Ask HN: I'm an MIT senior and still unemployed – and so are most of my friends
I'm a senior at MIT studying Course 6 (EECS), and I'm graduating soon with no job lined up. I've applied to tons of places, done interviews, built side projects, but nothing has landed—and it's not just me. A lot of my classmates, some of the smartest and hardest-working people I know, are also unemployed or under incredible stress trying to figure things out.
It's honestly demoralizing. I came to MIT hoping to build a better life—not just for myself, but for my family. Now I’m facing the very real possibility of moving back home to an unstable and abusive environment while continuing to job hunt. The thought alone is crushing. I’ve even considered staying for an MEng just to avoid going home, but I’m completely burnt out and have no thesis direction. MIT gave me freedom, food security, friends, a bed of my own for the first time. It changed everything. But now that graduation’s here, it feels like it’s all slipping away.
If you've been through something similar—late job search success, unexpected turns that worked out, or just any advice—I’d really appreciate it. What helped you push through when it felt like the system failed you?
Thanks for reading.
Yeah I'm sorry for your troubles. I have 8 or so years in the industry and some decent names on my resume, and nothing is really sticking for me either. It was bad in 2023, horrible in 2024, and maybe outright catastropic in 2025. You may indeed be way way smarter than I am, but if are this stiff with their senior market, the entry level market must be absolutely dead.
I wish I had better advice. I really only have some decent part time work from a blind linkedIn message. Luck really is opportunity + preparation. And these days, you REALLY gotta get lucky. Keep every channel up to advertise yourself, talk around to everyone in your community, and keep bolstering your portfolio. Grab any sort of job possible if you don't decide to move back. If you're willing t relocae for any role, all the better. Just be keenly aware of CoL, because it may slip under your fingers in these times.
I was sent out to an okay enough market that was still looking for people. You were sent out into a wasteland. Just remember that absolutely none of this was your fault. But unfortunately your goal right now is to survive and ride the storm out.
Best of luck.
Truly sorry you feel this way. For what it’s worth, this was common for people graduating into the 2008 financial crisis, too. It’s actually unusual that we went for so long without another period of contraction.
From last time around: The people who kept pushing and took any job, anywhere turned out okay. This translated to a lot of people taking jobs below what they expected to get or having to move when they didn’t want to, but it was ultimately temporary.
The people I knew who turned cynical, let negativity take the wheel, and checked out of the job market struggled much harder to get back in.
You’re early in your career. This current period of turmoil doesn’t mean that much, even though it feels like everything right now. Keep at it, work a little harder than your competition, and put a little more care into your applications and it will work out. Stay away from the doom spirals on Reddit or Blind. Uninstall those apps (and others) if they’re making you worse.
Anecdata to try and level expectations. As someone who *eventually* came out of that era fine, it wasn’t without hardship. Expect to graduate without a job. Expect to continue the grind for many many months. Expect to get rejected not for not meeting the bar, but for not exceeding everyone else who also passed that bar. Expect to very likely settle for a job that doesn’t meet the expectations that college (and the previous 10+ years of history) sold you on. Expect that financially, you will end up years behind the curve and that many life plans (ex: home ownership if that’s one of your goals) will be delayed. Expect that you will meet many people younger than you who will be at your financial level because they graduated post-recovery.
If you can accept that you just happen to be born at the wrong time, you will be in a better place mentally than where I was at for a long time. I won’t say it’s easy; it will suck. But it is possible to make it out ok. I luckily had some financial and emotional support from my family to keep me going. I don’t know your situation but hopefully you are able to find support too. I wish you the best of luck.
+1 to this. If I go look at social media the job market is ending. But if I look at the signals around me there's plenty of opportunities.
Also consider taking something below (or even much below) expectations. It's much easier to work your way up with connections than it is to get in the door with no references.
MIT students expect (not unfairly) to work at Jane Street/HRT/Jump/Citadel Securities/OpenAI/Anthropic and then "settle" for Google or Facebook. They're not going to work for Fidelity or Raytheon.
I get why they might have a certain expectation. It kinda depends on the job market. The guy in the cube next to me at Fidelity had a degree from MIT.
That's a bit of a charcacture of Course 6 at MIT. Course 10 is chemical engineering and plenty of them go into industry at all the major oil companies. Lots of MIT students go into aerospace and defense (Lincoln Labs is directly federally funded) and MIT holds a yearly Soldier Design Competition that also helps students go for SBIRs. Raytheon is a big hirer of course 2 (MechE) MIT grads.
As someone who's worked at Lincoln Labs, I do wonder if the poster here has considered this. Although, it is worth noting that LL requires citizenship for many/most of its divisions.
MIT kids get part time jobs waiting tables or working retail while in school, just like other college kids. My first job out of college was non-elite aircraft manufacturer... guy on my left was MIT, on my right was CalTech.
