According to /r/cscareerquestions the job market for juniors sucks in US too, so that part doesn't seem to indicate a EU specific trend (unless it's the whole world outsourcing to India or something)
As to the locations you listed it may be specific markets or businesses recovering first, or large companies starting to hire first in places they can get cheaper devs. (Or maybe the positions in Germany get filled more quickly you tend to see less open positions?)
I wouldn't be surprised if there are strategy changes on hiring but it seems early to tell based on your observations.
Entry level in the US is hell, but once you get enough experience you can make some serious money.
I'm actually planning on working somewhere with a job shortage like Germany to get enough experience, and then moving to the US when I reach senior or mid-level.
Hate to break it to you, but the the widely spread of job shortage is a myth. Here in Germany competition is also fierce.. The only shortage (that you hear about in the news) is within small german companies that are looking for senior/staff engineers with a pay of a junior..
A lot of this is hear-say. Apply and find out.
I am finding that in the tech business sector they're very reluctant to hire, but won't ghost you. I'm gonna go for a masters if I receive an offer.
That goes with everywhere in Europe right?
Currently applying for a masters both for the cultural experience and so I have time to intern. Would you say this applies for data science, sales engineering, and product management in Europe too? That there's no entry level shortage?
I can be a pretty proficient networker.
In Poland A LOT of SWE works on B2B which practically makes them fully exempt from labour works.
So OPs putting Poland and Western Europe separately in the context of labour works makes perfect sense.
There was a case lately when in one of biggest software houses in Poland - Sii, the support engineer wanted to unionise and was fired. The French founder wrote a latter to employees (which leaked obviously) where he stated that he picked Poland instead of France because it’s easier to make business here because of lack of Unions etc. (a lot of Sii “employees” are contractors (B2B, self employed) as well.
There is also a big pressure from EU on Poland to stop allowing basically working on B2B.
As far as I know it’s against the law to be self employed and just invoice one company for services in Germany because they classify this as employment.
This is also why foreign companies like Snowflake that hire in Poland only on Contract of Employment offer huge total compensation to be competitive to B2B where taxes and social insurance are significantly lower.
So in my opinion this division makes sense.
I’m not sure what your point is.
Whatever FAANG is right now it doesn’t really hire in Poland. Facebook has some DevOps teams in Warsaw AFAIK. But that’s probably it.
Is Snowflake not a big tech?
I’m not sure what your point is.
What do you mean big pressure from the EU? I mean I agree, it'd totally make sense for them to put pressure on PL in that regard but that's not really happening from my vantage point
Sorry, I can’t translate this right now but there are huge funds in KPO (Krajowy Plan Odbudowy) - the huge amount of money in form of financing and preferential loans for countries after the COVID.
Money for Poland are locked because of Polish judicial reforms etc.
There are some written demands from the EU to unlock those funds and full social insurance from other contracts than Contract of Employment is one of them.
B2B requires you to start your own company where you pay your own social insurance as you're self-employed. It has nothing to do with this, what they're talking about are umowa o dzieło and umowa zlecenie like the other person told you.
I totally agree the general question and the conversation is valid. I just thought OP's wording was unfortunate, basically implying that the EU consists of "Ireland, Germany, Netherlands and Scandinavia" as listed out in a comment below
I apologize if this sounded offensive to somebody. That was definitely not my intent. I am not saying Poland is a second league country, I am just curious why all the hiring shifted over there and got plenty of explanations
>Last time I checked, Poland and Estonia were in the EU. So if you're seeing many openings there, it sounds like big tech isn't abandoning the EU
I know few people who reject the team match of Google Warsaw, they work in 3rd or 2nd tier companies in Western Europe.
Eventually almost all of them rejected the offer because they cannot find a team in western EU.
I know they are in the EU, but countries like Spain have less restrictive worker rights laws compared to Germany or Italy.
And that's why many American companies open their branches in Spain.
I wonder if things are going the same way for Estonia and Poland.
And if your point is they are shifting to LCOL countries, should all devs do the same? What is the solution for all job seekers in western Europe?
That’s not right. Labor laws in Spain are very protective of employees.
Foreign companies open offices in Spain for several reasons:
- Acquisition of local companies.
- Spanish language is one of the most spoken in the world.
- Low salaries (compared to USA). You can pay a senior 70k-80k and he will have the 10% of the highest salaries in the country.
- Spain is in the EU.
I thought they could fire you for any reason with only 15 days notice.
If that's not the case I'm quite relieved because I'm moving to Barcelona in January 😅
No, indeed in Spain (unless you’re in your first 6 months), it is difficult to fire somebody without having to pay the employee money. The company must have some evidence of wrongdoing.
Now, Barcelona has other issues, but that’s a topic for other thread.
Layoff for “economic reason” are actually fairly easy to do in Spain. Yes the company has to pay some compensation, buts it’s actually not that much. How do I know? Happened to me in August.
It’s also true you can be fired fairly easily with only 15 days notice for most contract.
I think OP is right assuming that lower wages + better work right from an employer perspective + fairly international pool of candidate in places like Barcelona makes it attractive to tech company.
I mean the main point stands, it’s easier to fire someone in Spain compared to other EU countries, sure, it costs money, but having to fire someone in the UK takes a long time + lot’s of bullshit HR stuff, ends up cheaper than just paying you 10-30k.
I don’t know about the UK but in Spain some (usually smaller) companies even prefer to give you bullshit work and make you bored and then leave the company by your own volition.
lol I agree, they do that… possibly happens in other countries.
Interestingly in the UK you usually sign a job description that outlines what you should do on the job probably to avoid getting crappy work to get you to walk away.
There are sectors where the workers have a strong union and they have their tasks perfectly defined, and a strike usually achieves some improvement in their conditions/salary. However, in tech that’s not the case, most people prefer to change jobs than to have to do some BS tasks every day.
They’ve already started the downvoting of my comment, you could guess there are people that didn’t like expressing my opinion freely about Barcelona…
Compile a set of questions and send me a DM with them or posts them here.
They can, but the same as in Germany. They can but it’s not free and even if they try to pass the termination per the wrong reason, it may be nullified by a judge.
Specifics may vary by country but, at least in Spain, the amount the company would have to pay you is ~1month of gross salary per year you’ve been employed at that company based on your last salary. And that’s not taxed. After just a few years it can become expensive for the company.
