Got laid off at a big bank. What next?
Posted by Revolutionary-Desk50@reddit | ExperiencedDevs | View on Reddit | 37 comments
Story so far-
Was working at a big bank for about 16 months and got hit with a layoff today at 10:30. Kind of glad. It was some weird regulatory affairs backend project and the lead, manager, and skip were total nightmares to work with. After half the team was already sent home, I was voted off the island this week. Manager was totally blindsided.
Getting 3 months garden leave, 3 months of severance and with unemployment, I reckon I will have another 3 months after that. 9 months to find a job. Or else I have to do Bankruptcy or something. Just got done with a divorce. Depleted.
Have already been applying and am in my fourth onsite round. Twice at JPMC, once at Amazon, and now at a larger startup, so I have SOME trajectory.
I currently live in New York City but am open to relocating to the west coast if that's where the next job is. Not particularly interested in non-tech areas. The goal is to get out of IT (banks, retailers, staff augs, hospital systems et al) and into tech.
And have about 10 years of experience. Java seems to still be somewhat useful, but am thinking of doing some retooling but sure what that would be. I'm a backend engineer through and through. Been thinking about infra/and AI adjacent stuff.
Anyone have any advice beyond "LOL, THERE'S NOTHING FOR YOU TO DO GO AWAY", or if that's your advice, what's the next step?
Big-Wall8785@reddit
reminds me of when i tried automating my morning coffee routine
engineered_academic@reddit
Feel for you homie but this isn't the right sub for this kind of discussion. Hope you can get the support you need.
ExperiencedDevs-ModTeam@reddit
Rule 3: No General Career Advice
This sub is for discussing issues specific to experienced developers.
Any career advice thread must contain questions and/or discussions that notably benefit from the participation of experienced developers. Career advice threads may be removed at the moderators discretion based on response to the thread."
General rule of thumb: If the advice you are giving (or seeking) could apply to a “Senior Chemical Engineer”, it’s not appropriate for this sub.
CEOofQuestions@reddit
Black out any personal details and send me your resume. I know a hiring manager in a bulge bracket bank looking for a tech lead level head in the NY metro area.
bugtank@reddit
Grieve from the divorce. Take some relax time. It will be a gorgeous summer in nyc this year.
Why were they nightmares to work with.. I always fear I am a nightmare :(
Revolutionary-Desk50@reddit (OP)
They kept saying one thing it really meant another. And then kept getting upset when I did what they told me to do and they really meant something else. And I’m not talking about oh you know interpretations, it was literally they were very explicit about something and then I followed that and got yelled at. It was really bad. The communication sucks. They were totally blindsided by the director coming out and laying me off. They had no friggin clue.
SolarNachoes@reddit
Director might have acted on all of their complaints.
Did you put in writing their requests and get approval of each one? Seems like it would have cleared up the ask for one thing but mean another issue.
Revolutionary-Desk50@reddit (OP)
They refused to because they said it slowed them down.
SolarNachoes@reddit
They didn’t want accountability.
Lunchboxsushi@reddit
yeah that blows, I've been gaslighted before like that. It changed my relationship with the org. Some people are just like that. It's the reason I get everything, and I mean everything in writing now.
newprint@reddit
I mean, I've seen divorces in my life and they can't be even close to comparing to loosing a job. I would rather loose 20 jobs than go through 1 divorce.
Revolutionary-Desk50@reddit (OP)
The separation was two years ago but the divorce was final two months ago. The ex is still messing around and I have to bend over backwards to see my son. He's 3 years old and has CP.
newprint@reddit
I'm sorry you are going through this, I wish you to stay strong !
biggamax@reddit
If you fear it, you probably aren't.
Revolutionary-Desk50@reddit (OP)
Self-awareness is a big deal.
Kolt56@reddit
Since you mentioned big tech.. If you’re doing on sites with amazon, there is probably a Microsoft or Google building nearby.
Revolutionary-Desk50@reddit (OP)
I probably gotta send at least a couple of them to each of them each week. ChatGPT at least thinks that if I was able to get consideration at Amazon, eventually, Microsoft or Google would be interested it went on to say that Apple would be a stretch and that metal would be a stretch and Netflix probably isn’t worth it or do I have Meta and Google mixed up?
