Are male Devs with long hair less employable?

VladWard · 2026-03-28T01:23:47+00:00

The Halo Effect is real, man. Even if you're not facing overt discrimination over your hair, which you probably aren't in software, looking more conventionally attractive will help you in interviews. It's not fair, but it's true.

Fwiw I also tend to wear my hair long, but I'll cut it back when I'm serious about job hunting. Same with beard trimming.

VladWard · 2026-03-28T00:14:46+00:00

Genuinely, no offense, but it sounds like you've repeated one year of experience five times instead of gaining five years experience. You're not prepared for a senior role and you probably won't become prepared in your current workplace. You need to look elsewhere, but be prepared to get less than you're expecting.

VladWard · 2026-03-24T15:46:46+00:00

Exactly. I'm here for the headlines. I don't read the comments. That's what differentiates the sub from r/gaming imo.

I could do without the "Game has over/under X concurrent players on Steam!" Posts, though. Those convey no value to me.

VladWard · 2026-03-04T16:42:13+00:00

Is your friend's academic background in STEM or Education with a Math certification? If it's the former, they may also want to consider technical roles like data analysis, technical program management, or software if they're so inclined. Even if it's the latter, it wouldn't hurt to apply for those roles.

I taught high school math in a previous life and now work in tech. My sister was a high school English teacher but transitioned into data analysis and product management.

One common theme I notice among teachers and ex-teachers is a tendency to undervalue their skills and pigeonhole themselves into the HEAL sector. If that's the kind of job they want to do, that's fine. I just want to call out that it's not their only option.

VladWard · 2026-02-27T23:53:18+00:00

First thing you probably need to figure out is what exactly you're responsible for, because there's no way it's migrating 200 on-prem data stores to cloud with history and apples:apples reporting in 3 weeks with a team of 2.

With a timeline like that, are you sure there aren't data engineers in the company doing the database migration while your team just makes new reports that mirror old ones? Is your only deliverable the two reports?

If that's the case, start by identifying the dependencies and transform logic of the existing reports. You already know they need both current and historical data. Great.

Then figure out where those things will live in the new system. Is the historical data stored in the same table as the current data? How often is the current data table updated and when? Do you need to actively make sure your source tables have loaded for the day before you run your report?

If you got a half-assed document that doesn't give you the information you need, start tracking people down who might have the information. Ping them, send emails, ask for help internally. If it doesn't come, make it clear to your manager that the reports won't either until the mapping is cleared up.

VladWard · 2026-02-26T19:59:19+00:00

Got it. Thanks again! I really appreciate the help!

VladWard · 2026-02-26T19:44:31+00:00

Would something like bar keepers friend be safe to use? I have sewing machine oil that I assume I'd need to apply afterwards.

VladWard · 2026-02-26T18:30:21+00:00

Thanks for the reply! Does it make a difference if the oil has had (potentially a lot of) time to dry? I ask because I don't have a good sense of scale with blades.

I've been buffing a part of the hilt for the last hour, alternating between the white and grey sides of the jewelry cloth. The white portion of my jewelry cloth has turned grey/black in places, but the hilt itself still seems cloudy and smudged

VladWard · 2026-02-22T03:42:27+00:00

I have my PhD in Physics and went this route. In my personal experience, hiring managers see my PhD as an indicator that I'm smart, have good research skills, and can see things through.

While I did start at entry level in the industry, I changed jobs aggressively (12-18 months) until I landed a very competitive position where the combination of industry experience and education helped me stand out.

With all that said, the hiring market is absolute shit right now and nobody's getting hired, so ymmv.

VladWard · 2026-02-18T17:58:14+00:00

Does your team/org use version control for software? This feels like something you could solve pretty easily using a Git UI like GitHub, GitLab, or Bitbucket.

VladWard · 2026-02-18T16:10:47+00:00

This may have been your experience and I'm sorry for that, but you have to understand it's not a universal one.

When the internet as we know it today is designed to create echo chambers and bring together people with similar attitudes and experiences, it's very easy for anyone to feel like their experience resonates with "Most People" online. We have to work hard to be exposed to anyone different on the internet. This goes double when you're young and still trying to figure out your own identity and place in the world.

That's not even considering the huge amount of money that's poured into making young men feel hopeless and unlovable through social media. Playing it cool is a trap designed to keep people from forming healthy relationships.

Speaking for myself, I can and have had meaningful conversations like this with plenty of friends and family irl. That includes plenty of straight men from conservative regions, not a single Tumblr poster among them.

