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

urlahmed.com

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

#301

Post by augment_me »

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…

I agree but then the reality is that we are here now, so it's no longer ridiculous. So if you are that brilliant, you understand that there is no point of fighting the current, so to make your life easier and to get the job where you can feel fulfillment, you might have to adjust your CV to fit the reality. That is a part of the intelligence you need to adapt and has always been.

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

#302

Post by khafra »

socalgal2 wrote: post #186
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…

No idea about small companies but FAANG companies get > 1 million resume submission a year. You need to take that into account, the recruiters and other people in the chain do not have time to read your essay.

Thanks to modern technology, every advertised job opening now gets > 1 million resume submissions a year, no matter the size of the company.

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

#303

Post by Squarex »

margorczynski wrote: post #8

The most baffling thing is that even now the H1Bs, etc. are still pouring in. How can you say there is a shortage of IT talent and you need to import them where most grads can't find any work?

I find it strange. Any other qualified profession like doctors or lawyers would never let there an army of people from other countries to worsen their job market.

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

#304

Post by vkou »

lisbbb wrote: post #179
chis wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't really agree. I mean you scroll 1 paragraph down and it says he worked a Google Deepmind, that's really all I'd need to see. I think the market is just super hard for new grads. I've heard from people that had to apply to hundreds of companies and do 20+ interviews to get something. Totally agree that this guy could write books though. On some level I always wonder if it'll be better for society if the next g…

I don't see the point of applying for "hundreds of jobs." I think use the time to network with real people and forget about Indeed or whatever because those jobs are mostly fake anyways.

What kind of real people will the average new grad have in their network?

A bunch of other new grads, all in a cage match over entry level that don't exist?

Where are the nativists, and why aren't they demanding a $100,000/license tax on AI?

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

#305

Post by khafra »

MITSardine wrote: post #300

I just wanted to comment on the "out of distribution" solution the author proposes, partly for the young grads on this forum. Going "out of distribution" in abilities also means your job prospects go "out of distribution". When you specialize, so too does the kind of position you'd be the better fit for. This can mean radically fewer possibilities, and strong geographic restrictions. To give an example, my PhD topic…

Seems like the hope, for OOD workers, is that matching weird employer needs with weird employee capabilities is a belly-of-the-curve problem that's about to get automated away.

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

#306

Post by vkou »

coolThingsFirst wrote: post #224
windowshopping wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Which is, of course, the meat of the matter. Nobody 'needs' to hire a junior anymore.

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

#307

Post by aprilthird2021 »

coolThingsFirst wrote: post #224
windowshopping wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

> they REALLY are just not interested in hiring.

That is the point of OP's article yes, that and the idea that being "out of distribution" is increasingly important. This, mentioning his unique qualities (e.g. a Deep Mind internship) and not his similar qualities (everything else) would probably be pertinent

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

#308

Post by khafra »

YZF wrote: post #234
urlahmed wrote: post #175

Hey all, OP here (author of the blog post, someone else submitted it ). I wrote this a few days ago mostly out of frustration and honestly did not expect it to go anywhere. It is pretty surreal to wake up and see it on HN with so much discussion. Thank you for reading and for all the comments, messages, and thoughtful critiques. I am currently looking for roles that sit at the intersection of ML, product, and researc…

Good luck with your search. Free advice from the Internet- That role you're describing is pretty rare for new grads. You'd normally look for someone with experience and a track record before trusting them with open ended work or product management roles. Start by being a "junior" builder in a team, then as you prove yourself you'll be given broader scope, this can take a while. There are teams building things that ne…

Your free advice is well-taken and apropos in 2015 and before. The major point of the essay is that junior builders--e.g., people doing tasks that are standardized and understood well enough to automate--no longer get hired. Either we get a new way to identify the ability to complete open-ended work, or the tech sector suffers a succession failure (or everybody gets replaced by robots before the current generation of senior experts retires).

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

#309

Post by barrenko »

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…

With this in mind, I'd like to propose an alternative to OP. E.g. he may be extremely unlucky in the following 7 months in his job hunt, and tech is not what it used to be.

If the uses these 7 months to focus on his writing on the other hand... We'll need people with a soul and technical chops to cover this apocalypse (using it in the original sense of the word).

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

#310

Post by rvz »

nradov wrote: post #172
phatfish wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish Labour would impose any regulation on the tech industry, let alone "heavy". The UK is running sacred of Trump and will do nothing to stop the US tech giants avoiding tax and causing social unrest.

Why hasn't the UK been able to create any local tech giants? Would more regulations imposed by a Labour government help to turn that around?

Because the UK does not care about its own technology businesses and simply offshores the work overseas and even when they don't, they end up selling off the company to a foreign buyer.

> Would more regulations imposed by a Labour government help to turn that around?

That would accelerate the decline.

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