<story><title>Learn to sell</title><url>http://blairreeves.me/2017/12/06/learn-to-sell/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>shams93</author><text>The life of an engineer is a life if sacrifice and 7 days a week work for five days pay. Often you never have a partner so you&amp;#x27;re the most highly taxed people in the country especially in California. While you often work triple time you&amp;#x27;re rarely if ever paid for overtime it&amp;#x27;s taken for granted that you&amp;#x27;re not ever compensated for 3&amp;#x2F;4 of the hours you work. Nothing can happen without you but sales people get a piece if the business they get normal business hours and can have a life and a family don&amp;#x27;t learn to code learn to sell this is terrific advice. At least you get commission  and not worthless options in exchange for living off half the sleep a normal worker gets and continuous change and upheaval so you never get to have a life outside of work. Also continual layoffs and churn and then extra taxation when you are unemployed all told the life of an engineer is like the life of the slaves who row the cars on the Viking ship lol.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>scrumper</author><text>Your situation sounds shitty. It shouldn&amp;#x27;t be that way; I hope you&amp;#x27;re able to find time to step back over the holidays. A company shouldn&amp;#x27;t treat you like that, perhaps another one would be better.&lt;p&gt;Sales is no picnic though. I know it looks like a bunch of high-fiving frat boys talking sports metaphors and rarely coming to work, but the reality is very, very tough. Different challenges to engineering, for sure, but very real challenges and in some ways more acute.&lt;p&gt;In sales you&amp;#x27;re directly responsible for the money the company brings in. You have a number over your head. You are _gone_ the second you miss it. If you don&amp;#x27;t make your number, other people can lose their jobs too.&lt;p&gt;There are no breaks, no rest, no pause for enjoying the satisfaction in a job well done. If you think sales people don&amp;#x27;t work evenings and weekends you are out of your mind - when else do you get time to write proposals and draft contracts? When do you travel? You can&amp;#x27;t take a client, who you might not even like, for dinner during the 9-5 day.&lt;p&gt;You are on call all the time; the second an on-site engineer says something stupid to a client you are called, you have to deal with it, smooth it over, fix the damage to the relationship.&lt;p&gt;And turning the master build red doesn&amp;#x27;t even come close to a fraction of a hint of the stress that comes when you&amp;#x27;re close to losing a vital client and you&amp;#x27;ve got the owners of the company breathing down your neck. Relationships aren&amp;#x27;t like code: once broken, you can&amp;#x27;t git reset and try again. And it takes so little to torpedo a major client.</text></comment>
<story><title>Learn to sell</title><url>http://blairreeves.me/2017/12/06/learn-to-sell/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>shams93</author><text>The life of an engineer is a life if sacrifice and 7 days a week work for five days pay. Often you never have a partner so you&amp;#x27;re the most highly taxed people in the country especially in California. While you often work triple time you&amp;#x27;re rarely if ever paid for overtime it&amp;#x27;s taken for granted that you&amp;#x27;re not ever compensated for 3&amp;#x2F;4 of the hours you work. Nothing can happen without you but sales people get a piece if the business they get normal business hours and can have a life and a family don&amp;#x27;t learn to code learn to sell this is terrific advice. At least you get commission  and not worthless options in exchange for living off half the sleep a normal worker gets and continuous change and upheaval so you never get to have a life outside of work. Also continual layoffs and churn and then extra taxation when you are unemployed all told the life of an engineer is like the life of the slaves who row the cars on the Viking ship lol.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>ryanwaggoner</author><text>Do not accept this as the status quo.&lt;p&gt;It sounds like you live in California? If you&amp;#x27;re a decent software engineer in any major city in California, you are one of the luckiest people who has ever lived. You have your choice of employers paying you six figures to sit at a desk and push buttons 40 hours per week.&lt;p&gt;If you&amp;#x27;re overworked and underpaid to the point that what I just said sounds crazy, it sounds like you need a new job, immediately. There are better options out there, don&amp;#x27;t settle if you&amp;#x27;re miserable.&lt;p&gt;Some of the other points you mentioned sound like you might want to speak to a professional therapist. There&amp;#x27;s no shame in that (I&amp;#x27;ve done it before and will again) and it can really help you work through some issues.&lt;p&gt;Good luck!</text></comment>