5 ms·

[I have no idea] why we had over 200 open roles are on our web site. I do always find it odd when a not-megacorp company has dozens of open positions for vario

[I have no idea] why we had over 200 open roles are on our web site. I do always find it odd when a not-megacorp company has dozens of open positions for various departments. Surely they can’t actually be hiring for these jobs simultaneously, and it’s just a hiring strategy to attract talent that might otherwise not be aware the company exists?

alex_lav 3y ago
The frequency that I've seen companies open positions that don't actually exist to "fill the hiring pipeline" is gross. Recruiters and those that lead them should be ashamed of this, and yet I see it all the time.
6ak74rfy 3y ago
This, plus I’ve constantly seen job ads on LinkedIn from this company.
- leetrout 3y ago
  On here too. Just saw one a couple weeks ago.
  - iancmceachern 3y ago
    Yeah, they were actually actively posted by YC https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32700568 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32700568
bettercallsalad 3y ago
Is there going to be anyone accountable over this? Ryan doesn’t say and most likely the HR/recruiting under his reporting chain will stay unharmed. It’s amazing how absolutely dry these apologies come out. Everytime a layoff notice comes in there is this usual script. I am yet to see anyone taking meaningful responsibility over it such as CEO paycut or bonus withdrawals.
- yunyu 3y ago
  Ryan literally just made the previous CEO leave?
  - mdekkers 3y ago
    I think “take responsibility for fucking up the lives of a whole bunch of people, because he didn’t agree with the hiring strategy of the CEO he dumped” is the angle here. That fine specimen of humanity goes on to say, in the same breath “we are fine, we have money” so clearly they were not pushing bankruptcy, and would have been in a position to help out those they screwed over so brutally. I’m making it my mission to figure out the combined business interests of their board and c-suite, and make sure that I’ll not use those products if at all possible.
    - paulddraper 3y ago
      Question was holding people accountable. Like firing someone
- xwolfi 3y ago
  Why would a CEO take a pay cut, his job, approved by the owners, is literally to unload the burden and fire the fat. He would have to lose money if he didnt... a CEO responsibility is first to owners, second to client, third to employees who are resources, like the machines they bought and are compensated monthly for their time.
- paulddraper 3y ago
  Um, well there was the CEO that just got fired
freeAgent 3y ago
What makes it easier to sell VCs on your company’s exponential growth story: a website with dozens of openings posted, or a website with none? I think that’s your answer.
fortran77 3y ago
To make potential investors think the company is positioned for growth. That’s why they do it.
debo_ 3y ago
In my experience at smaller companies, often times you are open to candidates of multiple experience levels or backgrounds filling a role, but if you don't advertise for very specific roles, people are confused and don't apply. e.g. if your hiring manager says "If we could get someone on our team to cover either some of the devops or some of the backend dev, our one 5-year-tenured person on the team who is doing both could focus on the other." Now you've posted two roles for one opening; devops engineer and server software developer.
- jlokier 3y ago
  > if you don't advertise for very specific roles, people are confused and don't apply. As a candidate I have the opposite experience with companies that advertise a long list of roles, like Flexport's "200 open roles". If I see a company with a large number of slightly different roles, for example each specialising in one of the company's numerous obscure products, or some slightly diferent aspect of the process, I have no idea which one(s) to apply for and I end up skipping that company entirely, even if I like the company. Red Hat is like this. Before the IBM acquisition I was interested in working there but I couldn't figure out what to do with the enormous list of product-specific ad activitiy-specific roles I could theoretically apply for. A recruiter was unable to help; they just wanted to know which ones interested me. Well, about 50 of the roles look interesting and suitable, but... so I didn't apply.
  - skissane 3y ago
    > Well, about 50 of the roles look interesting and suitable, but... so I didn't apply. While different places do things differently - the role you apply for isn’t necessarily the role you are hired into. Once upon a time, I was asked to do a tech interview for a candidate. I was told we’d already decided to hire him - the purpose of my interview was just to give management feedback on which of two different roles he’d be better suited for.
  - Aurornis 3y ago
    > I have no idea which one(s) to apply for and I end up skipping that company entirely, even if I like the company. If you get overwhelmed by choice and prefer when companies are small enough that you don’t have to make choices like this, working for a big company probably isn’t for you anyway. If you want a heuristic to overcome this decision paralysis, pick the first one that looks remotely interesting. Apply for it. Applying for something is better than applying for nothing, for obvious reasons.
notsurenymore 3y ago
I thought it was résumé collection. I’ve noticed a weird pattern lately, where I’ll see a job, apply to it, and a day or two later it’s delisted.
- lubujackson 3y ago
  Likely they got 200+ applications and closed it for sanity, if current Linkedin numbers are to be believed.
- vsareto 3y ago
  Sometimes they get enough of a pool to choose from in a short amount of time, so it doesn't make sense to leave it open for longer. I prefer companies delist it rather than leave it up and simply ignore further applications.
  - notsurenymore 3y ago
    They usually get reposted the next week.
denton-scratch 3y ago
Some companies have a policy of hiring good people, even if they're not a close march for an open position; and of not hiring weak candidates, even if the hiring manager is desperate. That is, they hire good people when they come available, and never knowingly hire bad people. Hiring for a specific vacancy is silly - good people are adaptable. So I think that's a great policy, if you have enough money to cover the periods when good staff are cheap and available, and your vacancy list is short. You don't have to fire the dross, because you don't ever hire dross.
- psunavy03 3y ago
  Some companies have a policy of hiring good people, even if they're not a close march for an open position; and of not hiring weak candidates, even if the hiring manager is desperate. That is, they hire good people when they come available, and never knowingly hire bad people. How is this at all different from how literally every hiring manager in the world thinks of themselves? Literally no one is going to wake up in the morning and think "wow, I'm OK with whiffing on a candidate for my team."
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - fy20 3y ago
    Welcome to real life where you do not set your own budget. The reality is choosing someone who you feel can do a good enough job to make it worth your time, rather than just doing it yourself.
  - compiler-guy 3y ago
    It’s different because some firms will choose someone who is just good enough over someone who is super talented if the former has domain knowledge and the latter doesn’t. It’s all about how adaptable you think people are. If you need a database developer and some junior person who has a couple of indistinguished but relevant jobs on their resume shows up, do you take them over the person who has no database development at all but a decade of lisp with some very high powered firms? Some firms will choose the latter because they believe highly talented people can adapt. Some don’t.
roflyear 3y ago
Well, I know of a few big tech companies on the east coast do this so that they can attract higher-level devs and then say after the super-long interview process "sorry, you're actually a mid-level dev" or even try and convince them they are a junior. It's a way to get around salary disclosure laws, as well.

