Dennis Payne

There’s an article circulating right now about a candidate who reportedly went through 11 interviews, including take-home work, and ultimately took the company to court. There’s some debate about whether the story is real or exaggerated. What is real is this: I’ve been there. I’ve gone through 8–9 interview rounds. Multiple panels. Deep architectural walkthroughs. Whiteboards. Take-home assignments that require real thinking, real time, and real energy. Only to end in one of two outcomes: • “We don’t have the budget for your salary requirements” (which were disclosed from day one)  • “The position has been put on hold” That experience is not rare at senior levels—it’s becoming normalized. At a certain point, interviews stop being interviews and start becoming unpaid consulting engagements. You’re no longer being evaluated on fundamentals. You’re being asked to reveal how you design systems, how you reason about scale and risk, how you lead through ambiguity. That’s not hypothetical work. That’s real work. I’ve also taken flack for charging for interviews and take-home assignments. I understand why that makes people uncomfortable. But I also understand the value of senior-level time and thinking—especially when interview cycles stretch into months. The structure itself is part of the problem. Senior engineers are often interviewed by 2–5 people, sometimes more, many of whom are junior or mid-level. That’s not a criticism of them—it’s a structural mismatch. Culture fit? Absolutely. But evaluating senior architectural judgment requires senior context. And the more people added to the process, the smaller the margin for alignment becomes. One misread signal. One subjective reaction. One disconnect—and the entire process collapses after weeks or months of effort. This morning, I watched a segment on the Today Show where a LinkedIn representative discussed studies on AI-assisted interviews. The findings were telling: candidates reported less stress, companies reported stronger matches, and those hires stayed longer than candidates interviewed exclusively by humans. That shouldn’t be surprising. AI doesn’t posture. It doesn’t project insecurity. It doesn’t confuse confidence with arrogance or calm clarity with disengagement. It evaluates consistently. It listens fully. And in technical interviews, consistency matters. I’m not suggesting AI replaces human judgment. But I do believe it can reduce noise—especially in early and mid-stage technical evaluation. Engineers are up against the wall right now. Long interview cycles. Repeated storytelling. Take-home work completed at night and on weekends. All while roles quietly disappear. My hope is that 2026 brings a correction. Fewer rounds. Clearer expectations. Respect for seniority. Smarter use of AI to reduce stress, bias, and wasted effort—for both candidates and companies. Engineering is hard enough. Hiring engineers shouldn’t be harder than the job itself. #engineers #techinterviews

3

Dear head hunters No one will take a 3 month contract doing a company’s help desk. Here is why: It will disrupt/cause denial of the unemployment many of us techs are already on. 3 months worth of unemployment isn’t worth crap. Once those 3 months are up the contractor will again be stuck waiting a year or more trying to find a full time permanent job. Job seekers avoid short term low paying contracts. Know your worth fight for what you deserve.

151

79 Comments

A phrase I like to use is "Technical Debt is just like Financial Debt." If I have too much financial debt, the bank calls and if I can't come up with the money, they foreclose on my collateral. The very same is true of Technical Debt. If I don't spend the time and make payments on my technical debt, eventually the bill comes due where I HAVE to modernize. When that time comes, if I haven't been paying down my technical debt, the bill to modernize will be insurmountable. I'm seeing it right now with companies that have been using the "we have done it this way for 20 years, no reason to change it" manual processes. Now they wish to use AI for prediction and forecasting. The don't have the data. The don't have the digital processes to support it. What's more they don't have the company culture of innovation and change that is required for them to pick up and move at the pace demanded of them just to get to the starting line. AI gives companies the ability to automate like never before. But you have to be in a place where you can take advantage of the new technology. The amount of debt that you have will play a major part in how quickly, and how costly it will be to get there.

