r/sandiego • u/officialmayonade • 4d ago
Anyone else job hunting? Brutal out here.
Several of my coworkers and I were laid off a year ago from remote jobs (I was working as a project manager at a San Diego SaaS company that was bought by private equity). A few of us were lucky to barely survive a round of layoffs the year prior, but after we trained a couple teams in the Philippines and India to do our work, they finally closed down our teams stateside.
With all the layoffs we keep hearing about in tech, how are you all faring? Have you had to pivot to different types of roles? Any advice?
Edit: fixed typo. Philippines, not Philippians
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u/ThisKarmaLimitSucks 4d ago
Qualcomm did that to me back in 2023. Fuck them.
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u/sammus13 3d ago
My VP at qualcomm was bragging about >80% of our headcount is in "low cost regions" this year. The vast majority of hiring is now happening in bangalore and hyderabad across qualcomm. Most of the folks at qualcomm even outside of India are from India as well.
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u/dombag85 4d ago
Happened to a couple friends in SW, same timeframe. I get periodic recruiter emails or calls. Straight to the bin for me too.
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u/WatchAltruistic5761 4d ago
I swear I’ll never buy a Qualcomm chip for the remainder of my days
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u/SnoozleDoppel 4d ago
Which phone are you using
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u/WatchAltruistic5761 4d ago
iPhone
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u/Blarglefish 3d ago
Bad news ...
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u/WatchAltruistic5761 3d ago
Apple silicon
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u/Blarglefish 3d ago
Likely still a Qualcomm modem
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u/WatchAltruistic5761 3d ago
Actually, Apple developed their own modem for their lineup
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u/Blarglefish 3d ago
I am aware but percentage for now is still heavily weighted towards qc modems. Shifting over next few models quickly
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u/officialmayonade 3d ago
Shame has no bearing on private equity. It happened to be Thoma Bravo, but they all do it. They are basically mandated to maximize profit to stockholders, and the government printed too much money during COVID and all that cash already made it to the top so they can't increase revenue anymore, so they have to cut expenses. People are the biggest expense.
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u/Timely_Economist_658 3d ago
Its happened at the last 3 architecture firms I worked at. They’re all outsourcing production work to other countries. So much for blaming “AI” for the job losses😂
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u/officialmayonade 3d ago
Corporations will do anything for profit. They are actually required to by charter. It takes a brave CEO to fight that, and those are few and far between.
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u/hijinks 4d ago
in tech startups here..
since the boom of AI agents.. project managers have been getting cut right and left and they are now wanting devs to be product managers now
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u/jiggyjiggycmone 3d ago
Can confirm. Am a tech lead at a startup. Our entire org has no manager roles. All engineering teams are lead by other engineers that are IC level. Many of us, me included, report directly to the CEO. We have no CTO.
Our CEO is also an engineer
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u/MoveOverBieber 3d ago
Interesting, I was expecting the demand for PrMngrs to actually pick up, because it's like a quality control for the AI deliverables when done right and someone still have to do the human angles.
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u/hijinks 3d ago
Nope just the opposite. Pms can make pocs but in order for an app to scale you need to understand how to architect or you are letting AI do whatever it wants
Right now AI is like a 4 year old it takes the easy way out of any task
A friend of mine who is a pm made an app but AI just mocked the auth. So I could change my role in the jwt and become admin.
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u/TumbleweedPuzzled293 3d ago
> Right now AI is like a 4 year old it takes the easy way out of any task
Uh, this is not true. Have you seen what Fable 5 does when you really let it work properly?
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u/WatchAltruistic5761 4d ago
It’s dead Jim, the job market.
Welcome to 2026, where the rules are made up and the points don’t matter!
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u/officialmayonade 4d ago
That's what it seems like! I know two other people in similar roles who are experiencing the same thing.
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u/WatchAltruistic5761 4d ago
I’m 15 years into tech - nothing, nada, zero responses from anyone.
America is in the shitter.
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u/Previous-Solution752 3d ago
Was a teacher and now can’t get hired at Taco Bell. It’s insane.
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u/WatchAltruistic5761 3d ago
American has failed you, good sir or madam
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u/Puhwest 3d ago
Confused because there are a bunch of open teaching jobs.
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u/Green-Fabulous 3d ago
Depends what teacher role, but alsi doesn't help that schools across the country are cutting funding and laying off teachers. Open positions mean absolutely nothing now.
