10 ms·

Bigger, name brand tech companies have way more applicants than they can accept so they have a crude recruiter funnel that is tossing out resumes for any reason

by ansy 5y ago

Bigger, name brand tech companies have way more applicants than they can accept so they have a crude recruiter funnel that is tossing out resumes for any reason they can find. They're literally trying to turn thousands of resumes from hundreds of schools into curated packets of dozens of candidates. But recruiters don't know a thing about software engineering. At best they can keyword match a few buzzwords they got from some VP of engineering who hasn't actually coded anything in 20 years (if ever). If you don't have the right 3-4 signals (school and program prestige, internship number and prestige, GPA) it's in the bin you go. The actual front line hiring managers won't even see your resume. Try applying to smaller companies. Smaller companies aren't going to land the candidate from a top 10 school who already interned at multiple Fortune 500 companies. But small shops need to hire talent too. They're digging deeper and they have to read the resumes more closely. There isn't much of an HR department, and the hiring manager might be sifting through the raw resumes themselves. If you still want to land a big company job, you're going to need to bypass the HR filter by finding a direct line to the hiring managers. Maybe you have some friends or alumni you've met who are at the company and can refer you directly to a team. You can meet these people at networking events, recruiting fairs, or other social activities. Creativity, determination, and luck play a big factor.

NetToolKit 5y ago
> Try applying to smaller companies. Smaller companies aren't going to land the candidate from a top 10 school who already interned at multiple Fortune 500 companies. But small shops need to hire talent too. They're digging deeper and they have to read the resumes more closely. There isn't much of an HR department, and the hiring manager might be sifting through the raw resumes themselves. This describes my situation when I'm hiring entry-level developers: I, the hiring manager, am reading each application that comes in. However, I think this is probably more true for smaller companies that are not venture-backed; venture-backed companies probably have enough funding to hire senior developers (and are probably more rushed to do so). For the OP: I'm not hiring developers at the moment, but if you'd like to send me your resume (you can reach me through my profile), I can offer some feedback.
- AJ1998 5y ago
  The offer you handed out was not for me but is it okay if I send you my resumé as well? I am in the same boat as OP except it’s been a month since I graduated.
  - NetToolKit 5y ago
    Sure, no problem. I actually would not be able to distinguish between you two, since the OP used a throwaway handle.
- Hermitian909 5y ago
  As a note: With recent spike in salaries, many venture backed companies don't have the cash to pay the salaries of good seniors. Spoken with a dozen founders in SF facing this problem over the past two months.
  - epicureanideal 5y ago
    This doesn’t seem possible. Startups are raising Series A rounds of 15-20 million routinely. A quarter of that would cover a reasonable number of senior engineers for a year or two. But just in case it is possible… Maybe they should try offering meaningful stock packages, rather than 0.1% and less? Meaningful as in 0.5 to 1% for a senior engineer, 4-6% for a manager, until salary improves. Also, try offering stock with no vesting cliff. It’s not smart to trade salary for stock when you might leave before the cliff through no fault of your own. So smart candidates often round the value of stock to $0, especially before the cliff.
    - sokoloff 5y ago
      You shouldn’t be giving managers 6-8x what you offer senior engineers at a startup, at least not in a startup where engineering matters. If smart candidates are rounding the grant value down to zero, smart companies will not seek to give grants that are multiples of the current size. (That’s giving away $100 bills to someone who values them at less than your cost.) When you’ve raised a $20M round and have an employee pool that is 10-20% in total, you don’t have many 1% grants to give…and you have exactly zero 6% grants to give.