Indeed. I found myself unemployed and having a very hard time finding work after the '08 crash. My newly minted degree turned out to be worthless in that environment. It worked out for the best as I took a low paying job as a technician that at least let me make enough money to pay the rent and buy food while I continued building up skills. It's a raw deal and it's not fair, but the only thing you can control is yourself. Try to keep a positive attitude and understand that it won't be this way forever.
> From last time around: The people who kept pushing and took any job, anywhere turned out okay. This translated to a lot of people taking jobs below what they expected to get or having to move when they didn’t want to, but it was ultimately temporary.
I'm going to challenge this as you didn't give specific data to back it up. I read an article recently that did have data, and it made the argument that first jobs, and first salaries, tend to be remarkably "sticky". That is, if you are desperate for a job out of college so take one that causes you to be underemployed and underpaid, that doesn't just stick with you for your first job, but data showed that people were underemployed and underpaid for at least a decade after college.
The advice in this article was to hold out as long as possible for a desirable job, which meant a ton of networking, taking internships if possible, and also possibly additional schooling.
Apologies for not having the article on hand, but here's another one I found in 30 seconds of googling that makes the same argument, with research:
https://www.highereddive.com/news/half-of-graduates-end-up-u...
This sounds correct? I think I’m living evidence of it. The sad reality is that sometimes you can’t hold out long enough and you just gotta take what puts a roof over your head and food on the table. Everyone graduating now just got unlucky with when they were born.
Edit: that said, I think the majority of what the parent wrote is good. Esp the part about negativity. That hits hard and is good to be aware of.
It was the same for me in the 2001 dotcom crash. It was incredibly hard to find work.
I kept hearing about 2008 crisis. It is overrated. Just a market up and down ?
Also keep talking to people, since you never know when and where opportunities will come from.
This environment reminds me of the one I faced graduating into the 2001-2003 post-Dotcom Bust market.
> You’re early in your career. This current period of turmoil doesn’t mean that much
Is that true? I seem to remember data showing that the 2008-2010 graduate cohorts never overall caught up to the ones that came immediately before or after them.
Like sure sure OP has an engineering degree from MIT they're more like the ones that did catch up. But I'll bet there are a lot more people reading this who are about to graduate with degrees from perfectly adequate state schools and I'm not sure this unalloyed optimism is exactly correct for them. I don't think it turned out to be for their 2008 predecessors.
It doesn’t mean much in the course of an entire career.
Comparing to other cohorts isn’t useful because you can’t pick your cohort. You are born into one timeline and you play the hand you’re dealt.
There’s a lot of research that people who graduate into bad job markets are more cautious and less risk taking which can make them look like they’re behind peers who are more risk hungry when the market is up. I wouldn’t be surprised if it also makes them come out ahead in periods where the market is down.
I graduated in this time period and that makes sense. I definitely didn't start doing what I wanted until some time later. I guess in a sense that makes my career overall a few years behind resume wise but at this point, being in the industry 15 years instead of 17 probably isn't going to move the needle too much in terms of salary but who knows. Either way, at this point in time, I don't feel like I've missed out really.
Also, I graduated from a pretty mediocre state school. I'm by no means starving.
Yeah fwiw I think the ones that managed to get and stay in the industry are doing ok now. I had in mind someone I knew who graduated in 2008 with a CS degree from a state school and needed work immediately, took a helpdesk job, then took the promotions into mid-management, now is a starbucks district manager making like 95k. Never did get to realize that dream of coding professionally.
I believe he finally gave up studying & interviewing for junior dev jobs in 2016. At that point why take a "stale" graduate when you can just get an actual 22 year old from the same school, seems to have been everyone's reasoning.
I saw a similar thing a bunch when teaching at a code school ca 2018 too. It was a great move if you had savings or support for 6-18 months of job search. The ones that got in are still doing ok. But a lot didn't, they had to keep working at what they did before "temporarily" while interviewing and most of them are still doing exactly that.
So idk, I'm not sure how you would even get numbers on this. How many people would have excelled in this work if they had graduated at a different time, or with more support, but they didn't and they simply aren't here.
I suspect what really happens is you're set back a few years compared to someone with more fortunate timing. In a away, this is never catching up, but framing it as a setback gives a better picture of what happens.
My path into this career was completely different so I have no first hand experience either way. But my observation has been that you don't really get to just hang around for a couple years then pick up where you left off. When the job market picks back up the new grad jobs go to new grads, which you aren't, quite, anymore.
It's a more difficult path and people navigate it but I don't think everyone does if you see what I mean. I think some of who should be our colleagues are simply missing because they did what they had to to pay bills in 2010 and never made it in here.
Same in 2001. Took 8 months to get my first job. I started the hunt after graduation to avoid job interviews interfering with study (an 1 hr interview would be a 1 day affair with commuting).
Had I got a job before I graduated that company may well have gone bust or laid people off anyway.