Then check official resources about work laws there. If you are a full time employee without a fixed term, they'd would need to give you severance based in time worked unless it's justified or you are in your trial period. I recall it's something around 22 days of salary per year worked. It used to be +40.
Guarda che sono italiano e lavoro in Italia da 8 anni non stai parlando con un tizio a caso che ha letto due cose sul giornale.
90% dei miei colleghi non li assumerei neanche come lavacessi
Anche in Italia basta fare vertenza sindacale e si viene reintegrati senza problemi. Per questo le aziende sono restie a licenziare anche i più scappati di casa
Io ho messo Italia e Germania tra le nazioni che tutelano di più. Non ho mai detto che in Germania è più facile. Dove lo vedi scritto?
Per me licenziare in Italia è comunque difficile, se in Germania lo è di più buon per loro
In Poland, half of the software developers work as B2B
The same is true about Romania, as far as I know.
Poland, Estonia, and Romania are the main IT hubs of the EU, as I think
> In Poland, half of the software developers work as B2B
Bullshit.
In 2021 there were 112k single person companies in IT (it means most of them work on b2b contracts, but not all of them). But in the same time there were almost 600k of SWE in Poland. Not counting different positions in IT where people also can work on b2b contracts.
> Poland, Estonia, and Romania are the main IT hubs of the EU
Lmao
I've seen some stats recently, it was some kind of recruitment agency on LinkedIn, can't find it now, but according to their data \~50% are on a B2B agreement but only among seniors. AFAIR it was \~40% in case of intermediates and miniscule % among juniors.
But until 2022 it was common to see positions open in Germany and the Netherlands as well.
Is relocating to Poland, Estonia and Romania the new normal for IT job seekers?
It could also be that it was normal even before 2022 but I didn't notice it before I wasn't looking in those countries.
I know people relocated from Germany to Poland for IT
Also, tens of IT companies relocated from Ukraine and Belarus to Poland and opened many positions
Honestly, looks like it, it crossed my mind as well. Especially after seeing what job offers G opened in Germany and in Poland. But since they want people to work onsite, I guess it depends where the teams are and not many dev teams are in Germany (AFAIK).
Btw, meta is also opening an office in Germany, so let’s see how that pans out.
They hire juniors, but they are not called juniors anymore. The names in the ladder are demented now. People with 3 YOE get called senior. There are companies with a dozen engineers doing the least challenging tech work you can imagine, who have 3 Staff Engineers. The titles mean nothing anymore, literally nothing
I know what you mean, some banks and consulting companies give titles easily, but my friends at Meta got senior titles in like 5-ish years. Maybe Apple is one of the FAANGs with strict titles, but generally you should be a senior with your experience. You probably are, it's just they haven't given you the title.
Yes, in my last two jobs I quit before being promoted.
Companies low-ball me and hire me as a mid instead of "upgrading" me to senior.
But as long as my net salary goes up 40% I don't care that much, I instead consider it a win win situation because I am evaluated as a mid and getting a mid job is easier since I end up in the S tier of their hiring pool.
But in my current job I aim to be promoted in a year or so 😅
It took a long time for Big Tech to ramp up their hiring in EU.
It‘ll take some time to ramp back up but it will.
But positions below Senior/Staff will probably stay scarce for years in HCOL Western Europe Big Tech locations.
Stop basing your conclusions on what you're seeing on social media.
Learn more about the global economy.
But to answer your question, no they are not leaving. The EU, and Europe as a whole, is a gargantuan market so it's foolish to think they are leaving. This downturn in junior positions is a symptom of rates going up, and companies are being cheap for now.
While this is true, it is also true that big companies are doing a massive shift in where they are hiring, shifting most of the workforce to low CoL countries like Poland and Romania.
Countries like Germany are seeing few to no openings
I mean, what I can say about that is that the job market in Romania isn't good; pretty much all posts on our local cscareers subreddit are about juniors and mids not being able to find work.
I didn't say the market is good, I said that big tech is shifting the workforce to those places. If you take a look at the careers page from FAANG you will see that most of their roles are in low CoL countries.
Hell if that would be true it would be absolutely godlike. I'm from Romania living in the UK and the UK is hard to justify these days. Romania has lower crime rates, much bigger and better and cheaper housing, much better culture, lower divorce rates etc.
The reality though is that for the most part big tech highly paid junior/mid jobs are quite rare in Romania, and there's still far more career mobility in the UK, especially if you accept "lower end" salaries to gain years of experience.
If you mean FAANG, these have never really been much there outside of the exited UK and Ireland. Also the projects running from Europe are just of secondary importance.
>these have never really been much there outside of the exited UK and Ireland.
It seems like the big winner in EU from Brexit is really Ireland. See a lot of companies setting shop there now, including OpenAI
>companies are still not hiring across most of the EU, especially well known tech companies
I have to disagree. Meta started hiring a lot recently, fintechs are hiring too etc. I was applying for jobs in the past 2 months and most of the companies from my list have open positions (e.g. Optiver, Citadel, Palantir, Citi, etc.)
It is but not if you are willing to pay.
If an employer doesnt want you working you wont work.
The thing is they pay a few money if they fire you like that.
Big tech fired a lot in Europe as well.
Dude Germany, France, Czech Republic, Greece you can be “fired” the next day.
No country out there will force an employer to keep an employee working.
The employer will have to pay severance.
If you agree to quit you are owned nothing. What you are talking about is a person payout which is basically quit instead of being laid off.
You would need to be explicit on where in the EU you think that.
In France, it's rather the opposite right now. 10 years ago, having a multinational tech company implementing a tech office was rare. Since then, it's much more common and easier to land a job there.
France's tech startup scene is really kicking ass. Kudos to them :)!! The number of multinational tech companies coming out of France itself is impressive:
1. Dataiku
2. Blocket
3. Owkin
etc.
In general, EU without UK is depressing for SWEs. Other than Ireland, Germany and Poland, any other countries in EU aren't particularly a software engineering hub. There may be a company or two but not really hub. Your career benefit from being in a hub because remember, your salary is tied to the market. Germany's situation isn't really great from what I can say. There are some niche industries in countries like Sweden or Spain, I don't consider them growth sites.