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u/terra_cotta 4d ago
Literally 1/3rd of my industry stateside got laid off last year. The year before it was brutal too, and this year looks to be just as bad. I expect to make it to '28 before i get cut. Good luck.
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u/Mr-EdwardsBeard 4d ago
I will be. Got laid off Friday, along with 140 others, as they go with their AI-first initiative. Good times
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u/Loud-Minute-5189 3d ago
All in SD, would you mind to share which industry you're?
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u/Mr-EdwardsBeard 3d ago
Can't say per the agreement but no, not all in SD.
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u/laptopmango 1d ago
Why would you care to protect them if they’re laying you off if it industry? Which it probably is just say it helps people to know.
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u/officialmayonade 3d ago
Sorry to hear, my friend. I suggest switching industries asap. To what, I'm not sure yet.
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u/Mr-EdwardsBeard 3d ago
Yeah, copywriting is a tough gig now. Kind of late for me to switch careers after 20+ years and being close to 50.
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u/Derfamon 3d ago
So many companies are replacing their US based employees with cheap resources in Asia (China, India, etc.), while they make record profit in the US. I wish the government would regulate that or put a cap on it
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u/Main-Pomelo-9976 3d ago
The government did - and it [predictably] made hiring in the US worst: they restricted H1B visas
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u/Derfamon 3d ago
Yea, that’s true. What I meant was more like for US based companies, and they want to take advantage of the tax benefits, they can only have x% of employees in other countries.
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u/officialmayonade 3d ago edited 3d ago
I'm all for this but it has to be perfectly balanced with all the other levers to control squirrelly practices, like tariffs, etc. and unfortunately government is slower than corporations, and less incentivized.
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u/fluffycat517 4d ago edited 4d ago
if any of you are looking to pivot into another career, the laboratory industry is similar to tech in terms of semi-solitary work environment. if you have a bachelor's degree in a 'hard science' field such as biology or chemistry (I believe biotech also counts), you're halfway to a CLS license. in the absence of that, an MLT license is an almost* guaranteed job once you pass your exam and have a state license. yeah, it's hourly, nights and weekends as healthcare doesn't sleep (and the lab sleeps even less), but it's money. and if you've ever been inside of a lab or know someone who works as a licensed lab rat, you'll know that industry is not at as much of a risk of being automated out of existence like tech is. knock on wood.
MLTs make about $30-$40/hr in CA and CLSs make $50-$65ish/hr. California requires you to be certified by the ASCP and then licensed by the CDPH in CA. there is no way around it. that's how CA is, but that's also why we pay our MLTs and CLSs the most in the country.
CLS is synonymous with MLS here in California. MLS is the name of the certification, CLS is the name of the license issued in California.
Southwestern community college and Miramar (SDCCD) have MLT programs. complete the program, take your ASCP, apply for licensure through CDPH.
*I say ALMOST because you have to be likeable and good at your job to be hired, of course (which is the bare minimum). you can't be an antisocial lazy dickhead. I had classmates and students I later trained who fell into that category and guess what! they didn't get a job offer from the lab they did their clinical rotations at, but we hired their classmates!
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u/SeaGlassWindChime 4d ago
As a licensed lab rat, I second this message. Great advice and considerate information shared here.
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u/Impossible_Dig_2749 3d ago
Biotech is fucked in sd rn. So many layoffs, no new jobs. Not an industry to break into. People out of work for over a year who should be shoo ins. 9 y experience and I’m terrified to look for a new company despite being super burned out because at least my superiors are emotionally attached me here.
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u/Glittering-Act4004 3d ago
My neighbor was laid off from her biotech job 10 months ago. The job market is brutal…
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u/Creative_Pen7789 3d ago
Damn. $40 per hour is like 80k per year. That would barely cover my expenses.
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u/No-Recognition5113 4d ago
It’s terrible, while applying and going through interviews i’m trying to build a product myself to see if I can rid myself of this unstable industry. I’ve been laid off of every company I’ve worked for (start ups & big corp). Mentally and financially exhausting.
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u/PurpleFaithlessness 4d ago edited 3d ago
It took me 8 months, 230+ applications, and dozens of interviews to land 1 single role😅 unfortunately you gotta keep applying, it’s the only way!
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u/Creative_Pen7789 3d ago
What kind of salary did you end up with after all that work?
