4 ms·

This entire post gives me "the ick" as the kids say nowadays. The author is revealing lots of information about the company's infrastructure, given to him in an

by hnarn 4y ago

This entire post gives me "the ick" as the kids say nowadays. The author is revealing lots of information about the company's infrastructure, given to him in an interview, as well as directly linking to the personal LinkedIn-profiles of the people he is name-dropping. I don't know what to call this. Aggressive networking, maybe? First of all, three interviews is nothing, and secondly, the "lessons learned" are trivial to say the least: 1. If you're not X, don't apply for X positions. 2. Don't apply to jobs you don't want, and don't question the company's existence 3. Network I'm sorry to say this but the one thing I get out of this post is that this person is bad at compromise, is rough around the edges and plays fast and loose. I can see why any of those things alone would be a red flag in an initial interview with someone you know almost nothing about.

paulcarroty 4y ago
> The author is revealing lots of information about the company's infrastructure, given to him in an interview That info should be public by design anyway.
- hnarn 4y ago
  That's not the point. Of course any information given to a candidate in an interview should not be privileged -- the point is that the fact that this is how things "should be" does not mean that it's an implicit agreement to share the information you get with the general public. This should be obvious to anyone.
  - a4isms 4y ago
    I’ve been hiring programmers for three decades. What is obvious to me is that we play a game where there is a posted set of rules such as “Don’t talk shit about the companies that interview you and definitely don’t reveal what they told you in an interview.” We punish people for breaking these rules. But also, insiders break these rules all the time, quietly, either in “whisper networks,” or on web sites launched by startups that give people a way to post what questions companies ask when hiring, what biases various interviewers have, and so forth. What we’re punishing this person for when talking about their “oversharing” is not being enough of an insider to know the right way to play the hidden game.
  - ghaff 4y ago
    A lot of things that go on within companies are not some deep dark trade secret that you're violating some confidence by talking about with friends. However, if I were on an interview committee, and saw a blog post sharing the blow by blow complete with names of the people involved, I'd consider it at least rather weird. I certainly wouldn't have consented to having my name made public in that way.
- arnvald 4y ago
  Possibly, but I don't think it's up to the post author to decide.
- exitb 4y ago
  It highlights the tendency to overshare, thus hurts his future job prospects. Employers are typically hoping their employees don't play journalists, publicly writing a story about the company on the side.
Manfred 4y ago
The name dropping feels really weird, it almost makes it feel like a personal diary that should never have been published.
veidr 4y ago
Hmm, I read your comment and expected to agree with it, but... ¯\_(ಠ_ಠ)_/¯ I found it mildly interesting, and not very scandalous. I mean, sure, when we are interviewing/hiring people, I suspect almost all of us wish we could just keep everything off the record, but... would that really be a good thing for human civilization? I'm skeptical. Anyway, we can't. Definitely, three interviews is nothing in the sense of "I interviewed at THREE COMPANIES and got ZERO JOBS!!" but it is (again, mildly) interesting in the sense of "I did some interviews and here's how the non-successful ones went." Anyway, I suspect if we had (a lot) more of this kind of blog post, the net effect on the interviewing/hiring process would be positive... (?)
- ghaff 4y ago
  >"I interviewed at THREE COMPANIES and got ZERO JOBS!!" I think that sense is one thing that's bugging some people. Though you also get the vibe on here from some often enough that (at least until recently) if you walk off the job Friday and don't have four offers in hand in a week or two, there's something wrong with you. Personally I could have done without naming people and companies. It's not like it's confidential in general but it doesn't really add anything and, personally, I wouldn't have done it.
  - veidr 4y ago
    Yeah; I think naming the companies is actually fine — it does add something, in the sense that: if these weren't companies I'd heard of, why would I care at all about this story? But identifying individuals is... well, even though I don't actually think there is anything wrong with it, it's definitely not something you should expect to be consequence-free. Even if the consequences are mainly just potential employers in the future googling you with kagi.com and being somewhat put off by the sense that hmm this person seems inclined to share too much That's real, but if you don't care about that, then this kind of post is probably interesting and useful to those who aren't in a position to not care about that.
    - ghaff 4y ago
      I wouldn't but, sure, naming the companies is probably just in the mild-oversharing camp and it does make the post more concrete.
cheschire 4y ago
Somewhere there’s a 23 year old newbie that hasn’t learned these “trivial” lessons. Is there a name for the bias when someone thinks what they know is common knowledge? I seem to run into that often here on HN.
- a4isms 4y ago
  This is an absolutely evergreen comment, so much so that an appropriately worded version belongs in the guidelines, something like: “Before dismissing something as common knowledge or obvious, consider the vast disparities in education, experience, and cultural backgrounds of HN readers. What may be obvious or trivial to you may be revelatory to someone else.”
  - TeMPOraL 4y ago
    For some time now, this idea has also been referred to as "you're one of today's lucky ten thousand", or xkcd/1053 for short. https://xkcd.com/1053/ https://xkcd.com/1053/
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
dan-robertson 4y ago
I don’t feel like the author was really giving away anything that was meant to be secret. They also only linked to people whom they had good opinions of, though I feel like it’s a little weird. The lessons learned didn’t feel terribly interesting but they felt more like ‘this is what I learned’ than ‘here’s some advice for you’. Maybe the author is just blogging about their life.
jfk13 4y ago
This comment (which I read before looking at the post) made me think we're talking about someone fresh from college (or boot camp, or whatever) who hasn't yet "settled in" to how the world of employment works. But no: apparently "I've done hundreds of interviews in the past few years to hire the best talent". Feels a bit odd...