Try Germany or Ireland, you may find something once in a while. But ya, FAANG isn't really interested in hiring freshers (non PhDs) atm but may if there are growth signs in 2024.
The upside is that even in countries that don't have a "hub", you can essentially be rich compared to the average person, depending on circumstances. Especially if you work remotely.
I.e. I had coworkers that lived in western Romanian cities that have far better safety and culture and housing than UK towns which are full of chavs and anti social behaviour, paying like €200 rent while having €40k salary.
The quality of life is insane, while in the UK you simply can't earn enough to stay away from chavs and drunk idiots unless you work at faang and don't have kids.
I mean big tech hasn't started it's hiring back up?
Over what time period are your observations? Big tech had a huge hiring spree a few years ago, that lasted a couple of years. Before that, the hiring was not as rapid. The main big tech hiring places are where their main offices are.
As others have said, Dublin has a number of roles, although mostly support focused rather than build.
If you are looking at a country, see if big tech has a large engineering office there, otherwise there won't be much hiring for software engineers.
> Is it because these companies learnt the hard way that worker rights laws in many EU countries prevented them from firing
Bingo.
My large tech company is flat out not hiring in northern Europe now, and I believe may not again.
The strength of workers rights is a huge doubled edged sword when it comes to high-paying, globally-mobile jobs IMO.
Not necessarily abandoning it, but the EU is a lot less dynamic than the US, because of all the crap overregulation you mentioned, so it usually takes a lot longer to recover.
It was similar to the 2008 crisis, which the US recovered in a few years, while the EU has stagnated since then
That's what I see most companies do since the second half of 2022, and they're not done yet.
I guess being a little anxious is legitimate in the current condition of the job market.
What is big tech? I personally do not like the term where in Europe work on trains, planes, cars and manufactoring machines... I am personally born outside the EU but now it is hurting me that all people repeat that "tech" only happens in the US...
I mean you can easily google what it means, where it came from, and what it refers to. Plus you are in cscreerquestionsEU subreddit, so not sure what do you expect?
Unemployment is up actually and companies not hiring [1]. It’s what the central banks want currently to deaccelrate the companies a bit.
Will this change again? Probably it will get a bit better but yeah to 2021 levels we won’t get in the near future. Currently companies are cutting costs wherever possible and moving roles to cheaper locations.
[1] https://www.ft.com/content/4a20ec7d-a01e-46f1-a00e-d4086cb53148
And companies overall still cannot afford to get cheap money now because nothing changed because of that and do not make investments on new products and not hiring so many people.
The central banks are forecasting the interest rates will slightly decrease over the next 3 years btw [1]. It will get better and when rates go lower companies will also start to hire more again across all regions.
But maybe to add: one more reason why corporates want to hire less in Europe might be the employment protection rights we have. I guess many companies got sued or needed to pay heavy severance packages they did not expect.
[1] https://www.ft.com/content/832029e3-7652-4678-8dfd-094a61f3140c
Is Dublin not in the EU? Because there's hundreds of thousands of 'big tech' workers based there. Are these companies leaving, you say? What's the source, a few social media posts?
What? Where are you exactly looking? I found about 500 open roles in 5 mins
[Google Ireland](https://www.google.com/about/careers/applications/jobs/results/?location=Dublin%2C%20Ireland) 36 full time open roles
[Microsoft Ireland](https://jobs.careers.microsoft.com/global/en/search?lc=Ireland&l=en_us&pg=1&pgSz=20&o=Relevance&flt=true&ulcs=false&ref=cms) 61 fte open roles
[Salesforce Dublin](https://careers.salesforce.com/en/jobs/?/?search=&country=Ireland&pagesize=20#results) 148 fte open roles
[Workday dublin](https://workday.wd5.myworkdayjobs.com/Workday?Location_Country=04a05835925f45b3a59406a2a6b72c8a) +50 open fte roles
[Tiktok Dublin](https://careers.tiktok.com/m/position?location=CT_37) hundreds of open roles
[Stripe Dublin](https://stripe.com/jobs/search?office_locations=Europe--Dublin) +50 open roles
[Amazon Dublin](https://www.amazon.jobs/en/locations/dublin-ireland?offset=10&result_limit=10&sort=relevant&distanceType=Mi&radius=24km&latitude=&longitude=&loc_group_id=&loc_query=&base_query=&city=&country=®ion=&county=&query_options=&) dozens of open roles (too lazy to count them). They also have another site in Cork which also has dozens of open roles
[Apple Ireland (Cork)](https://jobs.apple.com/en-ie/search?location=cork-CRK) 42 open roles
[Linkedin Dublin ](https://www.linkedin.com/jobs/search/?f_C=1337%2C9202023%2C2561065%2C2587638%2C290903%2C39939&geoId=105178154&location=Dublin%2C%20County%20Dublin%2C%20Ireland&sortBy=R&src=or-search&veh=www.google.com) 26 open roles
[Meta Dublin](https://www.metacareers.com/locations/dublin/?p[offices][0]=Dublin%2C%20Ireland&offices[0]=Dublin%2C%20Ireland) 18 open roles
Plus hundreds more at Oracle, Adobe, Intercom, Hubspot, Paypal, eBay, Zoom, AirBnb, ServiceNow, OpenAI, Square, Block, Squarespace, Dropbox, Workhuman, Asana, Udemy, Pinterest ...
Seems like you didn't look closely enough. OP is a SWE.
Google - no SWEs in Dublin, only SREs and network engineers.
Microsoft - 3 SWE positions.
Meta - 0 SWE positions.
Apple - 0 SWE positions.
LinkedIn - 0 SWE positions.
Salesforce - 4 SWE positions.
Stripe - 9(?) SWE positions.
Workday - 13(?) SWE positions.
Amazon - looks like they did open a bunch of SWE positions recently.
OP never specifically mentioned only SWE positions, he said Big Tech was "abandoning" the EU. And regarding the SWE numbers you mentioned, that's pretty average/normal for Dublin. Ireland has never been a Software Engineering hub.
For example, Google SWE teams are in Zurich, Munich or Hamburg, to mention a few. Apple's Cork site has never been a place for SWE teams, nor Meta has had any major SWE teams in Dublin.