alex_lav 3y ago

The frequency that I've seen companies open positions that don't actually exist to "fill the hiring pipeline" is gross. Recruiters and those that lead them should be ashamed of this, and yet I see it all the time.

6ak74rfy 3y ago

This, plus I’ve constantly seen job ads on LinkedIn from this company.

leetrout 3y ago
On here too. Just saw one a couple weeks ago.
- iancmceachern 3y ago
  Yeah, they were actually actively posted by YC https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32700568 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32700568

bettercallsalad 3y ago

Is there going to be anyone accountable over this? Ryan doesn’t say and most likely the HR/recruiting under his reporting chain will stay unharmed. It’s amazing how absolutely dry these apologies come out. Everytime a layoff notice comes in there is this usual script. I am yet to see anyone taking meaningful responsibility over it such as CEO paycut or bonus withdrawals.

yunyu 3y ago
Ryan literally just made the previous CEO leave?
- mdekkers 3y ago
  I think “take responsibility for fucking up the lives of a whole bunch of people, because he didn’t agree with the hiring strategy of the CEO he dumped” is the angle here. That fine specimen of humanity goes on to say, in the same breath “we are fine, we have money” so clearly they were not pushing bankruptcy, and would have been in a position to help out those they screwed over so brutally. I’m making it my mission to figure out the combined business interests of their board and c-suite, and make sure that I’ll not use those products if at all possible.
  - paulddraper 3y ago
    Question was holding people accountable. Like firing someone
xwolfi 3y ago
Why would a CEO take a pay cut, his job, approved by the owners, is literally to unload the burden and fire the fat. He would have to lose money if he didnt... a CEO responsibility is first to owners, second to client, third to employees who are resources, like the machines they bought and are compensated monthly for their time.
paulddraper 3y ago
Um, well there was the CEO that just got fired

freeAgent 3y ago

What makes it easier to sell VCs on your company’s exponential growth story: a website with dozens of openings posted, or a website with none? I think that’s your answer.

