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Is LinkedIn Cheating Employers and Job Seekers Alike?

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Re: Is LinkedIn Cheating Employers and Job Seekers Alike?

#41

Post by richardjordan »

I think the broader principle of this post is solid. It's one that I've been thinking a lot as a friend asked me to advise his dating-site startup.

I don't like the space for one major reason (and job hunting is isomorphic with dating): to optimize making money you have to fail to deliver on the expectations of those for whom you're matchmaking.

With dating/jobhunting if you create a supremely efficient market place that finds the match almost immediately your customers go away. They don't need your service any more. It behooves you to increase the inefficiency of your marketplace to deliver almost-matches that keep people interested and paying, but not quite good enough to make them leave.

Perhaps you could argue that a job board is different because employers are repeat finders and will come back again and again - the adultfriendfinder approach, people who keep getting laid keep paying.

Either way they're tough businesses to make money on AND deliver a great service.

LinkedIn does a ton of other things of course, to monetize, and isn't just a job board. But that just raises questions about some of their other practises of holding your own data hostage - which seems to be a key business model for social network monetization at the moment, and that's a whole other question.

Re: Is LinkedIn Cheating Employers and Job Seekers Alike?

#42

Post by richardjordan »

henrik_w wrote: post #4

I never understood the "Job Seeker Premium" badge. It just makes you look desperate in my mind.

right - like a candidate anti-pattern - this person so lacks confidence in their abilities that they're trying to game the system to get attention (unfair probably but I'd be shocked if that wasn't the perception of many employers)

Re: Is LinkedIn Cheating Employers and Job Seekers Alike?

#43

Post by dragonwriter »

richardjordan wrote: post #41

I think the broader principle of this post is solid. It's one that I've been thinking a lot as a friend asked me to advise his dating-site startup. I don't like the space for one major reason (and job hunting is isomorphic with dating): to optimize making money you have to fail to deliver on the expectations of those for whom you're matchmaking. With dating/jobhunting if you create a supremely efficient market place…

> I don't like the space for one major reason (and job hunting is isomorphic with dating): to optimize making money you have to fail to deliver on the expectations of those for whom you're matchmaking.

For job hunting (but probably not dating), its at least conceivable that you can structure the charge model to one where one or the other party (or both) is paying for success in making a match (basically, that's what lots of non-web-based employment "matchmaking" services of various kinds do), so that you can, in fact, align customer satisfaction with profit maximization.

Re: Is LinkedIn Cheating Employers and Job Seekers Alike?

#45

Post by redschell »

WestCoastJustin wrote: post #2

Age and skills seem to be a factor. The people in the video are 40+, with many doing marketing/sales. The HN community, based off the what is your age? poll [1], suggests the majority here are between 21-35, so we probably are not experiencing their problem. Second, networking is a major factor, if the software keyword system is really the issue, you need to find ways around the system, email your old co-workers, etc…

It seems like some people actually take pride in their technical ignorance. They boast to coworkers how unfamiliar they are with CRM platforms and lead generators, and they laugh at the notion of using very basic coding skills to script some of their more monotonous job functions. It's disheartening. They must know that, regardless of age, it's adapt or die, but they're so damn stubborn.

Does anyone know of a Coursera for older, working professionals that have begun to fall behind in their skill development? I know that Coursera and other learning platforms are not necessarily designed for young people, but I'm sure the academic design/nature of it turns a lot of professionals off.

Might be an interesting startup idea (though I'm sure someone's already on it).

Re: Is LinkedIn Cheating Employers and Job Seekers Alike?

#46

Post by kvcrawford »

I hate LinkedIn. The pay walls and forced semi-hidden profiles are insanely annoying.

I wish I had the resources to build a competitor centered around openness and UX. It should monetize on really strong programmatic job matching, driven by the improved data from reducing all the UX friction. Somebody, please accept the challenge.

Re: Is LinkedIn Cheating Employers and Job Seekers Alike?

#47

Post by Amadou »

dev1n wrote: post #35
WestCoastJustin wrote: post #2

Age and skills seem to be a factor. The people in the video are 40+, with many doing marketing/sales. The HN community, based off the what is your age? poll [1], suggests the majority here are between 21-35, so we probably are not experiencing their problem. Second, networking is a major factor, if the software keyword system is really the issue, you need to find ways around the system, email your old co-workers, etc…

If you are in the red, with zero money coming in, isn't anything better than nothing, at least as a gap till you find something better? I'm not sure I would call it pride. Some won't apply to jobs if they feel it is below them because the general consensus among employers is that if a better job comes along that this person is more qualified for, they will quit that "lower" job. source: my Econ professor

Yep, but the smart people just dumb down their resume. Resumes are marketing tools, they should be tailored for the job no matter the "level."

I'm not saying lie, I'm just saying put in the truth that will get you hired and leave out the truth that will stop you from being hired.

Re: Is LinkedIn Cheating Employers and Job Seekers Alike?

#48

Post by echohack »

ngoel36 wrote: post #3
WestCoastJustin wrote: post #2

Age and skills seem to be a factor. The people in the video are 40+, with many doing marketing/sales. The HN community, based off the what is your age? poll [1], suggests the majority here are between 21-35, so we probably are not experiencing their problem. Second, networking is a major factor, if the software keyword system is really the issue, you need to find ways around the system, email your old co-workers, etc…

I'm just impressed with your ascii bar graph!

https://github.com/holman/spark

You'll like this then.

Re: Is LinkedIn Cheating Employers and Job Seekers Alike?

#49

Post by Iterated »

hga wrote: post #12
no-opinion wrote: post #6

I'm a student at a bush league school that doesn't have many connections to my field. Would it be in my interests to make a LinkedIn account for internship purposes?

I doubt it hurts to create a standard free LinkedIn account, it's still useful for networking, putting a resume on the web (well, there's advantages and disadvantages to that), etc. But I agree with Nick Corcodilos, which is almost a tautology, he's by far the best author I've ever found on these subjects. One of the best things you can do for yourself in the long run is to read the appropriate stuff on his http://ww…

Looks like he hasn't updated his website design since the late 90's.

Re: Is LinkedIn Cheating Employers and Job Seekers Alike?

#50

Post by rgbrgb »

kvcrawford wrote: post #46

I hate LinkedIn. The pay walls and forced semi-hidden profiles are insanely annoying. I wish I had the resources to build a competitor centered around openness and UX. It should monetize on really strong programmatic job matching, driven by the improved data from reducing all the UX friction. Somebody, please accept the challenge.

What resources would you need?
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