Had some bad interviews including being beaten by a other candidate on a job writing access databases for a 1 person business, and a job where they said they interview girls to see what they look like (not a girl but was disgusted... I carried on the process anyway because need $)
I don't think it was that bad. I graduated 12/2008 in aerospace engineering from a big state school. Not MIT. We all had at least 1 offer from big companies, even the middling students. I had 2 offers, and probably could have swung a third. It felt like the recession mostly affected the housing market and older career folks, but for us new grads things were mostly normal. This feels like a permanent shift due to AI in part, and interest rates going back up since pandemic.
2008 wasn't that bad for tech, but 2001 was and might be better comparison.
> It felt like the recession mostly affected the housing market and older career folks, but for us new grads things were mostly normal.
Yeah, they weren't. You were in a STEM bubble, which back in 2008 probably was the only bubble that could still get jobs "the old way", without going through application hell.
Also, the job market was way worse in 09-10 than it was in 2008, especially first half of 2008.
It's hard to face this when fresh out of school, but one piece of advice I can offer is to network as much as you can. Talk to folks you know that graduated before you and have a job. Talk to professors who might have industry ties in their history. Talk to folks in the career center. Try to be as visible as you can. Yes, I know that seems trivial considering you don't have job experience, but even building relationships at school can pay off.
Those types of connections are CRITICAL in the age of scorched-earth AI centric hiring. I spent 9 months recently jobless after getting laid off, and its damned near impossible to get a job through the usual resume farm (LinkedIn job board and the like).
Also, look for jobs local to wherever you are that don't look all that glamorous. RTO is a big thing now, and smaller organizations struggle to hire locally without the brand recognition of the big guys. That might be your in for your first job.
And the biggest thing, keep your head up. Keep pushing. You just got a degree from an extremely difficult program, and you can hang your hat on that. The factors affecting the job market are not within your control, and your skills will outlast them.
I agree with the emphasis on networking. At the risk of sounding like I am doing an advertisement, last month I gave away 5 free tickets to graduates of Fullstack Academy to come to my event, and one of those people found a part-time connection to a startup via the event. I'll do the same again, if you're in New York City, I offer 5 free tickets. Reach me at lawrence@krubner.com. Mention this Hacker News post. We will have entrepreneurs at this month's event who are hiring. Come join us. Details:
https://respectfulleadership.substack.com/p/april-28-the-inf...
Agreed with this — don't give up, start asking around. It's fairly well studied at this point so if you'd rather believe a sociologist, read Granovetter https://news.stanford.edu/stories/2023/07/strength-weak-ties
Agree with everything here, with one minor addition: talk not just to professors who might have industry ties, but everyone in your orbit with whom you have reason to think might help -- even those professors (or research scientists or postdocs or grad students or what have you) who entered MIT as a freshman and never left will have had many contacts (e.g., former students or classmates) who are in industry, and in many cases people do keep in touch.
Indeed, this is a big benefit of being from MIT. Most professors at most schools don't have good connections in my experience, but that is not the case for MIT.
Asking for referrals/connections will be more effective though if you have an interest and focus and can articulate that to the prof. Imagine they are the first link in the hiring chain and treat them accordingly. You need to sell yourself to them before they'll sell you to their network.
This. My comment was definitely not meant to limit, just giving examples. Introduce yourself to a brick wall if you think it will give you a boost
Send me an email — I'm an '18 and if you're telling the truth about side projects, interview skills, graduating, etc. then I should be able to help you find a job very quickly, either in my own org or with someone I know who is hiring.
> I’m facing the very real possibility of moving back home to an unstable and abusive environment while continuing to job hunt
You don't have to do this. You can do anything you want you're a free person with your own agency and plenty of skills. There are a million ways you can work around this.
> What helped you push through when it felt like the system failed you?
Realizing that I am owed nothing, and focusing on ways to get what I want. With your background and skills I am certain you can achieve anything you set your mind to as long as you don't put yourself in a subordinate, dependent, position.
> Realizing that I am owed nothing, and focusing on ways to get what I want.
I don't think the system _ever_ fails people with "merit" like MIT grads. It fails people like me that can't get into top schools that went to 50% accept rate public schools.
I graduated in 2018 too - I guarantee people like you consider me and my career accomplishments in the intervening years to be failure worthy. I genuinely think a typical MIT Course 6 grad from 2018 would be clinically depressed if they were in my shoes.
Even your gilded claim is breaking down these days it seems.
I started in state schools and leveraged that into one of the world's best (half the MIT professors had graduated from my alma mater when I was deciding where to go) for my MSc.
As [likely] one of the people you reference, I am a counter example to your guarantee. No one should fail who contributes in good faith. Live life well, be responsible, have fun, spread joy, and no matter what happens in your career you'll have succeeded.
How dare you guarantee that I'd consider you a failure? You don't know me, don't put that on me. In fact I am pretty sure I wouldn't consider you a failure. You're saying a lot of negative things about yourself and I don't know you or your situation but I hope you don't give up.
I recognize your username and I've followed your career since ~2017 or something. I never got an interview at Stripe, not that I would have ever passed it. I'm not a L6/L7/L8. I worked at Amazon, and people think my class of people are subhuman.
