah, just like hand waving. What do you think you do? And I was like, I guess I would do this. And she's like, cool. And literally just the most awkward, like, 30-minute coding interview of my life. And then it got weirder where I met the founder, and the founder was like very bro-y, like kind of swearing in the interview, which I— listen, I get informal, chill, but it was like very uncomfortable. It was like an uncomfortable, like, yeah, what's up? Like, yeah, we just, you know, we got vibes. I'm like, I don't, I don't know if this is for me. And then they gave me the job within the same day. So I was like, I, I feel like this should have been a little harder. I don't know if I want to work here.

Yeah.

And so I hope, I actually haven't looked to see what they're doing now. But yeah, I'll never forget that. Cause like you still gave me the job. Yeah. I should have sent people over there that didn't know how to code. That's where they should have went.

You want a job?

Go here.

They don't, they don't check your coding.

Wow. What about you?

That's interesting. Oh, similarly, it, it was an interview where I had like met with the hiring manager in person in an office. We had a really good conversation for like 20, whatever, 25 minutes. And then he took me around the office to sort of orient me like where things were and introduced me to people. And he introduced me as like, this is Allison, she's joining next week. And I was like, I was like, bro, what? Like, this is a job interview. I didn't accept anything yet. Did you offer me the job? It was so bizarre. And he repeated it over and over again. And at that time, I was like fresh out of college. I was not like intervening or saying anything. I just like went along with it. And I was just like waving like, hello. Yes. Hi. See you all here next week for sure.

Obviously he was manifesting.

He was early to the manifesting.

Uh, damn, you must have really— was that, was that like all in one day, or did you interview at least a little earlier?

No, that was all in one day.

Wow, you must have killed, killed that screener. That screener must have been so good.

Yeah, it was so uncomfortable. Um, and then I went home and had to send this guy an email and be like, listen, I will not be joining this company. I was like, if you're doing that, what does that mean about your I don't know, like everything. Social skills, like picking up on details, like how you communicate with people. Like not once had I ever said like, yes, I formally accept this job. It wasn't even offered to me. You know what I mean? So that was like definitely a little—

What if, what if somewhere this guy's story is actually that you did say yes and you just don't remember? Yeah. He's like, this, this woman said I was gonna join, she was gonna join, and then the same day He, she let me tell the whole company she's joining next week.

I mean, look, like to be totally fair to that guy, like I absolutely should have said something the second that he did that. I was just not, I was not, you're junior, you're junior.

You get away with a lot more. Like, I feel like you don't have a voice yet. Like, listen, that's a learning experience. It's not, that's not on you. It's good that you didn't just go do the job at least.

No, but like in that moment I was like, guess I'm joining this place.

I don't know.

Guess I have a new job now. Like, but yeah, for sure.

Why don't we talk about like what happens if you actually join that sketchy situation? Like what actually happens when you're in it and you're like, wait, hold on. I'm in, you know that meme when it's like, I'm in danger. Like that, that situation. Yeah. I have a story. For you about a situation somebody was in. So this one I got off of TikTok. Her username is ePotato, or AKA Critical Ravioli. So this is her story. One time I worked at this sketchy startup and they're all like, hey y'all, we're all going to Europe together on this family vacation. It's gonna be great.

Family, what? What?

I know, opening line, we're already, the red flags are out. Flag on the play. Stop the game. Okay.

Yeah.

But Europe. But I haven't had a company bring me to Europe, so I don't know. I'm just saying, like, y'all could be my family if we're going to Europe. So we went and it was fully paid. It was like a whole week. We went on yachts. There was this open bar, all this stuff, and which was a new take on team bonding that I really hadn't anticipated. But we were there to build synergy. So I guess it's technically in scope. And so we come back and they're like, oh, you know how we said we're all family here? Well, we actually have to kick some people out of the family. Like 30% of y'all are getting laid off. Grandpa's gone. All your cousins laid off. And so at this point we're kind of like, oh, is everything okay financially? Like, should we have not gone on that huge trip? And they're like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Everything's fine. We have $40 million in the family bank account. It's totally good. And so at that point, we were all just too scared to ask questions. We didn't want to get kicked out of the family. And then 3 months go by and they're like, oh, we're going to have another international trip. Isn't that great? And everyone's kind of like, uh, do we have to vote people out of the family when we get back? Like, I don't know if we want to do this. And that's when we realized that there are 2 kinds of startups. The first kind exists to make products. To work, sell stuff, that kind of thing. And the second exists strictly to fund the lifestyles of people who are cosplaying as tech executives.

