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GitLab Handbook

about.gitlab.com

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Re: GitLab Handbook

#31

Post by nzgrover »

dvtrn wrote: post #27
leipert wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That makes sense. Yes, children are not factored into the location calculator as this would be very hard to do. I could imagine that this is even protected information which your employer isn’t allowed to know in some countries.

Not sure I follow, admittedly I'm not entirely versed in employment law well enough to know better, but what would be the protected information that precludes a family planning calculation in the salary calculator but not parental leave? Asked a better way: if, per your Handbook employees who relocate go through a process "to stay aligned with our compensation principlea" and "understand the impact to compensation or…

Not associated with gitlab or employment law in any way, but employers in my country may not ask if you intend to have kids. The reasoning is that will be less likely to hire people that will be absent on parental leave, have more sick days, won't be as likely to do overtime, etc.

Re: GitLab Handbook

#32

Post by dvtrn »

nzgrover wrote: post #31
dvtrn wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure I follow, admittedly I'm not entirely versed in employment law well enough to know better, but what would be the protected information that precludes a family planning calculation in the salary calculator but not parental leave? Asked a better way: if, per your Handbook employees who relocate go through a process "to stay aligned with our compensation principlea" and "understand the impact to compensation or…

Not associated with gitlab or employment law in any way, but employers in my country may not ask if you intend to have kids. The reasoning is that will be less likely to hire people that will be absent on parental leave, have more sick days, won't be as likely to do overtime, etc.

Oh for sure, we have those laws too and I'm definitely aware of them. I guess my question has existing employees baked in mind. An existing employee who wants to move to a higher COL environment seemingly has to go through a process that existing employees who are expecting a child don't, even though having a child dramatically changes the day to day expenses of living for a household. Or at least, that is a situation that isn't discussed in the handbook.

I could have clarified that inquiry a bit better, me thinks.

Re: GitLab Handbook

#33

Post by __blockcipher__ »

sdesol wrote: post #20
__blockcipher__ wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I applied for a position (Backend Engineer in Search) that I felt I was a great fit for. I was rejected without even a phone screen. I am very early in my career, so I’d bet whoever handles the leftmost phase of the hiring pipeline saw that and basically immediately binned my resume. But I was still pretty bummed. Since Gitlab’s development is out in the open I could see the tickets in the team’s backlog and knew tha…

I've read they don't hire junior people, which might explain why you haven't heard anything. As somebody that has written a search engine, I would suggest you implement one and make it accessible to overcome the junior title...if that is the case in your situation.

> As somebody that has written a search engine, I would suggest you implement one and make it accessible to overcome the junior title

Their search infrastructure is built upon Elasticsearch, which I have direct experience scaling / putting out fires in my previous job.

So, I did have experience that was extremely relevant to their position (granted, not at the scale that they operate at, but that's always to be expected).

That being said, your point about "I've read they don't hire junior people" is precisely why I think I didn't make it past stage zero. So I totally agree with you there. I had a total of ~1.5 years of experience at my previous company, as an intern and then full-time, but since I was finishing up school during the tail end of my internship, I was only working full-time for ~7-8 months. So I'd bet it was certainly that.

--

Back on your idea about writing a search engine, perhaps I could see if there's some contributions I could make to Apache Lucene, which is the "kernel" that powers Elasticsearch.

Re: GitLab Handbook

#34

Post by ljm »

nbulka wrote: post #7

I applied for an Engineering role at Gitlab. I didn't make it past the initial interview screening and politely asked for feedback in order to grow professionally. I never heard back from the recruiter or company after that yet their handbook says: "If the candidate asks for further feedback, only offer frank feedback. This is hard, but it is part of our company values." I always wondered if it was because I question…

I also applied, but I also got good feedback.

The problem was that they wanted me to refactor their permission layer as part of the interview and submit it as a contribution when it was done.

I abandoned it because the merge conflicts came in faster than the feedback and while i surely fucked up on my part, so did Gitlab. They wanted the contribution and the ability to say no.

In retrospect and after the news over the last year I think I dodged a bullet. Of course I dodged into a different one but I don’t wish to engage with Gitlab again.

Re: GitLab Handbook

#35

Post by sdesol »

__blockcipher__ wrote: post #33
sdesol wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've read they don't hire junior people, which might explain why you haven't heard anything. As somebody that has written a search engine, I would suggest you implement one and make it accessible to overcome the junior title...if that is the case in your situation.

> As somebody that has written a search engine, I would suggest you implement one and make it accessible to overcome the junior title Their search infrastructure is built upon Elasticsearch, which I have direct experience scaling / putting out fires in my previous job. So, I did have experience that was extremely relevant to their position (granted, not at the scale that they operate at, but that's always to be expec…

Honestly the post for https://grep.app that was posted a few days ago is a perfect example of demonstrating what you can do. He had the CTO of GitHub reach out to him publicly.