11

2 Comments

The spreadsheet doesn't account for who actually knows what problems need solving. Remember the dot-com bubble?…. Companies spent billions on Cisco routers and network infrastructure, literally banking that connectivity alone would transform their business. Most of that equipment ended up sitting at low capacity, or simply sat idle. The fastest way to recoup that investment loss?…. The spreadsheet 𝘢𝘭𝘸𝘢𝘺𝘴 says: reduce labour overhead. Working in Production Technology in the #VFX space, I’ve watched a similar pattern unfold in the industry…. 𝘚𝘵𝘶𝘥𝘪𝘰𝘴 𝘥𝘦𝘮𝘢𝘯𝘥𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘭𝘰𝘸𝘦𝘳 𝘣𝘪𝘥𝘴 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘮𝘰𝘳𝘦 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘱𝘭𝘦𝘹 𝘸𝘰𝘳𝘬. 𝘔𝘢𝘳𝘨𝘪𝘯𝘴 𝘨𝘦𝘵𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘤𝘳𝘶𝘴𝘩𝘦𝘥 𝘣𝘺 𝘪𝘯𝘥𝘶𝘴𝘵𝘳𝘺 𝘷𝘰𝘭𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘭𝘪𝘵𝘺, 𝘪𝘯𝘧𝘭𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘨𝘭𝘰𝘣𝘢𝘭 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘱𝘦𝘵𝘪𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯. 𝘊𝘰𝘮𝘱𝘢𝘯𝘪𝘦𝘴 𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘱𝘰𝘯𝘥𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘣𝘺 𝘤𝘶𝘵𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘦𝘹𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦𝘥 𝘱𝘦𝘰𝘱𝘭𝘦, 𝘳𝘦𝘥𝘪𝘳𝘦𝘤𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘣𝘶𝘥𝘨𝘦𝘵𝘴 𝘵𝘰 𝘈𝘐/𝘢𝘶𝘵𝘰𝘮𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘪𝘯𝘧𝘳𝘢𝘴𝘵𝘳𝘶𝘤𝘵𝘶𝘳𝘦 𝘢𝘪𝘮𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘰 𝘮𝘢𝘬𝘦 𝘶𝘱 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘬𝘯𝘰𝘸𝘭𝘦𝘥𝘨𝘦 𝘭𝘰𝘴𝘴. It’s optimizing for 𝗰𝗼𝘀𝘁 𝗲𝗳𝗳𝗶𝗰𝗶𝗲𝗻𝗰𝘆 when the real work demands 𝗰𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘁𝗶𝘃𝗲 𝗲𝗳𝗳𝗶𝗰𝗶𝗲𝗻𝗰𝘆. They aren't the same thing. The math looks good, but then the work comes in. The realization becomes that the tools still need 𝘩𝘶𝘮𝘢𝘯 𝘫𝘶𝘥𝘨𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘵 to be useful: - Someone who knows when things actually need a certain level of detail or scope. - Someone who can tell the difference between "technically correct" and "creatively right". - Someone who intuitively knows where the if-this-then-that chain is broken and needs to be bridged or communicated. - Someone who understands through experience that project-specific nuances need to be actively discussed. - Someone who can simply read the room to maintain morale of the team amidst change. So, when that cost efficiency strategy starts failing it’s not because the need is for more compute. It's because the people who understand the problems actually worth solving are being eliminated from the equation in the first place. #ProductionTechnology #leadership #hottake

10

This developer almost lost a $50M deal…. All from a single state bill. Because he ignored one line of risk. He spent 18 months assembling the perfect site. Prime location, Abundant power. Hyperscale interest. The kind of deal that makes careers. Then the state legislature introduced new reporting requirements for data center power and water usage. "It wasn't even passed yet," he said, still frustrated months later. "But the uncertainty was enough to kill the deal." His anchor tenant walked away. 2 years of work, gone. The developer did all the traditional due diligence. Zoning. Utilities. Environmental But he'd completely ignored the political landscape. A critical mistake today. State bills are popping up everywhere. It requires self-reporting on energy, water, and even carbon emissions. Most don’t pass. But the threat is big. Enough to stall or sink multi-million dollar deals. Deals have evaporated in Virginia, gotten delayed in Texas, and completely shifted to neighboring states… All because developers didn't see the legislative writing on the wall. Smart developers have learned to track more than just megawatts and fiber routes. They monitor state house committees, local community sentiment and gubernatorial positions on data center growth. I listened to another developer who has a government affairs consultant in every target market. "It costs me $5,000 a month per state," he said. "But it's saved me from 3 major mistakes already." You can’t ignore experiences like that. The data center industry isn’t flying under the radar anymore. Every project is now a political conversation. So the room for error is shrinking. Site selection checklists need to include political risk assessment, not just power availability. Your perfect site means nothing now… Not if the state decides to regulate you out of existence. #datacenter #realestate #thewayofward

