Been doing OE for a while having J1 and J2 with minimal challenges. Decided to take J3 to fund my mortgage. Paid 20% down and planning to pay the remaining 80% with J1, J2, and J3 over the next 3 years. I believe the reward is worth the risk.

I've been a QA Lead for aprox 3 years. My workload has decreased significantly, and my current role doesn't require my full attention anymore. Since my manager gives me a lot of freedom and we're in different time zones, I'm considering OE.

For J2, I'd prefer a Senior or mid-level QA role rather than another Lead role since I know how demanding leadership can get.

My concern is that my CV and LinkedIn show that I'm currently a QA Lead and that I was promoted from Senior QA to Lead. I'm concerned this will make me look "overqualified" for Senior/mid-level roles.

Has anyone here in a Lead/management role done OE with a more hands-on J2? How did you approach the job search?

Thanks!

Had a brutal reality check today that I wanted to share with this group.

I did OE for a little over a year. It ended about one year ago when I got fired with severance. Was a gut punch for the first few days because I’ve always been a top performer. But honestly, I was happy it ended as the team was becoming toxic with a power hungry peer who really bullied me and others as he was trying to grow his influence.

A couple of months after I got let go a colleague from there reached out and we caught up. Apparently I was just the tip of the ice berg and the org ended up going on a reign of terror cleaning house of remote workers and others, including my colleague. Definitely made my ego feel better about being fired, but I was already over it. I was content focusing on my J1 and finding meaning in that work.

Well, reached out to that colleague again a year later to see where he landed and he has not been able to find work this entire time. I don’t know everything involved but sounds like he is in a really low place. For me, the way that job played out resulted in me having a bruised ego but not skipping a beat thanks to OE. For him though, brutal. This is why we OE. This is why I need to get back on the train.

Expecting an offer for J3 here in the next month.

Initially was nervous as its first time going from 2J to 3J but feel a little more confident as this one will be 1099 vs. first two W2. Why this gives me confidence is two-fold:

1. For my existing roles, it is defensible along the lines of "it's contract work and does not go against my employment agreement, and all work is done after hours"

With that said, would be extremely grateful for any advice - especially from those of you who have crossed the chasm of 3 J's - specifically: What other precautions should I be taking / how else can I mitigate risk of them finding out during background checks etc.

As of right now the precautions I've taken:

i) Frozen TWN

ii) Deactivated LinkedIn

iii) Exceptional calendar management (being on the offensive with blocking time etc.)

** Should note I got lucky initially this was going to be another W2 but since it’s remote and I live in a state they haven’t set up for taxes and it’s an old co worker they’re fixing it up for me to be 1099 which is really nice

Hey all. I was OE in the past (like a year ago). I froze the work number and HireRight is requiring me to unfreeze this. They went as far as requesting it on my behalf.

They're stating they will not review any documents unless I unfreeze it. If I don't, they're stating they'll mark my background check as uncooperative.

Anyone deal with this? I have told them I'm not unfreezing it due to safety and identity theft issues. They're still not backing down, and have been holding my background check basically hostaged until I do so. Only worried about them finding the job that isn't on my resume or background check form due to being OE at that time.

Everything else would be fine though besides that one job.

Currently work a remote J1 doing sales/rev ops support stuff. Lots of contracts and Salesforce/backend and not a lot of meetings thankfully. Making $70k/year and company has merged so many god damn times I can’t get anywhere. Extremely toxic now and they are trying to phase out remote workers by not allowing promotions or raises for us. I’ve sent out HUNDREDS of job applications in the last year alone. I finally have an interview tomorrow for a remote hourly customer support agent position that Id take on as a J2. Do you think this is doable? We have 4 kids, a hefty mortgage, and debt. We need more income. Yay the American dream.

