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Ask HN: With recent layoffs, how would you advise new grads entering the market?

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Re: Ask HN: With recent layoffs, how would you advise new grads entering the market?

#261

Post by ghaff »

vkou wrote: post #256
ghaff wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not sure of your point. So a job I got 13 years ago largely through a contact isn’t how things work today? As in my most recent example.

To clarify - a random SWE's random peer from 25 years ago is much more like to be in an influential senior position, than a random SWE's random peer from a job 13 years ago, or a random SWE's random peer from a job last year. Your friends are statistically more likely to be closer to the top of the pyramid than mine, and my friends are closer to the top than a fresh no-name college graduate's.

I think we're in violent agreement though. The reason I know a ton of people in the industry isn't that it was a different industry back when I was starting out--heck, a lot of those people are retired by now. Rather, it's that I'm senior, attend events, interact with other senior people, etc. Nothing to do with the industry changing mostly. But with the fact that as you spend time in an industry you know more and more people.

Connections obviously aren't the only way to land jobs. But, especially in leaner times, having someone you've worked with lay eyes on your resume certainly helps.

Re: Ask HN: With recent layoffs, how would you advise new grads entering the market?

#264

Post by cloudedcordial »

ryandrake wrote: post #22

I've been through the dotcom slaughter of 2000-2002 as a new grad (undergrad) and the comparatively small slowdown of 2008 (grad school new grad). Get ready to hit the Submit button... a lot. The stories of "getting three job offers after four interviews at five companies" are no longer reality. My application:interview:offer ratio has always varied from 50:5:1 to 100:10:1, and I would expect something like that or w…

Given how bad the job market was, how did the current senior and staff engineers started their career about 20 years ago? How could they stand out from the sea of applicants?

Ditto. I got my undergrad after the dot-com crash and finished grad school before 2008. You've reminded me the bad old days. I was considering seriously to go back to my old profession established during my teenage years.

I got lucky to get my first real adult job from my grad school's industrial partner, which paid with peanuts. At least I kept a great credit score. My undergrad education was paid partly by my old profession's gigs. Grad school was tuition-free with a stipend.

Re: Ask HN: With recent layoffs, how would you advise new grads entering the market?

#266

Post by Our_Benefactors »

mixmastamyk wrote: post #254
Our_Benefactors wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bad attitude. Would you rather be unemployed and receiving no callbacks, or unemployed and still having your pick of which recruiters to engage with?

It made absolutely no difference for me at one point. At least the first is not a waste of time. Could have directed to a floss project.

> At least the first is not a waste of time. Could have directed to a floss project

Oh, the irony…

Re: Ask HN: With recent layoffs, how would you advise new grads entering the market?

#267

Post by mixmastamyk »

Our_Benefactors wrote: post #266
mixmastamyk wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It made absolutely no difference for me at one point. At least the first is not a waste of time. Could have directed to a floss project.

> At least the first is not a waste of time. Could have directed to a floss project Oh, the irony…

Let me guess, you are using MS Word to compose these posts?

Re: Ask HN: With recent layoffs, how would you advise new grads entering the market?

#268

Post by thinking4real »

ghaff wrote: post #172
thinking4real wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Reach out to every friend, old coworker, etc. especially those that are in management now.” This advice always cracks me up. Most people don’t have deep networks of people who can hook them up with a senior level engineering position. Like, even the people I know who are quite well connected don’t really have this option. Sure, everyone has a buddy who’d love to pay them half for twice the work. But we’re talking re…

>This advice always cracks me up. And, yet, all three jobs I've had in the last 25 years (including one in 2001), I landed because I knew someone senior at the company pretty well. Not strictly engineering but tech and tech ecosystem companies. Was that lucky and atypical? Perhaps. But those were my experiences. The last job I got through "normal" channels was from a campus interview at grad school.

So you’re around 45-50 years old, which no offense is quite old if you’re a swe.

I’ve had around 5 jobs, am much younger, and none of them were due to connections (which I have well over 100 professional people who would vouch for me)

I think you’re either in a very fortunate place in society or you’re old enough in this industry to feel the small world effects

Trust me, for the vast majority your situation isn’t normal.

Re: Ask HN: With recent layoffs, how would you advise new grads entering the market?

#269

Post by l-portet »

notch656c wrote: post #253
l-portet wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait, why are you getting that much filtered from the phone screen to the interview? From my experience, it's just a bullshit step with a recruiter just to check you're not totally dumb.

Maybe I was totally dumb, idk. I don't really count recruiter phone screens as phone screen, usually I have 2 (one easy one from recruiter and one more critical one from the hiring manager/company)

I see, I thought you were only talking about the recruiter phone screen.

Re: Ask HN: With recent layoffs, how would you advise new grads entering the market?

#270

Post by pyuser583 »

mooreds wrote: post #18

I like the advice here: https://blog.pragmaticengineer.com/advice-for-junior-softwar... (didn't write it, but it jives with my experience). I also wrote something here on how to stand out: https://letterstoanewdeveloper.com/2022/09/19/ways-to-stand-... Finally, you ask: > Is it better to get any job than keep searching for the job I'd be most suited for? That depends on your financial situation and emotional runway,…

Digging ditches (or whatever) can be smart.

I took a non-tech job for survival money, and in spare time looked for a high paying dev job.

Everyone was pushing me to take an entry level tech support position.

There’s no shame in a survival job, especially if it helps you find a good position.

When I interview, I get asked why I left so many jobs developer (companies went under), but nobody asks why I left my job as a janitor.

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