Kolt56@reddit
With 10 years in tech at a big bank, Amazon, Microsoft, and JPMorgan all seem very realistic, and Google or Meta are definitely possible too if you interview well. Apple and Netflix feel a bit more dependent on fit, team, and network/referrals, but not impossible. Amazon usually sounds strong on initial comp, but the tradeoff is that the expectations are high.
j-random@reddit
Get comfortable with AI, it's everywhere. Play with GH CoPilot, Claude, whatever you have access to. I just started with JPMC a month ago, my manager is asking us to track how much time we spend working with AI and estimating how much time it saved us. My last job, we would be pulled into meetings to explain why we didn't use AI enough (they had monitors on the tools that told who used what and when).
Revolutionary-Desk50@reddit (OP)
I have many Chat GPT tabs open. I do it from everything from job searching, to creating "badazz skeliton"/hoss pictures on Facebook. Business and pleasure.
Jewcub_Rosenderp@reddit
You really gotta get into agentic engineering though. There is a lot of hype and useless harness or orchestration ceremony people do that wastes tons if tokens but you still gotta know about it all to stay up to date. And when done well it really does make a huge difference over raw claude code when you really optimise your skills and instructions etc. Try github copilot agent, codex, and claude code they all have some differences
Revolutionary-Desk50@reddit (OP)
I noticed this at work. If not done right, it causes a lot of hallucinations.
bookshelf11@reddit
I've recently been on the market and it is at least pretty easy to get interviews if you are open to 5 days in office right now. There does seem to be a ton of competition out there so not clear to me how hard actually landing a role is without some kind of prior connection to management.
Revolutionary-Desk50@reddit (OP)
At this point, there’s a lot of people just take anything, even jobs that pay about half of what you would expect and are basically just filling in for somebody who had to go back on their visa, and then there are those who are FAANG/quant/unicorns and are a millionaire in 2 to 5 years or bust. I’m just looking for a place where my code will be sold to customers. And if I got to move, I got to move. But I am not moving to someplace where I will have to move again in one or two years. That was the entire point of moving to New York and probably why I should probably be remote, New York, or bust at least until I’m actually terminated.
ColonelKlanka@reddit
presumably you would want to stay fairly close to new York to he able to access your son?
But I agree being able to move to some extent is a plus for employer
Revolutionary-Desk50@reddit (OP)
He’s in Virginia. But the deal is, what can I do for him? If I still can’t find anything? If I get a good enough job in California, I could come and visit.
bookshelf11@reddit
Edit: in new york specifically
garnett8@reddit
Just as a fellow dev and married man, how did you get depleted completely from a divorce? NY has pretty fair divorce statues and you should have at least left with half?
Sorry to hear about the loss in both ways, hopefully you’re less stressed from whatever relationship problems you had.
Goducks91@reddit
I imagine if his ex wife worked it can be depleting. You lose your wives salary and are now paying all your bills from 1 salary.
Revolutionary-Desk50@reddit (OP)
She fought me every step of the way and I have a child with cerebral palsy and she doesn’t really work and so I spent a lot of money trying to keep a roof over this kid’s head.
ToyDingo@reddit
How the fuck you getting interviews and you just got laid off? I got laid off back in January and I've only had 2 interviews with no offers :(
Sorry about the divorce bro. Good luck to you, I hope life gets better soon.
My only advice to you would be to try and learn some new skills and build stuff. In my time since losing my job I've just been building apps and trying to learn how to put AI agents in my workflow. Working with Claude and Cursor has opened a lot of doors to me that I didn't know were there.
Good luck dude.
Revolutionary-Desk50@reddit (OP)
Cursor is big. Already took a failed tech screen and built a skeleton ecommerce app. Really neat stuff.
ToyDingo@reddit
Lol I live in the Suburbs of Atlanta and was making about 150K as a senior at a large retailer :D
Guess I was getting underpaid.
Revolutionary-Desk50@reddit (OP)
For Atlanta, that’s competitive. But yeah, probably a little underpaid. Not as badly as I was though. That feels like that would be like a highIsh mid-level for Atlanta
newprint@reddit
Don't start drinking or doing dumb shit. Set yourself a regime and move forward. Don't dwell. Plenty of Physical activities. Move out your 401k.
I grew up in a household of WW2 veterans, one of them seen major battles and another person went through major starvation and poverty. They moved forward, daily, even at very old age.
Let your bank job be a blimp in your life and not defying feature.
Revolutionary-Desk50@reddit (OP)
My structure is review lc 1.5 hours, apply 1.5 hours, lectures/sd 1-2 hours, weights/calisthenics/maybe climbing now 2 hours 2 hours of walking and make time for interviews
iComplainAbtVal@reddit
The great C1 pippening strikes again