3 ms·

Everything I've heard is that it is near impossible to find talent in Silicon Valley. I've heard it's also the same in NYC ... shit, it's the same everywhere.

by __abc 15y ago

jellicle 15y ago
With a quarter of the young population out of work, nevertheless the idea that it's "impossible to find talent" continues. It's like a new blacksmith coming into town and complaining that there aren't any trained blacksmiths for him to hire, while staring at 50 strong farmboys who are holding up "will work for food" signs. If only there was some way of teaching people new skills... but alas, no such thing exists.
- untog 15y ago
  That takes time. We're in an industry that is (relatively) flush with cash right now, so it makes more sense to compete with other companies on salary than to take the time to train new employees. That may not always be the case.
- carguy1983 15y ago
  > With a quarter of the young population out of work Yeah, well.. those are the untalented ones. Not everyone can do every job. Especially in technology. Sorry. It's hard to find good auto mechanics, too. And electricians, and true salespeople. And anything that requires skills and talent and practice and learning. This is really just a perennial truism, not anything specific to today.
  - eli_gottlieb 15y ago
    There are plenty of good software people out of work. Hello, nice to meet you! Life is weird, and hiring is a very difficult process for both sides.
- gruseom 15y ago
  If only there was some way of teaching people new skills It's the other way around. If those farmboys you postulate don't have the initiative and aptitude to take up hacking, they're unlikely to be a great addition to a software team. The last thing you need is someone passively waiting to be told what to do and taught how to do it. It would be great to be proven wrong about this, but I've seen lots of examples of it being a problem and not one counterexample. If mainstream culture changes to one in which the idea of doing this work and being excited by it and making things with it becomes widespread, then one might see significant growth in the talent pool. If more creative sparks are flying around, the chance of one of your farmboys catching fire is greater. But that's a longer-term process. To become good at this stuff, people don't need training - they need inspiration.
  - nick_dm 15y ago
    In my experience most companies aren't interested in "initiative and aptitude". They are generally unwilling to look at people without a few years of experience already. I moved to NYC and started job-hunting in early 2011. I didn't have a background in software development but I had programmed in VBA for 18 months (pricing insurance), used R for my statistics masters degree project and had been dabbling in Python for around 5 years (all self-taught). Through direct applications, headhunters and networking at various meetup events I hunted for tech and tech/finance jobs for about eight months. While things would sometimes look promising, if usually came down to "we're really looking for someone with a bit more experience in X". I did manage to find some freelance work (for a Python/Django web startup) but they decided that rather than another backend programmer they needed someone who could do frontend development and system administration... After leaving NYC my sister got a call, "is your brother still looking for a job in New York?", and I ended up back here working as an accountant. I didn't have any experience in accounting either (though I had taken some classes in the past) but my new boss was happy to bring me in on a three month contract and see how things worked out (I got a permanent offer after a month and a half).
    - gruseom 15y ago
      Yeah. I think the answer there is: fuck those companies. The sooner we start new ones that get this right, the fewer their days are numbered. But you may have missed my point by a couple degrees. It wasn't that companies should look at initiative and aptitude directly. It's that those are the things that drive you to acquire the skills that make you good. Then you can prove that you're good. How exactly to prove you're good, or for companies to tell who's good, is a billion (trillion?) dollar question that's in flux right now. But clearly it has more to do with showing work and less with weak proxies like years of experience (which may be years of doing things badly) or resumes (a skill uncorrelated if not inversely correlated with good programming). Since startups are starved for good hackers, somebody's going to figure this out, gain a huge edge, and pave the way for the rest. In the meantime, training/retraining programs are not going to increase the talent pool much. Something fresh like Hacker School might, though. Edit: in my opinion the eventual answer is going to be found by reasoning backward from Christopher Alexander's great question, "What feels more alive?" But obviously that isn't much help to someone in the situation you describe right now. So how did it work out? Do you like accounting or would you rather be programming?
acgourley 15y ago
The hardest part about finding early stage talent in SV is that everyone is off trying to start their own company. The best part about finding early stage talent in SV is that everyone is earning their real world MBA the hard way, and when they succeed or fail at their venture they are going to be frighteningly well equipped to help you with yours.

