Comment by scient | Hacker News Reader

Comment by scient | Hacker News Reader

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Not to offend you or anything, but have you considered that the problem of your potential (better) employment is you. I see a lot of people claiming that the H1B program is bad and that there are tons of developers available in the US etc. But my experience is the polar opposite.

And to make things clear - I am actually a H1B holder, working as a CTO for a US based company, been here for 3 years now. When looking for people for our engineering team, we get lots of resumes but very few actually promising ones. Out of the promising ones, almost none are actual people with tangible experience that could be hired as a senior person. If there is someone who could be senior, they ask for like 200k and up a year - and this is just to be a senior engineer, not even in a managerial position or anything (P.S and this is the NOVA area, not the bay area).

So yeah, I would say good people are always in high demand, and the lack of good engineers right now is troubling. Then again most of the H1B visas get abused by companies who hire second rate talent from abroad so...

What this is actually saying, and I see this sentiment regularly, is that you want the best of the best, but you don't want to pay for it.

I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but you are not going to get the best of the best from any other country either, as they are in just as high of demand. What generally ends up happening is people make the argument you make, then go the H1B route and end up with mediocre engineers that are much cheaper than local counterparts, can be worked 60-80 hours per week and cannot easily leave. And this is no accident, it is exactly what they wanted in the first place.

I'm not saying this is your intention, I don't know you, but I have personally watched this exact scenario play out time and again.

Most of these resumes you are turning down are people who can be trained to provide exactly what you are looking for. If you do not want to invest in that training, then you need to pay for the time and energy that the rarer candidates have invested themselves.

> Not to offend you or anything, but have you considered that the problem of your potential (better) employment is you.

I have considered that, but I would think I would be getting and failing more interviews if that was the case. I have a hard time getting interviews.

> When looking for people for our engineering team, we get lots of resumes but very few actually promising ones. Out of the promising ones, almost none are actual people with tangible experience that could be hired as a senior person.

What do you consider "promising" and "tangible experience"? I have been refused interviews because of who I have worked for, without anyone delving into whether I might still have the experience desired.

> If there is someone who could be senior, they ask for like 200k and up a year - and this is just to be a senior engineer, not even in a managerial position or anything (P.S and this is the NOVA area, not the bay area).

You realize that NoVa is not much cheaper than the Bay Area, right? I mean, $200k for no management responsibility in NoVa is ridiculous to ask for, but I would expect $150k - $160k.

> So yeah, I would say good people are always in high demand, and the lack of good engineers right now is troubling.

So what is "good"? I have been told before that maybe the problem is me. Nobody has ever told me I'm not "good", though. I have consistently been one of the best engineers (software and systems at least; I was a bit dicier at electrical) wherever I have worked. I am an order of magnitude more competent than the anecdotes that come up during these discussions. Yet I get refused interviews because my background is "too government" and similar bullshit. I would love for someone to tell me there is something objectively wrong that I can fix. Nobody has done that. Except for my resume; fecack did a good job with that. Doesn't help with the aforementioned bullshit rejections, though.

> I have been refused interviews because of who I have worked for, without anyone delving into whether I might still have the experience desired.

Consider taking those companies off your resume. I'd prefer a gap in the resume to a negative item. A gap can be explained any way you want in an interview, but a negative item will cause you to get rejected before you even begin.

The problem is the company is Raytheon, and I spent the first 9.5 years of my career there. It isn't something I can just drop.

Consider leaving it off anyway, and shortening how your resume presents your current career by ten years. Rebrand yourself and wrap yourself in nice shiny new packaging. I'm 32, I present myself as having 4 years of experience, I make six figures. When they ask me what I did in my twenties, I tell them I worked in construction.

Your resume isn't your permanent record. It's a marketing initiative. You should feel free to treat it as such.

> Raytheon

...

What's wrong with working for Raytheon?

I don't think there is anything wrong with it. Other people do. What that problem is depends. Sometimes it's a stereotype that I'm going to be inflexible, steeped in backwards methodologies, and the type who is going to show up to a startup interview in a suit and tie with a stack of professionally-printed resumes. Sometimes, as I mentioned before, it is the view that my experience is too "government" and that I won't "get" their customers or lines of business. Sometimes it is simply objections to me wanting to work on "death machines". My current work isn't much better, since I am still working on government contracts.

I've dropped the first 10 years of my career so I could fit my resume onto a single page. Nobody even asks or cares. No employer even reads your resume past the first half of the first page.

Now that I think about it, it's good practice for anybody to just put the last few years on a resume. Unless you are actually selling yourself as someone with 14 years in X, with an expectation of commensurate salary and responsibilities, it's noise and should just be left off. Noise on a resume is unforgivable.

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