Developers: How to get Hired by Every Startup You Contact • Hacker News Board

Re: Developers: How to get Hired by Every Startup You Contact

#31

Post by raverbashing » Thu, May 24, 2012, 12:11 PM UTC

Peroni wrote: post #24

Here we go. There’s just no real barometer – it’s not like being a Doctor or a Lawyer where you can check the applicant’s college, GPA, and Bar Score (is that a thing?) and know the person is proficient. If you're hiring technical staff and you clearly understand what you need these people to do on a daily basis and why you need them to do it then there is absolutely no excuse for not having even a basic set of minim…

So much this

The "startup ninja hacker" world is in need of a reality check

The "tradicional hiring" methods has some glaring defects, but people don't realize it's got a lot of things right as well!

I want your resume, yes. You don't need one if your name really rings a bell like Gosling, Stroustroup, Torvalds. Not "built JQuery UI plugins" famous, sorry.

Also, it's great if you can link to a previous work, but if you can't it's ok. Projects go offline (happened to me), are sold as part of a product (yes), or are part of a really expensive product (yep).

"Sorry but if you're my employer, the onus is upon you to be familiar with international hiring policies." I lost count of how many "recruiters" contacted me offering a job in the US (residents only). But you know, in the same place you got my email there was a disclaimer "need sponsorship to work in the US". So if you ignore this, I'm gonna assume it's a poor job offer (and it usually is)

Re: Developers: How to get Hired by Every Startup You Contact

#32

Post by jiggy2011 » Thu, May 24, 2012, 12:37 PM UTC

fidz wrote: post #19

brianscordato wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For front-end dev, absolutely. Back-end is trickier to judge for someone less tech-savvy.

How about showing portfolio of open source application like how many our commits in Github? Is it relevant?

If you have it , sure.

Of course this causes a class divide between:

A) People who are paid to contribute to open source (either as part of their job or in some cases their whole job) and therefor have many commits.

B) People who write a little open source code on the weekends.

C) People who already work 60-80 hour weeks on proprietary/in house software and have other commitments for the rest of their time.

Also the "you need to contribute to open source to get a new job" thing has a perverse incentive for companies. If they know that having you contributing to open source makes it easier for you to either leave or demand a higher salary (because it is easier for you to get hired elsewhere). It is then in their interests to stop you doing it whenever possible.

Re: Developers: How to get Hired by Every Startup You Contact

#33

Post by brianscordato » Thu, May 24, 2012, 12:43 PM UTC

moocow01 wrote: post #25

"You won’t be the only developer after that job. Second, it won’t be like this forever. Supply and demand are out of whack, and people are catching on and catching up" Seems like a nice way to kick off an agenda with a bit of fear mongering but its rather the non-technical founders that are exploding in size. On top of it the actual thing that developers are catching on to is that it doesn't make any sense in this en…

Appreciate the comment - I didn't mean it as fear mongering, just pointing out that the landscape will likely change over the next two years. Great developers will still be great developers and will have tons of job offers, I just imagine there will be a bit of a squeeze in the middle. I may be wrong. As for developers starting something on their own, I'm all for it if they've got the idea. They'll run into the same challenges any single founder will, but will definitely start from a better spot than a non-technical founder. I was more targeting this towards people who didn't have the idea yet and were looking to join something.

Re: Developers: How to get Hired by Every Startup You Contact

#34

Post by brianscordato » Thu, May 24, 2012, 12:50 PM UTC

nnythm wrote: post #28

I generally disagree with what this guy is saying. This is reasonable from the perspective of, "How to pitch yourself to a non-technical founder." A. Programming languages do matter. Talking to other programmers, a good way to find people who actually love programming is to ask people what languages they use. People who have experimented with haskell or clojure are usually people who love programming more. PG has a g…

Thanks for the comment - lot of good stuff in here. As for the languages piece, broad knowledge on languages definitely shows something, I agree. And I want to know what the applicant knows. I just meant that I could get a lot of that from the github account (as you point out), and that it doesn't need to be displayed in a resume. A resume telling me you know things is one thing, a github acct showing me you know things is another.

The links note is a good point. I was tailoring this towards my specific startup, and really early startups in general making their first "tech" hire. Once you've got a CTO or someone technical on staff, they'll handle the technical hiring and will understand the process and applicants far better than a non-technical founder ever will.

