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Work after work: Notes from an unemployed new grad watching the job market break

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Re: Work after work: Notes from an unemployed new grad watching the job market break

#221

Post by alyxya »

windowshopping wrote: post #145
alyxya wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a skills section that lists keywords. Personally, keywords mean relatively little to me, because I don't think of people's skill sets as being static, and anyone can learn anything.

It is less about the content and more about the design. It is hard to skim. Recruiters receive thousands of resumes and need to be able to get the key points at a glance, and I just don't feel this design effectively works toward that goal. Everything's there if you spend the time to read all of it, yes, but a resume's goal is often to get someone to notice it fast - not to convince someone after a long leisurely rea…

If someone wants to use keywords as a screening mechanism for resumes, they don't need a human recruiter to do that, and some automated tool is perfectly able to parse keywords. You could over-index your resume on the prospect that there's a human recruiter as the first screening mechanism and that recruiter is going through every resume and skimming for keywords, yet isn't very good at identifying relevant keywords quickly, but it's a relatively meaningless micro-optimization overall. Keep in mind they were able to get multiple internships before with presumably the same resume structure, so it's already proven to work well enough.

Re: Work after work: Notes from an unemployed new grad watching the job market break

#222

Post by [deleted] »

lisbbb wrote: post #187
gdulli wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They stoke fear of immigrants to win elections, but to the extent that their donors want that labor, it will be allowed to continue.

Immigrants are one thing, but opening the floodgates to 20 million non-citizens by abusing an asylum law meant to grant relief to tens or hundreds was a huge problem.

[deleted]

Re: Work after work: Notes from an unemployed new grad watching the job market break

#223

Post by YZF »

ghaff wrote: post #88
tayo42 wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Job markets are bad for everyone though

From what I've seen, CS/programming job growth is significantly worse than in other comparable fields. Though my guess is that's a retrenchment from overhiring and overpaying.

I would expect CS doing better than EE or Physics or Chemistry or ME ...

In some science fields good luck getting a job if you don't have a Ph.D.

But otherwise, yes, these things are cyclical. But I think the trend, even with AI, is still towards more software. We've had explosive growth over the last few decades.

Re: Work after work: Notes from an unemployed new grad watching the job market break

#224

Post by coolThingsFirst »

windowshopping wrote: post #142
calepayson wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 1. This author’s writing is extremely, uncommonly good. > 2. His resume is designed poorly… This is the world of TikTok and Instagram reels Imo this is exactly the problem. We’ve constructed a system where brilliance doesn’t shine through. The idea that someone as thoughtful as OP needs to tiktokify their resume to even have a chance at getting hired is ridiculous. I’m young, so I have no clue, but surely the job m…

Well, I think there's a middle ground between "tiktokifying" and "having your CV look like an essay." Brevity is the soul of wit, after all. These summaries of projects/positions are just very long. In this context, I feel they're too long. 1-2 sentences each should be sufficient, not extended paragraphs. Many other commenters here disagree, though, so....clearly it's subjective!

It doesn't matter at all, if it's not enough that they have a DeepMind internship the rest are just trivia and details. People get hung up on details when they REALLY are just not interested in hiring.

No one rejects candidates based on the color of their shirt if they really need said candidate.

Re: Work after work: Notes from an unemployed new grad watching the job market break

#225

Post by ineedasername »

gruez wrote: post #165
ineedasername wrote: post #130

> The industrial nations of the twentieth century were built around the idea that work was the organising principle of life Hopefully this is what changes. If, for example, AI reduces labor needs by 50%, we ought to gradually move to a 20 hour work week. Consumption patterns would change— the Covid years provide some very limited guidance on how such a dynamic would be shaped by changing the demand for different form…

>Hopefully this is what changes. If, for example, AI reduces labor needs by 50%, we ought to gradually move to a 20 hour work week. Consumption patterns would change— the Covid years provide some very limited guidance on how such a dynamic would be shaped by changing the demand for different forms of entertainment and leisure activities. How would this work for the jobs that can't be replaced by AI? Sure, the program…

It doesn’t happen instantly. Wages for jobs like nurses: Yes. Conversely, as the labor market adjusted and everyone’s expectations were adjusted towards shorter work weeks, people would begin going in to something like nursing for the salary, labor supply would gradually equalize in line with new work week expectations and salary.

None of this is radical, it happens on a small scale constantly. Happening at this scale this fast is going to be painful, less so if there’s a minimum of thought put into it, but still painful.

