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0 pointsmlthoughts20187y ago0 comments

There is a simple reason: scarcity of talent. Talent that can be commoditized through a platform instantly becomes cheaper, with employers much more easily able to sift through inventory (candidates) and look for deals or just waste peoples’ time gathering market data on interview performance.

If you’re sincerely highly talented, you’re not going to advertise yourself as a commodity on a platform. Your increased skill may not have a chance to be displayed because the platform uses foolish things like coding trivia or a black box proprietary method for recommending salary ranges for candidates like you, or offers automatic ways to find similar candidates so that if employers don’t like your salary demands, they can use your characteristics to tailor a search for a cheaper version of you.

Putting yourself on a platform like TripleByte essentially instantly signals that you’re on the cheap, commodity end of the spectrum (and yes employers think of $130k as cheap salary for this type of position).

Using TripleByte is like cheapening your personal brand. In fact it’s even worse because you’re voluntarily doing it and voluntarily centralizing all of this interview performance data and profile data for them.

0 comments

mquander7y ago

I have a strong resume by most metrics, and I used Triplebyte because it seemed like a good method to learn about a ton of small companies I otherwise would never be able to find. (I didn't end up joining any of them, but they were solid 2nd/3rd/4th-choice offers.)

I'm confused about why you think this is irrational. If I find some startup through Triplebyte, and then apply to them, it doesn't seem like a substantially different process than if I applied directly. Once I'm talking to someone at the company, any signal based on how the recruiter found me seems like it should immediately be swamped by concrete observations about me.

If you know a better strategy for next time to find the kind of companies that Triplebyte will connect me with, I'm all ears.

mlthoughts2018OP7y ago

If you’re OK with that, then by all means use that commodity portal to seek jobs. I mean that sincerely. If you prefer to trade possibly tens of thousands of dollars of salary, bonuses, equity or other compensation for some vague ease of access “value-add” of a platform that makes your resume function like Tinder for jobs, then you would not be irrational to search via TripleByte.

For me, for example, the fact that those positions can be matched up to me on TripleByte would literally make me reject those jobs. No thanks. I’ll either pay for a private recruiter that essentially functions like a personal talent agent, or I’ll find networking events or other boutique application portals to use that keep me exclusively looking at jobs that pay competitive rates. Hell, I’d sooner just send cold application emails through regular company HR websites than agree to be the commodity product of TripleByte.

ontoillogical7y ago

> For me, for example, the fact that those positions can be matched up to me on TripleByte would literally make me reject those jobs.

That seems shortsighted.

If I was running a startup again and looking to grow my team after exhausting my personal network, triplebyte would be a good value proposition: reduce the time it takes me to hire by pre screening candidates and presenting me with a curated set of people to interview.

So it follows that if I wanted to join a startup I’d consider triplebyte for the same reason —- I can see busy ceos of small companies using it.

You seem to be focused on compensation not finding interesting offers though. To that I’d say two things:

1) If you want to purely optimize for compensation, work at FAANG. I don’t think they source via triplebyte so the point is moot.

2) In my experience, offer size is not related to where the candidate was sourced.

mlthoughts2018OP7y ago

> “So it follows that if I wanted to join a startup I’d consider triplebyte for the same reason —- I can see busy ceos of small companies using it.”

How does this follow? Obviously the buyer (busy CEOs of start-ups looking to pay below market) wants a commodity platform to buy.

That does not mean the seller (job candidates) wants to sell on that platform, especially if the platform cheapens their product (such as reducing developers to a commodity interview process that fails to capture their value additive skills).

1 more reply

solipsism7y ago

By virtue of locating you via TripleByte, those 2nd/3rd/etc. companies revealed their goal is explicitly to dramatically underpay you, through a hiring platform that enables them to treat you like a commodity. If you’re OK with that, then by all means use that commodity portal to seek jobs. I mean that sincerely. If you prefer to trade possibly tens of thousands of dollars

Are you saying it's impossible to negotiate a fair compensation package with an employer you found through TripleByte? You don't seem to be telling us why we should believe that.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse

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mquander7y ago

If you know a better strategy for next time to find the kind of companies that Triplebyte will connect me with, I'm all ears.

mlthoughts2018OP7y ago

ontoillogical7y ago

> For me, for example, the fact that those positions can be matched up to me on TripleByte would literally make me reject those jobs.

That seems shortsighted.

So it follows that if I wanted to join a startup I’d consider triplebyte for the same reason —- I can see busy ceos of small companies using it.

You seem to be focused on compensation not finding interesting offers though. To that I’d say two things:

1) If you want to purely optimize for compensation, work at FAANG. I don’t think they source via triplebyte so the point is moot.

2) In my experience, offer size is not related to where the candidate was sourced.

mlthoughts2018OP7y ago

> “So it follows that if I wanted to join a startup I’d consider triplebyte for the same reason —- I can see busy ceos of small companies using it.”

How does this follow? Obviously the buyer (busy CEOs of start-ups looking to pay below market) wants a commodity platform to buy.

1 more reply

solipsism7y ago

Are you saying it's impossible to negotiate a fair compensation package with an employer you found through TripleByte? You don't seem to be telling us why we should believe that.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse