6 ms·

Ask HN: What's with this ridiculous experience requirements these days?

• isbvhodnvemrwvn 3y ago
  The requirements evolve to match the market. At the moment there are so many people available that you don't really need to spend resources training people up.
• b20000 3y ago
  asking for experienced people and then asking for leetcode interviews haha
• lijok 3y ago
  > How about giving a fresher a chance? This is the source of a lot of misunderstandings in the eng recruitment space. There's no "chances" - you can either do the job or you can't. Your CV, in most cases, will paint the picture, and if not, the technical interview will. For certain positions, not having the experience means not being able to do the job - there are certain skills that can only be acquired with time.
• metaloha 3y ago
  It's worse when the requirements are impossible. I was told recently that one reason I wasn't shortlisted was because I didn't have 10+ years of experience with Angular 12+. For those who don't realize, Angular 12 was released in mid-2021, less than three years ago. Even if the company meant Angular2+, that was still only released in 2016, less than eight years ago. I asked if they meant AngularJS (originally from 2010), but no, their requirement was 10 years with "new" Angular. I informed them they would be looking for at least two more years, but good luck anyways :) I've seen the same type of request for React as well, with one company somewhat ridiculously asking for 15+ years of React experience (it's less than eleven years old). I think the quality of technical recruiters has taken a hit in the last half-decade or so.
  • gtirloni 3y ago
    > I think the quality of technical recruiters has taken a hit in the last half-decade or so. Recruiters without domain knowledge about the area they are hiring for is very common. I'd say it's like that for 95% of all recruiters I've worked with in the last two decades. There are those who specialize in some niche area and when you find them, it's awesome. But most are just hiring for any position that appears in the org chart or is requested by clients. Add to that being overloaded and the screening becomes really shallow (this, ATS systems and whatnot).
  • nonrandomstring 3y ago
    That is so common. Windows 14? iOS 18.0 ? Great warning sign that the HR department do not talk to engineering. Or that HR is an AI script. Or that they're posting a "fake job" (often advertised to meet legal requirements) and the position is already filled internally. In all cases you do not want to apply.
  • dakiol 3y ago
    > I was told recently that one reason I wasn't shortlisted was because I didn't have 10+ years of experience with Angular 12+. For those who don't realize, Angular 12 was released in mid-2021, less than three years ago. In my experience those are not the kind of requirements I deal with. I have to deal with: - Senior software engineer position requiring: knowledge of X programming language + Y framework + sql + git + linux + DDD + TDD + BDD + OS + networking... until here everything OK. But on top of that companies also ask: monitoring and observability (because of the stupid "you build it you run it"), docker, k8s, kafka/sqs/sns/rabbitmq, microservices, aws/gcp/azure, event sourcing/event driven archs, and a long etc. I mean, what the actual fuck.
    • fruktmix 3y ago
      Hahaha that's so fucking relatable. I saw an ad that was hiring for company X and would prefer candidates that actually been previously working at company X.
    • sethammons 3y ago
      > you build it you run it Huge fan of this model. And fwiw, aside from not being strong with aws but still familiar, I tick all the qualifications you listed and I would expect most of that list to be valid for someone to claim to be a senior. That person should have some experience in nearly all of that. Specific frameworks should allow for more wiggle room if you are familiar with the given language. The bigger problem is "senior" developers with 4 years experience who don't know half of that and are mostly familiar with crud apps.
• nonrandomstring 3y ago
  Decoding job descriptions shouldn't be so hard, you'll get better at it: 1) experienced = I want someone who won't need training. 2) n years experience = I want someone who is about 20 + n years old, to fit the team culture, but we aren't allowed to advertise age restrictions 3) n years at experience at a F100 company = we are speaking to someone from a pool of about 20 people from our immediate competitors but we cannot name them Maybe some other commenters will add more suggestions. To get past 1, take a short specific on-prem vocational training course with a high level of practical hands-on material. While it seems like "education" a lot of hirers will treat it as "experience" . Also, "experience" doesn't say what you gained from it, so be prepared to talk about specific take-aways. Your experience will be different than others. When interviewing I always ask that question. Good luck.
  • bruce511 3y ago
    Tech, and especially software is one of the few places you can get experience without a job. If you are st school, or college, and you want a leg up the hiring ladder, -get some experience along the way-. It might be as small as building some Web sites for local small business, it might be a bit of custom software for yourself, it might be doing tech at the local charity. Or participating (meaningfuly)in an Open Source thing. It doesn't really matter what it is or what language it is, or whether you sold it or not. What matters is you took the first step yourself. Showed some initiative. Saw something through. Got something done. Personally I was at Uni, responded to an ad posted on a CS noticeboard (from the medical faculty.) Wrote them a bit of custom software. On their advice marketed to other universities. (Using Smail Mail, think early 90s). Made some international sales. Apart from the signalling, it acts as a memorable topic to talk about in the job interview. You can display some passion, talk about what worked, what failed, the tech, the domain and so on. Experience someone gives you I great. Experience you go out, capture, wrestle to the ground, and conquer yourself, is priceless. -especially- I you are able to look back and identify everything you did wrong and would do better next time.
    • sujayk_33 3y ago
      I agree with this somewhat but I also believe that in IT, the real experience only begins when we become part of an organization because, on a personal level, we might not have that kind of infrastructure to practice. Like GPUs and administration services for the Cloud. Can we learn? yes, but there is a limit to it. Don't you think?
• cranberryturkey 3y ago
  i just hung up on an interview over video call this morning. wanted me to write some obfuscated algorithm shit. I have 25 years experience and could certainly do this when I have the time and a low stress environment, but I wasn't going to waste my time with this way of interviewing. Also he asked me to turn my video on which is always a red flag for me.
  • leandot 3y ago
    I have been on both sides and if someone doesn’t want to turn on the video and doesn’t want to even try discussing an algorithm in an interview then it is a 100% no go. In the eyes of the interviewer you are uncooperative, likely trying to cheat and they should expect similar conflicts in the future. If you are good and don’t want to be interviewed then be a freelancer, it might be a better fit if you can somehow prove you are good without interviewing.
  • b20000 3y ago
    not sure why this is downvoted
  • Atotalnoob 3y ago
    I’m a reasonable interviewer, but if you refuse to do anything or answer questions, why should I hire you? I wouldn’t hire someone who refused to do basic stuff in an interview
  • lkdfjlkdfjlg 3y ago
    Why is asking you to turn on your video a red flag for you? An applicant not wanting to turn on their video is a HUGE red flag, especially these days with all the scams going around.
    • carlosjobim 3y ago
      I just don't understand the insisting on video interviews and video calls. I would never want to do a video call with a prospective employee. A normal phone call has always been more than enough for me to get a feel for a person when I'm hiring. And if a recruiter can't get to know somebody by phone, then they're simply incompetent at their job of interviewing and hiring, which most of them frankly are. If the job is super important, then the recruiter should manage to arrange a face-to-face interview with the candidate. To me video calls are a huge sign of immaturity.
• mech422 3y ago
  Typically, only 1-2 of the 'requirements' are actually required (generally the ones that sound most applicable to the actual job..) The rest are usually added by various levels of management that feel they need to 'contribute' something. However, it makes it a PITA to get past all the databases/HR/etc. to actually get to someone that knows the 'real' requirements
  • OnionBlender 3y ago
    Sometimes I wonder if they are perm labor tests, since they're supposed to show they can't hire anyone with a specific person's skills. Other times I think someone left so they post the skills that the previous guy had.
    • isbvhodnvemrwvn 3y ago
      You don't do that online, you just post it on a local newspaper and that's it.
    • mech422 3y ago
      Yeah - I'm sure there's some of that as well. I think its mostly just 'design by committee' for the most part though. A lot of companies don't do sponsorships, etc. so they don't really need to worry about it. As others have mentioned, it can also be tailoring a position for a specific candidate just so they have a reason to hire the person they already selected.
• Perenti 3y ago
  I remember a position advertised in 1995 for a Java programmer with 6 years experience in Enterprise Class Java development.