Comments on: So THIS Is Why I Can’t Find Work

By: J. Timothy King

J. Timothy King — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 18:06:47 +0000

Good idea to collect the funny, the ridiculous, and the red flags from job ads into a book! I’ll post some more about that, see how well the idea goes over.

By: John

John — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 11:25:45 +0000

Excellent! Great!! This is the kind of stuff a great book should be made of! Too many exclamation points? No! Not enough. Write the book! Collect these want ads into something that can be very informative with a hilarious twist for perspective employees. Every out of work programmer/engineer should buy it.

By: kolia

kolia — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 16:22:38 +0000

enjoy the fact that you can still get picky about IT salary proposals in the USA, as it might not last much longer. There are perhaps millions of candidates that will gladly accept the scorned $50k for that position…outsourcing is a gold mine for IT firms, just not startups.

By: J. Timothy King

J. Timothy King — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 16:20:50 +0000

Paul: You’re welcome. Glad you enjoyed the post.

Bro Jim: Love the entry-level–5-10-years thing. And regarding the other: $50K?! When I was back at YC*** mumble-mumble years ago, and some people were taking pay cuts so they could stay on board, I was still making more than that!

Michael: I remember job ads like that for Java programmers back in the day. “10 years Java experience” or some such, and java had been invented only a few years previously. I guess now, it would probably be Rails. I haven’t been paying attention to ads for Ruby developers, so I don’t know whether there are any “Ruby on Rails 5-10 years experience” (when Rails is only 3.5 years old).

Nathan: They might have been talking about installing a stock CMS, because the ad did say “wiring the entire backend.” I assumed that was a typo. But maybe they got a graphic designer to do the HTML/CSS part, and now they need someone to install WordPress (or Drupal or Joomla) and translate the HTML demo into a stock theme. Still, I wouldn’t commit to completing that in less than a week, even if the graphic designer knew how to design for online CMS’s. Even so, that “compensation: uncompetitive” for a rush job? Eh… Might make a fun blog post, but I’m not in the mood right now, thanks.

Bruce: Actually, I wouldn’t mind paying $10/hr for a brand new grad, as long as I’d have at least one senior developer for each such grad. Such a position sounds like an internship of sorts, rather than a real position. I could ask him to hunt down bugs, and I could pair-program with him, and that could make for a wonderful experience for both of us. But he’d end up wanting a pretty big raise pretty darn fast.

Jim: Ha! That sounds pretty funny. Any company silly enough to bite probably deserves what they get, if you follow through on the “Juggalo” act. (For anyone who hasn’t heard the term Juggalo before, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juggalo

Suldog: That’s pretty kewl. I love it when I off the cuff write something like this, and it resonates. Now that you’re all here, I’m looking for dedicated fans to build my fan-base. Not willing to pay anything, but you’ll learn a lot about how opinionated I am, and I’ll give you stock in my non-existent company. Any takers?

By: Suldog

Suldog — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 15:35:51 +0000

Pretty cool, Tim. You’re linked over at Universal Hub, one of my fave sites. I usually access you from my place, but today you ARE a rockstar

By: Jim

Jim — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 14:57:11 +0000

Heh, I’ve always had an inchoate dislike of job listings that mention “rockstars” and “[some technology] ninjas”, but this post lends it some form.

Maybe I’ll email recruiters telling them I’m a “.NET Juggalo.”

By: Bruce Dodds

Bruce Dodds — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 14:53:43 +0000

Last month I saw a craigslist ad for a position in a town in Oregon. They were looking for a recent computer science grad for $10/hr. Thanks, H1B!

By: Nathan

Nathan — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 13:58:23 +0000

Good post and I’ve been there before myself. It’s amazing how people just don’t have the first clue about time and cost when it comes to web development. They think “hey, I go on the internet all the time. There are web sites there. And since there are so many web sites, they must be super easy to build.”

Additionally, these companies will absolutely find someone to do the job, and they’ll get what they pay for. They’ll also have to pay more than double to fix the problems with what they get for the lowball price.

And I love “the entire back end by the end of this week.” Maybe if they’re talking about installing a completely out-of-the-box install of wordpress, but anything other than that is completely laughable.

By: Michael Maggard

Michael Maggard — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 13:51:50 +0000

Best is when the job specs >n-years experience – in a technology that is n-1 years old. Yeah, I’d like to hook up with time travelers & clairvoyants too.

By: Jim King

Jim King — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 13:22:08 +0000

Yup, I went through the same thing a few years back. Some job descriptions would actually say ‘recent college grad’ & ‘5-10 years experience’ in the same sentence. And have the pay for an entry level position.

I actually got forwarded a job posting recently for a ‘Director of I.T.’ so the person would need hands on experience in the whole sha-bang-a-babg (coding, server set-up etc.). I asked for the salary range and they came back with ‘$50K’. I responded back thinking they meant $150K…nope…