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Ask HN: Having trouble getting senior applicants, wondering what to do about it

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Re: Ask HN: Having trouble getting senior applicants, wondering what to do about it

#341

Post by scarface74 »

scruple wrote: post #84
corrral wrote: post #21

> Take-home technical assignment (~4h) or similar at candidate's choosing If I can get a similarly-paying job at a place that doesn't do this, I'll skip you. Many seniors ( actual seniors, not 3-years-of-experience seniors) have a network and can say "hey I'm looking" and instantly have multiple options that won't have them do more than talk to the team and manager for an hour or two. If that.

> Many seniors (actual seniors, not 3-years-of-experience seniors) have a network and can say "hey I'm looking" and instantly have multiple options that won't have them do more than talk to the team and manager for an hour or two. If that. Just wanted to back this up a little bit. This is exactly what happened to me on my last job search. I'm currently in between jobs, starting the new gig after the 4th of July holid…

This is me exactly. My prior three jobs were based on my network referring me to a hiring manager (Directors and CTOs), us meeting for lunch and talking about their issues and how I would help them solve them. Then me meeting the rest of the team and them giving me an offer.

I would never do a “take home test”. Even my current job at $BigTech - working in the cloud consulting department doing exactly the type of work the original poster is looking for - involved a 5 hour behavioral loop and definitely not a “take home test”. They offered cash and real stock. Not equity that statistically will be worthless.

Re: Ask HN: Having trouble getting senior applicants, wondering what to do about it

#342

Post by geekbird »

PainfullyNormal wrote: post #35

I've noticed an increasing reticence from senior programmers I know to have anything to do with DevOps. They see it as an aggravation they don't want in their lives. Somebody posted a little while back about it being easy to find consulting work in DevOps with relatively little skill, especially AWS pricing, specifically because devs at companies aren't putting in the time to learn AWS properly. Has anybody else noti…

What's worse is that they want full-on programming, leetcode, algorithm mashing for jobs that end up being nothing more than slinging yaml or json and maybe tweaking a Jenkins job.

That's the reality of DevOps - it's not primarily development, it's applying frameworks to infrastructure and deployment tasks. Get a senior sysadmin in operations and pay for a few courses in what you need from them.

Re: Ask HN: Having trouble getting senior applicants, wondering what to do about it

#343

Post by roguecoder »

skeeter2020 wrote: post #300
the_watcher wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just wrapped up a take home project. When I was told about it, I told the HM that I withdraw from processes that include a take home. They told me that they understood, but that this one really did only take an hour or two, and that they’d send it over to me anyway. All they asked was that I take a look, and if I completed it, they’d send me a $150 Amazon gift card. I took a look, and it really did seem straightfor…

I think I share your interpretation, plus it is possible to scope something small that's (gasp!) interesting. The last one I did was use the company's product to create something and then demo it to the team. In addition to a gift card is was (almost) fun. IMO a (very small) take-home assignment is the least-worst of a lot of generally bad options. A pairing exercise focused on teamwork and communication (vs hardcore…

I always appreciate when they resemble the work the company expects I'll end up doing, because I do actually enjoy the work I do.

If I don't like the take-home, I assume I'll probably hate the job too. Whereas traditional interviews tell me almost nothing about what I'm going to end up doing day to day.

Re: Ask HN: Having trouble getting senior applicants, wondering what to do about it

#344

Post by crackinmalackin »

_odey wrote: post #285

`- Take-home technical assignment (~4h) or similar at candidate's choosing` This. Get rid of this. Everybody that reads this, get rid of it if you have such a step in your interview process. Do a 1 hour maximum live challenge instead, or skip it entirely if the candidate has any public code you review and good enough. This is what I've done in the current company and we've managed to hire some extremely good senior c…

100% agree on the 1 hour maximum live challenge. As long as the challenge is relevant to the role being applied for, this is the way to go. This is enough time for the company to see some code and for both parties to ask questions about the tech, role, etc.

Re: Ask HN: Having trouble getting senior applicants, wondering what to do about it

#345

Post by scarface74 »

adhesive_wombat wrote: post #115
cableshaft wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I'm interviewing at multiple companies and they all do that, that's 4 hours per company I want to check out. And let's be honest, most of these I've been asked to do weren't reasonable to do, and do well, and double check, in four hours, despite the claim. Eight hours is more reasonable to do them properly, usually. If I interview at three places, that's three days of unpaid work (or 6+ evenings after I've already…

> Like I just can't find the energy to put up with Amazon's 2.5 hour span of unbroken time take-home test By the sounds of it, that test would be the best bit of your time at Amazon.

I assure you that the sort of person who is qualified for the original submitters job is not doing a “take home” test to get into Amazon. (raises hand).

