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Come to London

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Re: Come to London

#31

Post by mseebach »

kolektiv wrote: post #27

Hmmm. I'm not one of the people you're really looking for here, but I could take a stab at reasons why I haven't been beating a path to your door... a) I haven't really heard of you. A few words here and there over the years, but how much do you get out there and tell the geek community you exist? I'm guessing it's specific to a few specific tech areas - which I haven't seen. b) You're in London, you talk about "work…

http://www.lokku.com/jobs/intern.html

    > Is this for real?
    > Yes.
Uhm, ok. I mean, it looks good, but it's not like I needed to pinch myself afterwards.

Also:

    > You're in London 
    > That's where we are. We're not hiring remote workers.    
      We're looking forward to some intense and fast paced face-to-face 
      brainstorming sessions. You need to be in London.
There's a certain vibe of, you know, needing to be in London and not, say, Portugal in that phrasing.

Re: Come to London

#32

Post by lifeisstillgood »

mseebach wrote: post #28
lifeisstillgood wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Scarily thats true Single flight Krakow to London :130 Zloty or about 29 UKP One week travelcard zones 1-6 - 55 quid. That's utterly insane * http://www.ryanair.com/en/cheap-flights/krakow-to-london-sta... (Airport tax not included) * http://www.londontoolkit.com/briefing/travelcard.htm

Yes, London travel is pretty expensive, but: You don't need a travelcard unless you travel more than once back and forth every days - pay as you go is cheaper. Also, the price of a flight without the airport tax is irrelevant, as there is no way to not pay it (which is why it's so dishonest for Ryanair not to include it in the price). Finally, commuting by bike in London is completely feasible - cycling from Poland i…

Yeah but the view is prettier. :-)

Re: Come to London

#33

Post by rdouble »

My EU friends claim the pay is never enough at London startups to make moving worth their while. Then they say something about the weather.

Re: Come to London

#34

Post by disputin »

kolektiv wrote: post #27

Hmmm. I'm not one of the people you're really looking for here, but I could take a stab at reasons why I haven't been beating a path to your door... a) I haven't really heard of you. A few words here and there over the years, but how much do you get out there and tell the geek community you exist? I'm guessing it's specific to a few specific tech areas - which I haven't seen. b) You're in London, you talk about "work…

C. And worsening. I'm looking at moving in the opposite direction, from London to Spain/Portugal/France. I don't know why anyone who lives close enough to pop over to London for a break would want to live here. Unless they work in finance.

Re: Come to London

#35

Post by kaokun »

kolektiv wrote: post #27

Hmmm. I'm not one of the people you're really looking for here, but I could take a stab at reasons why I haven't been beating a path to your door... a) I haven't really heard of you. A few words here and there over the years, but how much do you get out there and tell the geek community you exist? I'm guessing it's specific to a few specific tech areas - which I haven't seen. b) You're in London, you talk about "work…

Thanks for your feedback kolektiv. Allow me to follow up on a few of your points:

a) If you have any advice on how to get our name out in the geek community then let me know. You are right that a lot of our community stuff is Perl or Geo focussed, but that's where our expertise is so that's where we can contribute the most. How well received would we be at a Python or Ruby event? Or are there more generic events we should be aware of?

b) When it comes to interns and more junior roles we really need to physically see you, every day, with face to face interaction. You just get more bandwidth and more effective communication that way.

Your point about working smart is 100% right. Internally we have 'work smart not hard' as one of our mantras, and that's not well reflected in the job ad at all. Thanks!

c) We don't say anything about money precisely because London is expensive and getting more so every year. One way to work smart is to write an intern job ad that we've hardly touched since 2006, despite the fact that intern salaries have increased consistently every year since then. We also like to be flexible based on people's experience - is it really worth putting on a job ad "£25K - 50K" when that's the range we're willing to consider for different candidates?

d) We're a small company of ~15 people with 4 engineers. That means if we hire you as our fifth engineer you're immediately making up 20% of the engineering team! You're damn right we want to make our interview process intense. I think it's fair to forewarn candidates about that.

Thanks again for your feedback. I hope you'll share some more, especially on point (a) about getting our name out there more.

Re: Come to London

#36

Post by dkrich »

Will this internship make me filthy rich? No. If it's money you're after go work in the sub-basement of a bank on an obscure back end system that no one will care about. If you want the chance to work on critical projects used by millions of people, to have a voice in designing complex systems, to have your ideas be valued, and to learn an exceptional amount in a very short period of time then this is the place for you.

Come again? I don't care how successful these guys are- I hope whoever crafted this page isn't judging the communication portion of the interview. To whom is this kind of language supposed to appeal?

Re: Come to London

#37

Post by kaokun »

mseebach wrote: post #31
kolektiv wrote: post #27

Hmmm. I'm not one of the people you're really looking for here, but I could take a stab at reasons why I haven't been beating a path to your door... a) I haven't really heard of you. A few words here and there over the years, but how much do you get out there and tell the geek community you exist? I'm guessing it's specific to a few specific tech areas - which I haven't seen. b) You're in London, you talk about "work…

http://www.lokku.com/jobs/intern.html > Is this for real? > Yes. Uhm, ok. I mean, it looks good, but it's not like I needed to pinch myself afterwards. Also: > You're in London > That's where we are. We're not hiring remote workers. We're looking forward to some intense and fast paced face-to-face brainstorming sessions. You need to be in London. There's a certain vibe of, you know, needing to be in London and not, s…

You're right on that second point, that needs re-wording. With that in there it's surprising we've had so many people from Europe, the US, Canada, and even non-London-UK apply for and get internships with us :P

Re: Come to London

#38

Post by kaokun »

dkrich wrote: post #36

Will this internship make me filthy rich? No. If it's money you're after go work in the sub-basement of a bank on an obscure back end system that no one will care about. If you want the chance to work on critical projects used by millions of people, to have a voice in designing complex systems, to have your ideas be valued, and to learn an exceptional amount in a very short period of time then this is the place for y…

Personally I love it... to each his or her own :-) It's verbose but information-rich, no?

Re: Come to London

#39

Post by rdouble »

dkrich wrote: post #36

Will this internship make me filthy rich? No. If it's money you're after go work in the sub-basement of a bank on an obscure back end system that no one will care about. If you want the chance to work on critical projects used by millions of people, to have a voice in designing complex systems, to have your ideas be valued, and to learn an exceptional amount in a very short period of time then this is the place for y…

It's a bit of a straw man. In NYC at least, many of the hedge funds have more "startup" like environments than the startups do.

Re: Come to London

#40

Post by namdnay »

xadoc wrote: post #14
freyfogle wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But won't that opportunity be there after they spend 2-3 fun years in London?

That is my point exactly to them, but it seems tougher to leave family and friends when you live comfortably and still save some cash. Here is a sample of excuses my Portuguese friends (SW Engineer related) gave me to not even consider job opportunities in London: - can't leave my family now, I have a girlfriend and don't want to leave her - my English is not good enough - I don't like the weather there (sounds stupi…

Why do you consider the climate to be a stupid reason? If your mood is, like many people, closely linked to the weather, if you love the sun, the sea and all the outdoor activities they bring, why wouldn't you stay? I can perfectly understand someone who chooses a less fulfilling professional life in order to see the sun every day. In fact many companies in the nicer parts of the world actively use the surrounding climate and geography as a recruitment argument.
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