Oh my gosh. I don't even know what to—

I know, I know, I know, I know. I told you, I told you it was crazy. Oh my gosh.

Okay, but here's the thing is like people cosplaying as tech executives, like What's funny is they didn't have to bring the whole family along to do that. I'm so torn here between like, if I went on a full expenses paid European vacation and then came back and someone was like, we're laying you off, I would be wondering like, was that our last big hurrah? Or like, it sounds like they didn't actually lay people off though. It sounds like they threatened it or did they actually?

No, they did. They took 30% of the company after they went to Europe. They came back and they were like, yeah, so 30% of you are out. Yeah, that. And they're like, no, no, we have mad money. And then they did it again. I want to know what's up with the— like, do they have a board? Is the board like seeing this? Like, how are they explaining these? So this whole thing is giving Fyre Festival— it's like, where's the money going? Like, in what universe do they need to go all the way to Europe for a team thing, right?

So were we purely building synergy, or did we do any work-related, like, seminars or presentations or anything? Like, this is crazy. How— it was a week-long vacation? Yeah. Okay, the second that my company offers me that, I'm immediately, like, asking a ton of questions.

No, absolutely not. Now If— shout out to Jellyfish sponsoring this, but if Jellyfish sends me to Europe, I'm asking not a single question. I'm not asking a single thing. And I hope they're listening to this. I will not ask a single question if you send me to Europe.

I'm asking a lot of questions. This is the difference between you and I.

And then we won't go, Allison. Don't mess it up for us. We could have been at the beach.

I'm the kid. I'm the kid who's like, excuse me, teacher, aren't you going to collect our homework at the end of the month?

We're all, no. Girl, no, I see if you're like starting somewhere, like, yeah, you should. But like right now, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I'd be like, yeah, absolutely. That sounds like a great plan.

Here's the thing.

Here's the thing.

If Jellyfish wants to send you and, you and I on a European vacation, won't ask any questions. The entire company to send all of your employees. Did, did they say in the post how much?

That is crazy. It was, that is crazy. Yeah. I feel like that's above my pay grade, you know?

I don't make— I don't make—

I don't know. You know what though, you're right, you're right. Because like, probably I'm making a joke, but I probably would if I wasn't on the vacation. Like, if so, if they sent like a different department to Europe and we— I didn't get to go, I'd be like, what, what's going on? What's going on here? What's going on with the funds? I'm calling up the board. I'm kidding, I'm kidding. So this is a shifty situation, clearly. Yeah. But do you feel like this is an L? Like, I feel like there, you can get into a shifty company, but this feels like, I feel like you gotta, it's a little bit of a win in some regards. I'm curious about like the day-to-day operations.

Like, here's the thing. There may have legitimately been like positive things that happened at that family vacation.

Like, I'm reading— I don't know what you're reading. That's not what I got.

Well, well, okay, like minus the layoffs, obviously, but I, but I'm saying like, do you spend time with your coworkers in a non-work environment? Very infrequently, I would say, compared to how often you work with them. So it's like, maybe actually like some long-lasting work friendships were built at that time. I'm really trying here to find like a positive. I'm really looking forward.

Yeah, I don't know. You can go bowling, like you don't need to go to Europe for that.

You, yeah, you could go bowling, you could go on a hike, you could do it, do an escape room, like spend an afternoon. I don't know that we had to go all the way to Europe.

Europe is crazy for a startup too. Like, I don't know. My question is this, do you think they knew they were gonna lay people off before or after Europe?

This is the part that really concerns me. That's why I asked, like, was this like the last big hurrah? Like, okay, well we know we're gonna lay off 30% of our employees, so why don't we just take everybody to Europe beforehand? Like, that seems unlikely, but either way, like I, I, I just don't even think any of it matters because clearly there's like poor resource, financial resource allocation happening here.

No, obviously.

So you're, you're joking about wanting to, uh, about not asking any questions, but like when you come back from that vacation, from the family vacation with your coworkers and they announce that they're laying off 30%, like that to me, I'm like, okay.

Oh, that I'd have questions.

Like at that point.

Yeah. If you are not allowed to ask questions, it sounds more like a cult. Than it does like a company. Like it's giving, I want a 5-episode documentary on this company. That's like, that's what it, this, this story is giving.

I would watch it. I, I wanna know more details. Yeah.

So my question, closing question to you is, yeah. Would you join a company asking no questions? Your job's like lowkey a sham, but you get to fly out for free pretty regularly, would you do that?

