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Employers and recruiters are always bewildered when I say I don't have a LinkedIn account, or a public Github profile (I have a few tiny open source projects I

Employers and recruiters are always bewildered when I say I don't have a LinkedIn account, or a public Github profile (I have a few tiny open source projects I maintain, but they are all pseudonymous) - and this is exactly why. I don't want people creeping any kind of "profile" of me. Ever.

wvenable 3y ago
I have such public accounts but they are specifically for said creeping.
fHr 3y ago
Linkedin is required to market yourself though or else you can't bullshit your way through the HR hoops.
- FpUser 3y ago
  No. I have plenty of clients over the years and not a single on ever asked my LinkedIn and / or any other social. And if they ever will the answer will be NO. Well other than HN I am not really on social media anyways. Just have couple of accounts to talk to a couple of people.
- marssaxman 3y ago
  I deleted my LinkedIn account fifteen years ago, and it's been fine. I don't have random recruiters beating down my door trying to interest me in jobs I don't want, but is that such a loss? I've had no trouble getting the jobs I do want.
  - behringer 3y ago
    Maybe you have a better history than I, but I've only ever had 2 or 3 very interested recruiters that got a hold of me but they were the real deal and weren't looking to fill entry level crap or stupid temp work. All the other recruiters just make chat and email spam easily ignored and they never bother me.
- throwaway918274 3y ago
  And yet I am gainfully employed and haven't had problems switching when I want to..
- porkbeer 3y ago
  Is what they waht you to think. Fear of missing out is powerful marketing.
swozey 3y ago
It's by no means a limiting factor if they don't have one, but when I'm interviewing for mid - staff+ level engineers in my specific field I absolutely love when they have some sort of project portfolio I can look at. Github, Gitlab, medium, whatever. I learn so little from a persons bullet pointed resume that when I don't have those the interviews feel like I'm pretty much walking in completely ignorant to this persons interests and skills over and over again. When I can go "oh neat, jbob99 worked on a foss project I used a few years ago!" it's nice. But I also couldn't care less about being "creeped" on. Half of my career was built because I'm not an anonymous random software guy and companies know my work. You're using a completely random throwaway nick to stay anonymous on here, while I've literally gotten jobs from hn and grown my career from it. Just like I did on IRC when I was 13. It's an interesting difference of use. I don't mean one is better or worse at all and I totally get wanting to be anonymous.
- ryanjshaw 3y ago
  People often have reasons outside of their control for being anonymous. Others have employment contracts that limit what outside business interests they can be involved in, including open source. That being said, I've been on HN for 2 years longer than you, 2/3rds the karma, and zero job offers so what do I know.
  - swozey 3y ago
    I wasn't aware of any of this! Outrageous! All kidding aside I totally get it. I was lucky and taken under under the wing of a very generous group of people who have pretty much followed one another around to various jobs/projects over the last decade and our skills have just grown non-stop. I WISH I'd gotten into FOSS projects way sooner, like when I was a kid instead of just learning linux and crawling up the sysadmin route. Like, junior help desk tech support to principal architects nowadays, etc. I try to get my friends who want to level up or change careers to hop into foss projects, #goodfirstissue sort of things. A lot of people just have no idea where to start, and they don't think they're skilled enough to join a project like kubernetes or what not, but those projects actually have Contributor Experience people/teams to help bring new people in comfortably and they need all sorts of help, not just go developers, etc. Hell, those contributor experience people are absolute diamonds and really make certain communities so inclusive and great to be in. There is a lot of cool ancillary work to be done and everyone has something in their wheelhouse they can contribute. https://goodfirstissue.dev/ https://goodfirstissue.dev/
HeyLaughingBoy 3y ago
My take is exactly the opposite: the more people who know that I exist, the more likely I am to hear of jobs that might interest me. Let them creep all over my profile: so far the only downside is that I have a pile of messages to sort through and say "no, thanks" to.
- nuancebydefault 3y ago
  I have a very old linkedin account that has 10 years-outdated info. The company I'm supposedly working for does not exist anymore. As soon as I would even touch one word in my profile, a pile of recruiters would be triggered instantly. From experience I know that these recruiters have zero added value for me and often even their customer. On the contrary even, they have a tendency to try to fill any job with any qualification, because when they succeed, they hit a jackpot. Job vacancies are present on job sites like 'Indeed'. It is very easy to set an appropriate filter and just start sending out your CV to companies.
  - HeyLaughingBoy 3y ago
    It's even easier to do nothing and have people contact you. I got my current job because a recruiter cold-called me about my Linked-In profile. It was a perfect match for a position she was trying to fill. I wasn't looking, but it wasn't hard to persuade me to switch either.
  - macintux 3y ago
    I clearly need to do a better job with my profile, because recruiters never bother me.
  - RajT88 3y ago
    I had two pretty good jobs come to me from LinkedIn. The majority of job leads I got from maybe the start of LinkedIn to about 8 years ago were crap. These days, most job leads are not crap, they just are not competitive with my current job. Much improved! Granted, I just updated a couple months ago my profile to say, "Not open to opportunities" and because my profile is recently updated, I get people contacting me daily - even on the weekend.
szatkus 3y ago
Just yesterday I got a phone call from a recruiter asking about my LinkedIn account. I said that I don't have one. About an hour later she called me again with an invitation for a job interview. I don't really know what LinkedIn would change here...
raxxorraxor 3y ago
For the vast majority of developers, this is the smarter choice. If you contribute to a very popular project, it might be different. But otherwise keep a bit of privacy. Companies already tried to get rights to software created in your free time. Why even allow any attack surface here?

wvenable 3y ago

I have such public accounts but they are specifically for said creeping.

fHr 3y ago

Linkedin is required to market yourself though or else you can't bullshit your way through the HR hoops.