Everything I've heard is that it is near impossible to find talent in Silicon Valley. I've heard it's also the same in NYC ... shit, it's the same everywhere.

by __abc 15y ago

Everything I've heard is that it is near impossible to find talent in Silicon Valley. I've heard it's also the same in NYC ... shit, it's the same everywhere.

jellicle 15y ago

With a quarter of the young population out of work, nevertheless the idea that it's "impossible to find talent" continues. It's like a new blacksmith coming into town and complaining that there aren't any trained blacksmiths for him to hire, while staring at 50 strong farmboys who are holding up "will work for food" signs. If only there was some way of teaching people new skills... but alas, no such thing exists.

untog 15y ago
That takes time. We're in an industry that is (relatively) flush with cash right now, so it makes more sense to compete with other companies on salary than to take the time to train new employees. That may not always be the case.
carguy1983 15y ago
> With a quarter of the young population out of work Yeah, well.. those are the untalented ones. Not everyone can do every job. Especially in technology. Sorry. It's hard to find good auto mechanics, too. And electricians, and true salespeople. And anything that requires skills and talent and practice and learning. This is really just a perennial truism, not anything specific to today.
- eli_gottlieb 15y ago
  There are plenty of good software people out of work. Hello, nice to meet you! Life is weird, and hiring is a very difficult process for both sides.
gruseom 15y ago
If only there was some way of teaching people new skills It's the other way around. If those farmboys you postulate don't have the initiative and aptitude to take up hacking, they're unlikely to be a great addition to a software team. The last thing you need is someone passively waiting to be told what to do and taught how to do it. It would be great to be proven wrong about this, but I've seen lots of examples of it being a problem and not one counterexample. If mainstream culture changes to one in which the idea of doing this work and being excited by it and making things with it becomes widespread, then one might see significant growth in the talent pool. If more creative sparks are flying around, the chance of one of your farmboys catching fire is greater. But that's a longer-term process. To become good at this stuff, people don't need training - they need inspiration.
- nick_dm 15y ago
  In my experience most companies aren't interested in "initiative and aptitude". They are generally unwilling to look at people without a few years of experience already. I moved to NYC and started job-hunting in early 2011. I didn't have a background in software development but I had programmed in VBA for 18 months (pricing insurance), used R for my statistics masters degree project and had been dabbling in Python for around 5 years (all self-taught). Through direct applications, headhunters and networking at various meetup events I hunted for tech and tech/finance jobs for about eight months. While things would sometimes look promising, if usually came down to "we're really looking for someone with a bit more experience in X". I did manage to find some freelance work (for a Python/Django web startup) but they decided that rather than another backend programmer they needed someone who could do frontend development and system administration... After leaving NYC my sister got a call, "is your brother still looking for a job in New York?", and I ended up back here working as an accountant. I didn't have any experience in accounting either (though I had taken some classes in the past) but my new boss was happy to bring me in on a three month contract and see how things worked out (I got a permanent offer after a month and a half).
  - gruseom 15y ago
    Yeah. I think the answer there is: fuck those companies. The sooner we start new ones that get this right, the fewer their days are numbered. But you may have missed my point by a couple degrees. It wasn't that companies should look at initiative and aptitude directly. It's that those are the things that drive you to acquire the skills that make you good. Then you can prove that you're good. How exactly to prove you're good, or for companies to tell who's good, is a billion (trillion?) dollar question that's in flux right now. But clearly it has more to do with showing work and less with weak proxies like years of experience (which may be years of doing things badly) or resumes (a skill uncorrelated if not inversely correlated with good programming). Since startups are starved for good hackers, somebody's going to figure this out, gain a huge edge, and pave the way for the rest. In the meantime, training/retraining programs are not going to increase the talent pool much. Something fresh like Hacker School might, though. Edit: in my opinion the eventual answer is going to be found by reasoning backward from Christopher Alexander's great question, "What feels more alive?" But obviously that isn't much help to someone in the situation you describe right now. So how did it work out? Do you like accounting or would you rather be programming?

acgourley 15y ago

The hardest part about finding early stage talent in SV is that everyone is off trying to start their own company. The best part about finding early stage talent in SV is that everyone is earning their real world MBA the hard way, and when they succeed or fail at their venture they are going to be frighteningly well equipped to help you with yours.