5 ms·
Yup you’re missing something. In addition to attracting qualified candidates, good job listings repel those who don’t agree with them. No one wants to sift thr
by Dwolb 3y ago
Yup you’re missing something.
In addition to attracting qualified candidates, good job listings repel those who don’t agree with them. No one wants to sift through hundreds of applications.
Here’s the main mission filter: “to help pioneer commerce on the Internet.”
technical filter: “you should be able to do so in about one-third the time”
and culture filter: “Expect talented, motivated, intense, and interesting co-workers.”
If you didn’t get these things or why they were important, early Amazon wasn’t for you.
On the other hand, if you saw these lines and said “holy cow this is the future and I want to be a part of this”, then you’d roll the dice and apply.
This style of recruiting isn’t a numbers game and doesn’t appeal to the average person.
- hardware2win 3y agoEhh, I think you are making this up and your theory is sound just because Amaz turned out big I see stuff like this weekly "blablabla need skilled engineers for my unique brilliant idea company blabla" Nothing is exciting about this
- _ea1k 3y agoI feel like a lot of those look like imitations of the concept. I've certainly seen some wording like that which was transparently not relevant to the job.
- wittycardio 3y ago[dead]
- cafebabbe 3y agoNow let's have look at similarly-worded ads for the 2000s dotcoms
- baxtr 3y agoOn the other hand: if no-one ever tried something new, all would be the same always.
- klik99 3y ago“to help pioneer commerce on the Internet.” - In 1994, this would have intrigued me, in 2004 I would view with skepticism, in 2014 I would laugh “you should be able to do so in about one-third the time” - No matter the era, this kind of language is a big red flag to me - More often than not people who say this have no idea what they're talking about, the kind of people who call themselves "idea men" “Expect talented, motivated, intense, and interesting co-workers.” - meaningless phrase I don't know how recruiting messages were in 1994, but unless this is the Velvet Underground of influential recruiting messages (not many people got this email, but those who did started startups of their own) this reads like a generic recruiting email. Given the state of things in 1994 the "pioneer commerce on the Internet" would be interesting enough to learn more though.
- _ea1k 3y agoIDK, if someone advertised an AI job like this in 2023, I bet it'd pique some people's interest.
- Dwolb 3y agoYou’re on target. sama on this: “want to be stressed, watch some GPUs melt, and have a fun time? good at doing impossible things? send evidence of exceptional ability to chatgpt-eng@openai.com” [1] [1] https://twitter.com/sama/status/1630724485828714497?lang=en https://twitter.com/sama/status/1630724485828714497?lang=en
- klik99 3y agoThat sama tweet is very effective, he's known to be the real deal, his startup is known to have external funding and therefore validating, and the humor shows the work environment. A real equivalent would be a nobody, with no external funding (first external funding of amazon was 1995), promising equity and requiring a move. Let's say you got an email 2 years ago from someone you've never heard of saying: "Self-funded startup seeks extremely talented developers to work on AI. You must have experience building large and complex, yet easily maintainable systems, and work in 1/3 time that others say is possible. Top-notch communication skills are required. Familiarity with [the technology you'll be building for] would be helpful but is not necessary. Must be willing to move to Seattle." Not quite as interesting as sam altmans tweet...