No. No. If I know that, if I know that my job is a sham, I'm like, what am I—

I'm assuming, I'm assuming it's a sham. I actually don't know like more about this company.

Yeah. We don't know.

We should reach, we should reach out and ask for more. More. Well, let's just see. Have her tell the whole story.

Yeah. But if we're assuming that that is the case, like no, because Listen, I'll just get a job that's actually real where like we're doing real good work, solving hard problems. Like finances are like, you know, in order. And I, then I can fly myself out anywhere I wanna go if I save my money appropriately.

You know what I mean? Like I just, yeah, no, I feel you. But how sad is it like if they, like the engineering team or on this was like actually doing excellent work, like Fyre Festival, you know, it had nothing to do with like their actual product. Like they actually were building, they had an engineering team that was building stuff and then the marketing team just went crazy with the CEO or founder. I think I, I can't remember what his like position, I think he was CEO and founder. And, but there was an actual app that people were, and it was like really sad when the company went down cuz they put all this effort into an actual thing and they pretty much blew it on like the whole thing was just a marketing for the app.

And yeah, but the engineers didn't know that until it all sort of—

no, no, no. Exactly. Exactly. So would you still do it if you're— you were doing cool stuff, but, and I didn't know, you knew the company was gonna end up just getting destroyed. We get to go to Europe like a couple times a year if they don't lay me off.

Yeah. I don't know.

I don't think so.

I just like, listen, I have, I have standards and I have principles. Like, I don't know.

I'm not saying you should. I wouldn't do it. I'd be so like freaking out. Like, there's no way. Like, I'm teasing, but like, oh, I know, I know, I know. In reality, I would have been like, oh no, I'm good. It would be funny.

The one thing I'm hesitating on is like, if I love my coworkers, like my fellow engineers, and we're all like, what is going on here together? I'm like, I could see myself staying in that situation longer than I should just because I love the people that I'm working with. But otherwise, oof, hard pass. Okay, so I have a question here. Someone looking for advice on a company that they joined that maybe they saw some red flags initially that, you know, they decided to join anyway. So maybe they ignored, and now they're questioning some things about the company and they're looking for advice. So the title of the post is Company is too chill and now we are going bankrupt. Last year I joined a company that seemed too laid back. Despite good pay, I have little responsibility and have to share the simplest of tasks with other developers, which creates a lot of overhead for collaboration. My coworkers often take long lunch breaks or disappear during the day, leaving me blocked. Unsurprisingly, even minor projects take ages to complete with many people involved. Now the company is struggling with revenue and is talking about running out of funding. Meanwhile, we have well-funded competitors that are executing much more effectively. I'm not sure what to do. The job market is effed and I don't want to go through the grind again. Talking to the tech leadership would likely either mean I'm ignored or get me fired, as they are the ones who set up this environment in the first place and don't see the situation the same way I do. What would you do if you were in my shoes?

There's a lot happening. There's a lot here.

There is.

Well, let's, let's, let's walk through the situation real quick. So it sounds like this person First of all, knew that it was laid back.

Yeah.

They're, they're having an issue where things feel really slow. Right. It sounds like there might be maybe some issues with accountability. I mean, my, my biggest thing is that if you feel like you can't change the situation and you're unhappy with it, like you absolutely should find somewhere that you're feeling heard. My initial— I don't really know their situation where— I mean, if they feel like they're going to get fired by asking about it, that's not great. So, but I would also ask, like, did they try? Or do— if they have examples of these situations not going well, if they haven't tried themselves, like, that would be my initial thing. But if they're pretty certain that that's not going to work out, yeah, heard, because that can be a situation.

Yeah.

I mean, I'm imagining if you're in a situation like this and you feel like it's too laid back, you're describing it as laid back or people aren't, you know, taking things seriously. It can be unfulfilling, right? It feels like you're not really doing anything. Yeah. And so if you're feeling that way, check if you have a competitive agreement, go to the competitors faster. No, I'm just kidding. I'm kidding. Don't do that. Don't do that. Don't do that.

Well, I mean, they did call out that.

Yeah, they said they had well-funded competitors. See if you signed a competitive agreement and go there. I mean, yeah, you could technically. That's not always in good faith though. That's why I joke, check your situation before you do something crazy like that.

We are not giving legal advice.

Yeah, I'm not saying go do that, but I'm not saying not to not do that.

