4 ms·

What a great idea, let's put all our tech team members all on one page so that recruiters can have one-stop shopping for people to spam. I am half joking, but

What a great idea, let's put all our tech team members all on one page so that recruiters can have one-stop shopping for people to spam. I am half joking, but also half serious. I minimize my profile online to cut down on recruiting spam. Coderwall is a step in the wrong direction in this regard.

bitsweet 14y ago
The reality is this information is easily accessible on LinkedIn. Even if someone hides their current place of employment, LinkedIn's recruiting tools actually let recruiters see that information (one of the reasons we receive so much recruiter spam). Companies that want to build great teams need to start thinking more offensively than defensively. If you have a great culture and solving interesting problems, recruiters wont pose a threat.
- dpritchett 14y ago
  Yep. Security through obscurity is no security at all.
- k3n 14y ago
  I'm like donretag in the sense that I also seek to minimize my online profile as much as possible; thus, I don't use LinkedIn. So no, the reality is not that it's easily accessible -- unless you're already making it so on sites that are liberal with sharing your info like LinkedIn.
  - bitsweet 14y ago
    Coderwall never exposes personal contact information of anyone on the team, so the exposure is no greater then having a GitHub profile...probably even less.
    - k3n 14y ago
      That's cool, I was mainly just commenting on the LinkedIn aspect. Monster.com was probably the biggest mistake I ever made, it took 5+ years for my info to get fully removed there (or at least for the random spambot recruiters to stop spamming me).
      - sahat 14y ago
        Monster.com is a joke.
        donretag 14y ago
        Luckily for software developers, we can ignore the horrible job sites. Here is an article on Monster.com and endless email: http://blog.brusic.com/2012/07/how-private-is-your-online-job-profile.html http://blog.brusic.com/2012/07/how-private-is-your-online-jo...
  - donretag 14y ago
    Exactly. "information is easily accessible on LinkedIn". Unless LinkedIn has some psychic abilities, LinkedIn only knows what I voluntarily add. My LinkedIn profile contains only company names, dates, and titles. No descriptions. No StackOverflow. Github is used to share code with those I know, not some vanity site. I work with an amazing team, but you won't find us online (except for mailing lists or slides from talks).
mratzloff 14y ago
You assume recruiters go to sites besides LinkedIn in order to recruit people. They don't.
dasil003 14y ago
Why worry about recruiting spam? You can also avoid it by having no online presence too, but that will not serve your long-term career interests. It's not like you're under obligation to respond, and every once in a while a recruiter may even have a pitch that merits a response.
- svachalek 14y ago
  Exactly. 1999 was a lot like now. In 2001, I was calling recruiters and they literally had nothing. It's nice to think you'll never want for work and you can run out and find a great gig whenever you feel like it, but in reality you never know when the polarity is going to reverse so it doesn't hurt to keep an eye open at all times.

bitsweet 14y ago

The reality is this information is easily accessible on LinkedIn. Even if someone hides their current place of employment, LinkedIn's recruiting tools actually let recruiters see that information (one of the reasons we receive so much recruiter spam). Companies that want to build great teams need to start thinking more offensively than defensively. If you have a great culture and solving interesting problems, recruiters wont pose a threat.

dpritchett 14y ago
Yep. Security through obscurity is no security at all.
k3n 14y ago
I'm like donretag in the sense that I also seek to minimize my online profile as much as possible; thus, I don't use LinkedIn. So no, the reality is not that it's easily accessible -- unless you're already making it so on sites that are liberal with sharing your info like LinkedIn.
- bitsweet 14y ago
  Coderwall never exposes personal contact information of anyone on the team, so the exposure is no greater then having a GitHub profile...probably even less.
  - k3n 14y ago
    That's cool, I was mainly just commenting on the LinkedIn aspect. Monster.com was probably the biggest mistake I ever made, it took 5+ years for my info to get fully removed there (or at least for the random spambot recruiters to stop spamming me).
    - sahat 14y ago
      Monster.com is a joke.
      - donretag 14y ago
        Luckily for software developers, we can ignore the horrible job sites. Here is an article on Monster.com and endless email: http://blog.brusic.com/2012/07/how-private-is-your-online-job-profile.html http://blog.brusic.com/2012/07/how-private-is-your-online-jo...
- donretag 14y ago
  Exactly. "information is easily accessible on LinkedIn". Unless LinkedIn has some psychic abilities, LinkedIn only knows what I voluntarily add. My LinkedIn profile contains only company names, dates, and titles. No descriptions. No StackOverflow. Github is used to share code with those I know, not some vanity site. I work with an amazing team, but you won't find us online (except for mailing lists or slides from talks).

mratzloff 14y ago

You assume recruiters go to sites besides LinkedIn in order to recruit people. They don't.

dasil003 14y ago

Why worry about recruiting spam? You can also avoid it by having no online presence too, but that will not serve your long-term career interests. It's not like you're under obligation to respond, and every once in a while a recruiter may even have a pitch that merits a response.

svachalek 14y ago
Exactly. 1999 was a lot like now. In 2001, I was calling recruiters and they literally had nothing. It's nice to think you'll never want for work and you can run out and find a great gig whenever you feel like it, but in reality you never know when the polarity is going to reverse so it doesn't hurt to keep an eye open at all times.