Ask YC: Should People Compete for Jobs, or Should Jobs Compete for People?

[iamdave]

I read a rather interesting blog entry about the disparity between LinkedIn and Craigslist. Ultimately, the theme pointed out how by virtue both of how the sites are structured and geared LinkedIn and Craigslist have two different user types, and two different angles of usage.

LinkedIn having the approach of corporate HR where they are looking for skills. A person applies, an interview is setup and there's really no connectedness.. Craigslist on the other hand targets a more grassroots approach. Instead of letting a profile sell the person with the skills, you very often have to write the cover email to pitch your skills and services and hope something comes out of that.

This got to thinking about an idea that came into my mind for a startup last week for a simpler job hunt site (as if we need another one, but I aim to combine the utility of social bookmarking as well as a few other features).

So here we have us a scenario: your startup does well. In fact it does amazingly well and you find yourself with an impressive following of users who want to work for you. Or perhaps you know someone who's got such a startup going and sees a large developer base. Is it more beneficial for people to compete for a job with a startup, for for a startup to compete with other startups for quality devs?

[cduan]

It's supply and demand. Where demand is scarce, the supply competes for it. Where supply is scarce, demand competes for it. Programmers are the supply; startups are the demand.

Put in real terms, if you've got a really great startup, developers will compete for you. If you're a really great programmer, startups will compete for you.

Of course, there are all sorts of information asymmetry and risk aversion problems, but those are beyond the scope of this post.

[Tichy → cduan]

You could just as well say startups are the supply and programmers are the demand, depending on your perspective. Other than that, I had the same thoughts.

[samwise]

I'm still not sure why the facebooks and googles need 50+ coders unless they are working on different projects.

I think a small team no matter the size of the company is the way to go. The beauty of web startups is they need not follow the metrics of other traditional startups.

[indie01]

Maybe it's more like companies should compete for people, and people should compete for whatever jobs or job titles there are to be had within a company.

begin /mini-rant here from personal experience:

But with the advent of bloodsucking agencies and such, this ideal tends to not work. This I've learned the hard way. People can't compete for jobs within a company they're hired to go actually work at b/c they're stuck under contract (or would be) if the "trial period" goes well; finders fees and various other things added onto the cost of hiring said employee.

On one interview I went w/a place in San Jose I was basically told (because I specifically asked) that if this place found me a full-time employment gig, they'd take THIRTY percent of a full year salary. So, if my going rate is, for simplicity purposes 100K, this agency makes 30K. $30,000 for what? The week's worth of work it took to "discover" my resume on the internet, call me in for an interview, and interview me and make me sign a contract? I don't think so.

It makes such little logical sense to me why companies even feel the need to outsource their search for talent. Why do they? HR is one of those things that's benefiting from the efficiencies of the web and better search methods.

/end mini-rant :)

[nextmoveone]

I think that quality developers are not a dime a dozen and that is why bigger start-ups poach, i.e. Facebook -> Google.

[_tggb → nextmoveone]

Is Google still considered a startup though? Sure they may compete in similar markets as startups - they're all 2.0 companies - but does 2.0 always mean startup?

Or can a company move on past that and become established without being bought out by some other big company?

Oh, and just food for a thought, does this definition make Yahoo a startup with MS trying to acquire them and their stake in web2.0 sits?

To avoid going too far off topic though, it seems like there's an ecosystem of programmers and exec's going between the major companies/startups for a few years at a time, how well does this work for innovation - do the same people do the same type of thing all the time with minor tweaks (albeit in different languages/forms), or do people largely try do things differently every time?

[aneesh → nextmoveone]

Do you mean Google is poaching from facebook? I've heard a lot about people going the other way, developers as well as execs.

[nextmoveone → aneesh]

I meant Facebook (poaching employees from) -> Google.

[TheTarquin]

I would say that it depends entirely on the position. When I applied to my current job, I had to compete with other candidates because we were all on equal footing (applying in our last year of undergrad to a position targeted at graduating undergrads.)

The context dictated that people compete for jobs.

A worker with unique skills or tons of invaluable experience may have companies competing for them.

Again, context is what's important.

[bkrausz]

It depends who's perspective you're coming from. You want people competing for you, whether you're hiring or looking to be hired. It's great for the self-esteem and makes you look good to companies.

[trekker7]

i mean the two scenarios seem similar... what are the unique characteristics of either case? in both cases, a startup posts a job offer, multiple people apply, and these people compete for the job. at the same time there could be multiple startups posting job offers, and so these startups are competing for people. how could it be different?

[SwellJoe]

In Soviet Russia...jobs compete for people, and people compete for jobs!

Sorry, I just can't take a question like this seriously.