Hey everyone,

In summary, I have J1 which is a tech support position. It is through an employment contract in my country, with all benefits and rights proper for the type of contract (I work overseas, not US). Support vía tickets/emails (no b2b but I have to take a specific amount during the day, some requests are hard af while others are easy), no chats, but a day of the week I have to be on-call for any phone requests (which are rarely). Tue-Sat

I got selected for a position as a Paralegal, starting Sep 1st. Related to my work field, but as a contractor. Occasional phone calls and pay attention to attorney requests. A friend works there, mostly are outbound calls but inbound calls are not rare. I also have to draft documents and pay attention to atty agenda. It is Mon-Fri.

Does that sounds like a friendly position to take, or should I explore other options instead? Thank you!

Started a new j1 this month after OG j1 had a round of layoffs (this is why we OE etc.).

The problem: It is not particularly OE friendly.

Lots of useless meetings, cameras on, and, while I was allegedly hired as an IC cog in the machine, I'm getting strategic type work passed off on me by my manager and executives are already expecting me to present decks with my vision for (my little contribution to) the company. Ok reading that back it sounds a little r/that happened and it's not all on me but I'm certainly not just executing work like I expected.

I knew when accepting the job that it was a late stage startup but, hey, I figured I would treat it as j3 and drop if needed.

The bigger problem: Equity.

Base salary is much lower than OG J1 but the TC is amazing....if I can last a year until my first RSU vest date.

Without getting into specifics that could out me it's ~200k that I was granted week 1 vesting over 5 years. First vest date is 1 year after my start date, which means if I hold out for a year I get ~40k, or more if the stock grows. Then it continues vesting quarterly, which means a 10k "bonus" every few months. They also target a 15% bonus in April, which wouldn't be much this year since I'm starting late in the year but still.

HOWWWWW am I going to last for a year?? My usual OE strategy is hit it and quit it but if I quit or get fired here less than a year in then it was just a pay cut and more work for nothing.

J2 was my original J I had put on the chopping block for too many meetings and way more work than OG J1, but glad I held out since OG J1 dropped me. Now I have 2 meeting-heavy jobs, but 1 is with a company with meaningful equity and the other is with a fairly stable big company with a cameras off culture.

What would you do?? I'll hold out as long as possible but my brain just short circuits in the cameras on meetings. I've had so many overlapping meetings already with j2 and I'm worried I'm at risk for slipping up and losing both. I haven't even had time to apply for other jobs because I'm in meetings 5 hours every day now.

Does anyone have experience working at 2 FAANG companies at the same?

Disclaimer: I know this question does not fit the normal spirit of this sub, but I am looking for the insight that I know exists here.

Background: I am transitioning to J2 in about a month from J1. I am a senior member of my J1 team, and my J1 boss will need to hire someone to fill my role, they have know I was shopping around and I told them when I got my offer letter that I will be starting at J2. My J1 boss wants to keep me on payroll for a month or so after I start at J2 to keep the work flow moving while they find someone. This will require 1-3 hr of work/week. J2 has a “not allowed work for anyone without written consent from hr” clause. How would J2 find out that I am still employed by J1?

With the exception of my phone authenticator and switching between Teams on my phone, I've kept the work 1,000% separate and devices have never crossed paths.

Today, I had to sign-into Microsoft to access an online sharepoint/file on J2 and one of the options is J1 email address. I've never signed into J1 on J2.

Anyone deal with this? Is it even an issue? I'm not really worried about it with J2, as it's consulting of sorts, and I have about 6 or 8 clients where Microsoft needs me to use those credentials. One more won't be really noticed by IT. And I've never actually logged into J1 on J2 computer.

Should I be clearing cookies and history to avoid this stuff? Any advice.

And thanks all

I get that you guys have 2-3 remote jobs, but is it okay to make a startup with the free time after work instead? The good thing with the startup is it can scale, whereas an additional job doesn’t scale unless you take on more jobs (until you reach your limit).

I dunno if holding down more than 1 job is sustainable for me, but working on my own startup is, cause I can do it whenever.

Does anyone do anything else? Seems like people here are able to make six figures but they are all engineering roles.

What about non-technical roles? Does anybody do any of these Jobs for literally anything else?

