Top posting is the best for a wall of text. :-) About that anon poster - I think that his problem is mostly the "no other option" thing. He mentioned that "there is no jobs in the country that I come from". People without options are in very stressful situation, and can not improve their environment. so even the slightest problem can balloon to full emotional crisis. Been there - not fun at all.
About Booking - applying there, the red flags for me were: The brutal open space - in their office, IIRC, there are only long flat tables. no private space at all. no separators. Heck, even the Japanese, that I think invented the open space fashion, put separators between the sides of the table. When there aren't, the employees will create them themselves. (big computer screens, personal whiteboards, the computer body, a phone, stack of documents, and more) And they like being together. Medium salary + bonus: who else is working like that? sell persons and CEOs. I don't know any other company (granted, I don't know many) that pay their developers like that. What does it means? it makes you (if you want that or not, as in the bible written "money blinds the wise") focus on their business. Which is good for them. and good for some people. but let's make it honest: this is not a developer position. This is a technical entrepreneur position. I think that miss one question in their interview: do you want to start a company someday? and hire only the ones that say yes. This is actually quite genius of them - they take their developers, who know the best what the codebase can do, and make them always think about business opportunities. I don't know the individual people that work them, and how they fit to the scheme. Shmuel. On Wed, Jul 4, 2012 at 11:59 PM, sawyer x <[email protected]> wrote: > Top posting here, I hope it's okay. > > I've spoken to a few Booking.com employees (not just Micha) - people I > trust to tell me the truth (even if it isn't positive) - and it's apparent > that not everyone experience the same things. I understood some people did > not have the best experience (which is why some had gone after "greener > pastures"), but by-and-large the sentiments that were expressed in that > post were overwhelmingly different from anything I've heard people who work > there say. I'm stressing I'm referring to personal conversations with > people I count on for honesty. Some did say "yes, some things are more > encouraged than others, and sometimes it annoys you, but overall, this > isn't the way it seems in the post, at least not for me". > > Strictly speaking, regard a feeling of professional freedom and > satisfaction, if Booking.com were able to provide a home for Rafaël > Garcia-Suarez for such a long time, it means they're capable enough to do > it for others. Perhaps they're less motivated to do it for junior positions > (which I can understand) than to extremely skilled people, but it doesn't > mean it's impossible, or necessarily difficult for them to do so. > > This means that if you're professional enough, you're likely to be offered > conditions that will be worthwhile for you in the long run. At least enough > to attract some of the highest skilled Perl programmers in the world. It > doesn't necessarily mean you'll prefer to work there, or that I would, but > at least some insanely-good programmers do. So yeah, it means something. :) > > After speaking to the Booking.com people who came here for the Israel Perl > Workshop, I understood they aren't necessarily looking for Perl programmers > as much as they're looking for "good programmers", those they can then > train to use Perl. I really support that methodology. It's difficult but > it's very rewarding for the company, and very helpful for the Perl > community. > > On Wed, Jul 4, 2012 at 5:27 PM, Micha <[email protected]> wrote: > >> On Wed, Jul 4, 2012 at 11:26 AM, Shmuel Fomberg >> <[email protected]>wrote: >> >> Hi Shmuel, >> >> Though I do get payed by Booking.com (and using its resources for writing >> this post too :)), this is a personal (!) reply I felt the need to post to >> provide some insight from someone who's actually working for this company. >> >> Yikes! >>> And I almost took a job with them... >>> >>> >> Sorry that you feel this way, but I suggest you don't jump into >> conclusions based on a post from one anonymous source where you can easily >> get feedback from (many) people (with names) who work for the company (so >> you can at least be sure about that) about their own experience. >> I bet you will find that a lot of employees (junior / mid-level / senior >> and beyond even that) at Booking.com describe a (very) different experience. >> >> >>> It is true what he says about them dealing with all the developer as >>> junior. I interview with them, and got an offer. After much checking and >>> calculation, I found out that I probably won't be able to save money, and >>> the salary is, well, as for junior position. >>> >>> >> Booking.com is hiring developers (yes, we are still growing rapidly, and >> therefore need more people) with different levels of experience and >> knowledge, so naturally offers vary per person based on many different >> factors. >> Based on my personal experience, I think your conclusions may be wrong (I >> bet there are so many factors that need to be taken into account in order >> to make such calculation properly...). >> >> There are also other aspects to work-life in Booking.com such as awesome >> social experience (the company is full of expats coming from many different >> countries forming great and unique social life in and out of the office, >> which I'll cherish forever), stress-free environment and life (in the >> Netherlands) compared to Israel, the excitement of being part of something >> as big as Booking.com in the market it plays in, which also keeps on >> growing; and, of course, the professional aspect (just look at the next >> comment). >> >> The message that I got from that was: we don't care how good you are in >>> programming >>> >> >> I believe your conclusion is wrong, simply because: >> >> Yves Orton, Abigail, Rafaël Garcia-Suarez, Liz Mattijsen (until recently) >> and the list goes on and on (and on)... >> >> I like refactoring and improving things. probably would not have >>> survived there for long. >>> >> >> Personal preference, that's perfectly fine. >> >> Your assumption that we don't work on improving things is simply wrong. >> Though we may have slightly different definitions of 'improving' and of >> 'things' (this is a long discussion that I won't go into here), I can just >> say that as someone who identifies with the constant need to 'improve >> things' (and a pedantic one as well) my work here keeps me very much >> satisfied professionally and I find the way to channel this need into >> practical and productive use. >> >> If you want to know more, feel free to contact me personally. >> (hell, if you get to visit Amsterdam - come have a beer with me, I'll >> tell you even more) >> >> Cheers, >> Micha Nasriachi >> Booking.com >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> _______________________________________________ >> Perl mailing list >> [email protected] >> http://mail.perl.org.il/mailman/listinfo/perl >> > > > _______________________________________________ > Perl mailing list > [email protected] > http://mail.perl.org.il/mailman/listinfo/perl >
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