4 ms·

Uhh, I have a computer science degree with departmental honor, from a top 20 US school, I've been hired by companies with difficult interviews, I have a side pr

Uhh, I have a computer science degree with departmental honor, from a top 20 US school, I've been hired by companies with difficult interviews, I have a side project with users that I shared the source code with employers with, an active Stack Overflow with a lot of good answers, strong references, etc. I'm not a dude with a laptop. And I was asking for 125k.

alain94040 12y ago
My friendly advice as a former hiring manage for a startup, purely based on the details you posted here about your job search experience. Huge caveat: you know all the details and I only go by a post on the Internet, so I'm likely to be wrong. The tone of your messages make you sound a little bit demanding, or difficult to work with. You may have voiced strong opinions during those interviews. When you say that a startup will make you come back several times, it's a sign that they like you, but have a concern that they are trying to figure out. My guess (again, just a wild guess), is that you were technically very strong, but had possibly a bit of an attitude. That would explain the startups behavior. The main two reasons a startup would hesitate to hire a good engineer is either they are asking for too much money, or the candidate seems inflexible. Again, I'm likely to be completely off.
- boredprog 12y ago
  No, one internal employee did state that as the reason. I have very strong references from every direct manager I've ever had. I am not difficult to work with unless you can't deal with having your opinions challenged. Unless Google retracts my offer based on this post I plan to work there for a long time so your advice is irrelevant. Its just disingenuous for startups to say they can't find talent when they mean they can't find cheap, meek, timid talent.
  - Bahamut 12y ago
    My experience has been similar to yours but in the Valley, and I have a strong set of GitHub contributions as well on top of a clearly sharply skyrocketing work profile chock full of engineering accomplishments & roles. It is frustrating that startups do not want to pay anywhere close to what reflects what that quality of engineering may entail. Companies like Google will pay $100k more than what typical startups will pay for quality senior engineers as far as I can tell, and that too is even a bit of a bargain. Increased responsibilities do not justify a shortfall of that much when it means it is close to 33-50% of a potential candidate's salary that is chopped off for them.
- ef4 12y ago
  > The tone of your messages make you sound a little bit demanding, or difficult to work with. Strongly disagree. OP clearly knew exactly what he was looking for and actually got it. It's the startups that wasted time on interviewing him but didn't make their hire that clearly lost out. I don't doubt that some of those companies could have perceived an attitude problem, but that's a huge reason not to work for those companies. They're looking for serfs, not collaborators. When I interview a senior dev, I deliberately test to see if they will contradict/debate me on something technical. If they won't, they're not really senior or they're just yes-men who won't call out my mistakes and make the organization better. Everybody talks a big game about giving employees responsibility and autonomy, but many lack the guts to follow through and hire smart people who have actual spines and opinions.
- joshu 12y ago
  This was the sense I got too.

alain94040 12y ago

My friendly advice as a former hiring manage for a startup, purely based on the details you posted here about your job search experience. Huge caveat: you know all the details and I only go by a post on the Internet, so I'm likely to be wrong. The tone of your messages make you sound a little bit demanding, or difficult to work with. You may have voiced strong opinions during those interviews. When you say that a startup will make you come back several times, it's a sign that they like you, but have a concern that they are trying to figure out. My guess (again, just a wild guess), is that you were technically very strong, but had possibly a bit of an attitude. That would explain the startups behavior. The main two reasons a startup would hesitate to hire a good engineer is either they are asking for too much money, or the candidate seems inflexible. Again, I'm likely to be completely off.

boredprog 12y ago
No, one internal employee did state that as the reason. I have very strong references from every direct manager I've ever had. I am not difficult to work with unless you can't deal with having your opinions challenged. Unless Google retracts my offer based on this post I plan to work there for a long time so your advice is irrelevant. Its just disingenuous for startups to say they can't find talent when they mean they can't find cheap, meek, timid talent.
- Bahamut 12y ago
  My experience has been similar to yours but in the Valley, and I have a strong set of GitHub contributions as well on top of a clearly sharply skyrocketing work profile chock full of engineering accomplishments & roles. It is frustrating that startups do not want to pay anywhere close to what reflects what that quality of engineering may entail. Companies like Google will pay $100k more than what typical startups will pay for quality senior engineers as far as I can tell, and that too is even a bit of a bargain. Increased responsibilities do not justify a shortfall of that much when it means it is close to 33-50% of a potential candidate's salary that is chopped off for them.
ef4 12y ago
> The tone of your messages make you sound a little bit demanding, or difficult to work with. Strongly disagree. OP clearly knew exactly what he was looking for and actually got it. It's the startups that wasted time on interviewing him but didn't make their hire that clearly lost out. I don't doubt that some of those companies could have perceived an attitude problem, but that's a huge reason not to work for those companies. They're looking for serfs, not collaborators. When I interview a senior dev, I deliberately test to see if they will contradict/debate me on something technical. If they won't, they're not really senior or they're just yes-men who won't call out my mistakes and make the organization better. Everybody talks a big game about giving employees responsibility and autonomy, but many lack the guts to follow through and hire smart people who have actual spines and opinions.
joshu 12y ago
This was the sense I got too.