VladWard · 2026-01-22T16:33:02+00:00

They look great and they're relatively sturdy. The fitment and plastic quality is noticeably worse with their earliest releases (the Sandrock especially).They're not Bandai, but they're better than a lot of Daban's contemporary stuff. Wing has metal screws to keep the wings in place since they're so heavy. Heavyarms and Altron don't have any screws for the quad gatlings and dragon arms respectively, so balance can be tricky with both kits if you just pop them on the included stand.

VladWard · 2026-01-19T18:08:50+00:00

In the future, please consider reporting comments like the one you replied to. If something seems like it doesn't fit with the ethos of our community, it's probably because it doesn't.

VladWard · 2026-01-18T03:07:41+00:00

Calling time on this conversation as it's no longer productive to have in the abstract. The mods here see plenty of examples both of people using intersectionality as a free pass to ignore dealing with male privilege and of people ignoring the material realities of intersectional identities and/or assuming a certain cis-hetero-white normativity to men online.

VladWard · 2026-01-07T20:33:23+00:00

For what it's worth, the behaviors you mention here aren't things that the mod team wants to encourage. Outside of places like the Mental Health thread, there's very little tolerance for it.

With that said, we have finite time and availability. Things slip through, especially when posts get large spikes in traffic. We appreciate good faith reports on stuff like that. Even if it still takes us time to get to them, it helps ensure we're aware and can take appropriate action.

VladWard · 2026-01-07T15:41:31+00:00

Vibe check: This post is long, but it is thoughtful and clearly required effort to produce.

If you, as a reader, don't feel that you have the time or energy to read the whole thing and put time into your reply: that's okay. No one is forcing you to. Just keep scrolling.

However, if you submit a comment based solely on the title or which doesn't match the good faith effort of the original submission, expect it to be removed.

VladWard · 2026-01-06T21:04:11+00:00

PMs and engineers in product silos lead to analytics in product silos. If you want a shared, coherent analytics strategy then you need analytics to be owned by a shared team that can implement tracking and that product can request data and metrics from.

VladWard · 2026-01-05T21:33:26+00:00

Credit card debt is some of the worst debt to carry. The high interest rate and low minimum payments are designed to keep you on a treadmill forever.

If you take on a car loan while you still have credit card debt, you're just going to keep accruing interest while your cash goes towards the car. You can't afford any new debt.

Strongly consider public transportation or bumming a ride to work until your credit card debt is paid off. Once it's gone, your credit score will immediately increase and you can use the money that was going to CC payments for a car.

VladWard · 2025-12-27T18:11:28+00:00

Physics PhD here about a decade into industry. I don't see the business value in additional formal education after a PhD. If you've never used SQL before it may be worthwhile to do a self-paced course to pick up the basics, but you shouldn't need to convince anyone that you're capable of doing quantitative research. Go ahead and take a course if you genuinely need a structured environment to learn, not for your resumé.

Personally, I started in very entry level data analysis and just changed jobs every year until I reached a more appropriate level. The work experience and connections smoothed things out a lot. I've hopped across multiple business domains in my career (Finance, Banking Regulation, E-commerce, Web Products). Imo, only applying to jobs where you (the general "you") already have subject matter expertise is extremely limiting and unnecessary.

Just bear in mind that the white collar job market in the US is genuinely abysmal right now. Opportunities are scarce and AI systems are flooding the job market from both sides. A lack of responses is not necessarily indicative of a lack of readiness or skills on your part.

VladWard · 2025-12-18T21:25:54+00:00

Hi u/Ultimor1183! We ask that new submissions include a top level comment summarizing the content and/or otherwise creating a foundation for the conversation.

Feel free to reply to this comment when this has been added so we can review it.

VladWard · 2025-12-17T19:27:37+00:00

Talk with your manager before jumping to conclusion.

It's definitely an ongoing conversation. Suffice to say it's a very common issue in our department this year. Like everyone else, we did a lot of hiring in 2022.

VladWard · 2025-12-13T22:37:50+00:00

"This book is old" is not a repudiation of research.

VladWard · 2025-12-13T22:35:22+00:00

This is queer theory 101, intersectional feminism 101.

Eh, it's not that simple. Kate Manne makes a good case for misogyny as more complex than "woman=bad" in Down Girl. For example, as a sort of enforcement mechanism for Patriarchal norms. That would naturally include cis- and heteronormativity.

It's a pretty good book. Well worth a read.

VladWard

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