We Don't Have a Talent Shortage. We Have a Sucker Shortage • Hacker News Board

Re: We Don't Have a Talent Shortage. We Have a Sucker Shortage

#81

Post by pm90 » Sat, Apr 20, 2019, 6:20 PM UTC

robertAngst wrote: post #56

Aloha wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I see this all the time too, they offer 50-60% of market rate and wonder why they get no takers.

I imagine the people that would accept that are 'lifers'. Where they get comfy, rationalize that they know their job, and the company never has to spend more than 98k on this person for the next 35 years. Weirdly enough, it seems like Fortune 500 pays best for the brightest and they have them working on high level concepts and paying suppliers to perform the nitty gritty engineering. I don't quite understand the rati…

Its not that hard if you've worked in corporate america.

Executives like to work with people that they "like", so its frequently people who went to similar schools, have a similar sense of humor, don't say stupid shit etc. Even if these people are totally ineffective and have no skills, they will keep getting hired. Then, they make use of the new labor markets, where you can just outsource everything and hire consultants/contractors to do the actual implementation.

If the project succeeds, the hired person is a star and gets showered with money, poached by other firms where they try to replicate a similar, completely short sighted way of building business value.

If the project fail, blame the contractors get new ones.

Re: We Don't Have a Talent Shortage. We Have a Sucker Shortage

#82

Post by Aloha » Sat, Apr 20, 2019, 6:20 PM UTC

loteck wrote: post #40

As an employee, it is valuable to me that my company will not hire someone who doesn't think our business does something important ("get over yourselves, you're not curing cancer"), or who thinks the right way to ask business decision questions is to ask if "you're morons", or who has a problem with the company asking very basic probing questions, such as confirming you've thought through the challenge of changing fr…

I so dislike the ball-gargling exercise of "why do you want to work here?"

It's often a "well, I need a job, you're hiring, and what you guys are doing looks at least marginally interesting to me" - I ought not need to find whatever product/service/market they're doing/in inspiring - I should just want to do it for the pay offered.

Re: We Don't Have a Talent Shortage. We Have a Sucker Shortage

#83

Post by sokoloff » Sat, Apr 20, 2019, 6:20 PM UTC

caprese wrote: post #15

> "We only hire the best" of the people looking for jobs........ ?

And who weren't hired by the other 100 companies who also "only hire the top 5% [of people they get resumes from]"...

Re: We Don't Have a Talent Shortage. We Have a Sucker Shortage

#84

Post by hinkley » Sat, Apr 20, 2019, 6:21 PM UTC

I skimmed but there’s a kind of sucker I think he missed:

“Yes, ten other companies are doing the exact same thing our company does, and there is open source that almost does what we want but we’ve hired fifty developers to reinvent that wheel because reasons.”

There are too many people out there who could cut and paste most of my job descriptions onto their resume. That’s only partly a failure on my part. Most of my bosses don’t value my specialized skills (or only 3 months out of the year), and there are too many people repeating my work or vice versa.

There are a lot of custom CMS systems out there. If we refused to build them or insisted on making them thinner layers over standard modules, we would have plenty of people to go do other things. And I bet HN could name at least three other tropes that repeat all over the industry like that.

Re: We Don't Have a Talent Shortage. We Have a Sucker Shortage

#85

Post by pault » Sat, Apr 20, 2019, 6:21 PM UTC

golergka wrote: post #37

The author treats requirements as necessary - but they never are. I think that at most positions I applied to and got offer for, I haven't checked at least half of those "ticks". In the end, nobody treats them as if they're really required.

It's doubly self sabotaging because some of the most talented juniors and mid-level engineers I've worked with are the types that will say "oh, I can only do half of those things, I probably can't get that job anyway".

Re: We Don't Have a Talent Shortage. We Have a Sucker Shortage

#86

Post by ivanbakel » Sat, Apr 20, 2019, 6:23 PM UTC

loteck wrote: post #69

toomuchtodo wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very few businesses actually matter, despite your opinion of the business. If your argument is you only want to work with other suckers (who “care” about the business over comp and tangible compensation), I suppose that’s an opinion that could be held. Is that a rational opinion to hold? I don’t come to work because I care about your business, I care because you pay me. I’d like to work with others who have the same…

Successful businesses support the livelihoods of all of the families that depend on that business's continued success, including employees and clients. All such businesses matter very much to those people, regardless of their industry.

