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Ask HN: Am I unhireable?

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Re: Ask HN: Am I unhireable?

#51
post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

sounds just as bad as racism

Why? You can't choose how you will be identified by people as being of some race. While you can make choices about what kind of work you think is ethical or worthwhile. It is immoral to judge a candidate by the first but not immoral to judge by the latter.

You can't choose how you will be identified by people as being of some race, gender, religion, political beliefs... which all constitute illegal discrimination for employment in some countries (France is an example where it's illegal to discriminate on political opinion, or in our case, supposed opinion I shall say).

A hard pass on crypto means passing on people who

- wanted to bank the poor

- wanted freedom

- wanted self sovereign identity

- wanted border-less transfers for their family abroad

etc... Many people want to do good with crypto.

Questions: is it immoral to be in it only for the money at a carbon sequestration startup? How do you tell, from a resume? What if this startup is just greenwashing bs in the end? What if the money is to help his grand parents in the Philippines?

I think there's no clear cut way to judge the morality of someone from their resume: not from their skin color, nor from their previous work places. And I think it's unethical to judge people on what you presume of their own morality.

Re: Ask HN: Am I unhireable?

#52

> if my resume has black balled me as a hiring risk I think you're being a little paranoid. It's the market right now; everywhere is laying off or looking for ways to reduce headcount. This just isn't a good time. Despite that: > After probably a few hundred applications (mostly SWE but some product) I've only received first interviews from maybe ten? This has been my experience since internet applications became a t…

> Nothing about you really stands out as problematic, but in my own opinion your heavy startup/crypto background makes you seem like someone only interested in money/getting rich quickly. > You might be a great candidate, but I'd fully expect you to check out if a better offer even looked in your direction. Given a choice between you and a more-conservative candidate, I'd pick them. Something about this seems... off…

Most people will move jobs at a certain point for more money. Some people will move jobs every six months if it means getting more money, though, and no-one wants to hire someone who'll only stay six months.

Re: Ask HN: Am I unhireable?

#53
If it was _just_ people not wanting to hire job-hoppers, then you wouldn't have gotten the interviews in the first place; if your work history makes you unhireable for a company, they're not going to bother interviewing you, because interviewing you is very expensive.

Is returning to Amazon an option? They seem to be hiring at least to some extent right now.

Re: Ask HN: Am I unhireable?

#56

> if my resume has black balled me as a hiring risk I think you're being a little paranoid. It's the market right now; everywhere is laying off or looking for ways to reduce headcount. This just isn't a good time. Despite that: > After probably a few hundred applications (mostly SWE but some product) I've only received first interviews from maybe ten? This has been my experience since internet applications became a t…

"but in my own opinion your heavy startup/crypto background makes you seem like someone only interested in money/getting rich quickly."

I wouldn't say that necessarily but I do hate Crypto (to me, its all a get rich quick scam) and anyone who predominantly chose to work in that field will not get my attention. Having said that, one of my best employees loved crypto so there is that.

Re: Ask HN: Am I unhireable?

#57

Without seeing your resume, it is difficult to answer your question. For me, all the crypto stuff on a resume would be a flag. Maybe not a red flag, but pink or orange. I know it is a personal opinion, but the entire crypto industry is tainted in my eyes.

I have crypto on my resume, from a company that only ever took money from professional investors. What I did was a typical devops role, so I don't see why it would be a flag. I worked with typical AWS services and Kubernetes. Wrote some in house software as well. Yes it served a crypto product, but it could have been any sector really.

There is a difference between working for 1 company that did crypto vs choosing to work for multiple companies that are in crypto and talking about it aggressively on your Resume. For example, whenever I see "Web3, Blockchain, Crypto Enthusiast", I pass. It shows me poor judgement in my opinion of course.

Re: Ask HN: Am I unhireable?

#58

> if my resume has black balled me as a hiring risk I think you're being a little paranoid. It's the market right now; everywhere is laying off or looking for ways to reduce headcount. This just isn't a good time. Despite that: > After probably a few hundred applications (mostly SWE but some product) I've only received first interviews from maybe ten? This has been my experience since internet applications became a t…

Thanks for your thoughts - I might do uber or pick up a medical delivery route to supplement my income to make sure I don't burn too much of my emergency fund.

Re: Ask HN: Am I unhireable?

#59

> if my resume has black balled me as a hiring risk I think you're being a little paranoid. It's the market right now; everywhere is laying off or looking for ways to reduce headcount. This just isn't a good time. Despite that: > After probably a few hundred applications (mostly SWE but some product) I've only received first interviews from maybe ten? This has been my experience since internet applications became a t…

> Nothing about you really stands out as problematic, but in my own opinion your heavy startup/crypto background makes you seem like someone only interested in money/getting rich quickly. > You might be a great candidate, but I'd fully expect you to check out if a better offer even looked in your direction. Given a choice between you and a more-conservative candidate, I'd pick them. Something about this seems... off…

Thanks, I'm mostly confused when I don't even make it to the intro stage with a recruiter. This is why I'm paranoid that hiring managers see something structurally wrong with my work history.
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