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

Why is it taking longer and longer to fill open jobs?

vox.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 178 posts

Re: Why is it taking longer and longer to fill open jobs?

#51

Post by slyall »

memracom wrote: post #39

Don't well written cover letters help employers quickly evaluate a large number of applications? And don't complain that you don't get them along with the resumes. 1) Ask for a cover letter explaining why you are a fit for the job. 2) Discard applications that don't include them. 3) Resist the urge to look through the resumes anyway. And if you directly ask for a cover letter, and you get anm application that doesn't…

> Ask for a cover letter explaining why you are a fit for the job

How does this help anything. Plenty of these out there which the applicant can attached to the application.

"I am very enthusiastic to leverage my [INSERT HERE] skills to help [COMPANY] transform the [WHATEVER] industry "

Re: Why is it taking longer and longer to fill open jobs?

#52

Post by ryandrake »

GreenPlastic wrote: post #35
ryandrake wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What did you have under "here are some great benefits" or "why it's awesome to work here"?

Leaned on the company's official materials for this. Employee focused culture where we work hard and play hard. XX on best companies to work for list. Fast growing company with great benefits, dogs allowed at work, etc.

Here are some things I'd LOVE to see on a job posting, but never have:

1. Interview process MAX 1 afternoon. We commit to AFFIRMATIVELY giving you an accept or reject within 2 weeks. (in other words, we respect your time)

2. Need to hire for this position by [DATE]. (this is a real job opportunity and we are not just fishing)

3. We're not going to ask you to spend a weekend on a work sample or to write code for us for free. (again, we respect your time, and potentially your IP agreement with your current employer)

4. To apply, just upload your resume or send us your LinkedIn URL. You don't have to fill out a 500-form field online application. (see a pattern here?)

5. We offer detailed feedback after unsuccessful interviews. (we earnestly want you to re-apply later if you're better then)

6. If you're good but not an exact fit, we may suggest to you an alternate role rather than just reject and make you wonder if you should re-apply. (serious about finding talent rather than filling a specific narrow role)

I'd also love to see the company publish their current employee retention rate for similar roles, but I know that's asking for a lot.

When I already have a job, one of the main reasons I don't apply to other jobs more often, even ones that look very interesting, is that most hiring processes are opaque, endless, and generally painful. If you're not getting enough candidates into the funnel, maybe include something about how painless your particular funnel is.

Re: Why is it taking longer and longer to fill open jobs?

#53

Post by ryandrake »

mozumder wrote: post #48
ryandrake wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, make sure there are no better offers out there. If you think your employees are going to leave after you train them, that's a problem you can solve.

The proper solution to this is to offer stock options that vest over several years to keep the employee, and to continually offer new set of options each year.

If the equity is liquid once vested (i.e. public company), then "stock I get in the future" is no better a reason to stay than "salary I get in the future". It's identical to normal compensation. If I make M a year and expect N in stock to vest next year, then I could just go out and look for an offer better than M+N.

Options that are not liquid, however are a different kettle of fish. Mentally, I will usually value them at close to zero when comparing with other job offers (because more often then not that's what they'll end up being worth).

Re: Why is it taking longer and longer to fill open jobs?

#54

Post by ryandrake »

GreenPlastic wrote: post #31
smil wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So compensation is not relevant to your point at all since you didn't list it. Or were you looking for mind readers? The low response rate makes sense in that case.

Fair enough, but the information is publicly available on glassdoor. A couple reasons why I didn't list comp: 1. I didn't want to get candidates purely motivated by the high cash comp in the area. 2. Cash comp isn't core to how the company markets itself to employees and its culture. The company prefers to sell itself on being an employee friendly place to work. Like the article hypothesizes, I thought we'd get 50-10…

Everyone is different, but I would always take a job posting more seriously if it listed at least a salary _range_. I at least know I'm not wasting my time going thorough the whole process only to learn that the comp package is way below what I would accept. Yea, there's always Glassdoor for that, but I'm not sure how much I trust that site's data.

Re: Why is it taking longer and longer to fill open jobs?

#55

Post by logn »

GreenPlastic wrote: post #35
ryandrake wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What did you have under "here are some great benefits" or "why it's awesome to work here"?

Leaned on the company's official materials for this. Employee focused culture where we work hard and play hard. XX on best companies to work for list. Fast growing company with great benefits, dogs allowed at work, etc.

Companies described like that tend to be for underpaid workaholics. Also I think the "work hard play hard" phrase implies an unhealthy culture of excess. http://www.cbsnews.com/news/is-work-hard-play-hard-code-for-...

Re: Why is it taking longer and longer to fill open jobs?

#56

Post by wyclif »

ryandrake wrote: post #52
GreenPlastic wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Leaned on the company's official materials for this. Employee focused culture where we work hard and play hard. XX on best companies to work for list. Fast growing company with great benefits, dogs allowed at work, etc.

