Tech workers got what they wanted. That’s over.

Microsoft Corp. said earlier this week that it will lay off a small percentage of its workforce following layoffs at Netflix.,

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and Twitter Inc. Alphabet Inc.-owned Google CEO Sundar Pichai told employees this week that the company will slow its hiring pace for the rest of the year. and by Meta Platforms Inc. The head of engineering, Facebook’s parent, told managers to identify and report low-performing employees to management.

One tech worker, Lindsey Collins Guest, 40, said she’s experienced these changing expectations firsthand. She was fired from Bolt Financial Inc., a payroll-focused financial technology company, in May, and at the time of her search, employers were making an average of 30% less base salary than she was making. She eventually accepted a job at a live streaming marketing startup that met her minimum wage requirements.

“It was clear to me that the good old days were gone,” says Mrs. Guest.

One reason for the shift in bargaining power in startups is that capital isn’t flowing freely. As businesses tighten contracts and investors offer survival advice to portfolio companies poised for failure, startups focus on cutting costs rather than rapid growth. That means spending more money on salaries to attract new hires, say venture capital firms that help recruit portfolio companies.

Not all workers are in trouble. After all, there are still more roles open in the industry than there are people filling them. Postings for technology positions reached 505,663 in June, a 62 percent increase over the same period a year ago, indicating that employers are still more than compensating for what they are adding to their ranks, according to CompTIA, an IT trade group. For example, Microsoft will increase its headcount next year despite the layoffs.

Employers say that highly skilled workers in areas such as machine learning and artificial intelligence can still command a premium. According to CompTIA, software developers and engineers accounted for nearly a third of the tech jobs posted in June. The number of software development job postings mentioning remote work was nearly 38% at the end of June, up from 32% in the same period a year ago, according to Indeed.com.

Part of the difference between current salary estimates and reality is how high compensation will be in 2021, said Saideh Howard, chief talent officer at IVP, a venture capital firm that invested in Dropbox.,

GitHub Inc. and Snap Inc.

The 2021 increase was “exciting” and “unprecedented”, Ms Howard said.

According to venture capitalists and recruiters, candidates looking to go into an office may have an edge over those looking for a remote setting. Ms. Howard said executives now tell her they prefer to hire candidates who are excited about being in the office. “Not everyone speaks out loud now,” she says.

Some venture capitalists haven’t been shy about airing their picks for companies that are calling back workers: Keith Rabois, a partner with Founders Fund; Posted on Twitter in May How he was looking to fund an “IRL” or “real life” startup. Josh Wolfe with Lux Capital He tweeted his support last month. Elon Musk’s office mandate for Tesla employees.

“In tough times + the coming recession, people need a quick face to face body language communication and friendship and signal commitment,” Mr. Wolfe wrote.

Bill Gurley, Partner at Benchmark Capital and CEO of Uber Technologies Inc. and Grubhub Inc. early supporter, He tweeted the era of ultra-low interest rates. It created a competition for employees that led to a “Disney-esque” set of experiences and expectations.

“Laying off or cutting costs (or asking them to go into office) for workers who only know this world is downright heresy,” he tweeted. “This is not their fault. Excess capital has led to over-washing of employee benefits and inflated expectations.

A recruiting executive, Curtis Britt with Korn Ferry,

At this time last year, Mr. Britt said, about 50% of the vacancies he was trying to fill were completely alienated, and today that number is closer to 25%. Earlier during the pandemic, Mr. Britt said he helped fill 30 software engineering roles for a financial services company that was then open to remote arrangements. Now that company is becoming more selective about where workers can live, who it’s willing to hire and how much it pays, Mr. Britt said.

“Their tastes have become very refined,” said Mr. Britt, Korn Ferry’s vice president of projects.

Eric Duhaime, who runs Boston-based medical artificial intelligence startup Centaur Labs, recently made a similar adjustment in his search for a product marketing role. First Centaur Labs has lowered the upper limit of applicable salary and experience levels. Then he completely stole the search.

“To a candidate, ‘Hey, actually, we’re sorry, but we don’t want to offer because we’re reevaluating our priorities and we don’t want to be the company that offers. We’ll cancel the offer,'” he says.

Centaur Labs is still hiring for mission-critical roles, including a security engineer, Mr. Duhaime said. But “we don’t have the same sense of urgency. We want to make sure we get the right person. He says. “We want to make sure we’re very selective.”