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Tell HN: Employers are not desperate to hire developers

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Re: Tell HN: Employers are not desperate to hire developers

#301

Post by atrettel »

ryandrake wrote: post #39

Honestly, this doesn't sound much different than a year ago, five years ago, or ten years ago. Companies never seem to be serious about hiring: they go fishing but never reel anyone in, they ghost you after a few communications, they reject your application with automation, and even if you have an internal referral, the referrer is usually only able to do "Go apply through the normal funnel and if you get through the…

> Every job hunt for me is still around 100 applications : 10 interviews : 1 offer. These ratios have remained pretty reliable through bull and bear hiring markets.

This rough estimate agrees with the data I've collected from my own job hunting. My data say 100 applications : 14 interviews : 3 offers, specifically.

Re: Tell HN: Employers are not desperate to hire developers

#302

Post by rr888 »

cableshaft wrote: post #172
_ed7m wrote: post #30

It took me 200 applications to land my job, and I think the rest of everyone I know who’s a decent programmer had similar situations. The bottom line is that everyone has employment and only had to move for it if they’re taking a high (120k+ TC for entry level) paying position. This is “falling of trees” compared to any other industry. Being able to land a middle class job directly in the field of your education with…

Is this first job in the industry or mid-senior level? I don't think I've ever sent 200 applications in any of my job searches. Last time I didn't send any; I just flicked the switch on LinkedIn and Hired and had almost 60 recruiters reach out to me (followed up with about 18, had initial interviews with about 8 companies, ended up with 4 late stage interviews and 2 offers). And I wouldn't consider myself an amazing…

> Might be a bit different now, this was back in June/July 2021.

That was near the peak, it was a completely different world back then.

Re: Tell HN: Employers are not desperate to hire developers

#303

Post by anon50118810 »

aiisjustanif wrote: post #287
anon50118810 wrote: post #279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I looked at the jobs page off your HN profile. It looks like you're trying to hire firmware developers in-office in Houston, who also have to do customer support with an on-call rotation, and are paying on the low end of what web development pays. Kudos for being so upfront but looking at that I have a sense of where the challenges are for you.

As cliche as it sounds, beggars can’t be choosers. I’ve done customer support and on-call and it can be manageable.

"Beggars can't be choosers" is true in both directions. The problem with hiring beggars into a subpar situation is that they're going to jump as soon as their situation improves. The job listing talks about 12 month goals which suggests they want people for the long haul.

Really though this looks like one of those rare cases where hiring new grads and training them from scratch is the way to go.

Re: Tell HN: Employers are not desperate to hire developers

#304

Post by giantg2 »

smugma wrote: post #295
giantg2 wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Source? I thought it was $42k a year or two ago, but haven't looked since, and I don't remember if it was strictly full-time.

Asking "source" and saying what you thought it was doesn't contribute to the conversation. Searching Google for "median full time income" pops up $51,480 in bold. The next link is to the BLS (US Bureau of Labor Statistics): https://www.bls.gov/news.release/wkyeng.t01.htm For Q3'22, it was $1,068/wk, or $55,536/yr.

I would have said thanks.

Re: Tell HN: Employers are not desperate to hire developers

#305

Post by giantg2 »

chrisseaton wrote: post #235
giantg2 wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hate that there's so much talk about networks. There's a ton of talk about anti-discrimination, equity/equality, etc in other areas of HN. What's the word for cronyism if the person is qualified?

It’s not cronyism - it’s people knowing your portfolio of work and abilities. And at the end of the day - do whatever you need to within reason to put food on your own table. Don’t worry about someone else judging you for cronyism for feeding your family.

I didn't call it cronyism. I asked what cronyism would be called if the qualifications were met.

The point is that giving preference to someone you know reduces or even eliminates the other person's opportunity. This is especially important for minority groups that may not have as many connections in a given industry. Sure, people do what they need to for work, but people skipping in line...

Re: Tell HN: Employers are not desperate to hire developers

#306

Post by anon50118810 »

physicsguy wrote: post #266
more_corn wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve never met a tech screen that adequately measured candidate quality (actually I take that back Okta’s SRE interview was fantastic). I tried to hire a known, trusted, high performing engineer at Google. He was rejected. After reading his packet I could not figure out why. I had to call the recruiter and ask her if he’d said something so unmentionable they couldn’t even write it down. They decided to pass on him be…

Our process is not particularly difficult, I’m not doing Leetcode or anything. I just ask questions at interview which test whether people have a surface level understanding or whether we’ll have to hand hold people through things. For e.g. I’ve interviewed backend devs with 5+ years of Django experience who haven’t been able to tell me the general methods of how they might go about tackling a poor performing ORM que…

OP here. Failing surface level tests is not an issue for me. I agree you should not pass through a candidate who can't demonstrate basic coding skills in front of you, or more specialized skills like simple Django knowledge if that's essential to the position. I've been on the hiring side and watched at least one otherwise qualified candidate fall apart in front of me on a simple coding exercise, probably due to nerves. It can be heartbreaking to watch but at some point you have to draw the line.

Re: Tell HN: Employers are not desperate to hire developers

#308

Post by anon50118810 »

chris11 wrote: post #297
anon50118810 wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of the twists in the software industry is that something that looks braggy to a non-technical recruiter can look irrelevant to someone in the know, or from the other direction something that looks braggy to a tech person can be meaningless to a non-tech person. For example, if you say that you "developed software that saved the company $X million/year," that might look good to a non-tech person but a tech person…

I'd say it depends on the company. Silicon Valley likes to promote on impact. So being able to communicate that impact is a valuable skill.

The company and the position, so a good idea for an employee #1 position, less so if you're the tenth IC on some random team at some random company.

Re: Tell HN: Employers are not desperate to hire developers

#309

Post by P_I_Staker »

Joel_Mckay wrote: post #168

Ever tried negotiating budgets between the CEO, division managers, and CTO? You basically run into a few arguments: 1. Can't hire Juniors as they cost a lot to train, and keep leaving for better paying firms 2. Can't hire Seniors as they cost too much, and tend to be a challenge to manage 3. Why don't we keep piling on the ticket queue till the existing teams starts to burnout, as they will burnout in a year anyway 4…

Seniors are tougher to manage? I see some ways how, but this seems wrong overall.

Re: Tell HN: Employers are not desperate to hire developers

#310

Post by anon50118810 »

chrisseaton wrote: post #296
anon50118810 wrote: post #294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is an odd take given that the majority of remote software developer jobs I've found, with form applications, are specifically listed at the senior level or higher. Maybe you're suggesting it's something like Groucho Marx's quote "I wouldn't belong to a club that would take me as a member."

I think a FAANG-level developer would probably email a team they’re interested in working with.

Is that how it works? Imagine your typical 51-200 person company with your, I don't know, mobile, backend, product teams, whatever you call them. Is there some unspoken rule you pick up at FAANG or the Ivy League that the front door is for the unwashed and people in the know use back channels to get an invitation? If someone reached out to me and I redirected them to the careers page, would I be committing some kind of faux pas? I'm joking but only a little, I really don't know how those circles operate.
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