Pick your career poison: Google online sales and operations manager vs. Amazon.com support engineer
We picked the ten worst entry-level jobs in tech. Now, in a single-elimination tournament, we're going to let you choose which gig is truly the worst. Round one begins with Amazon.com support engineers versus Google online sales and operations account managers. We'll let your fellow readers advise you before you choose:
Some commenters couldn't believe we included the Google job on our list. Wrote one particularly unsympatethic commenter, Elaine Chow:
WAAAH I WORK FOR GOOGLE BUT I'M ONLY A CSR PERSON BECAUSE I WAS ONE OF THE DUMB ONES THAT COULDN'T GET A MORE 'CREATIVE' JOB WAAAH!
But another commenter, claiming to be a Google employee, explained exactly why we put the job on our list:
I'm [a Google customer service rep] and there's no opportunity for job growth. All you do all day long is customer service. In the beginning, the free food and perks prevented me from killing myself.
but now, the novelty of the cool perks is gone, and i'm left with the dismal realizationthat my job sucks. So yeah, WAHHHH I WORK AT GOOGLE AND ITS LIKE EVERY OTHER MIND NUMBING JOB OUT THERE. Plus, all the managers suck. I think more people complain about the fresh out of B-school managers — who all want to be all stars when really their only job is to make sure we're answering emails — than anything else.
No commenters defended the Amazon job. In fact, most echoed Dangster, who wrote:
These aren't valid reasons why this particular jobs sucks. I have a friend who works as a support engineer at Amazon, and his job sucks because he has to work nights, weekends, and holidays, in addition to his normal 40hr/week schedule.
Added another commenter, Edgewise: "As for the description, it doesn't quite evoke the drudgery."
We hear Google customer service reps get paid between $45,000 and $65,000. Readers guessed $57,000. As for the Amazon job, we guessed it paid $80,000; readers guessed $70,000, but a former employee who commented on the story said no one working as a support engineer at Amazon gets paid more than $60,000.
Check out both the Google and Amazon jobs, then come back here and let us know in the poll below: Which is the worse entry-level job in tech?