Techie says H-1B visa, Google job felt like dream milestones until layoffs hit: ‘Both were less secure than I thought’
For many tech professionals, winning the H-1B visa lottery and landing a job at Google represent two of the biggest career milestones. But for Gu Yichen, a Chinese software engineer, both achievements turned out to be far less secure than he had imagined.The techie majored in electrical and computer engineering at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. (Unspalsh/Representational image)In an as-told-to essay published Business Insider, the 31-year-old, who now lives in California, reflected on how an abrupt layoff at Google reshaped his views on career stability, visas and the tech industry. Today, he is back at Amazon, where he continues to work on an H-1B visa.Gu’s path to the US began long before his career in tech. He shared that he spent his sophomore year of high school as an exchange student in Washington state. Then, instead of taking China’s highly competitive college entrance exam, he decided to pursue higher education in the US. “I also hadn’t realized that it would eventually lead me to build a career in the US,” he told Business Insider.Gu majored in electrical and computer engineering at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and interned at Amazon during college. Then, after graduating in 2017, he joined the company full-time while working on an Optional Practical Training (OPT) visa.With a STEM degree, Gu said that he had three opportunities to enter the H-1B lottery. He shared that he was selected on his third attempt. “I had to return to China to get my visa, and because of COVID, I ended up working remotely for Amazon for a year,” he said.Gu revealed that in 2022, he successfully applied for a job at Google. “Companies were hiring aggressively, interviews were relatively easy, and compensation packages were huge,” he recalled.However, he said that his former Amazon manager warned him that the future looked uncertain and urged him to stay. However, Gu decided to take the risk anyway. “I felt that if I didn’t take the chance while I was young, I’d be less likely to do it later,” he said.(Also Read:
