What’s it like to work for The New York Times ?
I’m wondering if there’s anyone in the Technology part of The NY Times who can share what’s it like to work there. The culture , work life balance and salary range. I didn’t find much info on it here on blind. Also how competitive is it to land a job there as a Software Engineer or Full Stack dev?
I'd say we definitely put more emphasis on cultural fit than most companies (only 2 out the 5 on-site sessions are technical). I've been on a bunch of panels now and people who ace the tech parts do get rejected for being a poor fit. We have a good engineering culture that we always try to improve. The WLB is also great, but I'm sure that depends on the team, and a team with bad WLB would definitely be an exception. I won't say the salary is as low as the other post said. My mid-level starting salary was close to 130k TC and I haven't talked to a senior making lass than that as a base. I'm currently a senior making close to 180k in TC. I have about 5 YOE total.
Thanks for your reply ! Very helpful Working at the NYTimes is one my dreams regardless of pay rate. How I can best prepare for a technical and cultural fit interview for front end role ? I’m aiming for a front end dev internship there, so it hopefully leads to a full time offer afterwards....
worldwide9 wanting to work specifically there is always a plus! So making sure your interviewers know that you're excited about "the mission" is pretty important. Not to say that we don't hire otherwise, but it's definitely something panels flag if it's there (as a positive). I'm not sure what they ask during intern interviews to be honest. There might be a technical screen but it might also just be a chat with the hiring manager. They have so many resumes come in for interns that there's a committee to screen them comprised of engineers that pick their top favorite resumes and try to advocate for them. The year I did it, we picked just interesting candidates with interesting previous experiences, tech or otherwise. So a cool project on github is as likely to get you noticed as volunteering for an NGO. From that list, the managers called the candidates and did whatever additional screenings they needed to. To be honest, we got so many great-seeming candidates (based on their resumes) that it was very hard to choose. We've also definitely hired former interns to full time in many cases so making a good impression does pay off!
Competitive - as in many applications are submitted. As for the interviews, it’s like leetcode easy/medium. Work life balance depends on the team but in general the company encourages WLB by providing additional PTO days and being mindful of sending Slack messages before/after typical office hours. Salary range is disappointing. $130k midlevel, $145k senior for me. It ranges by level which is unfortunate. Senior salary can be anywhere between $110-150k, it really depends on how you negotiate and the budget the hiring manager has. Negotiations is hard so going in with a solid range first will help you since they prob won’t budge with bumping up the base salary. Signing bonuses also range, $5k-$10k is what I’ve heard for mid. Culture- eh, everyone’s nice and supportive. Could be better, since it’s such a large company, it’s easy to get lost in the shuffle. Perks for working at NYT are lacking. Outside of the newsroom, occasionally we have access to something cool like hearing the Pulitzer Prize speeches, the workings of projects like The 1619, etc. oh we can sit in on the Page One meetings where the head editors go over today’s page one section news.
I'm only familiar when applying, but I recall that their salary is relatively on the lower end for NYC. Something like around mid 120k TC for Senior Engineers. Work culture and WLB supposedly very good though.