Hi fellow leetcoders! Just want to share an unfortunate situation which I am in right now. Maybe I could get some support from some of you here. Or maybe some of you are experiencing similar situations too. It might be good to share this out.
So I managed to get myself a Senior Front-End Developer (React) job offer back in February 2020. I think it is a pretty good opportunity - a fintech startup, with a company size of 11 - 50 people, having presence in several countries in Asia, successfully raised fundings from several investors. It is a remote work company, which is what I’m looking for.
I went through quite a few rounds of interviews - one with a Dev Manager and a Senior Developer based in Lithuania, one with a Dev Manager based in Philippines, and the last one with the VP of Engineering based in Philippines (they were growing rapidly and were deciding which team to place me in, hence the number of interviews).
I was also given an assignment, which I completed over a weekend. Throughout the interview process, I felt we are a good fit and that we can work together very well. In the end, I received the offer in early February, and was set to be joining them in April 2020. I then tendered my resignation in my current company, and started serving my notice period. Things were looking hopeful.
However, things took a sharp turn. Two days ago, on Friday the 13th (!), March 2020, I got a call from the HR of the new company. Bad news: (almost) all engineers are being put on unpaid leave, for a period of 2 months, with immediate effect.
The main reason?
The current COVID-19 situation is causing all of the projects to be put on hold by the clients (their biggest client I know is a huge international bank based in the US). That also means that if / when I were to join the new company in April, I too would be put on unpaid leave. The HR personnel also mentioned that the period of 2 months may be extended to 4 or 6 months, nobody knows. I feel that the communication with me was honest and truthful. I was advised to try to remain in my current company, or start looking out for other opportunities. Even the HR personnel is feeling insecure over the possibility of being put on unpaid leave too. Things are gloomy.
So here I am now, feeling as if I am in a state of limbo.
Just to be clear, I’m not here to blame the company, and I prefer not to state any names here. It’s sad that things turned out to be this way, but in the end, it’s just business. I’d wish they have better ways to handle or prevent this in the first place, and I hope they’ll get back on track soon. Meanwhile, I’ll look out for other job opportunities and think about other possible options.
Thanks for reading. Feel free to share your opinions or ask me anything.
Shameless plug:
If you or your company is looking for a React / Front-End Developer, please reach out to me.
LeetCode: https://leetcode.com/ecgan/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ecgan/
GitHub: https://github.com/ecgan
Twitter: https://twitter.com/ecgan
My LeetCode solutions (JavaScript, with 100% code coverage): https://github.com/ecgan/leetcode
Interview assignment app: https://ecgan.github.io/react-image-gallery/
A mobile-first image gallery PWA (Progressive Web App) that searches and displays images from Flickr. Best viewed on mobile. Source code and assignment document is at https://github.com/ecgan/react-image-gallery . Note that I did most of the work over one weekend.
About me:
I have been doing web development for 12 years, and still going strong. I have full stack web development experience, but front-end and visual things are the ones that get me excited and are what I’m passionate about. I am based in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia (UTC+8 time zone). I am a night owl and occasionally I work as late as 2am (and that is 6pm UTC. It’s like I work in European time zone). And for what it’s worth, I can also speak and read Chinese.
Side note:
Maybe it’s time for me to consider doing native mobile app development. Hmm.
Thank you.