What can we do at our company to attract great talent?
Posted by nikochiko1@reddit | ExperiencedDevs | View on Reddit | 55 comments
Context: we are a small 3-person engineering team behind a startup that has organic and enterprise revenue + some VC funding. All engineers in our team are mid/senior in the sense that we are all able to work without too much handholding needed. We want to continue that trend and hire folks who can work similarly and won't cause a pull review bottleneck.
I realise that to really achieve this, we are competing for talent with companies that are known to have great cultures - big tech and startups that have been around for longer.
My feeling is that it won't happen automatically, and that something like a good engineering blog would help with building respect for the culture and team we have. Similarly, contributing to conversations in the community or talking at conference events.
In your experience, what works to attract great hackers? What is most effective?
Edit: we are already remote, we pay well (top quartile for the region). I am not one of the founders. I can say that there is decent work life balance.
I am really looking for how we reach the right developers now. Surely there are other companies with comparable benefits. How do we differentiate further? And in the first place, how do we get their attention so they know that we exist and are a great place to work?
omarhegazitech@reddit
before answering your question, i respect the fact that you're acting like you're the founder of a startup. the founder should be asking these questions and get the answers. regardless, nothing you do will help in building a culture, because it starts with the founder. i know this does not directly answer your question, but any sort of ideas brought up can help, but it does not solve the culture issue you're speaking about. its needs to be decisions that are made so naturally.
nobody-important-1@reddit
Top talent attracts top talent. My coworkers are average. Nothing wrong with that but I am forced to work at their pace. I spend 5 of my corporate 8 hours a day on my own stuff and still out perform others a bit.
I wish I could work with people at my own level. If another company contacted me and showed me they’re top talent I’d leave in a heartbeat
devoutsalsa@reddit
Making your company a place people want to work is a good start. Good compensation, minimal bullshit, being selective about who joins the team to keep quality high, etc. Instead of focusing on attracting talent, think about what it takes to retain talent. That way you’ll naturally make it attractive, and then you just need to show that to people who are looking for a quality environment. As part of your interview process, make sure to focus on people who will help keep quality up, not just on what skills they bring.
Inevitable-Waltz-889@reddit
Where are you advertising job postings?
No-Rush-Hour-2422@reddit
Pay more. People only go to work for money. They might lie to you and say they believe in your cause or whatever, but if you stop paying them they won't keep showing up. Ping pong tables don't attract talent, money does.
Pay is almost always the first thing people use to filter job postings on job boards. If you want to stand out amongst the other job postings, raise the amount you're willing to pay. It's that simple.
23sergej@reddit
You mentioned that you are not the founder. You can ask yourself: What keeps you in this position? Write down those reasons, and you'll identify benefits that might attract other developers.
Here are some possible advantages that might help you to compete with known brands:
However, a key challenge is that top talent is often already employed and not actively browsing job listings.
One solution we've had success with is running targeted ads to reach those who aren't actively looking for new jobs but may be open to better opportunities.
But your job ad should hook the developer. Salary isn't always the main motivator when people apply for a job (I've mentioned a few reasons above). So you have to clearly describe the position in your job application and its benefits.
Another important thing to mention is that great talents often don't have an up-to-date CV. So make it easy for them to apply to your position.
I'm happy to share my experience and help you with this. If you're interested, feel free to DM me!
Significant_Oil3089@reddit
Don't outsource
isaacfink@reddit
I am late to the party but here are my two cents, there are a lot of unemployed developers which makes it harder to weed through the noise, you basically have two options
In my experience all those tricks to attract top talent won't work for two reasons 1) there is a lot of noise, scroll through any job board and you'll see hundreds of startups promising the world, fully remote, top salaries and big benefit packages, you need to be famous for something other than your comp, all those benefits are great once someone has already heard your name but worthless if you're one in a sea of startups
The second reason is that the ones who might consider joining are already employed, you need to reach out to them in order to get them to join your company, the mythical 10x developer already works for faang and isn't interested in any benefits because they already have all that, you need something that will put your name out there, benefits only works once your name is already out
So your real issue is getting people to know about you, I don't know how you can achieve this but one thing that helped some startups I know is to start publishing technical articles, even if your product is not a tech product you can still publish some articles and invest a little in SEO this will get your name out there among developers and if your articles are high quality and aimed at experienced developers it will give off the impression of a good company with a good culture, I've worked with many top developers and the one thing they all have in common is a thirst for knowledge and they will appreciate a company that values quality work over just shipping, so a blog will also show them you're serious about the code you write and the technologies you use not just about the product, for me personally this could be what convinces me to join one company over another
Ok_Opportunity2693@reddit
Remote
WLB
Pay me with something real, not lotto ticket options
Izacus@reddit
Are you an actually great engineer though?