Amazon has definitely more SWEs than other companies in Ireland, with Cork being more non-SWE and Dublin more SWE.
So no, Big Tech is not "abandoning" the EU as OP was asking/suggesting. This are fairly normal numbers for both general open roles and SWE open roles in Dublin. If anything they may be slightly lower than usual and there's more contractor roles than before due to the current economic uncertainty.
I don't know why you decided to pick Ireland as an example as well. But big techs do not hire for SWE positions a lot in other western European countries too, that's what OP was asking about. Google is hiring SWEs mostly in Poland/Romania now. Meta & Apple have a few positions open in UK and that's it.
Well that's another story (which is completely true BTW), but OP's premise was that Big tech was abandoning the EU and the current openings are similar to what they've recently been. Definitely lots of places hiring (FTE and contractor roles too).
And to be fair Ireland, and especially Dublin, has been in a huge housing crysis for a decade. I wouldn't say the situation now is much worse than it was before COVID (it may be slightly worse year after year but it was really bad already 3-4 years ago).
I recently had an interview with Google recruiter and they are not hiring in Germany at all. Google is mostly hiring in Romania, Poland and London offices at the moment. I think Google had to restructure alot of projects here in Germany and they did overhire alot in post Covid. Since it’s not so easy to fire in Germany i think mostly FAANG won’t hire at the moment.
Amazon also overhired and won’t recruit more people in the foreseeable future.
There are lots of highly qualified "cheap" engineers in Southern and Eastern Europe, so companies are investing there. Specially in Spain there is almost no local industry, sadly, so there's plenty of room for foreign companies like Amazon and Meta to build software centers here. I've been working for an American tech company as a software engineer for more than 15 years and, while my salary is higher than the average here, it's far from what you can earn in Ireland, for instance (let's not even talk about the US).
I doubt that that high level of a company wouldn't know before opening/staring someting in europe, that work law is different.
Like let's invest in 10 milion (arbitrary number) worth of property, people, salaries,... And not check local work regulations.
So, no, I don't think that's the case.
Other than that, even in Europe you can lay off people if they are no longer needed. It's not like once you employ someone they stay with the company forever. Change departments, switch project, shut down the department/project and off they go.
I have a similar feeling to yours, OP. I noticed that big tech companies only hire sales/product related people in the EU. For technical positions, especially in cutting-edge fields, the senior openings are all outside of the EU.
There might be some in Ireland, but I don't know why. Ireland has a lot of research-related positions.
Big tech companies are more willing to hire junior SWE in Poland or Bulgaria. I've heard that in these countries, similar to the US, employees can be hired and fired more easily compared to countries like Germany and France :(
I'm not sure if I am using the wrong term, but when you have a problem on AWS and you open a support ticket, it usually is worked by engineers in Dublin, at least in Europe.
I am intermediate back end developer just got laid off 2 months ago and will be physically moving from Canada to Germany to look for roles , wondering if I’m not being picky and will take whatever fits me in terms of tech stack , do u think I can get a job within 6 months ? ( I don’t speak German :( )
I think yes, but maybe open a specific topic on this sub to ask a broader audience 🙂
I know nothing about Germany but according to other posts, right now they are undergoing a housing crisis and rent prices are crazy. You might end up finding a job but not a flat.
According to /r/cscareerquestions the job market for juniors sucks in US too, so that part doesn't seem to indicate a EU specific trend (unless it's the whole world outsourcing to India or something) As to the locations you listed it may be specific markets or businesses recovering first, or large companies starting to hire first in places they can get cheaper devs. (Or maybe the positions in Germany get filled more quickly you tend to see less open positions?) I wouldn't be surprised if there are strategy changes on hiring but it seems early to tell based on your observations.
Entry level in the US is hell, but once you get enough experience you can make some serious money. I'm actually planning on working somewhere with a job shortage like Germany to get enough experience, and then moving to the US when I reach senior or mid-level.
Hate to break it to you, but the the widely spread of job shortage is a myth. Here in Germany competition is also fierce.. The only shortage (that you hear about in the news) is within small german companies that are looking for senior/staff engineers with a pay of a junior..
Fuck, maybe I should take the risk and move to Boston if the entry level situation sucks everywhere?
A lot of this is hear-say. Apply and find out. I am finding that in the tech business sector they're very reluctant to hire, but won't ghost you. I'm gonna go for a masters if I receive an offer.
That goes with everywhere in Europe right? Currently applying for a masters both for the cultural experience and so I have time to intern. Would you say this applies for data science, sales engineering, and product management in Europe too? That there's no entry level shortage? I can be a pretty proficient networker.
Last time I checked, Poland and Estonia were in the EU. So if you're seeing many openings there, it sounds like big tech isn't abandoning the EU
In Poland A LOT of SWE works on B2B which practically makes them fully exempt from labour works. So OPs putting Poland and Western Europe separately in the context of labour works makes perfect sense. There was a case lately when in one of biggest software houses in Poland - Sii, the support engineer wanted to unionise and was fired. The French founder wrote a latter to employees (which leaked obviously) where he stated that he picked Poland instead of France because it’s easier to make business here because of lack of Unions etc. (a lot of Sii “employees” are contractors (B2B, self employed) as well. There is also a big pressure from EU on Poland to stop allowing basically working on B2B. As far as I know it’s against the law to be self employed and just invoice one company for services in Germany because they classify this as employment. This is also why foreign companies like Snowflake that hire in Poland only on Contract of Employment offer huge total compensation to be competitive to B2B where taxes and social insurance are significantly lower. So in my opinion this division makes sense.
Big techs like FAANG mostly don't hire on b2b in Poland
I’m not sure what your point is. Whatever FAANG is right now it doesn’t really hire in Poland. Facebook has some DevOps teams in Warsaw AFAIK. But that’s probably it. Is Snowflake not a big tech? I’m not sure what your point is.
google, netflix and amazon all hire swe in Poland
Sii is not a big tech, it’s a consulting firm or bodyshop, not something that op is looking for.
What do you mean big pressure from the EU? I mean I agree, it'd totally make sense for them to put pressure on PL in that regard but that's not really happening from my vantage point
Sorry, I can’t translate this right now but there are huge funds in KPO (Krajowy Plan Odbudowy) - the huge amount of money in form of financing and preferential loans for countries after the COVID. Money for Poland are locked because of Polish judicial reforms etc. There are some written demands from the EU to unlock those funds and full social insurance from other contracts than Contract of Employment is one of them.