Re: Developers: How to get Hired by Every Startup You Contact

#35

Post by brianscordato » Thu, May 24, 2012, 12:56 PM UTC

troels wrote: post #21

slantyyz wrote: post #5

I find it interesting that the OP seems to think that being a lead developer and being a CTO are the same.

Indeed. If he is hiring for a CTO, why has he made the technical decisions up front? I realise he has had a MVP built in Ruby, but that shouldn't dictate the technical platform - leave that for the future CTO to decide.

I made them so I could get something built quickly, and the development team I clicked with happened to build Ruby applications. I'd certainly be open to a change once I hire a CTO. I honestly don't know how hard it is to switch from one platform to the next, I assumed "very" so I looked for Ruby devs only. Maybe a bad assumption?

Re: Developers: How to get Hired by Every Startup You Contact

#36

Post by brianscordato » Thu, May 24, 2012, 1:03 PM UTC

technoir wrote: post #7

Surprised this guy didn't write an article on how to sell his position to developers. In spite of claiming to understand the current labor market for development talent, it appears he's still got it backwards.

I can't really write that one yet, since I haven't been successful - I may be doing it all wrong. As to your second point, I understand developers are in the drivers seat. I was just trying to point out a few good ways to market yourself to a non-technical founder, since that's what I am and that's what I can speak to. I wasn't saying that you NEED to do this to get a job - you don't. Just saying that if you wanted to get the attention of a startup, this could be a good way to do it.

Re: Developers: How to get Hired by Every Startup You Contact

#37

Post by brianscordato » Thu, May 24, 2012, 1:09 PM UTC

jordo37 wrote: post #13

technoir wrote: post #7

Surprised this guy didn't write an article on how to sell his position to developers. In spite of claiming to understand the current labor market for development talent, it appears he's still got it backwards.

Totally agreed. It seems he made some interesting choices about how to setup a startup for success before bringing on a technical co-founder, and as a technical co-founder I would be interested to hear 1) what he did and 2) what he thinks would be useful in convincing someone like me to come join him

I certainly tried to find a CTO before building a product - it's nearly impossible these days if you don't have funding, especially if you're founding your first startup.

So, I raised a small FAF round and outsourced my MVP to two awesome dev shops. Now I'm raising a second round of funding and can afford to bring on someone full-time. It's definitely not ideal, but it was the only way I could do it. I'm hoping the idea, the flexibility of the job, and the above average equity piece are intriguing to a potential CTO. Would be interested to hear suggestions on how to make this more attractive?

Re: Developers: How to get Hired by Every Startup You Contact

#38

Post by jasonlotito » Thu, May 24, 2012, 1:24 PM UTC

Oh, good. One of these again. It's been almost a week since I've read the last guys guarantee on how to get a job.

Regardless, the proper title for this piece is: "How to get hired by me." Nothing more.

The best way to get hired? Follow the instructions on applying provided by the company. If they fail to provide proper instructions, they'll probably fail at a lot of other things as well.

Re: Developers: How to get Hired by Every Startup You Contact

#39

Post by Spoom » Thu, May 24, 2012, 1:25 PM UTC

Another post saying that if I don't have a highly populated Github and a well-trafficked blog, I'm worthless as a candidate to a startup. Good to know; my employer will be disappointed.

Nearly all of my work is behind the screen of an NDA. When I am looking for a job, I'll send code samples, but I get the feeling that's no longer good enough. Is this correct?

In any case, I am noticing these things and will probably force myself to start a blog at some point, even though it's completely counter to my nature.

Re: Developers: How to get Hired by Every Startup You Contact

#40

Post by jsolson » Thu, May 24, 2012, 1:34 PM UTC

readme wrote: post #23

jsolson wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eh, you're doing better than I am. In general I don't make it past step one.

It helps if you pick a pet project that uses the technology of people that are likely to hire you. If some decent looking startup publishes a new API, jump on that. If your app is any good, they'll be excited to try it and help you promote it. This is how I was extended an offer for good freelance work recently.

Actually, I was lamenting the working-on-my-own-stuff part, not the getting hired part :)

I tend to build what I think is a cool pet project, then completely fail to put it in front of anyone other than friends who happen to be in the room while I'm tinkering with it. Usually by the time I've managed to build anything substantial, I no longer think it will be interesting to anyone.