Seen that job listing for a while, its no coincidence • Hacker News Board

Re: Seen that job listing for a while, its no coincidence

#31

Post by termain » Fri, Jun 19, 2015, 1:26 PM UTC

airza wrote: post #16

aidos wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can imagine what the theory is, but does it make sense in practice? Do you know which industries it tends to apply to? Would a developer be asked to take a drug test? It's interesting, because I've worked with a lot of people in a lot of places over the years and I've never seen drugs as a problem that impedes workplace attendance / performance. Alcohol / hangovers, sure - plenty of times - but they're not testing…

IIRC all US government contractors have to be tested on hire. Most of the large temp firms also do drug testing in the US (in my experience at least.) Never tested for booze, though everywhere I've worked on site has made it clear that you will be drug tested and breathalyzed in case of an on-the-job accident. As i've moved up in job quality it has gone from "we will test you aggressively to see if you do drugs" to "…

"IIRC all US government contractors have to be tested on hire"

That must be a new -- post 2007 -- thing, then.

Re: Seen that job listing for a while, its no coincidence

#32

Post by pjc50 » Fri, Jun 19, 2015, 1:27 PM UTC

auxym wrote: post #15

As a fresh grad interviewing for (real, non-internship) jobs for the first time, I'm really surprised at how long the hiring process is. The article mentions 23 days average. I'm currently interviewing for a BigCo where I already had done an internship, so they knew me. After I contacted my former supervisor, it took him 2 weeks of wrestling bureaucracy to open a position, then HR insists on collecting CVs for 4 week…

An ex-girlfriend of mine applied, on graduating, for a job at a prestigious investment bank. She heard nothing back.

Eighteen months later, after she'd been through two jobs and emigrated, they sent her a letter expressing interest.

Re: Seen that job listing for a while, its no coincidence

#33

Post by pjc50 » Fri, Jun 19, 2015, 1:28 PM UTC

Siecje wrote: post #27

iamthepieman wrote: post #23

the article mentions 27 days as the average time from job candidate to actual employee. This seems like a very reasonable amount of time for anything that is not traditionally high turnover like retail, certain service industries etc. I like to give at least 3 weeks notice simply because it usually takes that long to transfer all my projects and responsibilities. That only leaves 6 days for the active screening and i…

What if you are not working?

Obviously nobody will hire people who's unemployed.

/possible sarcasm

Re: Seen that job listing for a while, its no coincidence

#34

Post by bediger4000 » Fri, Jun 19, 2015, 1:28 PM UTC

aidos wrote: post #9

23% of interviews have a drug test. What's the incentive behind that?

To avoid having to actually do some real human thinking. Fail a "drug" test, you can just treat those people as scum, not worth your time, disgusting pariahs. You don't have to look at them as human, and actually use your wits to decide.

People who, for example, smoke marijuana, will fail a drug test. Will they miss work because they're hungover from a Big Weekend? No, mostly not. Will some straight arrow call in sick because he or she got sick on Sunday evening? Yes. We know this. But to avoid having to cope with ambiguity or grey areas or hard decisions, we just let a "drug" test do it all.

Re: Seen that job listing for a while, its no coincidence

#35

Post by pjc50 » Fri, Jun 19, 2015, 1:30 PM UTC

airza wrote: post #30

pjc50 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The long hiring times seem not to be due to lack of applicants, but due to internal hiring politics and process. Rising conservativism about making a "bad hire", perhaps.

You can't discount the role of applicant volume in that, though; if you have a 20 day hiring process with one person going through it at a time, the odds of it taking 40-60 days are a lot better than if you have 2-3 going through at once.

Those are unrealistically low applicant volume numbers, surely?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/jobs/10949825/Employers-r...

Re: Seen that job listing for a while, its no coincidence

#36

Post by atwebb » Fri, Jun 19, 2015, 1:32 PM UTC

airza wrote: post #19

Business-oriented publications and companies that are hiring always seem to carefully avoid the easy way to fix long hiring times: Increase wages.

The point of the article was less on the supply side and more that the process itself has become more rigorous. That people put up with it might imply they could lower wages.

EDIT: Can someone explain the negative votes? OP was right if the issue was: we can't find people, rather than: we're going to make the process even more rigorous and time consuming. Maybe increasing wages will draw more qualified applicants which will qualify for the tests faster?

Re: Seen that job listing for a while, its no coincidence

#37

Post by rm999 » Fri, Jun 19, 2015, 1:33 PM UTC

auxym wrote: post #15

As a fresh grad interviewing for (real, non-internship) jobs for the first time, I'm really surprised at how long the hiring process is. The article mentions 23 days average. I'm currently interviewing for a BigCo where I already had done an internship, so they knew me. After I contacted my former supervisor, it took him 2 weeks of wrestling bureaucracy to open a position, then HR insists on collecting CVs for 4 week…

Shoot to get another job offer. HR treats you much better when they know they have to compete for you - they'll speed up every step of the process, and they'll be more willing to negotiate. Also, you may end up liking the other offer more :)

Re: Seen that job listing for a while, its no coincidence

#38

Post by frandroid » Fri, Jun 19, 2015, 1:34 PM UTC

pjc50 wrote: post #26

airza wrote: post #19

Business-oriented publications and companies that are hiring always seem to carefully avoid the easy way to fix long hiring times: Increase wages.

The long hiring times seem not to be due to lack of applicants, but due to internal hiring politics and process. Rising conservativism about making a "bad hire", perhaps.

To add to airza's point above, if the team hiring is currently working on a timely deliverable, they can't dedicate as much time as they would like to the hiring process, even if it's counter-productive in the long term.

Re: Seen that job listing for a while, its no coincidence

#39

Post by skolor » Fri, Jun 19, 2015, 1:35 PM UTC

mjbellantoni wrote: post #20

Hiring velocity is one area where small companies can use their agility to advantage when competing against larger companies for talent. As a hiring manager, I always endeavor to make this process as streamlined as possible. A couple of anecdotes: I was able to hire an outstanding candidate simply because I got them through the process and extended them an offer. Our competition was a reasonably high-profile company…

I work for a pretty large company, and the more involvement I have with the hiring process the more painful it is to see. We just move so incredibly slowly, with frequent false starts, and we've lost a number of good candidates because of it. I'm fairly concerned we're going to lose someone I referred because of it, but there's only so much prodding I can do and that doesn't serve to fix the problem.

Re: Seen that job listing for a while, its no coincidence

#40

Post by madcaptenor » Fri, Jun 19, 2015, 1:36 PM UTC

culturestate wrote: post #24

aidos wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can imagine what the theory is, but does it make sense in practice? Do you know which industries it tends to apply to? Would a developer be asked to take a drug test? It's interesting, because I've worked with a lot of people in a lot of places over the years and I've never seen drugs as a problem that impedes workplace attendance / performance. Alcohol / hangovers, sure - plenty of times - but they're not testing…

You tend to see drug tests a lot in retail, fast food, and many other low-wage low-skill jobs. I truthfully have no idea how effective that is in weeding out people who would be generally unreliable, but that's often the justification given by managers. I'm sure there are some ultraconservative companies that drug test everyone — including developers and senior managers — but those are few and far between in comparis…

I work at a large telecom company and we drug test everybody.

Incidentally, it's quite awkward if you're currently employed when you get the new offer - as I was. The lab that collected the urine sample opened early in the morning for "regular" work but only accepted drug test samples from 10 AM to 3 PM on weekdays.