Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Ask HN: Who's getting their job applications rejected?

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

171–180 of 205 posts

Re: Ask HN: Who's getting their job applications rejected?

#171

Post by twojobsoneboss »

meowfly wrote: post #133
twojobsoneboss wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ding ding ding, this right here is a big part of it. Previously it was very rare for vc funded startups (which are the main source of decent tech jobs apart from big tech) to hire from abroad, but now it’s more the norm rather than the exception (just look at the HN postings, tons of latam) The remote work movement chickens have come home to roost

The model I'm noticing becoming more popular is a highly skilled US based team lead and exclusively Latam seniors and mids. The reason to have some US devs is that the Latam hires are technically contractors and they need US engineers to hedge against the risk a change in Argentina tax law forces employees to quit. Im sure it's very difficult to be a US based junior or mid right now.

I mean it hits the seniors hard too - you’re talking about a 50% or more reduction in this type of job compared to before

Re: Ask HN: Who's getting their job applications rejected?

#172

Post by ZjMyOWM1NzBkZW »

I've been tracking my job applications since 2020.

I'm not having applications rejected as much as I'm having them get ghosted.

My percentage of ghosted applications is up 25% from 2022 and 20% from 2020, while my number of outbound applications is up 40% from 2022 and 45% from 2020.

Like many folks here, I used to get a good amount of inbound recruiter activity prior to 2023, but that's all but stopped. That channel is _barely_ picking back up again.

The good news is that applications following up from referrals have gotten me interviews fairly consistently. The bad news is that places with open headcount are harder to find.

Re: Ask HN: Who's getting their job applications rejected?

#173

Post by dambi0 »

betaby wrote: post #160
dested wrote: post #38

Other side, I put out a job req for a remote react dev position a month ago and got 1k applications in a week. 95% were automated spam.

Why would spammers apply for a job?

How do you know the spammers and job seekers are separate groups?

Re: Ask HN: Who's getting their job applications rejected?

#174

Post by ZjMyOWM1NzBkZW »

benjaminwootton wrote: post #21

You have to wonder if remote work is starting to bite developers. 10 year ago I started a business that had hundreds of engineers in London and New York. I am now starting a new one and this time I am hiring talent from all over the world now that it is more acceptable for us and our clients. Surely this must be a factor in people in expensive western markets?

This happening was obvious (to me) the minute every engineer started clamoring for remote work.

Compensation packages and hiring processes were traditionally very regional. I remember having a very hard time finding work in a city I wanted to move to because I was not physically there.

Now they are not.

The push for remote work from our own was the second biggest "fuck you; I've got mine; should've been born earlier" moment I've ever seen in tech right behind OpenAI and Microsoft (whose engineers are paid extremely well) touting how well ChatGPT can replace engineers.

Re: Ask HN: Who's getting their job applications rejected?

#175

Post by FrustratedMonky »

throw1234651234 wrote: post #165
floor2 wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We've all secretly been benefiting from the dreaded "trickle down economics" which has shifted as interest rates have increased. What percent of HN users salaries are actually paid by the revenue from the customers of their business rather than burning down investment funding? Most of us have had high paid jobs funded by some billionaire VC burning their wealth on unprofitable ventures, because they were willing to l…

Speak for yourself, I built the architecture that enabled a business to go from 50 mil to 3 billion revenue in the last 4 years and I have zero equity and a midwest salary. Really need to think about my life choices.

Similar. Saved company a few millions.

I compensated by taking the occasional long lunch.

Sticking it to the man.

Re: Ask HN: Who's getting their job applications rejected?

#176

Post by nunez »

silverquiet wrote: post #60
benjaminwootton wrote: post #21

You have to wonder if remote work is starting to bite developers. 10 year ago I started a business that had hundreds of engineers in London and New York. I am now starting a new one and this time I am hiring talent from all over the world now that it is more acceptable for us and our clients. Surely this must be a factor in people in expensive western markets?

This is what I've been warning people about since I was at a company acquired by private equity. They straight up told us that if a job can be done from home, then it can be done from India. I got my layoff not too long after that.

The counterpoint, of course, was "we have special skills that you can't outsource; we're paid as much as we are because of the value we provide"

It was absolutely maddening to see mass-scale denial in real-time.

