Hi HN,<p>I've been agonizing over a decision between two offers.<p>The first one is from a company in Ottawa (Canada), doing systems programming (C/C++) with an above-average salary (for a new grad). The second one is from a company in London (UK), with ~ £40k salary. I'd be working with a more "modern" stack (think Python/JS/Ruby/Go/etc).<p>Following is a somewhat unstructured collection of thoughts.<p>Location:
London >> Ottawa. I'd be looking at a ~40-60min commute (by bus) in Ottawa. For London, public transit and cycling infrastructure seem good. I'm more familiar with Ottawa as I've done an internship there, while my impression of London is based solely on a short visit. Generally though, London seems to be a more exciting (but expensive) place to live.<p>Type of work:
The first offer seems more interesting as I would love to work on performance-type problems.<p>People/team:
When interviewing with the first company, I met with two people from my would-be team (including the manager), and with multiple senior engineers from other teams. The company has a high proportion of senior engineers. For the second company, I got to meet a larger portion of the team. There were a couple instances during the interview and several post-interview phone calls where I thought "man, I'd really love to work with this person".<p>Immigration:
For the sake of future stability, it is important for me to get permanent residency regardless of where I end up. Based on my research, getting a PR in Canada is much faster compared to getting an ILR in the UK.<p>Some of the questions on my mind are:<p>- Would it be irresponsible to give up the PR in Canada and move away?<p>- Would I later regret not moving to London in my early twenties?<p>- What's more important: work or people?<p>- How important is compensation for the first job out of college?<p>Would really appreciate any help/input/advice, especially from people later in their careers who have had to make similar choices.
The moment you take your first job, it starts defining your career. If you tend to lean towards C++, I'd go there. Otherwise, in 5 years time you may end up being a well paid senior "modern" stack developer who really wish he could work on low level stuff instead. At this point it'll be too late though - it's hard start over and take a pay cut from say 100k back to 40k.<p>Having said that, the "modern" stack is definitely safer. The C++ market is great for really awesome, technical people, but there's not that many offers for people who are average. With modern tech it's the other way around - it is generally easier to use so there's less need for awesome people (which can make it boring if you are very talented), but it's very safe (in terms of job security) for average people. Also, in the C/C++ world you'll be competing against guys who've been building up their domain knowledge for 20-30 years...<p>My story is that I went with the safe side and my salary and working conditions are excellent now. The jobs themselves are completely uninspiring though. On the other hand, I'm not sure if I had the mental firepower to be a really great c++ programmer (say, senior engine programmer at a game company), as I get tired rather easily. So, even now (10+ years into my career), I'm not sure if I made the right call.<p>Re: London, it's huge, feels old/dirty (when I touch a building's wall, I wonder how many hundreds of people and dogs have pissed on that spot in the past), crowded and absurdly expensive. On the other hand, it is great for job hopping, so it might be wise to stay there in the formative years of your career.
Hi from Ottawa. If you are moving back here for a job, why wouldn't you move closer to work? Also note the new light rail system is under construction, so that could also factor into where you might live wrt where you work. Long commutes may be standard in other places, but unless you want to live in the burbs for family reasons and then have a commute to work, I'd advise against that in Ottawa (or anywhere!).<p>I've not lived in London, but grew up in Montreal and lived in Toronto. I've been fortunate enough to visit many US and European metropolitan areas. In saying all that, I really find Ottawa to be a nice-sized small city. It's a government town for sure, but there is also a lot of Aero & Defence (where I ended up) as well as high tech (Shopify, Apple, Amazon, QNX/Ford's new self driving car centre). It's big enough to have pro sports teams, but small enough that you can be in the country in 20 minutes if you want to. No 16 lanes of highway anywhere in sight, either.<p>At the end of the day though, try not to worry about it too much. As others have said in this thread, the first job will define <i>a</i> path in life, but so will the second job, or that next person you talk to on the bus, it's all a big random walk. You are fortunate to have two interesting opportunities in front of you, so have fun and good luck.
I'd go with the London offer solely based on <i>"man, I'd really love to work with that person"</i>. In the early stages of your career, it's best to optimize for people. The best investment you can make is work with people you admire and want to learn from. In the long run, relationships matter more than anything else. All other things - stack, languages, cost of living - are temporal. Quality of people and relationships are valuable long term. Good luck!
You will do OK in London with 40k as your starting salary (if you are single). Senior Python devs would do north of 55k here. Though be prepared you will move flats several times before you land at your perfect spot.<p>London is huge, so is the market. So is the competition :-)<p>I have never been to Ottawa. I have moved to London 7 years ago, feel free to ask more questions if you have some.