throwawayjobs 5y ago
> Smaller companies aren't going to land the candidate from a top 10 school who already interned at multiple Fortune 500 companies One thing I have worried about though is they might require someone who is more experienced. I have noticed there are not many small companies on my school's job board. Would you know of a place where I could find these? Another commenter mentioned checking the website of VC firms for start-ups. I think I will give that a shot. I appreciate all the help from everyone in the thread, I am reading all the comments.
- ansy 5y ago
  > I have noticed there are not many small companies on my school's job board. The few small to medium sized companies on your school's job board are actually great opportunities. Those companies don't have the resources to recruit many places so they might not even be looking at any other schools or programs. There is probably a very strong alumni connection to your school or program. They likely know exactly what they're getting with those new grads and wouldn't be recruiting there if they weren't comfortable with that. > Would you know of a place where I could find these? One problem with small companies is that they tend to not advertise their job openings everywhere. You can usually find different ones everywhere you look. The worse they are at advertising the job, the less competition you have and the more likely you resume will be considered. So it does pay to look beyond any one job board. > One thing I have worried about though is they might require someone who is more experienced. This varies company by company. Some companies founded by new grads or college drop outs exclusively hire new grads. Some big companies exclusively hire experienced engineers. And there's everything in between. If they have a job posting for entry level or new grads, go for it.
jjav 5y ago
> They're literally trying to turn thousands of resumes from hundreds of schools into curated packets of dozens of candidates. This would indicate that there is a severe oversupply of candidates eager to work in this industry. Which may well be true, but conflicts with the narrative that there is a severe shortage of people.
- ARandomerDude 5y ago
  > This would indicate that there is a severe oversupply of candidates eager to work in this industry. Not the industry as a whole, but certainly there is an overabundance of people trying to land a job at very specific companies (FAANG, and a handful of others). There would be an industry oversupply if this situation were widespread, but it isn't. The industry has a shortage, certain famous companies are the exception rather than the rule.
- epicureanideal 5y ago
  There is an oversupply of candidates, as evidenced by the fact that engineers have very little bargaining power about the terms of employment with any particular company. The negotiation for 90% of engineers is very one sided.
  - habibur 5y ago
    And then how does that compare with other jobs? That possibly can be said for negotiation for 90% employees in any field too.
- filoleg 5y ago
  > Which may well be true, but conflicts with the narrative that there is a severe shortage of people. It might seem this way, because the narrative is almost intentionally simplified to the point of being vague enough to support almost any narrative. Shortage is real, but what often is omitted is the fact that it is the shortage at the senior level. At the entry level, shortage isn't really a thing. It isn't an insane oversupply either, unless we are talking the few popular FAANGs, but it isn't a shortage at the entry level.
zelphirkalt 5y ago
Also in a smaller company, chances are, that you need to touch a larger variety of the systems, as people are not in as specialized roles. At least in my experience. This is great for people starting out, because they will learn a lot on the job.
rcfaj7obqrkayhn 5y ago
too bad a lot of smaller companies try to hire like they're big companies and hand out unrealistic assignments for the applicants

