This feels similar to my experience! I got into tech during a period where there was a lot of talk about ‘diversity’, and I do think that make things slightly easier as a very junior person. I definitely got hired as a token ‘we hire women!!!’ at my first tech job, which was enough to get me going, but was an otherwise a sort of awful experience. And even after that, there was definitely a ‘show pony’ vibe at a few jobs, where on top of being a good hire, I also needed to Be A Good Example Of How Diverse We Are, while not necessarily getting the projects or support for career development.
There is a weird statistic I’ve never been able to substantiate (I didn’t try that hard) that people used to (still do?) quote about women in tech dropping out after 10 years, which sort of spooked me/sort of motivated me to be pretty aggressive, in addition to my feelings of being financially behind the curve due to the career transition.
I also think of the ways class play into it are kind of intense. I am/present very mid/upper class, whereas other women in my tech bootcamp group who didn’t have my educational or class background have struggled significantly more with their career trajectory. I’m still extremely blind to a lot of class markers/interactions, but even the little I can see is A Lot.
Hi i dropped out of (non software,) engineering after 10 years because i started getting handed the difficult to work with people, the jobs that wouldn’t go well, and wasn’t as reliable because i had a kid who got sick at daycare, like all other kids. I’ll be part of the cohort who elbows their way back in after a ~5 year hiatus.
I also experienced a great boss as my first real boss. I got fatigue etc issues after working a year but I wasn’t his first great worker with those issues and he’d learnt a lot from the other woman, who is still working with him AFAIK and I watched him push upper management for her promotions and raises, and her own direct manager to give her better work.
Second main boss was fine but didn’t really get it. I was also just slowly more worn out the longer I worked.
Eta: for clarity, I’m a white woman from a family that is at least middle class
Yeah, I’m on year 8-ish and I can see that stuff with the projects! I’m not mad about it (yet) because the money is good and my current boss is highly appreciative, but I’m not having a great time getting shoveled onto teams that are struggling.
I could have held on longer but I wanted to have babies and my body didn’t handle that well. Thats another factor in the drop off, along with outright discrimination theres a lot of simple physiology and subtle + systemic discrimination.
I definitely was trying to save up early in my career with that in mind.
Then I did an @allhat and got a high earning husband
My parents’ relationship is a classic nagging situation. I witness my mom disparaging my dad for purchases but I rarely, if ever, hear them talk about what they’re saving for together. I don’t want to repeat that in my own marriage!
Ooo, I want to read this now! I am hugely anti-nagging. I think it’s terribly destructive in a romantic relationship. My mom is forever nagging my dad (and us when we were kids) and it is exhausting and de-motivating. I grew up watching her rage out about my dad not doing his share at home, but this was while simultaneously seeing her nag him about the “right” way to do every little thing, correcting him, “following up and reminding” him, etc. It all screamed to me that she thought he was totally incapable which is like, kind of an insult to her own choice of partner, lol. I never understood that. Like you either trust each other or not?
It reinforces for me this idea that you can’t just be trying to manage money out of fear of having None. Instead you have to be working toward(s? I never know) something rather than trying to avoid whatever worst case scenario the brain can conjure
I think in a broad sense nagging is rooted in fear, regardless of topic. I think fear is useful when you are in actual peril but otherwise it’s really a misleading thing to go with. I mean, fear is primal, so it pushes you to extremes and snap judgments. This is good if you are being chased by a bear, so you don’t stand there and think, “golly gee, should I run? or should I pet it? or should I take a picture?” you just run. But if you are afraid of things that are wildly unlikely and totally out of your control and that haven’t even happened it’s like you’re forcing your own back against the wall and insisting on acting based on fear response instead of anything else, like logic, planning, wisdom, values, etc. Fear is all about snap decisions, which are like, usually not good in a partnership meant to span decades.
Totally. Can’t speak for everyone but in my mom’s case nagging is verbalization of her own anxiety directed at another person instead of inward. I notice the same tendencies in myself and you’re right; it can come across as a lack of trust in/respect for the other person and their abilities! Not great, Bob. So circumventing that pathway and carving out a new one where the goal is to proactively plan for future cool things together!