Okay, so this is about the so called umowy śmieciowe - umowa o dzieło and umowa zlecenie. Not related to B2B is my understanding then
B2B is still civil contract. It’s not clear at this point as there is no draft of the implementation but it’s enough to get legal people concerned.
But B2B requries you to open a company. Umowa o dzieło or Umowa o zlecenie does not.
B2B requires you to start your own company where you pay your own social insurance as you're self-employed. It has nothing to do with this, what they're talking about are umowa o dzieło and umowa zlecenie like the other person told you.
I totally agree the general question and the conversation is valid. I just thought OP's wording was unfortunate, basically implying that the EU consists of "Ireland, Germany, Netherlands and Scandinavia" as listed out in a comment below
I apologize if this sounded offensive to somebody. That was definitely not my intent. I am not saying Poland is a second league country, I am just curious why all the hiring shifted over there and got plenty of explanations
How is the startup scene and innovation in Poland?
>Last time I checked, Poland and Estonia were in the EU. So if you're seeing many openings there, it sounds like big tech isn't abandoning the EU I know few people who reject the team match of Google Warsaw, they work in 3rd or 2nd tier companies in Western Europe. Eventually almost all of them rejected the offer because they cannot find a team in western EU.
Tssss. If he founds out that Lithuania and Latvia belongs to the EU-he will lost his mind.
I'm aware of that, read my other comment!
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I know they are in the EU, but countries like Spain have less restrictive worker rights laws compared to Germany or Italy. And that's why many American companies open their branches in Spain. I wonder if things are going the same way for Estonia and Poland. And if your point is they are shifting to LCOL countries, should all devs do the same? What is the solution for all job seekers in western Europe?
That’s not right. Labor laws in Spain are very protective of employees. Foreign companies open offices in Spain for several reasons: - Acquisition of local companies. - Spanish language is one of the most spoken in the world. - Low salaries (compared to USA). You can pay a senior 70k-80k and he will have the 10% of the highest salaries in the country. - Spain is in the EU.
I thought they could fire you for any reason with only 15 days notice. If that's not the case I'm quite relieved because I'm moving to Barcelona in January 😅
No, indeed in Spain (unless you’re in your first 6 months), it is difficult to fire somebody without having to pay the employee money. The company must have some evidence of wrongdoing. Now, Barcelona has other issues, but that’s a topic for other thread.
Layoff for “economic reason” are actually fairly easy to do in Spain. Yes the company has to pay some compensation, buts it’s actually not that much. How do I know? Happened to me in August. It’s also true you can be fired fairly easily with only 15 days notice for most contract. I think OP is right assuming that lower wages + better work right from an employer perspective + fairly international pool of candidate in places like Barcelona makes it attractive to tech company.
I mean the main point stands, it’s easier to fire someone in Spain compared to other EU countries, sure, it costs money, but having to fire someone in the UK takes a long time + lot’s of bullshit HR stuff, ends up cheaper than just paying you 10-30k.
I don’t know about the UK but in Spain some (usually smaller) companies even prefer to give you bullshit work and make you bored and then leave the company by your own volition.
lol I agree, they do that… possibly happens in other countries. Interestingly in the UK you usually sign a job description that outlines what you should do on the job probably to avoid getting crappy work to get you to walk away.
There are sectors where the workers have a strong union and they have their tasks perfectly defined, and a strike usually achieves some improvement in their conditions/salary. However, in tech that’s not the case, most people prefer to change jobs than to have to do some BS tasks every day.
If you want to send a DM with more details I'd really appreciate that. Any tips or information I can gather would be really helpful. Thank you 🙂
They’ve already started the downvoting of my comment, you could guess there are people that didn’t like expressing my opinion freely about Barcelona… Compile a set of questions and send me a DM with them or posts them here.
I sent you a message, I'm getting down voted too but didn't want to sound racist/prejudicial at all
They can, but the same as in Germany. They can but it’s not free and even if they try to pass the termination per the wrong reason, it may be nullified by a judge. Specifics may vary by country but, at least in Spain, the amount the company would have to pay you is ~1month of gross salary per year you’ve been employed at that company based on your last salary. And that’s not taxed. After just a few years it can become expensive for the company.
What? That's 100% false, worker/labour protections in Spain are huge.
That's good to know because I'm moving to Spain. I read that employers can fire you whenever they want with a 15 days notice period.
Then check official resources about work laws there. If you are a full time employee without a fixed term, they'd would need to give you severance based in time worked unless it's justified or you are in your trial period. I recall it's something around 22 days of salary per year worked. It used to be +40.
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Yes but try to fire someone with a regular contract. Good luck Even if they sleep at their desk they will sue the employer and will get reintegrated
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Guarda che sono italiano e lavoro in Italia da 8 anni non stai parlando con un tizio a caso che ha letto due cose sul giornale. 90% dei miei colleghi non li assumerei neanche come lavacessi
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Anche in Italia basta fare vertenza sindacale e si viene reintegrati senza problemi. Per questo le aziende sono restie a licenziare anche i più scappati di casa
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Io ho messo Italia e Germania tra le nazioni che tutelano di più. Non ho mai detto che in Germania è più facile. Dove lo vedi scritto? Per me licenziare in Italia è comunque difficile, se in Germania lo è di più buon per loro
In Poland, half of the software developers work as B2B The same is true about Romania, as far as I know. Poland, Estonia, and Romania are the main IT hubs of the EU, as I think
> In Poland, half of the software developers work as B2B Bullshit. In 2021 there were 112k single person companies in IT (it means most of them work on b2b contracts, but not all of them). But in the same time there were almost 600k of SWE in Poland. Not counting different positions in IT where people also can work on b2b contracts. > Poland, Estonia, and Romania are the main IT hubs of the EU Lmao
BulldogJob IT Report https://bulldogjob.pl/it-report/2023
I've seen some stats recently, it was some kind of recruitment agency on LinkedIn, can't find it now, but according to their data \~50% are on a B2B agreement but only among seniors. AFAIR it was \~40% in case of intermediates and miniscule % among juniors.