Gnome_boneslf@reddit
his pay indicates he's a great engineer
AffectionateCourt939@reddit
On the online job application form, make sure to ask a lot of irrelevant questions like "What is the address of your high school". Make sure you get their city, state, zip code, AND county( just to be sure ). Make them create an account so they can have ANOTHER password to keep up with. Ask amorphous, lacking in context questions like "Do you have experience with cash?" Make them verify their email address. Be sure to get a social security number and mothers maiden name.
rayfrankenstein@reddit
FFS. It's not that hard.
Find devs who've created great projects on github that are used by lots of people, or who at least are prominent maintainers on the project. If the project is big enough, they've already had to deal with working with other people and giving/receiving PR feedback.
SuhDudeGoBlue@reddit
Don’t be shy. How much do you pay, say a senior engineer (maybe 5-7 years of xp) in terms of base, bonuses, and equity?
I usually find this to be the central problem for a company of your profile not being able to attract talent.
the-scream-i-scrumpt@reddit
yeah, it's also a red flag that they said "top quartile for their region," a top quartile developer (of those looking specifically for work in that region) probably isn't very good
that said, job advertisement is probably the bottleneck here
Groove-Theory@reddit
What did you mean by this?
GuinnessDraught@reddit
Top quartile of e.g. Arkansas isn’t a competitive market
Groove-Theory@reddit
Just so we're clear, are you referring to the quantity of candidates or the quality of candidates?
(I realize you're not the original commenter)
Akkuma@reddit
In this specific case it would likely be both lower quality and lower quantity in Arkansas of software engineers.
scodagama1@reddit
It's definitely lower quality as well, it's a simple process - how many great engineers move from Arkansas to say Bay Area or NYC? Probably quite a few do for those juicy compensation packages and to join highly recognized companies
Other way around how many great engineers move from these places to Arkansas? Probably single digit of people, basically only those who found a partner from that region who convinced them to move to lower costs of living and closer to their families
So if there's an outflow of great talent and it's not offset by inflow end result must be that local market has lower quality of engineers (on average) than global/national market or top local markets
That being said this doesn't mean there are no good people in local market - there's always a cohort of people who simply don't want to move out of their hometowns. But I would indeed say that it won't be too quarter percentile but perhaps top 10
Akkuma@reddit
I think the COVID era changed this up a bit in that you had more outflow happening than inflow. Out of school I didn't think super hard about it and have lived in a low quality & low quantity tech area; however, I've realized it definitely isn't as bad as some other areas. I've had the head of engineering at a remote job say they will most likely not hire another person from the local area because of how many low quality individuals worked there prior to him coming in and this was at probably one of the best paying companies in the area.
Electrical-Ask847@reddit
I feel like there is a big market of FAANG type engineers who are just jaded from working in a corporate and are poorly adjusted to corporate life.
Lots of these ppl yearn to work for startup but don't want to take chances with their finances and family responsibilities.
Biggest reasons ppl don't join startups
Forsaken-Diver-5828@reddit
Can you elaborate please on 4? i would say that big corps (not FAANG) are the definition of bro clubs instead of startups
Thin-Entrance8758@reddit
Just to add to everyone else's comments, larger companies are more likely to have real HR or lawyers that might pop in and be like "hey don't do that" for some of the really egregious stuff.
dexx4d@reddit
This is why I left startups for corporate work. I've got a much better work/life balance now and get to spend more time with my kids & hobbies.
Dx2TT@reddit
Also, startups used to have full ownership for the initial employees, now you get these fake options that aren't real ownership and get you maybe 2 months salary on the event of a sale.
When whatsapp sold, the whole pot was distributed. The grind mentality made sense when you could become a millionaire from a succesful startup. Now, thats long gone.
OnyXerO@reddit
I'd say you've reached at least a couple hundred engineers with this post. I'd assume of varying degrees of skill and level.
Maybe be more specific about what you're looking for and what the benefits are and you might find someone.
Mid, senior, principal? General skill set, specialist?
Do you have a job posting to share?
hornetmadness79@reddit
Have you tried using a great recruiter? It would be super easy to find all kinds of developers if your project is Greenfield. But if it comes with a bunch of legacy stuff, it's going to be way harder to find great talent.
reformed_lefthanded@reddit
I think what you're doing is probably your best bet: social, engaged medias. Forget the old job-board-submit-resume dance, that's for the masses. You're not aiming for the masses.
I know several companies who hired out of a Twitter/X thread or a Reddit discussion. After that, a recommendation system works best.
Still, the fact that you're thinking about this and asking for help means you care. If I knew the company, I'd apply.
