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> 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 advert

> 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.
- jlokier 3y ago
  Thanks, I see how that's good advice for someone who wants to proceed with an application and feels stuck. But personally I have no real problem making choices or decisions, quickly if necessary. I understand the usefulness of making decisions when there's no particular reason to favour one or other. It is more that the ocean of slight title variations, especially when there are lots of obscure products I've mostly never heard of or obscure departmental processes, make the roles (and the products I'd be working on) seem narrow, tedious and overly corporate. They make the jobs and the company feel offputting for me. I also want more of my skills and knowledge to be useful and used, so roles that seem like they're designed to only do one thing in a narrow skilll area, perhaps to appeal to people who think they only have one skill area, are offputting. (Note to ad writers: Long lists of tech skills and products does not help with this. Showing variety of things the employee could work on if they want to does.) Feelings and impressions are part of my heuristic for deciding which companies I find interesting enough to invest my time and energy in. I don't agree that applying for something is better than nothing. It certainly isn't obviously better. Some people take the "apply to hundreds of roles" approach to job applications. I'm the opposite (so far; it could happen). I'm very selective, and apply research and intuition before proceeding with any potential role or equivalent. Impressions from job ads or other materials, including the company's website and reputation, how they present, what they make, who their customers are, and their attitude towards open source, IP and personal side projects, are an important part of that. That's feedback I'd like to give to any would-be employers and hiring ad writers who are thinking they need to list hundreds of variations of roles to attract candidates, perhaps thinking candidates are combing through for narrow matches. It's going to put off some candidates. (In the last 20 years I've also found the best jobs have been ones where I didn't end up sending a CV or résumé, but a recruiter hooked me up with a company without one, or by knowing a person who is in a position to hire. Due to that I now see "if interested send your CV/résumé", or an online application form, as a red flag suggesting a worse job, though I wouldn't assume that it is; it's just a signal. But that's another story.)
- noirbot 3y ago
  I suppose, but I've recently had this issue applying to things with a large company. There were at least 20 open positions that fit my skillset, many of which seemed to be literally the same role on different teams. They made me apply to all of them individually, and didn't save any of my info, and some teams required cover letters and other info that other teams didn't. I gave up after 4 of them. A month later, I've heard nothing back on any of those.
mistrial9 3y ago
I believe that people who are accustomed to this size of company, do in fact write out two dozen+ applications, each altered for the role that is listed, with BLOCK LETTER Position Identifier and Very Corporate personnel photo on each and every one. Despite the stupid amount of time it takes to do this, if you do not do this you will get zero jobs. ps- not me

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.

jlokier 3y ago
Thanks, I see how that's good advice for someone who wants to proceed with an application and feels stuck. But personally I have no real problem making choices or decisions, quickly if necessary. I understand the usefulness of making decisions when there's no particular reason to favour one or other. It is more that the ocean of slight title variations, especially when there are lots of obscure products I've mostly never heard of or obscure departmental processes, make the roles (and the products I'd be working on) seem narrow, tedious and overly corporate. They make the jobs and the company feel offputting for me. I also want more of my skills and knowledge to be useful and used, so roles that seem like they're designed to only do one thing in a narrow skilll area, perhaps to appeal to people who think they only have one skill area, are offputting. (Note to ad writers: Long lists of tech skills and products does not help with this. Showing variety of things the employee could work on if they want to does.) Feelings and impressions are part of my heuristic for deciding which companies I find interesting enough to invest my time and energy in. I don't agree that applying for something is better than nothing. It certainly isn't obviously better. Some people take the "apply to hundreds of roles" approach to job applications. I'm the opposite (so far; it could happen). I'm very selective, and apply research and intuition before proceeding with any potential role or equivalent. Impressions from job ads or other materials, including the company's website and reputation, how they present, what they make, who their customers are, and their attitude towards open source, IP and personal side projects, are an important part of that. That's feedback I'd like to give to any would-be employers and hiring ad writers who are thinking they need to list hundreds of variations of roles to attract candidates, perhaps thinking candidates are combing through for narrow matches. It's going to put off some candidates. (In the last 20 years I've also found the best jobs have been ones where I didn't end up sending a CV or résumé, but a recruiter hooked me up with a company without one, or by knowing a person who is in a position to hire. Due to that I now see "if interested send your CV/résumé", or an online application form, as a red flag suggesting a worse job, though I wouldn't assume that it is; it's just a signal. But that's another story.)
noirbot 3y ago
I suppose, but I've recently had this issue applying to things with a large company. There were at least 20 open positions that fit my skillset, many of which seemed to be literally the same role on different teams. They made me apply to all of them individually, and didn't save any of my info, and some teams required cover letters and other info that other teams didn't. I gave up after 4 of them. A month later, I've heard nothing back on any of those.

mistrial9 3y ago

I believe that people who are accustomed to this size of company, do in fact write out two dozen+ applications, each altered for the role that is listed, with BLOCK LETTER Position Identifier and Very Corporate personnel photo on each and every one. Despite the stupid amount of time it takes to do this, if you do not do this you will get zero jobs. ps- not me