Live data from Hacker News

Custom resume from someone who wanted to work at Airbnb (2015)

nina4airbnb.com

51–60 of 108 posts

Re: Custom resume from someone who wanted to work at Airbnb (2015)

#51

The bigger story here is that given that she's clearly way above average at what she does - she couldn't find a job for a year and did this as a last resort - an act of desperation. Which also did not work out - she ended up with Elance. If we measure success by job vs no job, then yes, otherwise... eh... People 'say' they want creativity, passion, etc - but in reality, most people who work in successful companies di…

Regarding dumb luck, that's exactly how I got my first real job out of grad school. I had specialized in kind of a risky way. It would have made me less generally employable, but more desirable in the sector in which I wanted a job.

Looked like it wasn't going to pan out. I was totally unemployed in a bad market with skills not generally in demand. Student loans were looming and I was just about out of cash.

In a stroke of dumb luck, I went to the grocery to get a 6 pack of beer, a luxury at the time. On the way out, ran into my former boss from an internship who didn't even live in that area of town. She said they just got an opening and I would be perfect, as she knew my skillset.

Weeks later I started my career at my dream job.

Re: Custom resume from someone who wanted to work at Airbnb (2015)

#54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The blog post is worth a read. This part was especially interesting to me: the person interviewing me was saying he couldn’t contextualize my experience because i “hadn’t worked at facebook or google or studied at stanford”.

That's awful if true. Especially as a direct quote. So much for being inclusive.

SV is far from inclusive. Pedigree is every thing out here. Else, you're just in the 'minor' leagues trying to break in.

Re: Custom resume from someone who wanted to work at Airbnb (2015)

#58
post #46

The bigger story here is that given that she's clearly way above average at what she does - she couldn't find a job for a year and did this as a last resort - an act of desperation. Which also did not work out - she ended up with Elance. If we measure success by job vs no job, then yes, otherwise... eh... People 'say' they want creativity, passion, etc - but in reality, most people who work in successful companies di…

While what you say can often be true, it is a sign of weak leadership. Strong leaders promote the best people and thereby lift themselves and the whole team. Bad leaders see strong subordinates as threats to their power and suffocate the team. Not saying there aren’t a LOT of bad leaders out there, but what you describe isn’t a law everywhere. The bigger point I think is your first sentence. She’s way above average a…

To summarise your first paragraph #notallmanagers

Re: Custom resume from someone who wanted to work at Airbnb (2015)

#59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The blog post is worth a read. This part was especially interesting to me: the person interviewing me was saying he couldn’t contextualize my experience because i “hadn’t worked at facebook or google or studied at stanford”.

What in hell does that even MEAN? "contextualize an experience?"

It means placing an experience in context, and being able to relate it to other contexts.

For example, if you know someone who works with PHP then contextualizing their experience could follow these steps: understand that PHP is a programming language, look at their code and see it is well architected, decide to hire them even despite inexperience in Ruby because they have the core skills.

Being unable to contextualize experience isn't the same as not having emotional empathy. It is being unable to have an actionable intellectual grasp of a topic.

Re: Custom resume from someone who wanted to work at Airbnb (2015)

#60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What in hell does that even MEAN? "contextualize an experience?"

Not sure, but I think it means they couldn't make an apples-to-apples comparison. To them, they wanted some Coca Cola and instead were presented with a pair of Air Jordans. Sure, they are nice shoes, but they wanted a Coke.

Actually, they got a Pepsi. Tastes the same, affects the body the same, the only thing different was the packaging. And to be honest, if they didn't hire her because of the interviewers bias then she may have dodged a bullet- that kind of thing really raises a red flag for what a companies culture really values. And now I'll be more wary if looking for a job at AirBnb
Post reply on HN