An incredible achievement matched only by literally every other employer, and requiring the level of emotional investment immediately supplied by any employee with recurring rent/mortgage payments.

In other words, "get over yourselves, you're not curing cancer". If you need employees to "care", because the company supports their livelihood - don't worry, they already do. If you need them to "care" more than that, you need a better justification.

Re: We Don't Have a Talent Shortage. We Have a Sucker Shortage

#87

Post by kakwa_ » Sat, Apr 20, 2019, 6:23 PM UTC

EduardoBautista wrote: post #48

loteck wrote: post #40

As an employee, it is valuable to me that my company will not hire someone who doesn't think our business does something important ("get over yourselves, you're not curing cancer"), or who thinks the right way to ask business decision questions is to ask if "you're morons", or who has a problem with the company asking very basic probing questions, such as confirming you've thought through the challenge of changing fr…

Well, I believe there is a surplus of companies who think they are doing something important. Can you imagine answering "Why do you want to work here" if you apply to a company like Marlboro? Sometimes requiring people to believe in what your company is doing is not that important because the majority of startups just aren't that interesting. Accept that people work for money, not because they believe in your company…

A lot of startups and companies are centered around advertisement. And ads & martketing are not exactly the most popular thing in the world.

Disclaimer: my job is basically making sure our customers can send you commercial email spa... sorry, interesting product offers from their line of business. It's also making sure the tracking is properly working and detect if opened the email/clicked on a link.

It's really hard to get motivated about that. One, ecologically minded for example, could even see it as damaging for the environment as it pushes people to buy things they don't really need.

However, it's also where a lot of the the money is, and also some of the interesting technical challenges, for which an engineer could be motivated.

Re: We Don't Have a Talent Shortage. We Have a Sucker Shortage

#88

Post by mattnewport » Sat, Apr 20, 2019, 6:23 PM UTC

sonnyblarney wrote: post #46

Should note: there is quite a schism in 'market value' - it's a hard one to nail down. It's a range and it depends on a lot of factors. There are people who just want a decent job with decent pay and a decent place to work. They will do consistently decent work for stability, neat stuff to work on. They are not heavy negotiators, and maybe don't realize they could make '40% more elsewhere' - or frankly are not willin…

If the positions are being filled and the offers accepted then why would anyone be complaining about a "talent shortage"?

Re: We Don't Have a Talent Shortage. We Have a Sucker Shortage

#89

Post by marcinzm » Sat, Apr 20, 2019, 6:24 PM UTC

Aloha wrote: post #18

burtonator wrote: post #5

I had a recruiter call me a year ago with what sounded like a really amazing offer. Working for a well funded startup on a problem in which I happen to be a domain expert. They're aren't many expects in my field with my background and skill set and they said the right things to get me to interview (compensation won't be a concern). Anyway... Went in for 4-5 interviews. Took me about 10 hours in total to interview wit…

Yeah, I see this all the time too, they offer 50-60% of market rate and wonder why they get no takers.

The ones who are good salesman do get takers. I don't really know why or how but they get them. Not the greatest engineers but also not bottom feeders. It's surreal. Granted it's usually people who don't realize their own worth or are naive about how much equity is actually going to be worth.

Re: We Don't Have a Talent Shortage. We Have a Sucker Shortage

#90

Post by AznHisoka » Sat, Apr 20, 2019, 6:25 PM UTC

pault wrote: post #64

OJFord wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally I'd see that as much more attractive for any not already pretty much 'made it' startup. It's a nearer term reward, and a more direct incentive (not just because it's nearer, but because `profit => reward` vs. `profit => ceteris paribus 'worth more' => might IPO/sell => reward`).

How many new companies are profitable, and if they are, why would you want to work for a new company that isn't plowing all of its profits back into research, product development, and growth?

Because I get a share of their profits? If they plow all of its profits back into R&D, assuming I got no equity, what do i get as a reward? A potential chance to say i worked for a company that IPO’d? More coworkers?

Profit sharing means money in the pocket for me. Actual hard, green cash.