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Ask HN: Is the market bad, or am I having the worst luck job hunting?

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Re: Ask HN: Is the market bad, or am I having the worst luck job hunting?

#71

Post by Traubenfuchs »

Have you considered moving to Europe? Germany, Switzerland, Austria? With my senior salary and depending on frugality I can save between 1000 and 2000 € a month in Austria and have a very pleasant life. If you ask if there is gonna be leetcode bullshit in the interviews, most people laugh in your face because the idea is so alien to us. People want to hear about your authentic experiences and see you solve real world problems / take home tasks. Small no name companies are as desperate for talent as ever, while the banks, insurance providers, retailers, government related entities and consulting companies feeding on them have open positions all year round.

I don't think anyone experienced with fighting on the US software engineering market would have any struggle to get something here. Though it does depend on your expectations: You generally will not get 300k, 200k or maybe not even 100k starting and won't get any name worthy stock options unless you are doing very special things for very special companies.

Second consideration: Have you considered not applying for those FAGMAN level companies and their inflated salaries or overpaying startups, but something boring instead? Government, insurance, banking? In other words, have you considered lowering your expectations and standards?

Re: Ask HN: Is the market bad, or am I having the worst luck job hunting?

#72

Post by tap-snap-or-nap »

5350-uiop-1130 wrote: post #41

FED is finished . i would suggest moving into something with higher barrier to entry. last 4 FED my company hired are ex-sales/ex-whatever bootcampers (yes my company is cheap). remote working is the final nail. still few good FED jobs but you have 10,000s expert leetcoders fired by faang to compete.

I am amazed people are still getting jobs as FED

Re: Ask HN: Is the market bad, or am I having the worst luck job hunting?

#73

Post by basisword »

yosito wrote: post #68

When you say "applying constantly", what do you mean? A few years ago, when tried cold-applying to jobs, I had to send several hundred applications to get a few good interviews, and I have a very strong resume (15 years of experience and worked at NASA). During the pandemic, I was hiring for an engineering role at a fairly unknown startup and we had to filter through over 500 applicants and interviewed only 15-20. No…

In addition to your network I would say contact recruiters who may have “spammed” you in the past. At least they are almost certain get you interviews as opposed to just sending your resume places. Speak with a few recruiters and you’re almost certainly going to get doing one or two interviews a week for jobs you’re actually interested in.

Re: Ask HN: Is the market bad, or am I having the worst luck job hunting?

#74

Post by beebeepka »

It's not you. The market is really bad. I thought the massive layoffs in the US wouldn't have an effect on me here in Bulgaria but it just took a while to propagate. My LinkedIn spam is just the site looking for engagement, not recruiters.

I was s contacted by Microsoft representatives offering 5000 USD as a B2B. It's that bad.

Feels like my FE days are over.

Re: Ask HN: Is the market bad, or am I having the worst luck job hunting?

#76

Post by raverbashing »

RomanPushkin wrote: post #37
diavelguru wrote: post #36

Remember the FAANG layoffs were huge. You are competing against those folks (you may also be one of those). https://fi.money/blog/posts/faang-company-layoffs-what-cause...

Being in a major corporation sometimes can play against you: - I see a couple of corporations on your resume, do you have experience working in a startup environment? - ... If you have Blind app access, try to search for "I really thought after Google, I should be employable" post

> "I really thought after Google, I should be employable"

Well, I can see the employer side as well

"After Google" you'll complain about the lack of chef on site, about how the automation tools are not quite like how it was in Google, how "oh in G we used to do that differently" etc

Re: Ask HN: Is the market bad, or am I having the worst luck job hunting?

#77

Post by rewmie »

firefoxd wrote: post #63

I hate to say this, stop applying. Find a recruiter on LinkedIn. This is what it has come to. There are thousands of resumes being sent at my company, yet the recruiter can't find anyone. Why? Because no one is applying through her link. The regular resume channel is reserved for bots at this point. Contact a person and you have more chances.

> This is what it has come to. There are thousands of resumes being sent at my company, yet the recruiter can't find anyone. Why? Because no one is applying through her link.

It sounds like your recruiter is purposely ignoring any resume that is not explicitly sent to her personally. It sounds like a job security move at the expense of both the company and candidate's best interests.

Re: Ask HN: Is the market bad, or am I having the worst luck job hunting?

#78

Post by rewmie »

jacknews wrote: post #51

Rejection email? You were lucky to get a rejection! Or an email. We used have to lick the bosses boots clean, applying for a job paying penny a year, an' if we were lucky we might get a thrashing to within an inch of our lives, and a rejection screamed in our ear. Luxury.... . Yes sure, I'm in the same boat, but probably with worse prospects (took a 'career break' to work on side projects, etc), and it feels like I'm…

> - 90%+ of applications are just ignored, not even a rejection.

I recall being at that position. I firmly believe those 90% of applications are actually fake job ads to trawl for personal data. The most suspicious cases come from recruiters who post the most generic job ad over and over and over again.

Re: Ask HN: Is the market bad, or am I having the worst luck job hunting?

#79

Post by throwaway2037 »

scelerat wrote: post #25

Same here. 22 years experience full stack; leadership roles. Can't get an interview. Taking an ML class. I think telling some recruiters I had a baby on the way was a mistake.

I definitely hide everything about my private life when speaking with recruiters or potential employers. On the first day that you walk in the door of your new employer, dump all your personal problems (that you choose) on your new boss. It is the only chance you have to do it. All other times are "inconvenient" or an excuse to say no-to-hire or give you a lousy rating or layoff. Women have been facing this ... forever in the office. The smartest ones learn to play these games.

Re: Ask HN: Is the market bad, or am I having the worst luck job hunting?

#80

Post by strombofulous »

DoesntMatter22 wrote: post #19
kypro wrote: post #7

It's bad, but it's not that bad. The fact you have only had one interview this year is very odd in my opinion. I've been on the market twice this year and it's been harder for sure (especially earlier this year), but it's far from impossible to find something. I don't know if you're looking for advice or just anecdotes here, but I'll share some thoughts for what might be happening... Frontend development has changed…

Imo this is the worst market I've seen since 95 when I started.

Worse than the dotcom burst?
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