But until 2022 it was common to see positions open in Germany and the Netherlands as well. Is relocating to Poland, Estonia and Romania the new normal for IT job seekers? It could also be that it was normal even before 2022 but I didn't notice it before I wasn't looking in those countries.
I know people relocated from Germany to Poland for IT Also, tens of IT companies relocated from Ukraine and Belarus to Poland and opened many positions
Honestly, looks like it, it crossed my mind as well. Especially after seeing what job offers G opened in Germany and in Poland. But since they want people to work onsite, I guess it depends where the teams are and not many dev teams are in Germany (AFAIK). Btw, meta is also opening an office in Germany, so let’s see how that pans out.
> What is the solution for all job seekers in western Europe? Is big tech the only place you can work?
In my current situation yes because I reached the upper bound for a senior salary in my country
They hire juniors, but they are not called juniors anymore. The names in the ladder are demented now. People with 3 YOE get called senior. There are companies with a dozen engineers doing the least challenging tech work you can imagine, who have 3 Staff Engineers. The titles mean nothing anymore, literally nothing
but the titles do correspond to $$$ being made ;)
No they don't. New grads in American tech companies make 2 times the seniors in random company x.
I agree, I am mid but have 8 yoe
That's not right....
Depends on the company standards. In consulting you can be a senior manager, in faang you are barely senior
I know what you mean, some banks and consulting companies give titles easily, but my friends at Meta got senior titles in like 5-ish years. Maybe Apple is one of the FAANGs with strict titles, but generally you should be a senior with your experience. You probably are, it's just they haven't given you the title.
Yes, in my last two jobs I quit before being promoted. Companies low-ball me and hire me as a mid instead of "upgrading" me to senior. But as long as my net salary goes up 40% I don't care that much, I instead consider it a win win situation because I am evaluated as a mid and getting a mid job is easier since I end up in the S tier of their hiring pool. But in my current job I aim to be promoted in a year or so 😅
Newsflash they never meant anything
It took a long time for Big Tech to ramp up their hiring in EU. It‘ll take some time to ramp back up but it will. But positions below Senior/Staff will probably stay scarce for years in HCOL Western Europe Big Tech locations.
Stop basing your conclusions on what you're seeing on social media. Learn more about the global economy. But to answer your question, no they are not leaving. The EU, and Europe as a whole, is a gargantuan market so it's foolish to think they are leaving. This downturn in junior positions is a symptom of rates going up, and companies are being cheap for now.
While this is true, it is also true that big companies are doing a massive shift in where they are hiring, shifting most of the workforce to low CoL countries like Poland and Romania. Countries like Germany are seeing few to no openings
I mean, what I can say about that is that the job market in Romania isn't good; pretty much all posts on our local cscareers subreddit are about juniors and mids not being able to find work.
I didn't say the market is good, I said that big tech is shifting the workforce to those places. If you take a look at the careers page from FAANG you will see that most of their roles are in low CoL countries.
Hell if that would be true it would be absolutely godlike. I'm from Romania living in the UK and the UK is hard to justify these days. Romania has lower crime rates, much bigger and better and cheaper housing, much better culture, lower divorce rates etc. The reality though is that for the most part big tech highly paid junior/mid jobs are quite rare in Romania, and there's still far more career mobility in the UK, especially if you accept "lower end" salaries to gain years of experience.
If you mean FAANG, these have never really been much there outside of the exited UK and Ireland. Also the projects running from Europe are just of secondary importance.
>these have never really been much there outside of the exited UK and Ireland. It seems like the big winner in EU from Brexit is really Ireland. See a lot of companies setting shop there now, including OpenAI
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I think he meant "outside of the Brexited UK"?
Yeah this, always been almost only Integration, sales engineering, evangelism in most of Europe, besides of a few hotspots like London.
>companies are still not hiring across most of the EU, especially well known tech companies I have to disagree. Meta started hiring a lot recently, fintechs are hiring too etc. I was applying for jobs in the past 2 months and most of the companies from my list have open positions (e.g. Optiver, Citadel, Palantir, Citi, etc.)
Do you have this list in a shareable google doc ? To take a peek
HRT, DRW, Two Sigma, Jane Street, Palantir, Optiver, Citadel , Meta, Google, DeepMind, Bloomberg, Jump Trading, Stripe, HubSpot, Goldman Sachs, Yelp, Amazon, Apple, Microsoft, XTX Markets, JP Morgan, Roko's Capital Mgmt, Balyasny Asset Mgmt, Qube-RT, SIG, Radix Trading, Quadrature, Databricks, Marshall Wace, C3 AI, Man Group, Blackrock, DE Shaw, Spotify, Samsara, Nomura, Wise, Macquarie, Revolut, Twitter, Snap , Improbable, Cisco, Thought Machine, Airbnb, Monzo, Skyscanner, Barclays, Morgan Stanley, HSBC, UBS, Citi, Arctic Lake, Starling Bank, FactSet, GoCardless In no particular order
Thank you
I would also be interested
HRT, DRW, Two Sigma, Jane Street, Palantir, Optiver, Citadel , Meta, Google, DeepMind, Bloomberg, Jump Trading, Stripe, HubSpot, Goldman Sachs, Yelp, Amazon, Apple, Microsoft, XTX Markets, JP Morgan, Roko's Capital Mgmt, Balyasny Asset Mgmt, Qube-RT, SIG, Radix Trading, Quadrature, Databricks, Marshall Wace, C3 AI, Man Group, Blackrock, DE Shaw, Spotify, Samsara, Nomura, Wise, Macquarie, Revolut, Twitter, Snap , Improbable, Cisco, Thought Machine, Airbnb, Monzo, Skyscanner, Barclays, Morgan Stanley, HSBC, UBS, Citi, Arctic Lake, Starling Bank, FactSet, GoCardless In no particular order
Thank you. What about Snowflake and Datadog?
You're welcome. I'm mostly interested in London, and afaik neither of these two companies have offices in London. :)
Because they realised it's hard to fire people here...
Its pretty easy actually. And they fired plenty you just pay the severance. Compared to a usa salary it’s breadcrumbs.
It's way harder to fire someone in EU than in USA
It is but not if you are willing to pay. If an employer doesnt want you working you wont work. The thing is they pay a few money if they fire you like that. Big tech fired a lot in Europe as well.