Here are some things I'd LOVE to see on a job posting, but never have: 1. Interview process MAX 1 afternoon. We commit to AFFIRMATIVELY giving you an accept or reject within 2 weeks. (in other words, we respect your time) 2. Need to hire for this position by [DATE]. (this is a real job opportunity and we are not just fishing) 3. We're not going to ask you to spend a weekend on a work sample or to write code for us fo…

I like almost all of this, and I think it's far better than the hiring culture than we have now. Especially the part about making it clear that they're not just fishing and intend to let the req sit open for a year, and not making you do 3 or 4 interviews over the course of a month.

But I just wanted to add that I don't think your #5 could ever work, because of liability. There's a good reason why companies don't do post-interview feedback— to avoid legal liability.

Re: Why is it taking longer and longer to fill open jobs?

#57

Post by icelancer »

Animats wrote: post #7

How often do you see "Help Wanted - Will Train"?

A lot by smart employers. When I ran a data science team, we hired mostly physicists and math majors who had only secondary knowledge of CS. Best bargains on the market and they don't come with baggage.

Now I work in sports science. I try to hire brilliant people who have never played the sports in question. Still very, very hard.

Re: Why is it taking longer and longer to fill open jobs?

#58

Post by wyclif »

memracom wrote: post #44
ryandrake wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Extreme pickiness. Every hiring manager is convinced that they must only hire A+++ players or their business is doomed. They'd rather a position go un-filled for 6 months than take a risk on someone simply hungry and enthusiastic. Companies are holding out for that unicorn employee (but, strangely enough, not offering unicorn salaries).

It is a sign of incompetent management that they demand only A+++ players. A good manager would hire only B players, then train and mentor them. A really GREAT manager would hire only C players that have the right attitude, and still end up with the best team in the company. Before the MBA scourge hit the land, managers tended to hire the first B or C players that seemed to have the right aptitude and attitude. They…

I hear you on the A+++ player/unicorn/ninja/rockstar thing, but I wonder if the reason for resistance to mentoring and training is a bit more complicated:

1. Finding good mentors is hard, because companies (even large ones as opposed to startups) have cut back and folded several positions into one, all while wages are flat. That means nobody has time to mentor. Everybody's working insane hours at their primary responsibilities. Only the most well-funded startups do mentoring well. Most startups are "all hands on deck" with developers doing a lot of other functions essential to business that wouldn't normally be part of their job description. But these functions are "tyranny of the urgent" life support and there's no time for training.

2. Everybody on both sides of the table knows that the only real way to get a raise or change direction is to leave and get a new job. That's good for the employee who wants to be mobile and transferable, and good for the company that needs warm bodies and is growing, but it's terrible for training/mentoring and the people who want to think long-term.

Re: Why is it taking longer and longer to fill open jobs?

#59

Post by ryandrake »

wyclif wrote: post #56
ryandrake wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here are some things I'd LOVE to see on a job posting, but never have: 1. Interview process MAX 1 afternoon. We commit to AFFIRMATIVELY giving you an accept or reject within 2 weeks. (in other words, we respect your time) 2. Need to hire for this position by [DATE]. (this is a real job opportunity and we are not just fishing) 3. We're not going to ask you to spend a weekend on a work sample or to write code for us fo…

I like almost all of this, and I think it's far better than the hiring culture than we have now. Especially the part about making it clear that they're not just fishing and intend to let the req sit open for a year, and not making you do 3 or 4 interviews over the course of a month. But I just wanted to add that I don't think your #5 could ever work, because of liability. There's a good reason why companies don't do…

Companies (at least in the US) only have to worry about legal liability if their reason for not hiring someone is based on one or more of a very clear enumerated list of reasons: race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability or genetic information. As long as the company's feedback cannot be traced back to one of these, they should be in the clear to provide helpful, actionable feedback.

Re: Why is it taking longer and longer to fill open jobs?

#60

Post by aerique »

ryandrake wrote: post #54
GreenPlastic wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fair enough, but the information is publicly available on glassdoor. A couple reasons why I didn't list comp: 1. I didn't want to get candidates purely motivated by the high cash comp in the area. 2. Cash comp isn't core to how the company markets itself to employees and its culture. The company prefers to sell itself on being an employee friendly place to work. Like the article hypothesizes, I thought we'd get 50-10…

Everyone is different, but I would always take a job posting more seriously if it listed at least a salary _range_. I at least know I'm not wasting my time going thorough the whole process only to learn that the comp package is way below what I would accept. Yea, there's always Glassdoor for that, but I'm not sure how much I trust that site's data.

Exactly, I wouldn't consider a job posting that doesn't mention salary seriously either. It reeks too much of a job that wants to take advantage of you while paying peanuts.
Post reply on HN