42

Two Boston tech leaders this week told me: “We don’t and will never use staffing agencies.” I shared my thoughts, they politely ended the call… then both called back to set up coffee meetings for next week. Why the initial resistance? Staffing agencies sometimes get a bad rap. I get it misaligned candidates, transactional approaches, or past bad experiences can leave a sour taste. But when done right, recruiting isn’t about resumes. It’s about partnership, timing, deep market knowledge, and really understanding the nuance of a team’s hiring needs. Sometimes that takes a minute to digest. When leaders see that I’m not selling a shortcut but offering a strategic hiring edge they rethink that “never.” So here’s my question to the community: Why do you think some tech teams still have a negative outlook on agencies and what can the best recruiters do to change that? #TechHiring #Staffing #Recruiting #BostonTech #Leadership #HiringStrategy #EngineeringTalent #engineering #boston #bostontech #bostonjobs #nhjobs #newengland #remotejobs #recruiterlife #recruiter #staffing #itjobs #engineeringjobs

15

5 Comments

Disadvantages of using Paper IRS Return During "Covid Years" Moved this advice from the bottom to the top of the post For others, my recommendations: 1. Get the ID.me and IRS electronic account and check periodically. 2. If it works for you, use an electronic tax program to file yoru return. I had over 40 years of submitting annual tax returns to IRS and never hearing a word from them until Tax Year 2021. I have had issues with my 2021, 2022, and 2023 tax returns. If I apply my engineering/MBA root cause analysis to the situation, I would assign the primary cause to the reduced staffing during Covid period combined with my paper return. My best guess is that all the IRS did with my return when received was deposit my check (if taxes due) and put the paper return aside for up to three years before looking again. Problems: 1. Tax due on 2021 Tax Return - Check attached to the 2021 Tax Return credited to 2022 (finally figured what had happened in January 2026 when called IRS with normal 1 hour wait to be connected). 2. IRS incorrected figured my 2022 taxes and sent me an incorrect refund. I filled an amended return (same information as original) and was re-billed correctly several months later. 3. Later, IRS send a letter asking for me to re-submit parts of my 2022 Tax Return -- apparently, they had lost some or all of my tax return. 4. Initially, received a bill for 2023 taxes due (plus penalties and interest) paid via check when I filled in February, 2024. A call to the IRS (with the one hour wait before reaching an agent) resulted in the agent confirming payment of the tax due, correcting that, but being unable to correct the penalty and interest charges. After talking to the IRS agent in January 2026 about the 2021 Tax Return errors, I went to the Taxpayer Assistance Center for an in person visit. There was no assistance except to point out very minor errors to justify what the IRS had done. Based on my experience with 2021, 2022, and 2023 Tax Return and the IRS, I have made the following changes (somewhat based on "advice" from the individual at the Taxpayer Assistance Center. a. I will continue to use paper return but will use the editable IRS forms to type the numbers rather than handwritten (IRS suggestion # 1). b. I will always manage estimated taxes to have a few thousand dollars excess. I will have this "refund due" applied as estimated taxes to the next tax year. (IRS suggestion # 2). Previously I had managed estimated taxes to have either a refund or no more than a $ 999 taxes due. I was told that if I did not have all taxes paid by January 15 final estimated tax due date, I could be hit with penalties and interest. c. Finally, I registered with ID.me and set up my online IRS account. All future tax payments and estimated tax payments will be made online on the IRS site to ensure an electronic record of the payments, making ultra sure that the payment is credited to the correct tax year.

4

For software engineers navigating today’s market 👇 A quick reminder that doesn’t get said enough: Your value isn’t defined by how fast you land your next role. I’ve spoken with strong engineers lately—people who’ve shipped real systems, scaled platforms, and solved hard problems—who are questioning themselves because the market feels slower and noisier than it used to. A few things worth keeping in mind: 👉 Hiring cycles are longer, not worse 👉 Great teams are being more selective, not less interested 👉 Interviews today favor depth, clarity, and judgment—not buzzwords 👉 The engineers who stand out can explain why they built something, not just what they built If you’re in between roles or quietly exploring: 🔹 Invest time in articulating your impact 🔹 Clean up how you tell your technical story 🔹 Be intentional about the companies you engage with (signal > volume) 🔥 Strong engineers are still being hired 🔥 The bar just looks different right now.

2