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Dear HN "Who's Hiring" responders

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Re: Dear HN "Who's Hiring" responders

#61

Post by cdjk »

niggler wrote: post #48
ig1 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who's recruited heavily at the entry level, you're mistaken. Even substantial number of computer science graduates lack the capability of basic coding (i.e. "here's the detailed specification of this function; go implement it"). There is substantially more demand than available talent. SF, New York, London, Amsterdam, Berlin, etc. all have huge talent shortages. Even developer markets that were relatively…

"Even substantial number of computer science graduates lack the capability of basic coding" You misread my statement. A competent mechanical engineer graduate attending college in the past 5 to 10 years has more CS experience and coding ability than most CS graduates. The talent shortage, as it were, comes from restricting your view to the CS and CE fields. To review, this is what i wrote (emphasis added): "Many peop…

I think there might be some selection bias going on there. I know plenty of (non-software/computer) engineers who know very little about programming. The non-software/computer engineers who are interested in programming may be as good as or better than the average CS major, however.

I might agree if you change your statement to "Many people, especially coming from an engineering background and who have an interest in programming, have the requisite programming and computer science experience to do what you need."

Re: Dear HN "Who's Hiring" responders

#62

Post by EwanG »

As one additional data point to consider, anyone who has had their information posted to any of the job boards, or ever submitted once to a consulting company, gets dozens of solicitations a day where it is obvious that the person (if not robo mailer) saw a keyword and thought it wouldn't cost anything to send a "personal" request for you to reply. Even if you are a 100% match you often won't hear anything back.

Given that, I can't say I'm surprised that many people feel that what's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander...

Re: Dear HN "Who's Hiring" responders

#63

Post by tracker1 »

alxndr wrote: post #60
gfodor wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a difference between "low effort" and rude. Not taking 30 seconds to actually comprehend the position and have enough background to actually write a meaningful email basically would rule you out of me hiring you since it says a lot about how you would be to work with.

You should see the kind of messages I get from recruiters.

Most of which I doubt have even glanced at my resume. From the job listings outside of programming, and those for entry level positions, to those well below what would be a reasonable salary for anyone in the area they are looking (Usually coastal cities for less than is common in Phoenix).

Re: Dear HN "Who's Hiring" responders

#64

Post by tracker1 »

calinet6 wrote: post #23
niggler wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is absolutely a hirers' market if the market is for a low-level coder. Many people, especially coming from an engineering background, have the requisite programming and computer science experience to do what you need. It's a hirees' market at the rockstar level, as always.

Rockstars are a myth. So are low-level engineers who "know what they're doing." Hire smart people who can learn new things instead of resume bullet points and/or mythological creatures.

"Rockstars" may be a myth... but developers who are exponentially more effective than others, with more maintainable code are not.

Re: Dear HN "Who's Hiring" responders

#65

Post by jaredsohn »

niggler wrote: post #20
Udo wrote: post #13

I was absolutely with you until but it is a hirers' market which, even if it is (and that's debatable), is not the correct reason for anyone to behave differently. In this case, applicants should not be reading the actual postings because it's a hirers' market and hirers are now somehow considered royalty. Instead, applicants should be reading them because it's basic curtesy and not doing it ends up wasting everybody…

It is absolutely a hirers' market if the market is for a low-level coder. Many people, especially coming from an engineering background, have the requisite programming and computer science experience to do what you need. It's a hirees' market at the rockstar level, as always.

I'm confused as to what is meant by "low-level coder" here. Is it programmers who work with C or assembly and maybe on embedded systems or programmers who lack much ability? (My intuition and a google search suggests the former, although many comments and the contrast with 'rockstar' (unless that refers to another programming domain :)) suggests the latter.

Edit: It is especially weird when the post then refers to people with an engineering background, since those people are more likely to be working on low-level embedded coding.