Re: Ask HN: Having trouble getting senior applicants, wondering what to do about it

#346

Post by __turbobrew__ »

gleenn wrote: post #264
pclmulqdq wrote: post #244

I am going to add one thing that I haven't heard here. You probably need to raise the cash in your offer by a lot. Most mid-size companies think that they can get away with offering equity at a ridiculous valuation and attract people who aren't true believers. Most people aren't true believers in miscellaneous DevOps that doesn't involve a lot of code. I have spoken to a few series-C and D companies that wanted to gi…

To continue that very last sentence, you are doing yourself a disservice, or like a lot of startups I think people just legitamately don't know how to value stocks and I think there is definitely a predatory nature to that. Perhaps I'm reflecting on my own experience too much, but at my first startup I never asked the simple question "Assuming this company IPOs or gets bought and exits, what is the most this stock wo…

When calculating expected value of private stock/options I multiply by a factor of ~10 at the end. There are so many unknown unknowns that significantly decrease the value of your equity. The equity agreements I have seen also give ultimate discretion to the board on how your equity is executed. You don’t have control over triggering events and also there are usually quite a few clauses with “at the discretion of the board of directors”.

When negotiating offers for non-public companies I provide a sliding scale of cash vs equity. 1 dollar of cash is worth to me 10 dollars in equity of a private company. So if my total comp goal is 300k per year you can give me 250k of cash and 500k of equity, 200k cash and 1000k equity, or just 300k cash.

Most companies will baulk at this, but in my experience you have none of the power when holding private equity and so you need a really large multiplier to make it worth the risk.

Equity in a public company is a totally different story because the company valuation is controlled by the stock exchanges and you can cash out you equity at any time.

Re: Ask HN: Having trouble getting senior applicants, wondering what to do about it

#347

Post by ShamelessC »

TameAntelope wrote: post #339
oaiey wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the hiring manager cannot distinguish a smooth talker for a senior role position, maybe the hiring manager is the problem. There is nothing a work sample can provide what a conversation cannot show for a senior role.

Okay so now we're hiring a hiring manager and a developer, great. ...or maybe people in this thread just don't like having to prove they know things in an industry where a lot of people don't know things.

More like we're tired of having to "prove we know something" to people who have no clue what they're talking about (most recruiters).

Further, there are probably lots of software engineers that have _never touched_ your framework of choice and will be able to learn and become proficient with it in a manner of weeks.

Re: Ask HN: Having trouble getting senior applicants, wondering what to do about it

#348

Post by enasterosophes »

s0rce wrote: post #326
jiggawatts wrote: post #314

POST THE SALARY. Senior people are senior because of their work experience, which they gain from steady employment. Almost by definition you are looking to entice busy, employed people away from their current jobs. They don’t have the time or inclination to trawl through job ad after job ad. Where your competition will ask for 15 years of experience and then only after hours of calls and meetings reluctantly make an…

I've tried to advocate for this at my organization and been told that we don't want people primarily motivated by money...

Even people who aren't motivated by money will still follow the money, because unless you know the new employers personally, it's the most reliable indicator that your work is valued. And then, if it turns out that you don't really enjoy it for whatever reason, at least you know you are getting something for it.

Re: Ask HN: Having trouble getting senior applicants, wondering what to do about it

#349

Post by roguecoder »

Also, if you don't have someone at your company with a network & social cachet to pull in the talent you need, you might need to start there. If you don't have an in-house recruiter, bring one on to spend their time managing your proactive outreach. Giving up the equity/cash required to attract a Director/CTO may be a harder pill to swallow, but you need someone whose job it is to be trying things out & experimenting with what works at your company.

In this market, you can't expect that talent will come to you.

Re: Ask HN: Having trouble getting senior applicants, wondering what to do about it

#350

Post by tfehring »

lumost wrote: post #315
tfehring wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even without getting into the magnitude of the difference, and just talking about the direction, I think a lot of folks at private startups expect external candidates to value $1 of their stock (based on their last 409a) more than $1 of stock in a public company. I don't have a strong opinion on how big the liquidity premium for equity in a private tech startup should be, but I feel pretty strongly that it shouldn't…

Honestly, I think most startups are betting that employees don’t know any better. This was true up to maybe 5 years ago, but sites like levels.fyi have really made this trade off clear to potential employees. Half the time when I talk to a potential hiring manager at a private company, they really don’t know what the equity is worth or how it’s structured. I’d argue that an effective 20-30% discount on 409A for emplo…

> Honestly, I think most startups are betting that employees don’t know any better.

Yeah, that's probably accurate. For whatever reason, many seem to view equity as a "check the box" formality rather than a material part of your compensation. I mostly avoided non-unicorn startups during my last job hunt for that reason, but the few that I got around to talking numbers with offered <$50k in equity over 4 years (and in the form of options to boot); the equity comp for the role I ended up taking is around an order of magnitude higher.

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