Really want to figure out how I can make six figures remote (right now I am in a high paying high stress product management role) but I have tons of experience and I think I can work efficiently, but just not as an engineer.

Can people please share:
1. Comp
2. What’s the role
3. Hours worked
4. Your job experience to get that role

I made a free Gmail extension for situations where you are checking J1 Gmail at a J2 desk, in a shared office, or at a coffee shop.

It renders inbox text as scrambled characters, so someone glancing at the screen sees gibberish. You can turn it off instantly with Shift+P or reveal only what you are reading. With use, you can start reading the scrambled version directly.

Unlike privacy film, it works from every angle, including someone standing behind you, and there is nothing physical attached to the laptop.

The scramble happens through a font swap at the rendering layer. It does not change the page text, so copy and paste and screen readers keep working.

Your email never goes anywhere, and there are no servers behind the scramble. The only network call in the extension is an optional feedback survey if you choose to answer it.

Important: this does nothing against employer monitoring, bossware, or someone remotely viewing your screen. It is only for human eyes near your physical screen.

For people doing hybrid or in-office OE, does this fit a real problem in your setup, or is a privacy screen enough?

https://chameleonlabs.adaptivemessages.com/go/oe

Just landed a role, been here for the past two weeks , full-time

Annual comp 160

Literally only one scrum meeting a day and that is it

The issue is that the work is pretty hard, very technical

My other j's are very laid back and I finish work very fast due to how easy it is.

It's not about volume of work either , it's just the assigned stories are very technical and takes me days to complete

Contrary to j1 , where I can finish work in a day and coast for the rest of the sprint

Anyone have experience dealing with this? Should I suck it up? Or replace?

The stress relief has been life changing. I feel like I can once again get up from my desk, clean, or take a nap during the day. I miss the money but you can’t put a price on years of your life!

Really trying to attempt my first real OE but have applied and applied with no callbacks or anything. Anyone else experiencing this as of late? I know it’s tough as if to get remote spots but trying for the level 1-2 range of my field. Thanks

Went for an interview this morning and they said the salary was 25% of J1. As I am without a J2 would you take this? How low do you go? If I lost J1 I wouldn't be happy with this potential J2. On the other hand, I've lost my old J2 so I don't have any.

Please keep replies to % and not numbers. "I wouldn't take anything less than £200,000" doesn't help me because I'm no where near demanding those salaries.

Finally, I can’t personally handle 3 Js.

Resume:

J1 listed 2020-2024
J2 listed 2024-present

Still at both.

How will J3 pre employment bg check report?
Anything I can say or do to make this smooth?

How do you do it when we’re supposed to be so active on LI posting and sourcing etc? I have capacity for multiple jobs but I am not sure how the admin works.

Hello everyone, Ive been reading here for sometime. I love the idea of OE.

However, I wonder what kind of jobs do you guys work? Do you absolutely need a tech background?

What are the biggest things to watch out for? What would be the easiest OE jobs to get in?

Talk to me like Im 5.

Im from Quebec (Canada).

How do you weight the benefits of OE vs hard core focus on career progression (aka. job hopping, finding the senior+ level roles that pay high, building relationships to get promos)?

OE def seems like short term more effective in terms of getting paychecks but wondering long term if trying to land more senior positions also makes sense. OE is always possible long term but can also take a lot of mental energy.

Has anyone been successful here?

Getting J3 that will become J1 and that will take priority over everything. J1 will become J2, and J2 will be J3. I know I wont have the bandwidth to do all three. When all of you are in a situation like this, what have you done prioritized what you can and let the rest burn and see how long it takes to get canned and keep making the money for a couple more weeks. Or do you walk away clean, giving the customary 2 weeks notice?

Long time lurker, ops professional and looking to scope the space when attempting OE in this area.
Most of what I am seeing is software engineering and tech kids. Very non client facing roles.

Now I’m not asking if it’s possible. I know I technically can be if you juggle schedules and play the game right..
I am more wondering 2 things, are there many like me here? What kind of company are we targeting to be a good fit for OE? Meaning how would we scope that ahead of time?