I see that your username is “laidoffamazon.” It seems that you are allowing the low points in your life to define who you are and what you think you can accomplish. Have you considered therapy?
Levels.fyi has L5 at Amazon making $150k base, $220k TC. You might not be Jeff Dean or Andrej Karpathy but there's only two of them. None of us are. That's not remotely subhuman failure.
https://www.levels.fyi/companies/amazon/salaries/systems-dev...
https://www.reddit.com/r/hiringcafe | https://hiring.cafe/ (not mine, but I've chatted with folks its worked for)
Know when to rest, not to quit. Take whatever job you can now while continuing to look for your next role.
> What helped you push through when it felt like the system failed you?
Grit and nihilism. No one is coming to save us.
> Grit and nihilism. No one is coming to save us.
What I'll say won't help you now, but: this will help you later.
Don't assume you'll always be able to find a job. Work towards financial independence early. Avoid debt. Don't get some fancy car as a "treat" to yourself, counting on your future income to make payments... that income might not come.
Sorry it sucks right now. Don't give up, don't let your skills dull. Keep grinding and take any programming job just to start getting that 2-3 experience that locks out so many of the labour market.
Good advice. Save for future you, possessions are temporary.
> Take whatever job you can now while continuing to look for your next role.
This. And by any job I mean any job. McDonalds, book store, what have you. A good friend of mine dropped out of Harvard sophomore year. She found work at the COOP, then CVS, etc. It was definitely better than going back to an unstable and abusive environment while continuing to job hunt.
To me, it sounds like you need professional experience on your resume so that should be your goal. However, professional experience != a full time software engineer role. Can you find something really small that pays from a freelance site? Maybe it's just a python script that takes 4 hours and pays $10 - but with that you are a professional software engineer. Do you anyone who owns a website for a business? Ask them if you can do some really basic work for $1 - because if you do that, you're a professional software engineer.
Once you have some professional experience on your resume, it should get a little easier - it's still going to take some time and grit, but it should work out.
I graduated in June 2009 from a UC just after the crash. It took me until September 2010 to find a job in the field I wanted and get my career going. I got super lucky and found that job off a Craigslist ad. Just remember the system isn't set up to support you, so you are going to have to be proactive, creative, try and network and be uncomfortable asking for what you want until you get it. These are core life skills. Grit 'n' Grind.
1. Go for masters in a field where you can get TA or other stipend. Masters is generally worth it because it will give you more experience. There are lots of places outside of US that are starting to invest into AI infra, and having advanced knowledge gives you an edge. Don't limit yourself to MIT - other universities (even overseas) have funding. A lot of times, especially in US, the graduate projects are basically company funded tasks that they can get done while paying way less than the market price, so plenty of those are floating around.
2. Look outside US for jobs. There are remote opportunities everywhere, and at your young age, its not super hard to move. Even China has some startups that can hire within US.
3. In general, even in recession, there are companies that end up making big as demand shifts to more fundamental things. Most companies need IT support. Generally, as a computer engineering grad, you should be able to do the full range of IT support (and if you can't ask yourself why not).
Yeah, the world is a illusion, it tells you "study here or there and you'll have an amazing job and will win a lot of money!" but a lot of times, that never happen. You ended up felting like "was all for nothing?". I see my dad now working with his 60+ years old and I can't say to him "You can rest now, I'll pay your bills", at least was something that I was dreaming for a long time and now I know that will never be possible. I can't give you advice since you and I are on the same boat (I'm not an MIT senior but you get it, right?) but try not to lose hope and don't be harsh with yourself
Is there no pipeline--or a job fair? A way to get a moment with prospective employers? It seems tragically stupid if MIT offers no such thing. Applying into the void seems like a fool's errand.
Many student loans can be put on basically indefinite hold via income based repayment (if you make little enough, your minimum payment is zero, but the interest keeps accruing). This gives you some flexibility to take any job you can find, even something that doesn't require a degree.
You might also look into trades, depending on your engineering specialty. A machinist with a MechEng degree from MIT or a millwright with something related to manufacturing will be extremely valuable, especially if you're willing to move where the work is.
MIT students almost definitely don't have student loans. The degree is free to cheap.
Thought about a career at one of the national labs? I work at one currently and I quite like my job.
> What helped you push through when it felt like the system failed you?
The feeling of inadequacy is an absolute self-esteem wrecker such that it distracts you from reality. You and your friends got into MIT, that's a big accomplishment. You're like a Tony Stark or whatever. Be proud of that attribute.
But I'll give you some reality: accept that you probably won't find a job in your field any time soon. It may take years. Once you accept that you don't have the cards, your mind starts thinking up more possibilities.
There is no shame in serving happy meals for awhile, but start aiming for a trade, perhaps some city/state work.
Service industry (waiting tables is my go to) doesn't pay well but it does pay...