Re: Ask HN: Who's getting their job applications rejected?

#177

Post by mikhailfranco »

thrwaway1985882 wrote: post #116

From the perspective of a hiring manager at a mid-size company, I'm not at all surprised. I'm having a tough time getting backfills approved when we have voluntary departures, all my opens were cut, and the goal is "do way more with way less". HR has already frozen salaries - no increases for existing employees, and they're already starting to cut salaries for newly posted positions. When you do get a position posted…

> "take it or leave it" up front

I have also encountered this - salary negotiation with HR/recruiter at first contact. This was before any interviews or coding tests, at a point when I only had the vague job posting as a guide for the role. There seemed to be two filters: a remoteness/WFH/RTO test; and a low-ball salary bludgeon.

As Groucho Marx almost said, I'm very glad I don't work for a company like that :)

Re: Ask HN: Who's getting their job applications rejected?

#178

Post by rco8786 »

fragebogen wrote: post #68
rco8786 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Surely this must be a factor in people in expensive western markets? Yea, this was/is my main fear with remote work. It will "even out" the pay ranges across the globe...not perfectly (due to language, timezone, regulatory, and general cultural barriers), but the imbalance will be less severe as western salaries come down and int'l salaries rise from the new demand. I expect this to happen over the course of 5-10 y…

On the other hand, I read stories online where people claim that it's hard/impossible to get promoted as remote employees. I wonder if these constraints will loosen as well.

There will be a lot of churn along the way, companies will all try various things and find strategies that work for them. I just think, on average, salaries for "western" software engineers will stay flat or trend down over the next decade.

Re: Ask HN: Who's getting their job applications rejected?

#179

Post by jimmydddd »

bormaj wrote: post #155
mojomark wrote: post #16

I have not from the perspective of seeking emplyment, but from the smaller mid-size employer side (200 employees, robotics) we have had to reject a number of candidates. Normally this is based on a resume review (so as not to waste people's time), but sometimes it does come out in interviews. My main challenge, and I'm not saying this is the case for you - I'm just offering the perspective on the other side, has been…

Inline with many adjacent comments, I think companies could genuinely do more to offer an incentive to stay for the long haul. What worked for past generations isn't enough in the current age where inflation/cost of living have significantly outpaced wages. On a nominal basis I would expect to make more money in 10 years by switching companies every few than sticking around at one company for the duration. Beyond tha…

In the 60's and 70's, people stuck around for the long haul to collect their pensions.

Once that game ended, all bets were off.

Re: Ask HN: Who's getting their job applications rejected?

#180

Post by PheonixPharts »

apocalyptic0n3 wrote: post #113
ghaff wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many people looking for jobs though have a 10 year stint with a company on their resume? It's probably pretty uncommon outside of some traditional tech employers like IBM where I know people who have been there for 25+ years. On the other hand, if the resume is all 1-3 year segments, yeah, there's no reason to think you're going to be different.

I'm not the OP but I think you're looking at it backwards. It's not that you're looking for a 10 year commitment, it's that you're looking for someone who isn't planning to leave in 1-2 years. At my place we actively discard resumes of people who never stick around for longer than 2 years even when they're a good candidate. The investment we put into the hire and the amount of pain caused when someone leaves means it…

What kind of organization culture do you have where someone leaving after two years causes an "amount of pain" and you have to spend considerable resources on-boarding new hires? That sounds like a deeper problem to me.

I tend to work pretty short stints at places, but in the vast majority of cases am shipping things to prod the first week or so and building and releasing revenue generating products in the first 6 months. Most of the places I've left, even after a short tenure, are continuing the work I started just fine and generally get lasting value from a even a year of my time.

With few exceptions, most of the teams I've left are sad to see me go, but that doesn't diminish the befit my time there has provided.

On the other hand most of the people I know that have worked 7+ years at a place aren't particularly engaged in the products and certainly aren't keeping up with major industry trends/changes/etc, and generally just go to work each morning without leaving much of an impact. Even at places like Google, most of the 10+ year people (with some notable exceptions) are the "rest and vest" types.

Post reply on HN