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Ask HN: Why am I suddenly unemployable?

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Re: Ask HN: Why am I suddenly unemployable?

#121

Post by araes »

haspok wrote: post #110

I think one of the problems with your CV could be that I can't really tell who you are and what kind of a job you are really looking for, unless I read the whole thing (and even then it's a wild guess!). Sadly, "software developer" is not really a thing anymore. You'd probably want to mention that you are full-stack, have X years of experience in Python (backend), and Y years of experience in Javascript (frontend). D…

Another note with this, the job titles look worse or less impressive with increasing time. There may not be much you can do about the impressiveness, yet rearranging to emphasize other work / skills may help.

"Worked on industry-leading tools" -> "Worked on a research project" -> "Created a 3D experience" (which like others have mentioned sounds like "wrote an app")

Re: Ask HN: Why am I suddenly unemployable?

#122

Post by nmaley »

As others have said, rewrite the CV. It's not clear to me who you are and what kind of role would best suit you. Put a summary at the top making clear what you are best at and what kind of role you are looking for. Summarize your skills and achievments. Consider using simple graphics. eg List of tech skills rated with slide bar from expert to familiar understanding.

Re: Ask HN: Why am I suddenly unemployable?

#123

Post by keiferski »

fuzzythinker wrote: post #118
keiferski wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Explaining how you’ve impacted the bottom line isn’t BS, it’s how business works. Failing to understand this is a common mistake made by technical people, unfortunately.

How do you prove that X and only X cause the company's revenue or some other metrics increased by Y? And let's say you can just for sake of it, how does that metric gives you any idea how good an engineer is? When I read a resume, anything that is beyond his skills (soft & tech) and experience is just sugar coating. A little is acceptable, too much and it gives me a bad feel for the candidate.

As I said above, an interview isn’t about trying to determine if you were solely responsible for the outcome at your previous job. Obviously any intelligent person knows that it’s a complex situation, and that it may not translate directly to the new company.

The point is to convey that you’re capable of providing some value to the company, should you be hired. It’s like being on a championship football team: sure, you weren’t solely responsible for winning. But being apart of winning team is certainly a lot more impressive than just listing your dribbling and passing skills.

I think you are taking this entirely too literally and missing the forest for the trees. The simple point being made is that communicating your value is easier when you go beyond the basic Skills and Experience CV that every average candidate slavishly sticks to. It doesn’t need to be an exact calculation, it just needs to convey that you’ve achieved something.

Re: Ask HN: Why am I suddenly unemployable?

#124

Post by lurking15 »

ownagefool wrote: post #85
lurking15 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure that's ideal but honestly I've worked on a bunch of stuff at several different companies but have yet to land in a place where I was able to collect these sorts of statistics that everyone is always going on about putting in your resume.

I have £19m to £75m revenue in approx 20 months bootstrapped start-up CTO on my CV. In the UK market folks aren't particularly receptive to that sort of thing.

In that case, I wonder if that makes you seem overqualified?

Re: Ask HN: Why am I suddenly unemployable?

#125

Post by eek2121 »

You aren't.

The economy is absolute garbage right now.

I'm in the US and the situation is similar here. I've never had an issue finding a job before either, but I've been unemployed since the middle of 2023.

Assuming you aren't under financial hardship, my advice is to spend more time on your hobbies and check back in around July/August. That is when the layoffs are projected to drop and hiring is expected to keep up.

Re: Ask HN: Why am I suddenly unemployable?

#126

Post by keiferski »

Scarblac wrote: post #107
keiferski wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not about saying you directly caused the specific increase in revenue, it's more about highlighting the value you can bring to a future organization – at least so you can talk about it in an interview. Remember, this game is not about determining if that increase was purely attributable to your work, it's about convincing an employer that you can add value. For example: you coded and launched a new feature, and…

> For example: you coded and launched a new feature, and that feature brought in 20% more users over the following year. Even if I did, it was probably someone else's idea, someone else decided it would be worth adding to the product, someone else made a UX and UI design, I wrote the code, someone else tested it, maybe there were some iterations of those. It's all team work. Someone claiming such a increase as their…

It was a simplified example. Obviously on a real world resume you would say “was a part of a team that did X.”

Re: Ask HN: Why am I suddenly unemployable?

#127

Post by eek2121 »

theandrewbailey wrote: post #87
f0e4c2f7 wrote: post #67

We're currently going through the largest tech downturn since the dot com bubble. It's not you, it's the market. Tough for everybody who is looking right now. For the first time in 20 years there are more applicants than jobs again.

> For the first time in 20 years there are more applicants than jobs again. I'd argue that happened during 2008 and 2009. Source: I graduated and had to get a first job during that time. For every 100 positions I applied for, I got a call for 5, and had on site interviews for 1. Sounds like that may be the case again.

I had absolutely NO problem finding employment during that time period.

First jobs are usually the "first" to go FYI.

I'm a senior dev, and even back then I had a ton of experience.

I agree with OP. This is easily the biggest down cycle since the dot com bubble.

Just remember, things will recover. Eventually.

Re: Ask HN: Why am I suddenly unemployable?

#128

Post by WXLCKNO »

eek2121 wrote: post #125

You aren't. The economy is absolute garbage right now. I'm in the US and the situation is similar here. I've never had an issue finding a job before either, but I've been unemployed since the middle of 2023. Assuming you aren't under financial hardship, my advice is to spend more time on your hobbies and check back in around July/August. That is when the layoffs are projected to drop and hiring is expected to keep up…

Every time I bring up this uneasy feeling of everything feeling like it's going to crumble soon, I get employment data hurtled at me and the stock market thrown in my face.

Maybe Canada is worse due to how insane housing is but for the average person life does not feel anywhere like it used to pre pandemic at least.

Re: Ask HN: Why am I suddenly unemployable?

#130

Post by pgwhalen »

eek2121 wrote: post #125

You aren't. The economy is absolute garbage right now. I'm in the US and the situation is similar here. I've never had an issue finding a job before either, but I've been unemployed since the middle of 2023. Assuming you aren't under financial hardship, my advice is to spend more time on your hobbies and check back in around July/August. That is when the layoffs are projected to drop and hiring is expected to keep up…

I truly do not mean this in a snarky way - who is projecting that layoffs are projected to drop and hiring is expected to pick up around July/August?
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