If anything, at least we'd have a nice chat. :)
Good luck!
Only-Requirement-398@reddit
There are a lot of excellent developers struggling to land a position. Shouldn't be difficult to find somebody as long as you are not asking full stack, plus devops plus 0 years of experience on something that was available just yesterday.
kevinossia@reddit
Interesting work, autonomy, and fantastic pay packages.
nikochiko1@reddit (OP)
I believe (as someone who has worked here for a year) that we have all of these. My question was more along the lines of how to best convey that to other developers.
stoneg1@reddit
If you arent already, on your job board show the salary and equity range. The equity should be quite a bit, most engineers arent dumb and can do the math on your equity. Founders tend to be afraid to give equity but tbh good engineers will see through the “if we become a 10 billion dollar company your equity will be worth x million”
EMCoupling@reddit
A lot of founders don't seem to understand that having a smaller percentage of a big pie is better than having a bigger percentage of no pie. That's why they're so miserly with the equity.
revolutionPanda@reddit
Not just start up founders. You can make a business owner a million dollars and they’ll bitch when you tell them your fee is $100k.
EMCoupling@reddit
Lot of "missing the forest for the trees" from business owners. It's weird, I don't get it.
xKommandant@reddit
Send that job listing my way
Unsounded@reddit
Put it in the job description and make sure to spend the interview session actually talking about those things instead of wasting an hour white boarding.
I’ve done hundreds of interviews at big tech and my personal opinion is that interviews should be purely discussion based and not based upon an arbitrary coding problem. If you really want a sense of how they code give them a small take home assignment relevant to the job.
amatiasq@reddit
Last time I got a take-home assignement I spend 4+ hours to complete it and got rejected after the following round.
chickentalk_@reddit
have a product that is technically interesting to work on, isn’t just another AI shovelware proposal, and isn’t just a CRUD app
and that isn’t easy
it means you need a good idea and those are rare
skodinks@reddit
I'm currently in the market (late mid / early senior level) and this is an off the cuff list of things that get me more excited about a company, from a culture perspective:
The hard part, however, is how to make applicants believe that you actually uphold these values, and that's where things like blogs and robust "About Us" pages that seem genuine can pull me in. I can try to find some examples of job recs or company pages that make me feel they're being honest about their values, but I think it simply comes down to effort.
Write about it on the job posting itself. Be super detailed about what sort of people you are and who you want to attract. The more detailed you are, the more I'll believe you aren't just bullshitting.
I want to work somewhere that I want to stay, and I want to believe you when you tell me that your place is that place.
bufferingmelonshorts@reddit
I love my startup but I’d leave in a heartbeat for a company that did a 4 day workweek (even if it was only seasonal like in summer).
ghostwail@reddit
I write this because I recently saw "noise canceling headphones" as a perc for a job ad: I would definitely get my attention caught by an ad that said "your own office door that you can close".
That said, the pay, the commute, the colleagues come first.
MrMichaelJames@reddit
Good pay, remote, high end MacBooks for dev boxes, an actual WLB not just be talk. Unlimited vacation that can actually be used. No calling or bothering devs after work hours or weekends. You know the basic stuff. No leet code bullshit during interviews. Be upfront about salary budget in the job posting.
nachohk@reddit
Better yet, make it a choice. Personally, I'd rather be running Linux on a ThinkPad.
MrMichaelJames@reddit
Oh absolutely choice is better but don’t force windows for sure :)
quentech@reddit
If this is some way of trying to sound like you pay well when in reality TC is half or less of FAANG & adjacent, that's going to be a problem.
crazyeddie123@reddit
Have a person read the resumes that come in. Preferably a person that knows a thing or two about tech.
Schedule actual interviews. No more than two.
Make offers within a week or so after the final interview.
Sadly, that puts you way ahead of a bunch of "great" companies right now.
946789987649@reddit
Yeah ditto on this. Move fast.
dataGuy123x@reddit
Give some esops?
PortlandIsTooWet@reddit
Offer Bay Area wages without requiring them to live in the Bay Area.
zeke780@reddit
I feel like this is the only answer, everyone in this thread saying "interesting problems, small team dynamics, etc." are wrong. Its just money, if you pay the most you will get the best people. Its just how it works.
tonydrago@reddit
It might be true for you, but it's definitely not true for me. I've turned down large pay rises and switched jobs for a reduced salary because other factors are more important to me.
zeke780@reddit
Did you grow up poor? Cause I have a pathological drive to make more money so I can avoid having to ever live like that again. I assumed this was 90+% of the population.
tonydrago@reddit
No, I didn't grow up poor. What country do you live in where 90% of people are in poverty? I guess you're American because you used the phrase "the country", as if there's only one of them.