by ansy 5y ago

NetToolKit 5y ago

> Try applying to smaller companies. Smaller companies aren't going to land the candidate from a top 10 school who already interned at multiple Fortune 500 companies. But small shops need to hire talent too. They're digging deeper and they have to read the resumes more closely. There isn't much of an HR department, and the hiring manager might be sifting through the raw resumes themselves. This describes my situation when I'm hiring entry-level developers: I, the hiring manager, am reading each application that comes in. However, I think this is probably more true for smaller companies that are not venture-backed; venture-backed companies probably have enough funding to hire senior developers (and are probably more rushed to do so). For the OP: I'm not hiring developers at the moment, but if you'd like to send me your resume (you can reach me through my profile), I can offer some feedback.

AJ1998 5y ago
The offer you handed out was not for me but is it okay if I send you my resumé as well? I am in the same boat as OP except it’s been a month since I graduated.
- NetToolKit 5y ago
  Sure, no problem. I actually would not be able to distinguish between you two, since the OP used a throwaway handle.
Hermitian909 5y ago
As a note: With recent spike in salaries, many venture backed companies don't have the cash to pay the salaries of good seniors. Spoken with a dozen founders in SF facing this problem over the past two months.
- epicureanideal 5y ago
  This doesn’t seem possible. Startups are raising Series A rounds of 15-20 million routinely. A quarter of that would cover a reasonable number of senior engineers for a year or two. But just in case it is possible… Maybe they should try offering meaningful stock packages, rather than 0.1% and less? Meaningful as in 0.5 to 1% for a senior engineer, 4-6% for a manager, until salary improves. Also, try offering stock with no vesting cliff. It’s not smart to trade salary for stock when you might leave before the cliff through no fault of your own. So smart candidates often round the value of stock to $0, especially before the cliff.
  - sokoloff 5y ago
    You shouldn’t be giving managers 6-8x what you offer senior engineers at a startup, at least not in a startup where engineering matters. If smart candidates are rounding the grant value down to zero, smart companies will not seek to give grants that are multiples of the current size. (That’s giving away $100 bills to someone who values them at less than your cost.) When you’ve raised a $20M round and have an employee pool that is 10-20% in total, you don’t have many 1% grants to give…and you have exactly zero 6% grants to give.

throwawayjobs 5y ago

> Smaller companies aren't going to land the candidate from a top 10 school who already interned at multiple Fortune 500 companies One thing I have worried about though is they might require someone who is more experienced. I have noticed there are not many small companies on my school's job board. Would you know of a place where I could find these? Another commenter mentioned checking the website of VC firms for start-ups. I think I will give that a shot. I appreciate all the help from everyone in the thread, I am reading all the comments.

ansy 5y ago
> I have noticed there are not many small companies on my school's job board. The few small to medium sized companies on your school's job board are actually great opportunities. Those companies don't have the resources to recruit many places so they might not even be looking at any other schools or programs. There is probably a very strong alumni connection to your school or program. They likely know exactly what they're getting with those new grads and wouldn't be recruiting there if they weren't comfortable with that. > Would you know of a place where I could find these? One problem with small companies is that they tend to not advertise their job openings everywhere. You can usually find different ones everywhere you look. The worse they are at advertising the job, the less competition you have and the more likely you resume will be considered. So it does pay to look beyond any one job board. > One thing I have worried about though is they might require someone who is more experienced. This varies company by company. Some companies founded by new grads or college drop outs exclusively hire new grads. Some big companies exclusively hire experienced engineers. And there's everything in between. If they have a job posting for entry level or new grads, go for it.

jjav 5y ago

> They're literally trying to turn thousands of resumes from hundreds of schools into curated packets of dozens of candidates. This would indicate that there is a severe oversupply of candidates eager to work in this industry. Which may well be true, but conflicts with the narrative that there is a severe shortage of people.

ARandomerDude 5y ago
> This would indicate that there is a severe oversupply of candidates eager to work in this industry. Not the industry as a whole, but certainly there is an overabundance of people trying to land a job at very specific companies (FAANG, and a handful of others). There would be an industry oversupply if this situation were widespread, but it isn't. The industry has a shortage, certain famous companies are the exception rather than the rule.
epicureanideal 5y ago
There is an oversupply of candidates, as evidenced by the fact that engineers have very little bargaining power about the terms of employment with any particular company. The negotiation for 90% of engineers is very one sided.
- habibur 5y ago
  And then how does that compare with other jobs? That possibly can be said for negotiation for 90% employees in any field too.
filoleg 5y ago
> Which may well be true, but conflicts with the narrative that there is a severe shortage of people. It might seem this way, because the narrative is almost intentionally simplified to the point of being vague enough to support almost any narrative. Shortage is real, but what often is omitted is the fact that it is the shortage at the senior level. At the entry level, shortage isn't really a thing. It isn't an insane oversupply either, unless we are talking the few popular FAANGs, but it isn't a shortage at the entry level.

zelphirkalt 5y ago

Also in a smaller company, chances are, that you need to touch a larger variety of the systems, as people are not in as specialized roles. At least in my experience. This is great for people starting out, because they will learn a lot on the job.

rcfaj7obqrkayhn 5y ago

too bad a lot of smaller companies try to hire like they're big companies and hand out unrealistic assignments for the applicants