I'm pretty sure if you can demonstrate how you can orchestrate a cluster of Elasticsearch nodes, it will go a long way. And if you can contribute to the many discussions they have about Elasticsearch in their issues, it will go a long way to demonstrate your domain knowledge.

As for Lucene, I wouldn't invest any time in contributing to it, as it has been iterated on for over a decade by very smart people. Just build something with Lucene or build something like https://grep.app

Re: GitLab Handbook

#36

Post by ljm »

leipert wrote: post #21
dvtrn wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me it's a combination of both, I think? -- BEGIN: BIG ASS WALL OF TEXT -- Submitted for your thoughts: I toyed around with their salary calculator. Selected my job role and what I think is an appropriate guess of my own skill level with the options provided. And then I got stuck. Because the "area" (my hometown in the rural southeast US, an economically depressed former mill town) I'm about to buy a house in isn'…

Interesting. I have worked a bit on our calculator in the past (technical implementation). Some clarifications, best of my knowledge, currently on mobile: It would be impractical to calculate all the location factors in the world, and in your case it would be calculated. I agree with you that this is less than optimal, as it might stop people from applying if that data is missing. So this is an area where we could im…

I would like to ask why you feel a job should be rewarded differently based on location when the deliverables and other gains from the employee are the same?

E.g I don’t see why I should take a pay cut moving from the US to the EU. Looking at Basecamp, they give everyone the US salary and they arrange their culture around remote work that way.

Note how it doesn’t even work this way between countries, through the ‘most favoured nation’ laws.

Re: GitLab Handbook

#37

Post by johannes1234321 »

tomcam wrote: post #11
nbulka wrote: post #7

I applied for an Engineering role at Gitlab. I didn't make it past the initial interview screening and politely asked for feedback in order to grow professionally. I never heard back from the recruiter or company after that yet their handbook says: "If the candidate asks for further feedback, only offer frank feedback. This is hard, but it is part of our company values." I always wondered if it was because I question…

To me offering feedback is an unnecessary attack vector for lawsuits.

That's a reason why many people don't provide it.

However GutLab, in their handbook, states

> the hiring manager should be prepared to let the candidate know why they were declined if they had progressed to the team or manager interviews. https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/hiring/interviewing/#rejec...

In the case of the GP the interviewer apparently wasn't up to that.

As I haven't interacted with them in any way I can't judge in any way further.

Re: GitLab Handbook

#38

Post by Polylactic_acid »

sdesol wrote: post #20
__blockcipher__ wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I applied for a position (Backend Engineer in Search) that I felt I was a great fit for. I was rejected without even a phone screen. I am very early in my career, so I’d bet whoever handles the leftmost phase of the hiring pipeline saw that and basically immediately binned my resume. But I was still pretty bummed. Since Gitlab’s development is out in the open I could see the tickets in the team’s backlog and knew tha…

I've read they don't hire junior people, which might explain why you haven't heard anything. As somebody that has written a search engine, I would suggest you implement one and make it accessible to overcome the junior title...if that is the case in your situation.

It doesn't seem like it. I have applied twice and I have 4+ years rails experience. The feedback I got was that I wasn't ready and to come back in a year or 2.

Re: GitLab Handbook

#39

Post by Polylactic_acid »

johannes1234321 wrote: post #37
tomcam wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To me offering feedback is an unnecessary attack vector for lawsuits.

That's a reason why many people don't provide it. However GutLab, in their handbook, states > the hiring manager should be prepared to let the candidate know why they were declined if they had progressed to the team or manager interviews. https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/hiring/interviewing/#rejec... In the case of the GP the interviewer apparently wasn't up to that. As I haven't interacted with them in any way I ca…

I have applied twice and got given feedback both times.

Re: GitLab Handbook

#40

Post by sciurus »

dvtrn wrote: post #32
nzgrover wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not associated with gitlab or employment law in any way, but employers in my country may not ask if you intend to have kids. The reasoning is that will be less likely to hire people that will be absent on parental leave, have more sick days, won't be as likely to do overtime, etc.

Oh for sure, we have those laws too and I'm definitely aware of them. I guess my question has existing employees baked in mind. An existing employee who wants to move to a higher COL environment seemingly has to go through a process that existing employees who are expecting a child don't, even though having a child dramatically changes the day to day expenses of living for a household. Or at least, that is a situatio…

You seen to be conflating a household's actual expenses with a city's relative cost of living. Gitlab (along with my own employer and most remote-friendly companies I know of) adjust's pay based on the latter, not the former.

If I wanted to move to San Francisco I'd have to get my manager's approval, and I'd get a raise.

If I decided to have more kids, buy a bigger house, eat out more, start collecting vintage cars, etc I don't need my manager'd approval, but I won't get a raise.

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