FpUser 3y ago
No. I have plenty of clients over the years and not a single on ever asked my LinkedIn and / or any other social. And if they ever will the answer will be NO. Well other than HN I am not really on social media anyways. Just have couple of accounts to talk to a couple of people.
marssaxman 3y ago
I deleted my LinkedIn account fifteen years ago, and it's been fine. I don't have random recruiters beating down my door trying to interest me in jobs I don't want, but is that such a loss? I've had no trouble getting the jobs I do want.
- behringer 3y ago
  Maybe you have a better history than I, but I've only ever had 2 or 3 very interested recruiters that got a hold of me but they were the real deal and weren't looking to fill entry level crap or stupid temp work. All the other recruiters just make chat and email spam easily ignored and they never bother me.
throwaway918274 3y ago
And yet I am gainfully employed and haven't had problems switching when I want to..
porkbeer 3y ago
Is what they waht you to think. Fear of missing out is powerful marketing.

swozey 3y ago

It's by no means a limiting factor if they don't have one, but when I'm interviewing for mid - staff+ level engineers in my specific field I absolutely love when they have some sort of project portfolio I can look at. Github, Gitlab, medium, whatever. I learn so little from a persons bullet pointed resume that when I don't have those the interviews feel like I'm pretty much walking in completely ignorant to this persons interests and skills over and over again. When I can go "oh neat, jbob99 worked on a foss project I used a few years ago!" it's nice. But I also couldn't care less about being "creeped" on. Half of my career was built because I'm not an anonymous random software guy and companies know my work. You're using a completely random throwaway nick to stay anonymous on here, while I've literally gotten jobs from hn and grown my career from it. Just like I did on IRC when I was 13. It's an interesting difference of use. I don't mean one is better or worse at all and I totally get wanting to be anonymous.

ryanjshaw 3y ago
People often have reasons outside of their control for being anonymous. Others have employment contracts that limit what outside business interests they can be involved in, including open source. That being said, I've been on HN for 2 years longer than you, 2/3rds the karma, and zero job offers so what do I know.
- swozey 3y ago
  I wasn't aware of any of this! Outrageous! All kidding aside I totally get it. I was lucky and taken under under the wing of a very generous group of people who have pretty much followed one another around to various jobs/projects over the last decade and our skills have just grown non-stop. I WISH I'd gotten into FOSS projects way sooner, like when I was a kid instead of just learning linux and crawling up the sysadmin route. Like, junior help desk tech support to principal architects nowadays, etc. I try to get my friends who want to level up or change careers to hop into foss projects, #goodfirstissue sort of things. A lot of people just have no idea where to start, and they don't think they're skilled enough to join a project like kubernetes or what not, but those projects actually have Contributor Experience people/teams to help bring new people in comfortably and they need all sorts of help, not just go developers, etc. Hell, those contributor experience people are absolute diamonds and really make certain communities so inclusive and great to be in. There is a lot of cool ancillary work to be done and everyone has something in their wheelhouse they can contribute. https://goodfirstissue.dev/ https://goodfirstissue.dev/

HeyLaughingBoy 3y ago

My take is exactly the opposite: the more people who know that I exist, the more likely I am to hear of jobs that might interest me. Let them creep all over my profile: so far the only downside is that I have a pile of messages to sort through and say "no, thanks" to.

nuancebydefault 3y ago
I have a very old linkedin account that has 10 years-outdated info. The company I'm supposedly working for does not exist anymore. As soon as I would even touch one word in my profile, a pile of recruiters would be triggered instantly. From experience I know that these recruiters have zero added value for me and often even their customer. On the contrary even, they have a tendency to try to fill any job with any qualification, because when they succeed, they hit a jackpot. Job vacancies are present on job sites like 'Indeed'. It is very easy to set an appropriate filter and just start sending out your CV to companies.
- HeyLaughingBoy 3y ago
  It's even easier to do nothing and have people contact you. I got my current job because a recruiter cold-called me about my Linked-In profile. It was a perfect match for a position she was trying to fill. I wasn't looking, but it wasn't hard to persuade me to switch either.
- macintux 3y ago
  I clearly need to do a better job with my profile, because recruiters never bother me.
- RajT88 3y ago
  I had two pretty good jobs come to me from LinkedIn. The majority of job leads I got from maybe the start of LinkedIn to about 8 years ago were crap. These days, most job leads are not crap, they just are not competitive with my current job. Much improved! Granted, I just updated a couple months ago my profile to say, "Not open to opportunities" and because my profile is recently updated, I get people contacting me daily - even on the weekend.

szatkus 3y ago

Just yesterday I got a phone call from a recruiter asking about my LinkedIn account. I said that I don't have one. About an hour later she called me again with an invitation for a job interview. I don't really know what LinkedIn would change here...

raxxorraxor 3y ago

For the vast majority of developers, this is the smarter choice. If you contribute to a very popular project, it might be different. But otherwise keep a bit of privacy. Companies already tried to get rights to software created in your free time. Why even allow any attack surface here?