Yeah, I mean, I totally agree that it seems worthwhile to figure out, is this a situation that you can influence at all? What I'm not hearing is what you already pointed out, an attempt to maybe talk about some of this culture with anybody in leadership, right? They mentioned that they joined— when they joined the company, they thought it seemed too laid back. So they, you know, registered some kind of like yellow flag even at the very start. And I wonder if they have ever engaged with anyone in saying like, hey, you know, I come from a company or other companies that have this other type of culture, and I'm much more used to working in this other way. Like, I'm curious, like, historically, like, how things have worked here. Because it also doesn't really sound like a very empowering environment. You know, if you're sharing every single task and you're blocked all of the time, it sounds way more frustrating probably for more people, I would imagine, than just the person posting this.

Another thing you can consider is bringing in something like an idea, like more like developer experience. Like, I wonder if they're running developer experience surveys. Are they doing DevEx? Talk about like, hey, like bring up ideas that would actually improve the environment so that they could show. Or I don't know, Jellyfish, that company. That, I don't know, helps you measure engineering efficiency. But like, I think bringing in something like that could possibly help to illuminate some of these things where there is a disconnect between how engineers are seeing things and how engineering leadership is seeing things. And maybe this person might learn something that they didn't know, or leadership will as well, and, or most likely both will learn something, right?

So back to identifying red flags or yellow flags, or like, you know, the moment when you're observing something, you're like, is this, is this weird? Is this not weird? I don't know. I do think it's interesting, the opening sentence of this post was, last year I joined a company that seemed too laid back. You know, like, what's done is done. This person already joined this company, but it's just a good thing, I think, to like follow up on after you join a place, right? Because It's not always the case that you notice something and then it turns out to be like obviously like horrible and toxic and bad, but it's a good thing to say like, I was worried about this thing when I interviewed, like what is the culture actually like? Or, you know, was that just a misrepresented thing that happened in the interview or is that actually happening in reality? And I think if this person does end up, you know, whether they end up leaving or staying, like now they maybe have a better sense of like what that instinct feels like to recognize something. And then like how you can go about making sure that, you know, what questions could you ask in an interview to see if that is actually the case or if that's just a thing that you perceived? So for example, you know, if you picked up on this company being too laid back in an interview, company is too chill, like ask questions about how work gets done. Like try and understand like, is this a type of company where we're like grinding every day, crushing Red Bulls every night? Or like, is it something like, no one's gonna say like, yeah, we always take like extra long lunch breaks and people disappear all the time. But you can ask questions to gauge like, yeah, are people generally like excited to get their work done? You know, if you're inter— being interviewed by an engineer, like what's the last project that you owned?

Does leadership respond to feedback? How well do they respond?

Yeah, like I think all of this in some twisted way is really good training for like recognizing things that might be different from what you've experienced at previous companies or how you're used to working, and then knowing what questions to ask to try and gauge like, is that actually going to be a good fit for you or not?

That's a really good point. And making sure you stand on that, like don't let that little thing pass your brain. Make sure you like really investigate it thoroughly. But I understand sometimes like the interview process moving fast, you just wanna get the job and it makes sense, but it shows you like what the risks can be if you, if you choose a job. It did give me one more piece of advice that I wanna add in that you gave me an idea, which was like maybe, um, scoping the problem down to your team. Also, they said they're going bankrupt, but they just said they missed their revenue targets and they needed to get funding. So I don't know if they're really going bankrupt, but another option, if they're really going bankrupt, definitely go look for another job. Start doing that already. But if there's just like some revenue problems and it's interim, like figure out how to solve the issues on your team. Like that's something you can influence in your sphere. Don't try to over— make the problem bigger because it's gonna be much harder to solve. But if you can solve it with your team, like Hey guys, like I've been noticing that I've been trying to reach out to folks, but it's been really hard to collaborate because our schedules are a bit different. That's something you can work out with your team, with your manager. Like maybe there are issues with accountability, but you also need to hold your teammates accountable. And so that's also your job. Now, does this mean you're gonna solve everything?

No.

That the team might not even be responsive if there are no accountability measures being held to the team itself. Like where do the motivators, where does the pressure come from? You know? So I feel like typically people wanna do a good job and move fast, right? Like, or move smoothly. So likely there's looking at the positive sides, maybe we will move past this and we will be able to improve the team on a team level. And then maybe you can copy those to the other teams if you, So wish, but at least your, into your immediate sphere, you can influence. Don't worry about everything that you can't control.

Yeah, that's such a good point. It's not your job to fix the whole company and get, yes. You know, funding for the company.

You don't get paid that money.

You're not getting paid that money, but yeah, exactly. You can influence how your team works and how you work with the individuals on your team.

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