Usually the perception is that Microsoft is obviously better than IBM, but I'm shocked to see that it fucking sucks. Maybe I went from one of the better orgs in IBM to a dysfunctional org in Microsoft. Anyway, here are the reasons: 1. Most code doesn't have a readme. Tribal knowledge and reading the code is the only way to figure out what's going on. 2. Very few design docs. All architecture knowledge is rehashed every 6 months by someone new in a "brown bag" or "FHL" call. If only you wrote down and maintained what you're talking about, you wouldn't waste everyone's time just to re-explain the basic architecture. 4. Too much knowledge on OneNote. OneNote sucks because there is no version history. Impossible to know what is new and what is stale. People hesitate to remove things because deleting content is permanent. 5. No culture of repo ownership. A lot of critical code doesn't have a clear owner and the history is littered with random people making 2 line changes as they need. Deps go stale. Unit tests go stale. Even very senior engineers are assigned small tasks in various repos instead of total ownership of one area. 7. (Most surprising:) WLB is B.A.D. People regularly work 8am to 7pm. Low-trust culture: if people take a lunch break they post on the team channel. If people take 30min off they apologize for it. Maybe you folks aren't used to a remote-first culture but the whole point of working remotely is so that you aren't glued to your chair and have the freedom to intersperse household work with office work. 8. Weird concept of managership. First line managers are just Principal Engineers who also play the role of scrum master. Often they are the most proficient engineer on the team and continue pushing code as if they're IC. You people don't understand that manager is a totally different skillset that involves relationship building with the team, maintaining morale and motivation, growing talent and other soft skills functions. If a manager needs to touch code then they have trouble delegating. The talent quality is good overall but it's stuck in a dysfunctional context. I just feel bad for the lifers who have never seen better because their view of the profession is probably very grim.
Tech Industry
Yesterday
1118
How common is it actually to earn more than 300K TC?
India
Yesterday
1263
Modi is a legend, will be remembered for centuries to come
Working Parents
19h
1363
Closed now - thank you all
Tech Industry
8h
972
Women, help me understand why this is inspirational
Cars
Yesterday
969
Do you really feel special in your Tesla?
I switched from Amazon to Microsoft and I have to agree with what you said. There’s a lot of bad things but just as many good things. Having a technical manager you report to has been a god send. At Amazon no one in management understood how software worked
Why are SDM at amazon former TPM and not former SDE? The one good thing about msft is that most if not all SDM were former senior SWE and have coded before.
Yup a lot of SDMs are TPM converts or industry hire non-SDEs(never been SDEs) Working under a manager who you can talk code with and get useful feedback from them is a night and day difference. It will really help your career
You really need to ask questions about this of the hiring manager on the way in. None of this is my experience in my 20 years at Microsoft and it seems to be sparse teams.
You don't mention your IBM TC vs Microsoft TC. That should make it worth even if its bad as you claim
As SWE we're not compensated based on the level of dysfunction in the company. In fact in theory higher paying companies should have better processes because they attract better talent. That's why it's surprising that Microsoft is internally worse than IBM.
You still didn't answer
Not my experience. Been here long time. Which team are you in?
Been at Microsoft before in multiple teams. What you said is largely true in both teams. Except the wlb part. Office and azure wlb is worse but windows and others was a breeze.
1 and 2 is pervasive across the tech industry. Definitely true of Apple, equally true of so many teams at Google. Hate to say this but being able to reconstruct design from code is a valuable skill set.
What irks me is that even the people who wrote the code originally never bothered to write a readme. It doesn't take more than 30-60min to write one so it's a systemic problem.
True to some extent. Which team are you in Microsoft. Weird about people mentioning 30 min break. Looks like you got one of worse teams in Microsoft
I've generally noticed that people who apologize for taking breaks or announce lunch plans often worked in other countries before working in the US. Seems like it's a remnant of their work culture they had.
I just joined and I could have written this myself! It sucks! I worked less hours at FB!!
Seriously? Which team did you join? I heard Fb is toughest to survive pip etc
My team works on an internal tool. But it's a nightmare.. got to put lunch on your calendar etc..At FB, it ebbs and flows for my team. some weeks I basically slept on the couch in my home office but other weeks I get away with just working 4h days.
Yep, it's not the Microsoft it used to be. Alot of long timers bailing out for greener pasture and liking the change.