I took a page from the @noodle playbook and requested that my library get “Cashing Out” THEY OBLIGED OMG. This was my first time ever requesting a book and it felt SO GOOD. I didn’t snag it fast enough and now need to wait 2 weeks to read it but I am very excited.
I hope you all noticed my “take a page” and the fact that I am talking about a book pun… hehe
I listened to their episode today on “Quiet Quitting” and I really enjoyed their discussion about the benefits and very real risks to doing this. I have been teetering on the edge of burnout for a while and I made an interesting conclusion that they probably didn’t intend. When they were discussing how it would be easier to “quiet quit” if you have a remote job I was thinking that I can do a better job of dividing my heavy work tasks and the mindless easy ones and try to batch the mindless easy ones to 1-2 days/week. I have now created two to-do lists that will help me sort tasks into these two categories. I am hoping this will give me a few more days that feel like breaks and cause a bit less stress for me. I’ll let you know how it goes!
I also listened to their episode about the lessons from past recessions and it gave me more confidence in our current investing strategy. I appreciate them discussing how the goal posts for this recession keep changing and you cannot make snap judgements in response to timelines. I haven’t been consuming much news or content on the internet due to my current energy levels but I wish Julien’s suggestion of being able to block keywords from your internet search were real lol (he suggests blocking anything with the word “recession” in it for now).
Ahahahhaa this pun sent me!! CPL has this check box where you can place any book you request on hold first (if they approve the request). Bummer your library didn’t. But SO FUN that they approved it!! I’ve had great success with my requests, I get the feeling they really like to get them—I know I would if I was a librarian! Proven community need/interest!!
They start the episode by saying “millionaires are made in recessions”. They acknowledge that this can be gaslight-y depending on your circumstance but essentially you should not make big purchases based on emotional decisions (toilet paper in 2020, buying a house, buying and selling investments, anything). They say that over time the most successful people are the ones who keep their consistent strategy and not to make big swings without lots of consideration.
With regard to the moving goal posts - the technical definition of a recession is two straight quarters (originally said months) of GDP decline, which happened in Q1 and Q2 2022 so technically we should be in a recession right now.*. HOWEVER, there is a lot of debate on if this is actually a recession or not. If you look at the full economy the only sector that seems to be experiencing other signs of recession is tech (lower revenue and profits, layoffs, etc.) The confusing part here is that a majority markets (over 70% IIRC) are making record profits and still hiring. Over 526k jobs were added in July and 315k added in August. Also unemployment is back to historical low levels which is counter to many past recessions where unemployment was high.
They are also debating if Q1 should really count as GDP decline because there were so many supply chain issues domestically that imports were up and therefore artificially lowering the GDP of the US outside of demand.
There are alot of other factors that are making this a difficult recession to understand due to the pandemic landscape, war in Ukraine, etc that could be influencing this too.
So there are two sides 1- either we are in a recession and the media and politicians are trying to reduce the fear of one to keep people spending and the economy strong or 2- we are not quite in a recession and may need new metrics to define it in the future.
*Side note the amount of google searches for the term “recession” is at similar levels to 2008.
Either way - the safest thing to do if you are able is keep to your investment strategy and don’t make decisions out of fear. Recessions have happened in the past and they will happen again in the future. Focus on reducing your spending in conscious ways to protect yourself and keep to the strategy that has worked for so many people over time.
One thing they discuss is in times of recession people tend to go back to school to gain new skills but many of these programs will not give you the ROI that you think. If you want to level up your skills do the math to make sure the payback is worth it (an executive MBA at a big fancy school is ~$200k it will be a long time to get that ROI). They were not discouraging new skills or education, just telling you to finish the equation before spending money and ensure its the right thing for you.
I was actually kind of happy that someone snagged it before me! It means that other people are going to be reading it too! To be fair, they told me when it would go on the app and I was a day late so my fault not theirs.
I can’t wait to ask for more purchase requests in the future! I had NO CLUE this was an option.
I’m almost done with internet time today.