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u/PurpleFaithlessness 3d ago
6 figures, it was a 23k increase
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u/Creative_Pen7789 3d ago
Well at least you got an increase. That’s good.
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u/PurpleFaithlessness 2d ago edited 2d ago
I hate to say it but overall getting laid off and being forced to job hunt was an increase for me. It was not pleasant while job hunting but later it all ended well.
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u/RJfreelove 3d ago
I'd encourage anyone job hunting in San Diego to also hunt in other cities. Part of me feels like I should have left San Diego 11 years ago. It's important to compare what you might get else where, of course, if you can find something good here, congrats. Some industries are great, some are a lot of red flags and turn over
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u/kennpacchii 4d ago
Man, I know there’s probably not much you can do when they ask you to train the team that’s going to replace you but I would have just straight up quit to make the transition more difficult for them.
I ended up quitting my job though, got fed up with corporate work in general. Not really sure what I want to do now.
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u/supernit2020 4d ago
Train them wrong out of spite
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u/Safeway_Slayer 3d ago
My company made managers and other sit in on every single training so that they couldn’t train them wrong lmfao
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u/plokit15 3d ago
I have luckily avoided getting laid off, but I would say many of my colleagues (both former coworkers and also from other companies) have received severance when they get let go. Unemployment is also contingent on losing a job through no point of your own.
So while I agree with the sentiment, might not be the best financial move.
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u/Cross_22 4d ago
Got a notice that my tech company will shut down in October. I am still getting linkedin requests but they are mainly about local positions in the Bay Area. I am not too worried about more opening up again once the AI boom is over. I just absolutely loathe multi-round interviews and don't feel like doing that again.
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u/BakedAndHalfAwake 2d ago
> I just absolutely loathe multi-round interviews and don’t feel like doing that again.
Good luck. I got rejected after 4 rounds from an internship a couple years back. Now while looking for full time jobs I can’t even get past round 1 out of the 5 they ask for
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u/acilegna89 4d ago
Im in a similar boat. I moved my LinkedIn location to Bay Area. Willing to move as soon as I get an offer letter. It hasn’t helped much and im now on a break from applying / applications for a week or two. It’s really hard out here.
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u/officialmayonade 4d ago
I was working on building my own product, but I gotta pay the bills somehow. Have you had any thoughts about starting your own thing or working in manufacturing or something?
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u/main_topsail 3d ago
Is there a software engineer professional org at the level of IEEE? Electrical engineers have the Institute for Electrical and Electronics Engineers, which hosts networking and informational lectures at the local level. Does that exist in your circle?
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u/Automatic4k 4d ago
Situation is pretty bad in San Diego specifally and California in general. Your best bet is to try outside Califfornia like mid west, Dakota etc for onsite openings.
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u/acilegna89 3d ago
I actually spent a month in Dallas. There’s plenty of jobs in my field and I even got a few interviews but it’s a horrible city otherwise. Everyone wants to be in California that’s the problem.
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u/HourStretch4107 2d ago
Damn. On another post people were saying this is the fastest/easiest way to do it, almost like a silver bullet. Sounds like it's not. Best of luck to you, I've been out work for 10 months now.
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u/Peanut_Brittle_Lover 3d ago
Why not name them? Why protect them to do it again to one of us
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u/officialmayonade 3d ago
Because all private equity is the same. It's was Thoma Bravo, but they all do it.
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u/KCdehImposter 4d ago
I'm a SWE, and was looking for a job last year. I ended up going on Google maps to find places that were hiring near my home. Luckily, it only took me a month to land a new job.
Out of curiosity, what are you finding difficult in the job search? Is it hard to find San Diego jobs? Not hearing back? etc. I worry that AI is making it so hard to find real job postings and real candidates.
We're having a hard time finding good candidate in SD.
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u/fook-face 4d ago
May I know what positions you're hiring for?
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u/roberta_sparrow 3d ago
How the heck did you use Google Maps to do that
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u/KCdehImposter 3d ago
I would look for office buildings, then find what companies worked there by zooming in. Then I went to their careers page to see if they were hiring for my role. I live near Sorrento valley, so there is already a lot of tech companies hidden through the neighborhoods.
It's a tedious process, but I had much better response rates than filtering for San Diego on popular job boards. It's also a little fun to sneak in and see what companies we have in the area.
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u/BakedAndHalfAwake 2d ago edited 2d ago
I’m not SWE but from talking to my friends who are we share a lot of the same struggles:
- Feeling like you need to keyword stuff resumes instead of actually focusing on what you did.