But there has to be some change in things. There is no equilibrium possible in having the world produce the same amount of stuff but half the population has zero money or everyone has half as much— and can’t afford that stuff so then it just wouldn’t be produced, but that isn’t the way the economy has ever gone either. We have a 5 day work week in part because 1) industrialization made it possible and 2) It gave people more time to themselves, which was required in order for people to have time to spend more money on all of the things being produced by industrialization. It was a somewhat deliberate process and even happened pretty quickly. Something similar should hopefully happen here.

There are alternatives! A “Covid 2.0” that ends up being much deadlier could present a much more morbid solution in the form of outright population loss. But then again, absent a little economic foresight then even without a sequel worse than the original Covid the social unrest and other upheaval might simply lead to a bunch of absurd wars and we get the same or worse population loss… sorry, I don’t want to get into the territory of bad Hollywood movie plots. But massive changes to labor force expectations on what employment means are pretty much required in some form or fashion.

Re: Work after work: Notes from an unemployed new grad watching the job market break

#226

Post by soupfordummies »

calepayson wrote: post #137
windowshopping wrote: post #62

Two initial thoughts: 1. This author's writing is extremely, uncommonly good. Good enough to write a book and have it sell. "Competing with the past of the economy," "residual behaviour of a world that treated labour as sacred," "immigration without immigrants" -- there are many elegant turns of phrase here. This is a very skilled writer. 2. His resume is designed poorly. Have a look. I'm not surprised his job search…

> 1. This author’s writing is extremely, uncommonly good. > 2. His resume is designed poorly… This is the world of TikTok and Instagram reels Imo this is exactly the problem. We’ve constructed a system where brilliance doesn’t shine through. The idea that someone as thoughtful as OP needs to tiktokify their resume to even have a chance at getting hired is ridiculous. I’m young, so I have no clue, but surely the job m…

Buddy, the amount of people these days with MASTER’S degrees that can’t even communicate via 2-3 (short) paragraph email exchanges… yep, it can be rough out there.

Re: Work after work: Notes from an unemployed new grad watching the job market break

#227

Post by YZF »

StellarScience wrote: post #153
RobertDeNiro wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, our team of two gets two interns a semester. We cannot convert them to full time as there is no position open. Complete hiring freeze since 2022.

We paused hiring fresh grads, but still hire interns, and those who prove themselves get full-time offers. We've found internships to be a great pipeline to great hires over the years. We've had several candidates with completed bachelor's degrees apply for internships, prove themselves, and get full-time jobs that way. This "back door" job hiring pathway might work elsewhere as well.

Same here. We pay interns pretty well and we invest a lot in them during their internship. It doesn't make sense for us (and I imagine others) to take in interns and then not hire the good ones. That's the entire reason we do internships to start with.

Re: Work after work: Notes from an unemployed new grad watching the job market break

#228

Post by gdulli »

lisbbb wrote: post #187
gdulli wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They stoke fear of immigrants to win elections, but to the extent that their donors want that labor, it will be allowed to continue.

Immigrants are one thing, but opening the floodgates to 20 million non-citizens by abusing an asylum law meant to grant relief to tens or hundreds was a huge problem.

That sounds like a big scary Fox News number, got any actual detail or context for it?

Re: Work after work: Notes from an unemployed new grad watching the job market break

#229

Post by kjkjadksj »

tdb7893 wrote: post #154
rudedogg wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does that work financially? Will you work in academia?

Yeah, I'm employed as a research assistant as part of the Master's program currently. There are jobs in government, non-profits, and academia potentially after. I've never loved money (except for the flexibility having it gives me) so I have several hundred thousand saved up after a decade of engineering so while grad school is an 82% cut in pre-tax pay I can withdraw 1% a year from my investments and live fine. Even…

People I know in academia are also having a terrible time. Grant funding is in the toilet. The focus is on providing for current staff not hiring. No one is leaving because no one has anywhere to go.

Re: Work after work: Notes from an unemployed new grad watching the job market break

#230

Post by kjkjadksj »

selimthegrim wrote: post #63
joshdavham wrote: post #40

Depressing article but it really captures the zeitgeist among recent tech grads. I’m more of a mid-level dev, but I was recently unemployed for about 6 months and it felt brutal - and this is despite having a couple years of work experience. I can’t imagine how hard it would be for junior data scientists where there’s an even worse supply to demand ratio of applicants (and almost always with graduate degrees).

To answer your question, it’s taken me about two straight years, but I think I’m finally getting somewhere. I didn’t get any interviews between June 2022 and April 2024, and then another year long gap until this April not counting an internship interview.

How did you survive?
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