Ask HN: For those trying to hire how hard is it to find people currently? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: For those trying to hire how hard is it to find people currently?

#91

Post by throwaway5959 » Sat, Oct 14, 2023, 10:18 PM UTC

JohnFen wrote: post #47

cebert wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there a reason you don’t think a good Java/C# developer willing to learn couldn’t learn C/C++. Especially with LLMs, I feel like which language(s) a developer is currently comfortable with is less of an issue. I previously had no Python experience, but know how to code well in C# and JavaScript. Using a LLM, I was able to quickly get up to speed writing DevOps Python scripts because I understood basic programming…

No reason at all, and we don't rule out applicants because of language. But Java/etc programmers have a strong tendency to be specialized in a particular sort of programming that we don't do, and get very weak when they're not doing that. They need more training that we can afford in order to come up to speed. But we absolutely interview the ones who seem like they'd be able to come up to speed. The pickings seem a b…

We ran into the same problem with Scala. I love the language but only about half the people we hired could pick it up (or were willing to put in the time to do so). Oh well, Python it is.

Re: Ask HN: For those trying to hire how hard is it to find people currently?

#92

Post by throwaway5959 » Sat, Oct 14, 2023, 10:20 PM UTC

jwells89 wrote: post #6

UncleOxidant wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Someone on another thread here about hiring in the ML/AI space bemoaned the fact that they mostly get applications from people who have dabbled with ML/AI on the side and very few applicants who have actual ML/AI work experience. But it seems like the ML/AI space is still nascent and growing rapidly - you're not going to find a lot of available people with ML/AI work experience. Given that ML/AI is where a lot of cur…

It's another variation on the classic, "6 years experience with X required" where X is something that has only been publicly available for a year or less. Everybody wants candidates who can hit the ground running even when that's not practically possible.

That sounds more like H1-B shenanigans. Easier to justify not being able to find someone local if they make the job req impossible.

Re: Ask HN: For those trying to hire how hard is it to find people currently?

#93

Post by throwaway5959 » Sat, Oct 14, 2023, 10:22 PM UTC

PeterisP wrote: post #58

thih9 wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If so hiring managers are going to have to start looking at people who have an interest and have done some self-learning in the field. Or candidates who have just started working with ML/AI are going to have to accept lower pay as their cost of changing specialisation. Or, likely, both.

I think there really aren't very many job positions that try to hire candidates who have just started working with ML/AI for a lower pay, everyone wants 'all or nothing', exclusively trying to hire people who already did that specialization change somewhere else; many are willing to pay for experience, but they aren't willing to accept lack of it for less pay.

This is true in general. The average software developer is doing the jobs of three or four people when I started fifteen years ago. Ops, dev, DBA, storage (s3, ebs, etc).

Re: Ask HN: For those trying to hire how hard is it to find people currently?

#94

Post by tester756 » Sat, Oct 14, 2023, 10:23 PM UTC

replwoacause wrote: post #89

linsomniac wrote: post #23

A couple weeks ago we put a advert out on Indeed and also listed it here on HN. Initially we didn't have any further qualifications beyond the job post, which did indeed go into details on the job and requesting a cover letter. After spending a couple days of 2-3 hours each on reviewing resumes that were "only ok", we started adding additional hoops for getting resumes in, and also tried to put in a gatekeeper to rea…

I’d never write a cover letter to get a job somewhere. It seems like such an antiquated holdover practice to me. In fact, if it were required I’d actively avoid it, which sounds like the effect you were going for. Especially now that I work for one of the biggest and most sought after companies in my country and they didn’t get two craps about a cover letter.

I disagree as hell.

Yea, sure, cover letter for some JoeSoft writing crud apps may be weird

but for fancier jobs I don't really see problem with cover letters where candidate can share something more human than CV's "i've did blabla" like passion, motivation, etc, etc.

And highly motivated employee may be way more valuable than more skilled employee

Re: Ask HN: For those trying to hire how hard is it to find people currently?

#95

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Oct 14, 2023, 10:28 PM UTC

jpp wrote: post #59

We finished a hiring process about 2 months ago, along with two other hires earlier in the year. As a hiring manager, 2023 has been brutal — 1,000:1 application to hire ratio (based on stats in Lever; no exaggeration). I’ve made a point to try to be as open and as fair as possible in our hiring process. We list the salaries up-front in the job description. We create per-hire ”join our team” pages that share a lot mor…

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: For those trying to hire how hard is it to find people currently?

#96

Post by drdunce » Sat, Oct 14, 2023, 10:29 PM UTC

It's incredibly easy to find people, there's a huge surplus of talent and very few opportunities going. You can scoop up top engineers laid off from big tech companies for small change right now.

Re: Ask HN: For those trying to hire how hard is it to find people currently?

#97

Post by throwaway5959 » Sat, Oct 14, 2023, 10:30 PM UTC

Mountain_Skies wrote: post #56

Hiring pipeline have been extended to absurd lengths and now are extremely successful at achieving their true purpose: avoiding hiring anyone. There's no good reason for the current state other than pathological laziness and extreme fear of ever having a "bad" hire where bad means anyone who can't be productive their first day in the office with whatever weird frankenstack the company has implemented. There's no shor…

> There's no shortage of intelligent people who could fulfill your company's needs but there is an extreme shortage of unicorns who will work for a junior/mid salary and be able to produce senior level work instantly. Everyone struggling to hire will deny all of this but they also will recognize it completely because it is the simple truth.

Sometimes comments are so good on Hacker News I wish I could click a button and tip them. Companies that don’t deserve to have way too high of standards/requirements now.

Re: Ask HN: For those trying to hire how hard is it to find people currently?

#98

Post by tester756 » Sat, Oct 14, 2023, 10:30 PM UTC

sys_64738 wrote: post #79

cebert wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there a reason you don’t think a good Java/C# developer willing to learn couldn’t learn C/C++. Especially with LLMs, I feel like which language(s) a developer is currently comfortable with is less of an issue. I previously had no Python experience, but know how to code well in C# and JavaScript. Using a LLM, I was able to quickly get up to speed writing DevOps Python scripts because I understood basic programming…

It's because it's likely a HW embedded position so web language people don't have a grasp of the fundamentals and low level experience.

What fundamentals and low level things do you mean?

Bit manipulation? proficiency in hex notation? firmware frameworks (e.g UEFI)?

Re: Ask HN: For those trying to hire how hard is it to find people currently?

#99

Post by moltar » Sat, Oct 14, 2023, 10:36 PM UTC

Finding people is easy.

Finding talented people is harder than before.

It was talented people who were not laid off (mostly, generalizing ofc).

So now we have a huge surplus of untalented, average developers applying for all the jobs en mass.

Signal to noise ratio is worst I’ve ever witnessed.

Re: Ask HN: For those trying to hire how hard is it to find people currently?

#100

Post by throwaway5959 » Sat, Oct 14, 2023, 10:36 PM UTC

throwaway38475 wrote: post #11

MattGaiser wrote: post #5

It wouldn’t surprise me if this is a question of credentials. I don’t know any experienced people with solid skills who also have degrees who have been having difficulty. I know one good one, but without a relevant degree who is struggling. I also know lots of boot camp/recent grads in iffy masters programs who aren’t getting anywhere. I am aware of a few hiring processes that are just inundated with people who don’t…

Degrees are as useless a metric as bootcamps in my experience. I've done so many interviews in which a 4.0 CS grad can't sort a list that a degree from even 'elite' institutions doesn't mean much.

I’ve never written a linked list after college and I’m a principal software engineer. Why would I waste my time when there are libraries written by dedicated, excellent engineers that have been used by millions of developers?