We created a fake language to root out resume liars • Hacker News Board

Re: We created a fake language to root out resume liars

#331

Post by buu700 » Wed, Mar 10, 2021, 2:09 PM UTC

indeed30 wrote: post #289

eternalban wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nonsense told to me repeatedly by recruiters over the years: - (your point) no incentive to send you for an interview if not a good fit. - "I make more money if you make your money" often said to spin the "what is your salary requirement" question Most recruiters work for an agency. Agencies have accounts with businesses. The account is central. You are in no position whatsoever to make determination as to what incen…

Yes, recruiters have accounts with companies, but in my experience the recruitment fee is a percentage of salary, and the individual recruiter compensation is on a commission model. In short, I personally have no problems in believing that the higher the salary, the higher the payment to both the recruitment company and individual recruiter. However, I think we all know that closing the deal is far more important to…

I haven't worked with a recruiter, so this is pure speculation, but it seems to me that a recruiter's greatest incentive would be to close any deal at all as quickly as possible, because they're competing against the alternative of you finding a position on your own first (or otherwise no longer requiring their services). Getting you a high salary is just gravy.

Re: We created a fake language to root out resume liars

#332

Post by falcolas » Wed, Mar 10, 2021, 2:10 PM UTC

So, let me get this straight - you lie about your job requirements, but get all bent out of shape when the candidates lie right back at you?

Brilliant.

I can’t think of a better example of why hiring is broken; of how unequal the power dynamic is between employers and employees.

Re: We created a fake language to root out resume liars

#333

Post by JAM1971 » Wed, Mar 10, 2021, 2:10 PM UTC

brigandish wrote: post #77

> That way, when candidates were pitched to us with "X years of MOVA experience", we knew that somebody was full of it. I'd put my money on the recruiter. I once had an excruciatingly awkward interview at a company on an industrial estate in the middle of nowhereland with no train station nearby that took me bloody ages to get to… which was actually going well until they asked me about my long experience with Exchang…

> The recruiter had inserted it onto the copy of the CV he sent to them.

It's been a while, but when I doing technical interviews I would give the candidate a copy of the resume that I had and ask them "Before we start, is this your resume? Is everything on it accurate?"

Re: We created a fake language to root out resume liars

#334

Post by luxuryballs » Wed, Mar 10, 2021, 2:10 PM UTC

neolog wrote: post #60

JimmyAustin wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A mate of mine's consulting company offers a 10% discount on any work if the client buys them a plant, any plant, for the office. Apparently they've only had two clients take them up on the offer.

Why do they offer that?

memorable marketing engagement that you’d tell your friends about

Re: We created a fake language to root out resume liars

#335

Post by rrmm » Wed, Mar 10, 2021, 2:12 PM UTC

dmos62 wrote: post #199

ALittleLight wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's been a while since I've read it, but doesn't someone get decapitated in that clever test of knightsmanship?

Well yes, Greenknight gets his head lobed off, but he then puts it back on. The scary part is that in a year's time he'll get to return the favor (but doesn't, because it was a test of chivalry (and the protagonist was chivalrous)). Wikipedia has a synopsis.

Sure, but Gawain only finds that it's a test after the fact (by surviving the test due to his virtuousness). So my take away was always something along the lines of don't play games whose stakes you may not fully understand against people whose power you may not fully appreciate especially if it doesn't seem like there is a downside.

Re: We created a fake language to root out resume liars

#336

Post by miobrien » Wed, Mar 10, 2021, 2:16 PM UTC

DaiPlusPlus wrote: post #312

tempodox wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Johnathan Swift's “Gulliver's Travels” (published 1726) it is stated that fraudulent behavior needs to be punished systematically since the erosion of trust will eventually destroy a market. Your comment describes a situation where exactly that happened. It is frustrating to see such an important (and simple) lesson, known literally for centuries, get forgotten or ignored.

> fraudulent behavior needs to be punished systematically since the erosion of trust will eventually destroy a market Can you expand on the quote from Gulliver's Travels? It's been decades since I read it and I can't think of where in the book it could have been from, I don't remember much economics being in the book...