by hnarn 4y ago

paulcarroty 4y ago

> The author is revealing lots of information about the company's infrastructure, given to him in an interview That info should be public by design anyway.

hnarn 4y ago
That's not the point. Of course any information given to a candidate in an interview should not be privileged -- the point is that the fact that this is how things "should be" does not mean that it's an implicit agreement to share the information you get with the general public. This should be obvious to anyone.
- a4isms 4y ago
  I’ve been hiring programmers for three decades. What is obvious to me is that we play a game where there is a posted set of rules such as “Don’t talk shit about the companies that interview you and definitely don’t reveal what they told you in an interview.” We punish people for breaking these rules. But also, insiders break these rules all the time, quietly, either in “whisper networks,” or on web sites launched by startups that give people a way to post what questions companies ask when hiring, what biases various interviewers have, and so forth. What we’re punishing this person for when talking about their “oversharing” is not being enough of an insider to know the right way to play the hidden game.
- ghaff 4y ago
  A lot of things that go on within companies are not some deep dark trade secret that you're violating some confidence by talking about with friends. However, if I were on an interview committee, and saw a blog post sharing the blow by blow complete with names of the people involved, I'd consider it at least rather weird. I certainly wouldn't have consented to having my name made public in that way.
arnvald 4y ago
Possibly, but I don't think it's up to the post author to decide.
exitb 4y ago
It highlights the tendency to overshare, thus hurts his future job prospects. Employers are typically hoping their employees don't play journalists, publicly writing a story about the company on the side.

Manfred 4y ago

The name dropping feels really weird, it almost makes it feel like a personal diary that should never have been published.

veidr 4y ago

Hmm, I read your comment and expected to agree with it, but... ¯\_(ಠ_ಠ)_/¯ I found it mildly interesting, and not very scandalous. I mean, sure, when we are interviewing/hiring people, I suspect almost all of us wish we could just keep everything off the record, but... would that really be a good thing for human civilization? I'm skeptical. Anyway, we can't. Definitely, three interviews is nothing in the sense of "I interviewed at THREE COMPANIES and got ZERO JOBS!!" but it is (again, mildly) interesting in the sense of "I did some interviews and here's how the non-successful ones went." Anyway, I suspect if we had (a lot) more of this kind of blog post, the net effect on the interviewing/hiring process would be positive... (?)

ghaff 4y ago
>"I interviewed at THREE COMPANIES and got ZERO JOBS!!" I think that sense is one thing that's bugging some people. Though you also get the vibe on here from some often enough that (at least until recently) if you walk off the job Friday and don't have four offers in hand in a week or two, there's something wrong with you. Personally I could have done without naming people and companies. It's not like it's confidential in general but it doesn't really add anything and, personally, I wouldn't have done it.
- veidr 4y ago
  Yeah; I think naming the companies is actually fine — it does add something, in the sense that: if these weren't companies I'd heard of, why would I care at all about this story? But identifying individuals is... well, even though I don't actually think there is anything wrong with it, it's definitely not something you should expect to be consequence-free. Even if the consequences are mainly just potential employers in the future googling you with kagi.com and being somewhat put off by the sense that hmm this person seems inclined to share too much That's real, but if you don't care about that, then this kind of post is probably interesting and useful to those who aren't in a position to not care about that.
  - ghaff 4y ago
    I wouldn't but, sure, naming the companies is probably just in the mild-oversharing camp and it does make the post more concrete.

cheschire 4y ago

Somewhere there’s a 23 year old newbie that hasn’t learned these “trivial” lessons. Is there a name for the bias when someone thinks what they know is common knowledge? I seem to run into that often here on HN.

a4isms 4y ago
This is an absolutely evergreen comment, so much so that an appropriately worded version belongs in the guidelines, something like: “Before dismissing something as common knowledge or obvious, consider the vast disparities in education, experience, and cultural backgrounds of HN readers. What may be obvious or trivial to you may be revelatory to someone else.”
- TeMPOraL 4y ago
  For some time now, this idea has also been referred to as "you're one of today's lucky ten thousand", or xkcd/1053 for short. https://xkcd.com/1053/ https://xkcd.com/1053/
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]

dan-robertson 4y ago

I don’t feel like the author was really giving away anything that was meant to be secret. They also only linked to people whom they had good opinions of, though I feel like it’s a little weird. The lessons learned didn’t feel terribly interesting but they felt more like ‘this is what I learned’ than ‘here’s some advice for you’. Maybe the author is just blogging about their life.

jfk13 4y ago

This comment (which I read before looking at the post) made me think we're talking about someone fresh from college (or boot camp, or whatever) who hasn't yet "settled in" to how the world of employment works. But no: apparently "I've done hundreds of interviews in the past few years to hire the best talent". Feels a bit odd...