Re: Dear HN "Who's Hiring" responders

#66

Post by michaelochurch »

Udo wrote: post #13

I was absolutely with you until but it is a hirers' market which, even if it is (and that's debatable), is not the correct reason for anyone to behave differently. In this case, applicants should not be reading the actual postings because it's a hirers' market and hirers are now somehow considered royalty. Instead, applicants should be reading them because it's basic curtesy and not doing it ends up wasting everybody…

It's a bilateral matching problem, not a clear buyer's or seller's market.

The first part of the story is convexity, also known as the "10x phenomenon": http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2013/03/14/gervais-macle... . This is generally a good thing, but it's bad in the context of rapid scaling (which is what most VC-funded startups are trying to do) because convexity creates a need to fill specialized job queries fast. In a saner world, companies could hire a generally smart person and give her 6 months to train up. Most VC-funded startups either can't afford that, or don't think they can. They want "plug and play" and that necessitates purple squirrel queries, which creates a job market that leaves them just as unhappy as employees.

It sucks for both sides, but the upshot is that when you get a job, you're generally paid well (perhaps to compensate for the wonky purple-squirrel queries, companies going out of existence, and high turnover).

Incidentally, as bad as our job search latency is, I think it's worse for regular managers at the same pay level. In managerland, the going assumption is that it takes 1 month to find a new job per $20k; for us, it seems to be 1 week per $20k if actively searching. The biggest mess for us is the stereotype that makes active searching dishonorable because "good developers never look for jobs" (which isn't true).

Re: Dear HN "Who's Hiring" responders

#67

Post by eli »

Poor cover letters are really one of my pet peeves.

Dear Applicants: Why would you send me what is very obviously the same cover_letter.doc that you send everyone? What do you think it says about you as a candidate if you couldn't be bothered to replace "Dear Hiring Manager" with my name? And that little informal note in the body of your email ("Hi, saw your ad on X. See my attached cover letter and resume"), that effectively becomes your cover letter. It's the first thing I read when you apply. Make me want to open your resume right away.

So what should you write in the cover letter? Not single right answer, but here's an idea: Most jobs--especially at startups--are really about solving a problem that the hiring company has. Sure, the job title might say "DevOps Ninja" but if you read carefully you can figure out that what's really going on is the company has grown rapidly and needs to get serious about its messy, hacked-together infrastructure. Address this in your cover letter. Talk about how organized you are and how you once recabled a data center in a weekend, etc.

Re: Dear HN "Who's Hiring" responders

#68

Post by dbieber »

jaredsohn wrote: post #65
niggler wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is absolutely a hirers' market if the market is for a low-level coder. Many people, especially coming from an engineering background, have the requisite programming and computer science experience to do what you need. It's a hirees' market at the rockstar level, as always.

I'm confused as to what is meant by "low-level coder" here. Is it programmers who work with C or assembly and maybe on embedded systems or programmers who lack much ability? (My intuition and a google search suggests the former, although many comments and the contrast with 'rockstar' (unless that refers to another programming domain :)) suggests the latter. Edit: It is especially weird when the post then refers to pe…

niggler is referring to a low level of talent, though the word choice was less than ideal.

Re: Dear HN "Who's Hiring" responders

#69

Post by waterlesscloud »

lhnz wrote: post #47
calinet6 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rockstars are a myth. So are low-level engineers who "know what they're doing." Hire smart people who can learn new things instead of resume bullet points and/or mythological creatures.

Smart people who can learn new things are the rockstars. (Even though in actuality this term is a joke turned into a marketing term to attract confident developers.)

"Smart people who can learn new things"

That seems like a pretty low bar.

Re: Dear HN "Who's Hiring" responders

#70

Post by pekk »

tracker1 wrote: post #64
calinet6 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rockstars are a myth. So are low-level engineers who "know what they're doing." Hire smart people who can learn new things instead of resume bullet points and/or mythological creatures.

"Rockstars" may be a myth... but developers who are exponentially more effective than others, with more maintainable code are not.

Exponentially more effective, meaning that what Joe writes in 3 years Jim can write in one day?
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