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

Dear HN "Who's Hiring" responders

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

151–160 of 212 posts

Re: Dear HN "Who's Hiring" responders

#151

Post by mootothemax »

vacri wrote: post #142
mootothemax wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're doing it wrong. I just want a quick note explaining briefly who you are and why you're applying. It shouldn't take more than five minutes. Seriously, try hiring someone, the influx of irrelevant applicants and those who won't take even thirty seconds to read your ad is truly dispiriting. If you make even the tiniest effort with your application, you will stand out, guaranteed.

Seriously, try hiring someone, the influx of irrelevant applicants and those who won't take even thirty seconds to read your ad is truly dispiriting. The average time of inspection of a resume is 15 seconds, so it seems it's a two-way street.

The average time of inspection of a resume is 15 seconds, so it seems it's a two-way street.

Heh, quite. Although from my experience, receiving a hundred CVs featuring C# application development alone when you've requested PHP will have a significant effect on the average reading time ;)

Re: Dear HN "Who's Hiring" responders

#152

Post by _pmf_ »

tzaman wrote: post #41
calinet6 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rockstars are a myth. So are low-level engineers who "know what they're doing." Hire smart people who can learn new things instead of resume bullet points and/or mythological creatures.

> Rockstars are a myth No they are not. One would think it's easy to find smart people who can learn new things , but I've dealt with both young and senior developers (by senior I mean writing code 15+ years) and was amazed how most of them feel comfortable being completely ignorant of new technologies/libraries/frameworks/best practices/whatever. I've met a rockstar the other day, and could feel him being the one I'…

> and was amazed how most of them feel comfortable being completely ignorant of new technologies/libraries/frameworks/best practices/whatever.

They are probably equally amazed that you are not able to discriminate between fads and/or half-assed rehashes of decade-old technologies and actual new technologies.

Re: Dear HN "Who's Hiring" responders

#153

Post by ig1 »

uniclaude wrote: post #101
ig1 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not familiar with that stat but it's perfectly believable. Many people are clearly getting by with a mixture of memorization and trial-and-error rather than understanding. I think of those who understand algorithmic reasoning (i.e. understand loops, assignment, etc.) they also fall into two categories. Those who can understand more abstract programming concepts (indirect referencing, recursion) and those who can'…

I might have interviewed a very different subset of the programming world than you, but I wouldn't make the categorization in this way. Indeed, I haven't met any programmer who couldn't understand recursion when explained in clear terms, same goes for indirect referencing. If I had to divide the programmers who really understand algorithmic reasoning into two categories, those would be - A: those who program because…

It's a relatively well studied area of programming pedagogy, numerous studies have shown students struggle with those concepts:

https://student.brighton.ac.uk/mod_docs/cmis/past%20papers/c...

Re: Dear HN "Who's Hiring" responders

#154

Post by jpgvm »

koide wrote: post #148
lsiebert wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mark, when you come back to this, this might be helpful for you. https://github.com/gryftir/recursivereverse

Thanks! Sorry for asking this, but why the strange (to me) indent?

8 spaces?

Probably because this is similar to the Linux kernel programming style. Many of us learnt C from the kernel or projects that follow it's coding style.

Re: Dear HN "Who's Hiring" responders

#155

Post by groundCode »

>> tl;dr if it'll take the company more effort to reply to your email than you put into sending it, you're doing it wrong.

from my side of the table, when I was interviewing (about 6 months ago), probably 8 out of 10 startups that I applied to and interviewed for didn't bother to contact me again - not even a polite "thanks but no thanks". I'm not arrogant enough to think I'm the perfect fit for every company I apply to or even that I aced every interview, but I would think common decency dictates at least a response or acknowledgement after an in person interview.

Two sides of the same coin, in my opinion.

Re: Dear HN "Who's Hiring" responders

#156

Post by vellum »

sravfeyn wrote: post #125

I should probably post a "Dear HN 'Who's hiring' posters". And put following content. With the same token that you say HN is not a CraigsList, when an HN-responder puts an effort in going through their product and writing a personal note inquiring about a possible opportunity at their company, posters should have the courtesy to respond to the responder acknowledging that in-spite of their good/bad profile they can't…

You should get someone to proofread your writing. Your English is very good, but there are still a few things that sound weird. People spend 30 seconds skimming your CV/profile/resume. If you can make it more readable, it can only help your cause. I'd recommend going to fiverr.com and finding someone with a lot of good reviews to proofread your CV, profile, and cover letter.