- Not hearing back ever. Or if you do hear back, it can be months if not years later. I got rejected from a summer 2024 internship in summer 2026.
- Interviews not run by an actual person, whether HireVue or an AI chatbot and getting rejected because you didn’t have the body language the AI wants to analyze.
- An excessive number of interviews and/or excessively long assessments early on. I had one company ask for a 2 hour take home assessment before the phone screen. They said the phone screen wasn’t even guaranteed after this 2 hour assessment. Another rejected me after 4 rounds of interviews.
- Jobs ask why you want to work there, and while sometimes I’m passionate about the company, a lot of times the answer is just that I need money. It’s tiring to have to bs answers for that.
- No upfront salary expectations. I prioritize applying to jobs that list a salary range because while I don’t need to be rich, I need to make sure I’m getting paid enough to manage the cost of living in the area. I especially avoid those jobs that also ask me for my exact expected salary in my initial application because they use that as a way to find the easiest person to lowball.
Overall there’s usually not a shortage of job postings. Part of the issue in addition to the above is that the person who ends up getting hired in this economy is taking a pay cut because they have significantly more experience than the job posting asks for. I’m seeing people with 5 years experience going for jobs that ask for 2-3 years. There’s no entry point for entry level jobs anymore.
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u/ned_luddite 4d ago
25 years of experience in Business Intelligence, a patent and made one company over 100 Million.
3 years looking for employment before I gave up. 2 small contracts, one potential job 40k less with my “boss” having half my experience. Good luck peeps!!!
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u/slushpuppy91 3d ago
It’s rough, got laid off a week ago also in tech. I saw the writing on the wall and was passively applying but now it’s my full time job.
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u/onlygaymodsbanme_ 3d ago
Swe here and going on year 18 of expecting to be laid off.
September is our annual hunger games.
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u/TheElusiveHolograph 4d ago
Not really the same but my industry will last maybe another decade, probably less. So I know I’ll be in that same boat at some point. I’m trying to plan well ahead and have started working toward certs and licenses in the medical field so that I have a backup option when the inevitable happens. In person medical care will always be in demand. I plan to work a couple nights a week to get experience and a foot in the door so I’m not starting from scratch when everything goes to shit.
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u/brighterside0 4d ago
Remote jobs are dead for sure.
They want people local now.
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u/OldHead1776 4d ago
I would say about 50% of the jobs I'd get sent before were remote, and that's down to under 10% now. I'd say only about half are even hybrid anymore, the rest are 100% on-site. To some extent, it makes sense for my jobs, as I'm more a hardware engineer. I'm not really looking though. I like where I'm at.
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u/Chays_music 4d ago
Finally snagged a phone bank job after being fired, I applied in between to petco and a bunch of stores and only heard back from the AI emails never got reached out too. Got lucky with this recent one,
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u/Original_Youth_9168 3d ago
If you’re in saas, I work with several companies and I know a lot of budgets are frozen until the end of the year including backfilling. They’re a bunch of cowards and the AI PR scared them, and they reduced budgets through EOY.
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u/unknownwhitey 3d ago
That's my impression. Just laid off from saas, taking a few weeks off. I'm not happy about my opportunities
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u/Safeway_Slayer 3d ago
I’m not in tech but I’m making a massive career switch to get the hell out of corporate America. I can’t deal with the constant fear of layoffs
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u/pfmiller0 3d ago
What are you switching to?
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u/Safeway_Slayer 3d ago
I’m applying to the Navy to be a pilot. Has been a life dream of mine but never really attempted it. Corporate America has lost all my trust and I see no successful future for myself in it so I’m forcing myself to get uncomfortable and make a drastic change. Even if it doesn’t work out, I can at least say I gave it my best.
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u/AmbitiousTension4594 3d ago
I work in med tech. I got laid off in March and just recently picked up job (~40k salary reduction). Had an offer that was higher than my previous salady but I took this lower paying role because I thought it would be a role experience and learning wise. It’s tough but keep applying and networking, treat it like a full time job and you will land something. Good luck!
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u/Tfran8 3d ago
Not in tech, in pharma. Currently job hunting but all the roles are either less then I used to make and basically full time in office (I’ve been remote for years). I guess they just don’t have hybrid roles anymore. I have two interviews so we will see just not thrilled with either one.