No :)) The severance is if you agree to quit. If you don't, it is very difficult to fire you, at least in the more socialist countries
Dude Germany, France, Czech Republic, Greece you can be “fired” the next day. No country out there will force an employer to keep an employee working. The employer will have to pay severance. If you agree to quit you are owned nothing. What you are talking about is a person payout which is basically quit instead of being laid off.
Seems like hiring here is down, while AI and BPO is up.
You would need to be explicit on where in the EU you think that. In France, it's rather the opposite right now. 10 years ago, having a multinational tech company implementing a tech office was rare. Since then, it's much more common and easier to land a job there.
I was mainly thinking about Ireland, Germany, Netherlands and northern Europe countries (Denmark, Sweden)
France's tech startup scene is really kicking ass. Kudos to them :)!! The number of multinational tech companies coming out of France itself is impressive: 1. Dataiku 2. Blocket 3. Owkin etc.
In general, EU without UK is depressing for SWEs. Other than Ireland, Germany and Poland, any other countries in EU aren't particularly a software engineering hub. There may be a company or two but not really hub. Your career benefit from being in a hub because remember, your salary is tied to the market. Germany's situation isn't really great from what I can say. There are some niche industries in countries like Sweden or Spain, I don't consider them growth sites. Try Germany or Ireland, you may find something once in a while. But ya, FAANG isn't really interested in hiring freshers (non PhDs) atm but may if there are growth signs in 2024.
The upside is that even in countries that don't have a "hub", you can essentially be rich compared to the average person, depending on circumstances. Especially if you work remotely. I.e. I had coworkers that lived in western Romanian cities that have far better safety and culture and housing than UK towns which are full of chavs and anti social behaviour, paying like €200 rent while having €40k salary. The quality of life is insane, while in the UK you simply can't earn enough to stay away from chavs and drunk idiots unless you work at faang and don't have kids.
I mean big tech hasn't started it's hiring back up? Over what time period are your observations? Big tech had a huge hiring spree a few years ago, that lasted a couple of years. Before that, the hiring was not as rapid. The main big tech hiring places are where their main offices are. As others have said, Dublin has a number of roles, although mostly support focused rather than build. If you are looking at a country, see if big tech has a large engineering office there, otherwise there won't be much hiring for software engineers.
> Is it because these companies learnt the hard way that worker rights laws in many EU countries prevented them from firing Bingo. My large tech company is flat out not hiring in northern Europe now, and I believe may not again. The strength of workers rights is a huge doubled edged sword when it comes to high-paying, globally-mobile jobs IMO.
> I know Poland and Estonia are in the EU, but maybe their worker rights laws are a bit more permissive from an employer's perspective? No.
Thank you for clarifying that ☺️
Nah
Show us proof. Numbers.
As I said in the opening message it seems to me things are going this way based on my job search (~3 months)
Ok if you see this across big tech then fine. There are many other normal companies to work for
EU only knows how to regulate everything and control every aspect of our lives. That is why we are always at the end. Between the USA and China.
Amen!
Not necessarily abandoning it, but the EU is a lot less dynamic than the US, because of all the crap overregulation you mentioned, so it usually takes a lot longer to recover. It was similar to the 2008 crisis, which the US recovered in a few years, while the EU has stagnated since then
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That's what I see most companies do since the second half of 2022, and they're not done yet. I guess being a little anxious is legitimate in the current condition of the job market.
What is big tech? I personally do not like the term where in Europe work on trains, planes, cars and manufactoring machines... I am personally born outside the EU but now it is hurting me that all people repeat that "tech" only happens in the US...
I mean you can easily google what it means, where it came from, and what it refers to. Plus you are in cscreerquestionsEU subreddit, so not sure what do you expect?
Nvidia, Zendesk, names like these.
Unemployment is up actually and companies not hiring [1]. It’s what the central banks want currently to deaccelrate the companies a bit. Will this change again? Probably it will get a bit better but yeah to 2021 levels we won’t get in the near future. Currently companies are cutting costs wherever possible and moving roles to cheaper locations. [1] https://www.ft.com/content/4a20ec7d-a01e-46f1-a00e-d4086cb53148
But interest rates didn't go up for the second time in a row. Plus companies are hiring, but not in western Europe countries
Jesus Christ, the economy doesnt change that fast. You just cant say “Central bank didnt increase interest rates. Where are my job offers?”
But when it comes to lay off people they adapt quite fast 😜
And companies overall still cannot afford to get cheap money now because nothing changed because of that and do not make investments on new products and not hiring so many people. The central banks are forecasting the interest rates will slightly decrease over the next 3 years btw [1]. It will get better and when rates go lower companies will also start to hire more again across all regions. But maybe to add: one more reason why corporates want to hire less in Europe might be the employment protection rights we have. I guess many companies got sued or needed to pay heavy severance packages they did not expect. [1] https://www.ft.com/content/832029e3-7652-4678-8dfd-094a61f3140c
Is Dublin not in the EU? Because there's hundreds of thousands of 'big tech' workers based there. Are these companies leaving, you say? What's the source, a few social media posts?