Re: Dear HN "Who's Hiring" responders

#157

Post by groundCode »

niclupien wrote: post #105

I've applied to many positions (internships) advertised in these threads with a lot of effort to craft each email for each of them. I don't speak english so often so it took me a very great amount of effort to do this. Got only 1 reply, the others didn't even bother saying "Thanks for applying" or anything. I don't know if this behavior is normal but I would expect a bit more from hirers advertising on HN. Especially…

I've found most organisations are absolutely terrible at responding to applicants. Large corp are somewhat better in a strange twist of fate - the bureaucracy that comes with having dedicated HR departments means that you will probably at least receive an acknowledgement. I find many smaller companies just don't bother to reply if they have filled the position or just don't find your CV a perfect fit.

It can be disheartening, because when I'm looking for work, I also spend a lot of time on applications and generally only apply to one or two companies at a time so I can devote attention to the interviews et al. Also I'm not usually looking for any job so trying to hit as many companies with my CV as possible is not my modus operandi, but it feels like that would be more appropriate, or at least get a better rate of return on effort applied to the process. :/

Re: Dear HN "Who's Hiring" responders

#158

Post by anthonyb »

asveikau wrote: post #149
anthonyb wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Dear Anthony, Thankyou 4 ure notes in LinkedIn about contacting u - much easier to know that you're approached all the time. U r too experienced for my role, but if you know of any mid level Python / Linux developers happy 2 discuss referral $$if I can place them:) Happy Friday!" (Actual recruiter message on LinkedIn - I keep it around to remind me why I don't talk to recruiters)

I had a good laugh at that quote, but now I'm thinking: is it legit to cite one or more persons doing their job poorly to dismiss the entire profession? Do you keep around bad code to remind you why you don't talk to programmers? Examples of quack medicine to remind you why you don't talk to doctors?

Essentially every recruiter message that I've received on LinkedIn follows one of two patterns:

a) Hello, you do Python, do you want a job? (with no position details, salary, reason to join, etc.)

b) a) followed by a clumsy attempt to fish details of my contacts (I don't connect with recruiters).

So, er, yeah - "Ha ha, profession!"

Re: Dear HN "Who's Hiring" responders

#159

Post by mackwic »

dizzystar wrote: post #29

I totally agree with your rant, but the fallacy is that you are posting with the absolute expectation a certain level of talent to apply, when this is not the case. HN attracts under-qualified programmers along with high-quality programmers, and I suspect there are far more of the former than the latter. You're more likely to get the low-quality programmers because they are more likely to be looking for work, especia…

That's totally true ! Moreover when you know for sure that the guy who read your mail is himself a very good programmer, that he saw dozen of little guys like you, we really have to make intensive efforts in our letters.

But we also have to keep in mind that's only a mail : an article won't be read. So, even if we fall in love with some startups (HN startups have such amazing projects, I spend hours reading your blogs about your work), even in this case we can't send a poem in your honor. The letter have to be well balanced.

... and that's how I spent four hours for sending only one letter to one company. Faith in the fact that the good work pay, you know what it is.

Re: Dear HN "Who's Hiring" responders

#160

Post by sravfeyn »

vellum wrote: post #156
sravfeyn wrote: post #125

I should probably post a "Dear HN 'Who's hiring' posters". And put following content. With the same token that you say HN is not a CraigsList, when an HN-responder puts an effort in going through their product and writing a personal note inquiring about a possible opportunity at their company, posters should have the courtesy to respond to the responder acknowledging that in-spite of their good/bad profile they can't…

You should get someone to proofread your writing. Your English is very good, but there are still a few things that sound weird. People spend 30 seconds skimming your CV/profile/resume. If you can make it more readable, it can only help your cause. I'd recommend going to fiverr.com and finding someone with a lot of good reviews to proofread your CV, profile, and cover letter.

Hey, thanks for taking the time to read and give such a valuable insight. Can you tell me what sounded weird. I have made a Google Doc, if you have minute please leave comment in the Doc. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1mab-wHgNyTzGGBTdRiiY9yKZ...

I will have it proofread by my friends.

Post reply on HN