fortran77 3y ago

To make potential investors think the company is positioned for growth. That’s why they do it.

debo_ 3y ago

In my experience at smaller companies, often times you are open to candidates of multiple experience levels or backgrounds filling a role, but if you don't advertise for very specific roles, people are confused and don't apply. e.g. if your hiring manager says "If we could get someone on our team to cover either some of the devops or some of the backend dev, our one 5-year-tenured person on the team who is doing both could focus on the other." Now you've posted two roles for one opening; devops engineer and server software developer.

jlokier 3y ago
> if you don't advertise for very specific roles, people are confused and don't apply. As a candidate I have the opposite experience with companies that advertise a long list of roles, like Flexport's "200 open roles". If I see a company with a large number of slightly different roles, for example each specialising in one of the company's numerous obscure products, or some slightly diferent aspect of the process, I have no idea which one(s) to apply for and I end up skipping that company entirely, even if I like the company. Red Hat is like this. Before the IBM acquisition I was interested in working there but I couldn't figure out what to do with the enormous list of product-specific ad activitiy-specific roles I could theoretically apply for. A recruiter was unable to help; they just wanted to know which ones interested me. Well, about 50 of the roles look interesting and suitable, but... so I didn't apply.
- skissane 3y ago
  > Well, about 50 of the roles look interesting and suitable, but... so I didn't apply. While different places do things differently - the role you apply for isn’t necessarily the role you are hired into. Once upon a time, I was asked to do a tech interview for a candidate. I was told we’d already decided to hire him - the purpose of my interview was just to give management feedback on which of two different roles he’d be better suited for.
- Aurornis 3y ago
  > I have no idea which one(s) to apply for and I end up skipping that company entirely, even if I like the company. If you get overwhelmed by choice and prefer when companies are small enough that you don’t have to make choices like this, working for a big company probably isn’t for you anyway. If you want a heuristic to overcome this decision paralysis, pick the first one that looks remotely interesting. Apply for it. Applying for something is better than applying for nothing, for obvious reasons.

notsurenymore 3y ago

I thought it was résumé collection. I’ve noticed a weird pattern lately, where I’ll see a job, apply to it, and a day or two later it’s delisted.

lubujackson 3y ago
Likely they got 200+ applications and closed it for sanity, if current Linkedin numbers are to be believed.
vsareto 3y ago
Sometimes they get enough of a pool to choose from in a short amount of time, so it doesn't make sense to leave it open for longer. I prefer companies delist it rather than leave it up and simply ignore further applications.
- notsurenymore 3y ago
  They usually get reposted the next week.

denton-scratch 3y ago

Some companies have a policy of hiring good people, even if they're not a close march for an open position; and of not hiring weak candidates, even if the hiring manager is desperate. That is, they hire good people when they come available, and never knowingly hire bad people. Hiring for a specific vacancy is silly - good people are adaptable. So I think that's a great policy, if you have enough money to cover the periods when good staff are cheap and available, and your vacancy list is short. You don't have to fire the dross, because you don't ever hire dross.

psunavy03 3y ago
Some companies have a policy of hiring good people, even if they're not a close march for an open position; and of not hiring weak candidates, even if the hiring manager is desperate. That is, they hire good people when they come available, and never knowingly hire bad people. How is this at all different from how literally every hiring manager in the world thinks of themselves? Literally no one is going to wake up in the morning and think "wow, I'm OK with whiffing on a candidate for my team."
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- fy20 3y ago
  Welcome to real life where you do not set your own budget. The reality is choosing someone who you feel can do a good enough job to make it worth your time, rather than just doing it yourself.
- compiler-guy 3y ago
  It’s different because some firms will choose someone who is just good enough over someone who is super talented if the former has domain knowledge and the latter doesn’t. It’s all about how adaptable you think people are. If you need a database developer and some junior person who has a couple of indistinguished but relevant jobs on their resume shows up, do you take them over the person who has no database development at all but a decade of lisp with some very high powered firms? Some firms will choose the latter because they believe highly talented people can adapt. Some don’t.

roflyear 3y ago

Well, I know of a few big tech companies on the east coast do this so that they can attract higher-level devs and then say after the super-long interview process "sorry, you're actually a mid-level dev" or even try and convince them they are a junior. It's a way to get around salary disclosure laws, as well.