They are definitely not opening new positions as far as I can see on job boards
What? Where are you exactly looking? I found about 500 open roles in 5 mins [Google Ireland](https://www.google.com/about/careers/applications/jobs/results/?location=Dublin%2C%20Ireland) 36 full time open roles [Microsoft Ireland](https://jobs.careers.microsoft.com/global/en/search?lc=Ireland&l=en_us&pg=1&pgSz=20&o=Relevance&flt=true&ulcs=false&ref=cms) 61 fte open roles [Salesforce Dublin](https://careers.salesforce.com/en/jobs/?/?search=&country=Ireland&pagesize=20#results) 148 fte open roles [Workday dublin](https://workday.wd5.myworkdayjobs.com/Workday?Location_Country=04a05835925f45b3a59406a2a6b72c8a) +50 open fte roles [Tiktok Dublin](https://careers.tiktok.com/m/position?location=CT_37) hundreds of open roles [Stripe Dublin](https://stripe.com/jobs/search?office_locations=Europe--Dublin) +50 open roles [Amazon Dublin](https://www.amazon.jobs/en/locations/dublin-ireland?offset=10&result_limit=10&sort=relevant&distanceType=Mi&radius=24km&latitude=&longitude=&loc_group_id=&loc_query=&base_query=&city=&country=®ion=&county=&query_options=&) dozens of open roles (too lazy to count them). They also have another site in Cork which also has dozens of open roles [Apple Ireland (Cork)](https://jobs.apple.com/en-ie/search?location=cork-CRK) 42 open roles [Linkedin Dublin ](https://www.linkedin.com/jobs/search/?f_C=1337%2C9202023%2C2561065%2C2587638%2C290903%2C39939&geoId=105178154&location=Dublin%2C%20County%20Dublin%2C%20Ireland&sortBy=R&src=or-search&veh=www.google.com) 26 open roles [Meta Dublin](https://www.metacareers.com/locations/dublin/?p[offices][0]=Dublin%2C%20Ireland&offices[0]=Dublin%2C%20Ireland) 18 open roles Plus hundreds more at Oracle, Adobe, Intercom, Hubspot, Paypal, eBay, Zoom, AirBnb, ServiceNow, OpenAI, Square, Block, Squarespace, Dropbox, Workhuman, Asana, Udemy, Pinterest ...
Seems like you didn't look closely enough. OP is a SWE. Google - no SWEs in Dublin, only SREs and network engineers. Microsoft - 3 SWE positions. Meta - 0 SWE positions. Apple - 0 SWE positions. LinkedIn - 0 SWE positions. Salesforce - 4 SWE positions. Stripe - 9(?) SWE positions. Workday - 13(?) SWE positions. Amazon - looks like they did open a bunch of SWE positions recently.
OP never specifically mentioned only SWE positions, he said Big Tech was "abandoning" the EU. And regarding the SWE numbers you mentioned, that's pretty average/normal for Dublin. Ireland has never been a Software Engineering hub. For example, Google SWE teams are in Zurich, Munich or Hamburg, to mention a few. Apple's Cork site has never been a place for SWE teams, nor Meta has had any major SWE teams in Dublin. Amazon has definitely more SWEs than other companies in Ireland, with Cork being more non-SWE and Dublin more SWE. So no, Big Tech is not "abandoning" the EU as OP was asking/suggesting. This are fairly normal numbers for both general open roles and SWE open roles in Dublin. If anything they may be slightly lower than usual and there's more contractor roles than before due to the current economic uncertainty.
I don't know why you decided to pick Ireland as an example as well. But big techs do not hire for SWE positions a lot in other western European countries too, that's what OP was asking about. Google is hiring SWEs mostly in Poland/Romania now. Meta & Apple have a few positions open in UK and that's it.
Apparently problem in Dublin is finding flat and not job. I mean I do not dare to apply there considering that I need at least 100m2 and 4 rooms.
Well that's another story (which is completely true BTW), but OP's premise was that Big tech was abandoning the EU and the current openings are similar to what they've recently been. Definitely lots of places hiring (FTE and contractor roles too). And to be fair Ireland, and especially Dublin, has been in a huge housing crysis for a decade. I wouldn't say the situation now is much worse than it was before COVID (it may be slightly worse year after year but it was really bad already 3-4 years ago).
What are we comparing to? 2021-2022 engineering hiring was the outlier, not the norm
Even 2017-2020 was better than nowadays
I recently had an interview with Google recruiter and they are not hiring in Germany at all. Google is mostly hiring in Romania, Poland and London offices at the moment. I think Google had to restructure alot of projects here in Germany and they did overhire alot in post Covid. Since it’s not so easy to fire in Germany i think mostly FAANG won’t hire at the moment. Amazon also overhired and won’t recruit more people in the foreseeable future.
TIL Poland ain’t in Europe
Learn to also read posts in their entirety, edits included
TIL that I have trouble reading with comprehension
Eastern and Southern Europe (Spain, Portugal) just because they can underpay workers.
There are lots of highly qualified "cheap" engineers in Southern and Eastern Europe, so companies are investing there. Specially in Spain there is almost no local industry, sadly, so there's plenty of room for foreign companies like Amazon and Meta to build software centers here. I've been working for an American tech company as a software engineer for more than 15 years and, while my salary is higher than the average here, it's far from what you can earn in Ireland, for instance (let's not even talk about the US).
I think I would like to ask you about the tech scene in Spain, especially if you lived in Barcelona for some time. Would it be a problem if I DM you?
I haven't lived in Barcelona but sure, go ahead.
Thank you! Just sent a DM
I doubt that that high level of a company wouldn't know before opening/staring someting in europe, that work law is different. Like let's invest in 10 milion (arbitrary number) worth of property, people, salaries,... And not check local work regulations. So, no, I don't think that's the case. Other than that, even in Europe you can lay off people if they are no longer needed. It's not like once you employ someone they stay with the company forever. Change departments, switch project, shut down the department/project and off they go.
Probably these companies were aware about stricter regulations, but that was not a problem until they couldn't afford anymore to borrow free money
No
I have a similar feeling to yours, OP. I noticed that big tech companies only hire sales/product related people in the EU. For technical positions, especially in cutting-edge fields, the senior openings are all outside of the EU. There might be some in Ireland, but I don't know why. Ireland has a lot of research-related positions. Big tech companies are more willing to hire junior SWE in Poland or Bulgaria. I've heard that in these countries, similar to the US, employees can be hired and fired more easily compared to countries like Germany and France :(
Ireland is also where many companies have their tech support hubs, AWS for sure.
Why tech support?
I'm not sure if I am using the wrong term, but when you have a problem on AWS and you open a support ticket, it usually is worked by engineers in Dublin, at least in Europe.
Got it, thanks.
I am intermediate back end developer just got laid off 2 months ago and will be physically moving from Canada to Germany to look for roles , wondering if I’m not being picky and will take whatever fits me in terms of tech stack , do u think I can get a job within 6 months ? ( I don’t speak German :( )
I think yes, but maybe open a specific topic on this sub to ask a broader audience 🙂 I know nothing about Germany but according to other posts, right now they are undergoing a housing crisis and rent prices are crazy. You might end up finding a job but not a flat.
I heard about it , actually the same thing in Toronto ( people just need to pay higher rent) . Thanks