I worked at Stinkies Fish Camp as a dishwasher fwiw after my 6 years as a Cyber Threat Operator in the AF (2012 government sequestration did wonders to clearance renewals). It sucked, but I lived. Well, survived.
Best of luck, always keep a candle of hope to a wildcard interview!
The advice I give to students is to leverage connections, especially family connections, as much as possible. Take any job you that have a family connection to, even if it isn't in tech.
Learn the business as well as you can and then apply your technical knowledge to it.
Since there are currently no posts mentioning this, if you have down time, build something.
Not because it will make you rich, but because it shows you have the grit to actually do something. It will also keep your skills fresh and/or grow them.
These things do make a huge difference to hiring managers.
Hunting for work in a down economy is hard and depressing. Building something is a excellent way to stave off depression. Much better than self-pity, alcohol, drugs, videos games, or doom scrolling.
Sorry to hear the challenge.
You and your friends should email me with your resume and anything you're proud to have built. I'll extend that to any MIT senior/recent grad who wants to discuss moving to SF and helping us apply LLMs to build product features that solve interesting customer problems.
I'm at james.peterson@fathom.video. Include "[responding to HN thread 43614795]" in the title. I'd love to chat.
To OP, sorry you're experiencing this. If you want 1:1 help debugging your job search, feel welcome to email me directly (contact in HN bio). I probably won't be able to get to it until this weekend, but I will try to help if I can.
If you can get support, staying for a graduate degree is a time honored way of riding things out when you graduate into a recession. And if the stock charts are an indication, industry is bracing for the mother of all recessions.
I’ll echo a couple of other people who have said to network. This was many years ago, but when I was in college and applying for jobs I was getting no interest at all. No interviews… not even an email response acknowledging receiving a resume. Then a person that I knew who had graduated the previous year was at a campus event, I started talking to her, and she told me the company she worked at was hiring. I emailed the hiring manager the next day, attached a resume, mentioned the woman I was talking to. Got a call 2 days later, an interview the following week, then an offer after later.
When I graduated in 2011, the Great Recession was just beginning to unthaw. I nearly joined the Air Force as an officer. I even went to MEPS and did the physical but decided against it at the last second and joined a military contractor instead.
It was a similar situation, but honestly nowhere as dire as yours. Even in that rough situation, the best of my state college were at least getting one offer. I cannot imagine how rough it must be for MIT grads to not be getting job offers.
I'm not proud of either, but I did what I needed to so that I never moved back home.
These days, applying through job portals is a losing strategy. People are overwhelmed with perfect-on-paper AI-generated applications.
Email people directly. DM them on Twitter/LinkedIn. Meet people in person.
2002 felt similar, although it was never so bad that even MIT grads had trouble finding jobs, just those of us from low tier schools.
The classmates who took non-tech jobs after graduating in 2002 never came back to the industry. They generally did alright, but taking a job outside the industry makes it really difficult to get back in. Employers expect to hire people with no experience straight out of school.
That MEng sounds like the best option to me. That was definitely the best option for my 2002 classmates.
> If you've been through something similar—late job search success, unexpected turns that worked out, or just any advice—I’d really appreciate it.
So, I can provide my anecdote, at least. It took me the better part of a year after I graduated to find my first job. (That paid real poorly.) I lost that job after a year due to the role being eliminated and my contract not being renewed. I lost my next job at a startup after six months due to the company pivoting. I’ve been at my following job for 10+ years now.
I am seeing this in my community as well, it has become nearly impossible for early career folks to find opportunities and it is due to a number of factors. In addition to economy, the fast ramp up of hiring in covid and of course AI, we now have geo-political headwinds in the mix. If you are in this situation, or if you would like to help make a difference, please reach out to me, email is in profile. @Dang, if this is not appropriate, please let me know.
I received a campus offer in 2008, but then the recession hit. Since it was with a large company, I graduated in 2009 and was supposed to join afterward. However, just a few weeks before my start date, they postponed it indefinitely. I found myself back at square one and it took more than six months to land a job at a mid-sized company with a lower salary. Eventually, things worked out. So, don’t lose hope—just keep trying. Best of luck!
I’m a MIT grad from ‘12. PM me (email is on my profile)
I never had any internships and I didn't gradute from a well-known university. During my senior year of college, I took on low-paying software development contracts I found on craigslist.
I used this as previous experience and found a job right out of college. I also learned a lot from this experience and used the same skills to find work during the 08 crash and never really had a loss of income during this time.
Decide where you WANT to be (like, literally, location).
Plan to move there and get any job.
Don't be ashamed to apply for any and all government assistance you might be able to find.
Is it location based? All the engineering students at the local university by me aren't seeming to have problems.
https://msoe.s3.amazonaws.com/files/resources/2025-career-co...
It was like this when I, and my friends graduated. This too will pass. Do not let it discourage you and take away everything you've worked so hard to achieve. You will triumph anyway. It's not easy to get into, let alone graduate from a school like MiT. God speed my friend.
