by logotype on 1/28/25, 7:24 PM with 136 comments
Edit: I now run a fintech startup https://fixparser.dev and we do look for a technical/business co-founder, feel free to reach out.
by TheGamerUncle on 1/28/25, 7:49 PM
by themanmaran on 1/28/25, 8:18 PM
A few big problems:
1. AI Spam. I categorized the inbound we got the other day from a job post. Out of 172 daily applicants, we got 22 that looked reasonably like a person, and 150 that were primarily AI generated messages. Which are pretty easy to spot because they're 500 words of tech jargon and rehashing the job description.
2. Purely automated applications. There are a lot of "Apply to 1000 jobs with AI" startups out there that just spam job boards [1][2][3].
3. Qualifications. There is a shocking number of engineers applying to work at an AI company who have never made a single API request to OpenAI. After three years of hearing about AI every day if you've never tested a single inference API then why are you applying to an AI startup.
The signal to noise ratio is so bad that it's better to just do outbound. At this point the job listing is mostly there so we can share it with candidates that we reach out to.
[3]https://www.reddit.com/r/GetEmployed/comments/1eo8uyp/i_used...
by kdamica on 1/28/25, 8:04 PM
My advice: never do a cold application. Find ways to hustle to get a warm intro.
by ryandrake on 1/28/25, 8:00 PM
by jjice on 1/28/25, 8:24 PM
He went through and found that almost all the applications he was able to go through were absolute nonsense.
He then screened some people before a technical interview with the rest of the team and found over half of them either had no clue how to really write any code or were completely lying about any experience they've had.
We then had five interviews set up for the following week. None of them were a fit. We have a pretty straight forward set of real world examples for our programming questions and no one got them. Keep in mind, all the other engineers on the team had gone through these questions without issue in the past, and we're not particularly amazing engineers. The "trickiest" of them is essentially performing an in memory group by given to arrays of data that have relations to each other. These were all full open internet as well.
We decided to pause hiring for the next quarter. I think the main issue was the absolute flood of applicants that had no ability to fill the role, and filtering through that with limited man-hours while features still need to be shipped is really difficult.
Years ago, when I'd be part of engineering hiring efforts, we had a recruiter who would handle screenings, so I don't know if it's always been like this and we need to get better at screening, or if it's notably worse now.
by ceroxylon on 1/28/25, 7:50 PM
My latest job search made me want to create a startup that addresses this, by vetting both posters and users. The largest hurdle is that adding money to the scenario opens a whole new can of worms for scammers.
by awkward on 1/28/25, 8:07 PM
I think there's some active memes in the startup community about not hiring people from finance specifically.
by tslocum on 1/28/25, 7:48 PM
by scarface_74 on 1/28/25, 8:11 PM
It’s almost impossible to stand out and rise above the noise these days if you are just randomly submitting your application to a job board.
When I mentioned this before, someone asked me should they reach out to the company directly. That doesn’t help either unless you have a special set of skills or experience that would make you stand out.
Neither “I am a full stack developer” or “I worked for a FAANG” set you apart.
by linebeck on 1/28/25, 7:51 PM
by burgerrito on 1/28/25, 7:57 PM
Ask HN: Who is pretending to be hiring? <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41714672>
by steve_adams_86 on 1/28/25, 8:39 PM
by rvz on 1/28/25, 8:00 PM
Why? They don't have the money nor will they risk it on people who they do not know.
The best way to get "hired" by them is to fiercely compete against them to the point where they wave the white flag and buy you out.
by CoderJoshDK on 1/28/25, 8:04 PM
As a data point, yes, some companies do hire here. Maybe not all. But I had a great experience through YC.
I think in general, the hiring market is a mess (on both sides) and HN suffers from similar issues.
by 0x0000000 on 1/28/25, 11:06 PM
Quality hack.
by chrisoconnell on 1/28/25, 7:54 PM
This being said, I've been self employed for several years, so this may have changed since ~ 2021, but I don't think it's likely.
Also, the landscape has changed, and some job posting may have been made during more optimistic moments, and they may just be stale, rather than fake.
I have referred many people to "WorkAtAStartup" in recent years who have had quite a bit of success. While it's unfortunate that you are not having the best of luck, definitely be optimistic and continue to try! There are many great companies that recruit through the YC boards, and I recommend using WorkAtAStartup to have the best chances of response, even more so than their direct job listings.
by mjasher on 1/28/25, 8:20 PM
by bobthecowboy on 1/28/25, 8:32 PM
I also participated in the hiring side for the previous startup I worked at - SoftIron - and we did actually hire someone we found through a post I made here on the monthly Hiring thread. He was a good candidate, but eventually everyone got laid off anyway. I actually felt bad about that - I think we were only around a year after hiring him.
On that note, since I was participating in the hiring, I will say that we had a shocking amount of low effort and AI-written responses to the posting.
by gentlesoulcarp on 1/28/25, 10:14 PM
Last I checked, that radio category is account-wide, so if you do “frontend”, that’s all your account can do. This makes it difficult to apply to multiple kinds of roles through the interface and it makes it harder for founders to find people who can wear multiple hats. Most of them could probably use a versatile person at their stage.
by tptacek on 1/28/25, 8:20 PM
by fasteddie31003 on 1/28/25, 8:15 PM
by rgbrgb on 1/28/25, 7:58 PM
by carlbren on 1/29/25, 1:24 PM
by asdasdsddd on 1/28/25, 8:22 PM
by xenospn on 1/28/25, 8:18 PM
by dang on 1/28/25, 9:33 PM
by Hormold on 1/28/25, 8:27 PM
by scarface_74 on 1/29/25, 1:33 AM
What are you offering to pay your “technical cofounder”? I bet it’s peanuts and “equity”. If that’s the case, do you not see that you are part of the same toxic culture that defines many startups hiring process.
by mikhael28 on 1/28/25, 8:36 PM
by clarkalistair on 1/28/25, 8:30 PM
by wendyshu on 1/28/25, 9:20 PM
by steele on 1/28/25, 8:02 PM
by very_good_man on 1/28/25, 7:43 PM