This is an important point. A LOT of the pathologies we decry in the industry are massively amplified, if not created, by the recruiter industrial complex and (to a lesser extent) HR.
Credentialism. Risk aversion. Hiring people to repeat past achievements.
Credentialism. Risk aversion. Hiring people to repeat past achievements.
The idea that there is such a thing as a "Javascript engineer" or a "rails engineer".
Chasing a few Stanford/MIT students like mad, ignoring great state schools.
Keywords. Title obsessions. The weird "bar" and aversion to giving someone a chance to prove themselves.
Chasing a few Stanford/MIT students like mad, ignoring great state schools.
Keywords. Title obsessions. The weird "bar" and aversion to giving someone a chance to prove themselves.
The recruiting industry is seeking relentlessly to commoditize people and reduce them to a collection of traits.
So much of getting hired nowadays consists of tricks to bypass recruiting and get to a human being, who might see potential and give you a shot.
So much of getting hired nowadays consists of tricks to bypass recruiting and get to a human being, who might see potential and give you a shot.
I've bitched before (honeycomb.io/blog/observati…) about how much employers seem to be looking to find your flaws and weaknesses.
Why? We aren't hiring you for your weaknesses, we want you for your strengths. Show me what you're ✨good✨ at.
Why? We aren't hiring you for your weaknesses, we want you for your strengths. Show me what you're ✨good✨ at.
I consider it a mild insult if someone wants to hire me to do what I have done before. I want to be hired for my potential, I want to master *new* skills, you know? And I want to work with others who feel that way too.
If all you see in me is my last job, repeated for you, that tells me a lot about how you see me and my potential.
After I left Facebook, having had a pretty famously great run of things, I got a pile of offers to do *deeply* uninspiring things. Run a site, run an ops team.
After I left Facebook, having had a pretty famously great run of things, I got a pile of offers to do *deeply* uninspiring things. Run a site, run an ops team.
My favorite was the one who magnanimously offered to let me come on as a manager right away, and skip putting time in an ops engineer first. (Gee.. thanks?)
Anyway. It's funny now, in retrospect. Probably won't be next time I'm looking for a gig and being told "gosh, we just don't think you have the experience for a director level role" 🙃🧨