Get a McDonald’s job. Why would you move home to an abusive environment
Share you resume with the MIT alumnus who replied here and I am sure you will land a job pretty quickly.
You can even just anonymize your resume and make it public.
Have you tried applying for an internship? This is sometimes an easy route to getting hired as you have a chance to prove you can do the work at a company.
You are one of the best in history prepared to do your job, with current knowledge etc. and best university in the world, get your colleagues and start a company. You don't need a jerk who barely passed a college to tell you what to do.
It feels like getting a job gets harder and harder over time.
Wouldn’t starting a startup or business be actually easier in this environment?
Look for marketing jobs, technical marketing, marketing on social media. People are hooked to youtube, tiktok, instagram.
That being said, the whole tariff situation is creating a dark cloud over all jobs
[dead]
Don't be afraid to:
- Hit up alumni on LinkedIn, even though you've never met them before.
- Cold-call companies.
But at the very least be genuine, and look up what the companies and people do.
Become a founder. It's the easiest way to make something people want and get paid a moderately decent salary while you're doing it!
Consider tapping into the alumni network - I can help with more guidance on this front. Drop me an email.
If MIT graduates don’t get jobs, who else is getting them?
> I've applied to tons of places
What kind of places are you applying? FANG? Startups? Something else?
Relevant experience is more valuable than a schools name. If your school didn't offer you the opportunity to acquire significant experience in your field, you were cheated. They should at least be able to guide their students into apprenticeship programs upon graduation.
This is indeed a very rough time to be graduating. You're unfortunately getting screwed. It happened to me too in '08/'09, so I know very well how shitty it can feel. Try to be stoic about it though and just worry about the things you can actually change, not what you can't change.
Here's my advice and what I would do in that situation again, though you should definitely adjust/adapt to your strengths/goals:
1. Don't "spray and pray" your resume out there (at least, don't do that to jobs you actually want). When jobs get tight it feels natural to want to spread your (resume) seed as widely as possible hoping one will germinate, but realistically that doesn't work. Instead I would find job postings that you want, and make yourself spend 20 to 30 minutes tailoring the resume for the job. Don't lie or even exaggerate, but don't include irrelevant information and definitely don't omit anything relevant. If it's something you have and it's mentioned in the job post, it should be on your resume, unless you don't think you could speak intelligently on the subject. For example I put in a job posting I needed someone with bash scripting experience, then interviewed somebody who put bash on their resume, but when I asked about it they hadn't done much more than just run simple commands. They didn't even know how to set a variable in bash. They did not get an offer.
2. Be willing to take something in QA or another adjacent area even if you feel it is beneath you (especially being from MIT. You went to a phenomenal school and deserve to be proud, but don't let that turn into counterproductive pride). Even the best school only partially prepares you for the workforce, and you can learn a ton even slinging test code. (to be honest, my time working in QA was one of the most enjoyable because I didn't have to deal with Product :-D). Being humbled to dust a few times in life has (IMHO) ultimately given me much better perspective on myself.
3. Take a look for Professional Services and/or Support Engineer roles that involve some coding. These are often a little less pay, but they are also more plentiful and the competition is much lower because many people avoid these roles. However, this can be a great way to get your foot in the door and pivot to a full SWE role 6 to 12 months down the line. You can also get some incredibly useful experience in these because you'll work will real customers/users and will learn a ton about product, bug hunting, and building clever solutions to solve real problems. You'll also gain industry experience in whatever industry your employer is in, and that can be invaluable for getting your next role. I worked with someone who started as an L1 support with no schooling, learned to code, started automating small parts of his job, and also learned a ton about the finance industry. He later got a fantastic job in large part because he knew a lot about loan origination and underwriting from working with customers. If you do this, talk to and get to know the engineers you work with. Not just to use them to pivot, but to actually get to know them as people and also learn from them. Many of them will be able to give you excellent advice and mentorship to help you get to where you want.
4. (this one can be a bit controversial but it's my opinion): Don't just look at local options. Moving sucks, but there are lots of great jobs in areas with rapid growth that will even sometimes pay for your move. I would definitely look in areas like Texas, Utah, and Colorado. I've even seen some interesting roles coming out of Arkansas, Chicago, and Minnesota as well. Hell, Boise Idaho has some good roles pop up here and there too, especially if you are interested in embedded systems.
5. Unless you are well differentiated in it, I would avoid chasing "AI" or even "Big Data" roles as those are insanely competitive and saturated right now, so you'll be competing against people with a ton more experience than you. Also everyone is currently throwing cash at AI, but I think the vast majority of those companies aren't going to see anywhere near the ROI they expect and will start slashing. As a n00b you'll be among the first to get the axe, and even if you don't you may find the work drying up and getting assigned stuff that isn't what you want to do. Generally speaking I recommend trying to work on whatever core product the company makes, excepting maybe if you're a researcher and it's a big tech co
Stop looking for a job and start looking for experience. I entered the workforce during the GFC (and while still being in education) and I worked for literal peanuts for years. Sometimes even for free. I lived between my childhood bedroom, friends places and my girlfriends place eating only peanut butter and egg sandwiches for almost 2 years because it was the cheapest way I could get enough protein and carbs.