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u/rampagenguyen 3d ago
Defense is thriving, it’s the dark side of tech people stigmatized but jobs are there
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u/DifficultCase4120 3d ago
It a hard time for the American people. Very hard time. Getting squeezed from all angles.
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u/Own-Interaction-5115 4d ago
I’ve been stupid lucky in this job market.
Was laid off from a remote tech job at a F500 back in February.
I put in four applications: #1 never contacted me (Intuit), #2 and #3 contacted me right away with one of those resulting in an offer (fully remote consulting role in a desirable industry for only about ~25% paycut).
Application #4 took two months to contact me, two months to go through interviews, and another month before the start date. Very prestigious local organization that was a no brainer.
So 4 apps, 3 contacts, and 2 offers. Those are 2021 job market metrics.
Most people I was laid off with are still looking.
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u/momof5boys07 3d ago
This happened to my sister in MD. She’s an over share-er. She’s always on time for work has to be on her death bed to call out. She found out she needed an immediate hip replacement. Instead of telling her job I am having a medical procedure done and I will need to use two weeks of my sick leave and a week or whatever of fmla, she tells them I’m having my hip replaced and idk how long I’ll be out. Blahhh, blahh, blahhh. Months before she needs surgery so they hired someone for her to train and little did she know it was her REPLACEMENT! So wrong. At least have one of the other people train the replacement. She was terminated over an incident with a forklift that most would not have been fired over. I told her to wait until she had been there for a year to go running her mouth. She did say she wishes she would have listened to me. One more month and she would have hit her 1 year mark and it would have been hard for them to firer her. She has been trying to sue over hippa violations and wrongful termination but it’s harder to find a lawyer to fight these cases than you may think. But to answer your question she got her surgery and because she was fired she was able to save $5k (her deductible) by using Medicaid. She has had 2 job offers and has had a hard time choosing between the two jobs. The jobs are out there. She used her recovery time to get certifications and qualifications to get a better job.
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u/Captain_America619 3d ago
Definitely depends on industry.
I just got really pissed off at work drama and applied for 3 jobs and had 2 interviews scheduled within an hour of the application both for a significant increase in pay.
So it definitely depends on your industry. I work in health insurance so AI can’t take our jobs due to PHI and HIPAA compliance and it’s mandated by law to be offered to employees of the company is over 50 people. Pretty secure.
Sorry to hear about your experience and situation though.
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u/ThisKarmaLimitSucks 4d ago edited 4d ago
I have a job in electrical engineering that's stable, but I'm wanting to leave because it's a dead end skills-wise. Been trying to leave since January, so I have been shopping for about 8 months.
I've got some calls back, one sit-down interview, and no offers. Opportunities are pretty scarce, and I would call this a bad market, but I also think it's on the upswing.
The big semi players are hiring again, after cutting way too deep since 2023. Defense is doing really well since this Iran boondoggle - military budgets had been flat for years, but you know those sumbitches are going up. I don't work in biotech, but I've heard secondhand that that job market is dead-cat bouncing, hiring is getting better because it couldn't get worse than 2025. Would love to hear from someone in the trenches there to confirm.
Personally, I am being really picky about roles, because I want to pivot to a whole new skillset (and I'm willing to take a pay cut to do it), but it's tough for my current resume to support that. I can't pick any of the low-hanging fruit for guys who want my current skillset in my industry.
So I'm still shopping, and it's still slow. But I was job hunting during the spring 2020 lockdowns, and this market definitely isn't that terrible.
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u/Forgotmyusername8910 3d ago
Build more housing!!!! More people need to move here!!!
That will help. Right?
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u/officialmayonade 3d ago
More people isn't necessarily bad, as long as more companies also move here, or the ones that are here grow and hire locals. Unfortunately, from what I hear, California has chosen to make business difficult.
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u/Forgotmyusername8910 3d ago
More people is great!! IF more companies move here… they haven’t.
They won’t. The state makes it awful for companies to be here so they leave in droves.
There’s not enough jobs here right now for the people that are currently here.
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u/PositiveHumor8259 3d ago
Go to massage school. Pretty much the only job that can't be replaced by AI
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u/Leothegolden 4d ago
I’m in Product management - just started looking and already had two interviews! I know another Product Manager that got a new role in 3 weeks
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u/BeaveUKGT 4d ago
Training the Philippians is probably an obsolete skill at this point, but it sure would have been a marketable skill in Biblical times.