221–230 of 810 posts
Whaddaya Mean, You Can't Find Programmers? https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/06/15/whaddaya-mean-you-...
(Repost from five years ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6454140#6455545 and 7 months ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17946388#17948113)
I agree with most things in this, but one point about the "super narrow criteria" part. It's annoying but in reality the list of "must haves" is actually a list of "want to haves" If you check some of the requirements, go ahead and reply. Maybe 10% of the companies actually mean it, the rest will consider hiring you.
I had a recruiter call me a year ago with what sounded like a really amazing offer. Working for a well funded startup on a problem in which I happen to be a domain expert. They're aren't many expects in my field with my background and skill set and they said the right things to get me to interview (compensation won't be a concern). Anyway... Went in for 4-5 interviews. Took me about 10 hours in total to interview wit…
I find it strange, as software developers, that we discuss the effects on automation all the time, but no one seems to understand that automation has made searching for new employees incredibly inexpensive and efficient compared to the past. So in technical roles there are a lot of companies that are always hiring. Recruiters work for free until they find you someone and placing job listings online is so inexpensive…
And also made many of us irrelevant. Most of the things I have build over my career have just moved to the cloud. Every company is now the same - glue cloud stuff together with Python/Java/Go whatever. 95% of work is now identical, which is why a company's actual business is increasingly irrelevant to me.
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Why should you get a say in who works with you? As a team lead I'm trying to find the right balance. If we hire only people the current devs like we endup having too many similiar developers with the same mindset and shortcomings. Trying to have a more diverse, balanced team means you don't get a say.
Why do you think your good people don't want to work with people that complement them? Why do you think you are so much better than them at balancing a team? I pity the team that has to work with such an egostistical openly hostile lead, but I imagine it must give you plenty of experience with recruiting and hiring.
What you think of the hire shouldn't matter because you are looking to perserve your place on the team and that taints your judgement. You shouldn't hire your own boss for similiar reasons. You should never hire your peer.
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The ones who are good salesman do get takers. I don't really know why or how but they get them. Not the greatest engineers but also not bottom feeders. It's surreal. Granted it's usually people who don't realize their own worth or are naive about how much equity is actually going to be worth.
Hey, uh. So, I'm going to be graduating with a B.Eng soon. Any tips on how to realize my own worth? I have a tendency to let myself be taken advantage of... I mean, I'm currently doing a research internship at a computer vision lab at my uni for very little compensation (grant + departmental top-up). I told myself I was doing it "for the experience." I... I feel like I might be a candidate for the behavior you descri…
Can you imagine that if on hiring a new truck driver the company was passing him trough 50 different routes on snow, ice and wet road. Or forcing a construction worker to build a house or something.
Yet if one of these two professions fucks it up - people might die, if a coder fucks up - he'll be fired and someone will remove 10 lines of code boo hooo.
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But that's exactly what I did? Sorry, I didn't phrase it right. My non-negotiable requirement was 20% more than I was getting. I gave a hard number and they said "yeah we can give that" before the interview. However the recruiter just assumed I was bluffing and went ahead with that colossal waste of time.
They promise that amount up front, and then renege? That's not even deceitful, that's just intentionally wasting your time. I would send them an invoice for the time spent on the interview. What a bizarre way to run a business.
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> Anyway... Went in for 4-5 interviews. Took me about 10 hours in total to interview with them. The experience of the poster you are responding to doesn't seem to align with the situation you are describing. Sure posting an online job ad is pretty cheap. The rest of the hiring process, not so much.
Believe it or not, those interviews usually aren't that expensive. You probably have a mix of managers, which spend all their time in meetings anyway, and engineers, which are paid salary so they typically end up putting in a couple extra hours when they fall behind due to interviewing. Sure it isn't free, but remember, this person had made it all the way to the end of the process. The determination was made that the…
I feel like a broken record, but I'm going to say it anyways. There is NOT a shortage of software developers. That myth was developed by big tech, and pushed all the way up the ladder, to the top of government. The goal? Reduce labor costs. Big tech has always been 1 step ahead of the employee, just like coal, and metal working was. They saw the huge need for developers and realized their costs would increase unless…
I sometimes get pings from Japanese and European recruiters, and it's not uncommon to see the ranges in those. They're usually pretty hilarious by US standards, though, so I politely decline without wasting anybody's time interviewing (even though I wouldn't mind spending a few years in Europe or Japan). At the very least, this is respectful of my time and effort.