You might think working for nothing is a bad deal and that it would be exploitative but you need to remember it's temporary and a little bit of experience will make it 10x easier when it comes to applying for jobs a year or two down the road. Almost any employer is going to pick someone with a bit of experience over someone with none.
I don't know how much you're paying for your education right now, but even assuming you can only find unpaid work this is literally infinitely better than the negative income you're receiving in return for improved career prospects right now. I find it quite crazy that people will so happily drop tens of thousands of dollars on an education for a chance at a good career, but are also completely unwilling to work for free for a few months to get the experience they need. Experience is extremely cheap to acquire relative to the cost of education.
The market sucks at the moment and I've argued for some time it's probably only going to worsen due to structural shifts in the global economy, and tech specifically. Keep this in mind and try not to blame yourself because it's easy to give up. I had a lot of friends who studied comp sci with me who ended up getting regular jobs because they struggled to find work after graduating.
If I were you I would look for a niche which isn't fully technical because that will give you more security from automation and outsourcing standpoint. If I were in your shoes I'd probably look for local startups and offer to work every day for free and do literally any job they asked of me. Startups are good place to start your career because they always have lots of random jobs that need doing without anyone to do them. Because of this they can be great places to find out what you enjoy and where you can add the most value. If you're concerned about where you'll live sleep literally anywhere someone is willing to offer you a bed or a sofa, but if you have to move back with your parents temporarily that isn't the end of the world.
I wish I could start my career again. I have a well paid job today, but I'd still love to be in your position. The problem when you get to my level is that life is good but expensive. It's very hard to learn new skills or shift your career when you have dependents and a mortgage to pay. Unless you want to up end your life for little to no return you just have to follow the money. But for you the whole world is at your feet. I guarantee there's hundreds of interesting companies in your area who would love to bring in new talent but they can't justify it because money is too tight. Find them and let them know how much you'd appreciate the opportunity to get some experience with them. Pick up skills, form connections, and see where it takes you. In my experience most opportunity in life comes from meeting the right people, being loyal to them and providing them value. That is what you should be focused on doing.
In my opinion there's not a simple path to a good life these days. "The system" will almost always fail you. I know it shouldn't be this way, but you have to accept the cards you a dealt and play your best hand.
Hope this helps.
Can you go to grad school while figuring things out?
He mentioned that in his post. He's a bit too burned out and doesn't have a good idea for a thesis at this time.
Welcome to the machine. What sort of jobs are you applying for? If you haven't worked in your field at all yet, keep your sights low and apply for entry level positions or internships. IME there can be a large gap between what formal education provides and actually producing work. Also, soft skills are very important and often overlooked.
I've interviewed some PhD students that we deep in their field, but they had zero work experience. That, combined with the fact that they were applying to a non-entry level position, meant that I'd be taking a large-ish risk in my position if I were to hire them.
If you're interesting in automated manufacturing, contact me at paul@neofactory.ai
Most hardtech startups dont have the same constraints as big tech in hiring. More than anything we need smart dedicated people to create the future.
Your future isn’t slipping away, but you’re updating your intuition. The path forward has always been there.
The system failing is the default. Allies tip the scales. You can see the board more clearly now; play accordingly
> built side projects
Link please?
Why anon?
I find this seriously unlikely. Most MIT grads are getting into Jane Street or at minimum Google - they literally think working at Amazon is beneath them. Course 6 grads are not going unemployed.
It is funny to hear that this person might have an unstable environment though - that isn't the profile of someone that gets into MIT.
If OP is actually serious I'm more than willing to give resume advice - including in person living in the area. But again, I seriously doubt this is real, or if people like OP are willing to take advice from failures like me.
I was an undergrad and this is just wrong. Most are not going into HFT, and a bunch don't go into FAANG either. And not everyone who gets in was raised in a perfect upper middle class life. Do you really want to care about judgement from people who think not working at a trading firm is a failure? Those people are insufferable anyway
MIT EECS undergrad? I can believe not everyone is HFT out of the college, but there is a broader point being made.
Yes. I mean if the point is that MIT grads have unfair advantages sure, but he's built a quite unrealistic image of MIT/its students. There is a whole spectrum from IOI gold medalists to students who fail intro classes.
Yes, he exaggregated intentionally. That's why I referred to a "broader point".
Broaden your search. Apply to startups, for less money / more equity - there are plenty of them in the Boston area. Basically just do a sober assessment of how much you need to live on (perhaps with a roommate), add 30% to that and that's your minimal acceptable cash-side compensation. Do that for some time (a year or more), learn, move on. While you work, set aside some money for the rainy day. This is not optional, you have to do it even if you don't set aside a ton. Fundamentally, you have to stand out and you have to start building a track record. How much money you make in your first job is not very important. I'd say what you _do_ in your first job is more important. That's what people see in the resume. Good luck, and remember - you've got the very best education available. Do not sell yourself short in job 2 and so on.
