Serious question, how do you deal with FOMO? I’ve been at FAANG for about a year, coming from startups and lower-paying companies before.

Internally it’s nothing but complaints about comp and attrition, but to me it’s the best I’ve ever been paid. My idea was to stay here long term and learn a ton before thinking about leaving, but does anyone do that anymore? Maybe I’m being naive.

You have a good plan.

Complaints on comp and attrition, I've seen literally in every large-ish company I or my friends have worked at. It's a lot of politics.

Since your at a FAANG, learn a lot, build network, and that shiny company name on your resume will help you move later when the time comes.

Thanks for the advice and affirmation. I’ll stick to the plan.

I've had friends at FAANG companies get FOMO and quit, then come back within a year because the grass was browner. They've taken a comp hit in the process, but still made a firehose of money like anyone at a FAANG. People love to complain about relative inequalities without fully appreciating how good of a situation they have within society, so actually trying new jobs once in a while can be healthy and eye opening.

I've been fortunate enough to always leave companies on good terms while generally happy there. I've left for exciting new projects and challenges, rather than for compensation. Part of that is I try to be an agent for change when there's something I am frustrated with. I've also always given several months notice. I also have the mentality of committing to something for at least three years.

I haven't stressed out about compensation. I've always negotiated aggressively before accepting a job offer, and then just not worried about it. I've leaned toward equity over salary, and found that my salary naturally increased over time to stay competitive anyway. I have a reputation for being straight forward, honest and reliable, and that's paid off more than any negotiation or job change. I would have probably been the wealthiest today if I stayed at my first job, making a relatively comically low salary, but I wouldn't be as good of an engineer.

There are always lots of over-entitled loud people at FAANG/friends when it comes to conversations about compensation. At one point, my company was rated as one of the highest paying companies on levels.fyi, and people were still complaining about pay in internal meetings.

I have to agree. In this case it’s more an internal thing: I’m 32 and took a few years off software to pursue other things (where I spent most of my time writing software as fortune would have it), result being a lot of my colleagues are half a decade younger than me having settled into Staff Engineer positions.

I don’t feel that I should be anything higher than L4 but at the same time it’s hard not to feel the FOMO and insecurity that comes with being “behind” in a hot market.

Big companies often ladder refresher grants so you always have a lot of unvested equity just over the horizon.

Yes but those refreshers at best total 70% to at best 80% of what new hires are getting. You’re always going to get stiffed for sticking around longer.