They look upon fraud as a greater crime than theft, and therefore seldom fail to punish it with death; for they allege, that care and vigilance, with a very common understanding, may preserve a man’s goods from thieves, but honesty has no defence against superior cunning; and, since it is necessary that there should be a perpetual intercourse of buying and selling, and dealing upon credit, where fraud is permitted and connived at, or has no law to punish it, the honest dealer is always undone, and the knave gets the advantage. I remember, when I was once interceding with the emperor for a criminal who had wronged his master of a great sum of money, which he had received by order and ran away with; and happening to tell his majesty, by way of extenuation, that it was only a breach of trust, the emperor thought it monstrous in me to offer as a defence the greatest aggravation of the crime; and truly I had little to say in return, farther than the common answer, that different nations had different customs; for, I confess, I was heartily ashamed.[330]

[330] An act of parliament has been since passed by which some breaches of trust have been made capital.

https://www.gutenberg.org/files/829/829-h/829-h.htm

Re: We created a fake language to root out resume liars

#337

Post by Gustomaximus » Wed, Mar 10, 2021, 2:18 PM UTC

A while back a few of us created a April fools 'Face Gestures' video for Opera software.

For years after I would occasionally have people mention they were interviewing a candidate that said using our 'face gestures' was one of their favourite features of the browser.

Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kkNxbyp6thM

Re: We created a fake language to root out resume liars

#338

Post by bena » Wed, Mar 10, 2021, 2:19 PM UTC

eternalban wrote: post #276

dempseye wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The recruiter did good work here. I suspect this was a screw up in internal HR. The external recruiter has absolutely no incentive to send you for an interview you will bomb out of.

Nonsense told to me repeatedly by recruiters over the years: - (your point) no incentive to send you for an interview if not a good fit. - "I make more money if you make your money" often said to spin the "what is your salary requirement" question Most recruiters work for an agency. Agencies have accounts with businesses. The account is central. You are in no position whatsoever to make determination as to what incen…

It's one of those things that are technically true, but doesn't matter as much as the candidate is led to believe.

Negotiating $10k more for a candidate might see them get some percentage of that. But if they place you now, they can move on to another candidate and get a percentage of $100k or more.

Churn is far more important than min-maxing any single candidate.

Re: We created a fake language to root out resume liars

#339

Post by laurentdc » Wed, Mar 10, 2021, 2:19 PM UTC

mattkevan wrote: post #263

arethuza wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get as angry with recruiters as everyone else, but then I remember then time where I worked for a company that shared a floor of a serviced office building with a recruitment company. They were brutal in their treatment of staff - they were too cheap to get rooms for staff appraisals so they would do them in the coffee area we shared with them so we could hear how they were treated by their management - seeing peop…

Used to work at a place that shared a kitchen with a recruitment company and the same thing would happen. Very awkward to have to make a coffee right next to someone in floods of tears getting absolutely monstered by their manager. Like Lord of the Flies in shiny suits.

Most of my friends from university who went into recruiting burned out and quit within 6 months. The turnover (especially in temp agencies) is insane

Re: We created a fake language to root out resume liars

#340

Post by DoubleGlazing » Wed, Mar 10, 2021, 2:20 PM UTC

brigandish wrote: post #77

> That way, when candidates were pitched to us with "X years of MOVA experience", we knew that somebody was full of it. I'd put my money on the recruiter. I once had an excruciatingly awkward interview at a company on an industrial estate in the middle of nowhereland with no train station nearby that took me bloody ages to get to… which was actually going well until they asked me about my long experience with Exchang…

Had the almost exact same experience, but with Java. I'm a C# developer and although I have some experience with Java, I don't have enough to list it as a skill on my CV.

Anyways, in this interview I was being asked about Java and I answered every question by saying I don't really know Java. The interviewers were obviously getting annoyed. So I asked "Sorry, I thought this was a C# job?". No, it was a Java job and magically my CV had modified itself to say I had 7 years of Java experience.

I told them I did not put that on my CV, I actually had my own copy with me and showed them that. We all realised the recruiter changed my CV. They apologised and wished me luck.

Thirty minutes after leaving the recruiter is on the phone to me, screaming at me and berating me for not going along with the ruse. He said "Sure aren't Java and C# are pretty much the same thing?"

Now that is why if I ever have to send my CV to someone it will only be a PDF version.