Talk to peers, friends, even people you do not know that well and ask about their plans. Don't be afraid to ask for help. Crash on a couch for a few months. Keep refining and sending out resumes. Take a job that you might be overqualified for. Early in your career you should accept and work for entry level positions and anticipate that you will be doing this same thing every 2-4 years in order to get to a salary range you are hoping for anyway.
Don't expect or even look for a dream job straight away. Lower your standards. That's what I did, and I ended up where I'm supposed to be in my career after a few years. I took an early risk on a personally important project early in my career and found myself broke and headed home afterward. I just committed myself to taking entry level work and moving jobs several times in order to catch up with my peers who went straight into industry.
Feeling burned out is completely normal after college. In my experience, it's hard to work at an endeavor for more than about 3 years without burning out. As you move out into the world, you'll find find that time and energy management can be more important than the work. Because work just sort of happens when we create the right conditions, so emphasizing it too much tends to lead to failure anyway.
I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but I feel that we are entering an era of great struggle. The social contract has been eroded to the point that it's crumbling. Not for any scientific reason, but because dark forces have coopted the goals of technology. Where once the internet was going to bring free access to information for humanity, now it's used to propagandize and subvert the population for the ego-based goals of a handful of wealthy and powerful men whose greed can never be satisfied. AI will mostly accelerate the decline.
What that means is, the promise of a better life which you sacrificed long years for is no longer guaranteed, if it ever was. Where once you could apply at a handful of agencies or institutions with a high likelihood of being hired, now you're up against potentially hundreds of similarly qualified candidates who get weeded out by algorithms. Nobody takes the broad view to see that most of them are overqualified, or to ask why we're doing it this way, or what gives certain people the right to decide and not others - why only they have the money.
I went through a similar situation when I graduated with my ECE degree in 1999 right into the Dot Bomb. I tasted a year of progress before the powers that be started taking it all away. The arrival of the iPhone and Facebook around 2007 replacing Waterfall with Agile, the funneling of R&D funds into outsourcing and the Housing Bubble popping in 2008, the racist backlash to Obama from 2009-2016 that led to the Citizens United case and billionaires buying elections, the COVID-19 pandemic, just on and on and on. I can't remember a good year in all of that, only melancholy, bittersweet. Maybe 2013 after the election when there was enough confidence for electric cars to get a foothold and music was getting good again like it was in the 90s hah.
Nobody told me that the average wage isn't an average. Rather than saying "the typical graduate earns $85,000 at this job", they should say "a dedicated worker can earn up to $85,000 with a little luck". Because nobody is fully employed, usually. A few good years get wiped out with a few months of unemployment. A stable job ends when the company goes out of business. The industry you're trained for gets disrupted with no replacement.
This will all hit the fan around 2030 when AI surpasses humans at all labor. We thought it was 2040 or 2050, but it's on our doorstep because unsupervised machine learning grows exponentially. Nobody has a clue what will happen next after the Singularity.
So I guess my best advice is that the cognitive dissonance you're feeling is very real, and I know it can be hard to endure. But it's also a warning from your subconscious. If you can't see any way through the challenge to the success, then it might be time to step back and take a bird's-eye view of the situation. I highly recommend meditation.
Another way of looking at it is from a holistic perspective. Your challenge isn't unique, meaning that others are facing it too. I can't say enough good things about finding like-minded peers. Together you can overcome adversity that can't be met alone. In fact, that may be the shift needed to take us into the New Age and UBI and an economy that actually works, meaning that the cost of living gets lower each year instead of higher. Maybe what you thought was the thing was the thing that gets us to the thing.
I'm finally finding meaning working at a startup like I thought I'd be in 2000 after a long odyssey. Or I should say, it found me when they saw my comments on a local tech Slack. What changed is my mindset, from ego to service. Where once I was looking for an angle, a hack that would let me get from point A to point B faster, now I seek peace. I stopped chasing money for survival and surrendered to heeding a calling, and letting creation handle the details that foster my existence. After enduring so much negative reinforcement, I've found that the answers can be easier than we ever expected, and that they're often right in front of us.
No one has mentioned considering the military. An MIT grad could be an excellent candidate for an officer. Joining the military has been the way many young men and now women have got out on their own.
It’s less than ideal if you do want to be a technical IC later as it’s typically a multi-year technical career gap. I never saw another ex-(US-)officer SWE/SEM appear in the veterans@google ERG. And tbh I didn’t really count either because I had a post-service PhD.
But to be sure I served with two amazing MIT NROTC grads in my sea tour. You do what you have to do.
Makes sense, though I mention since I'm reading the OP not wanting to move back home to bad situation, others suggesting working at fast food, etc. Both of those seem really drastic compared to considering military (unless OP is holding out for a top-paying, high-status position, in which case they need to pick their priorities imho, especially in this market)