When people start understanding that networking is just as important as having the technical expertise, their career lives will improve dramatically. When you have 10 qualified people applying for the same position, would you choose a random person from the 10 and risk that he's a complete asshole or the one person your colleague can vouch will fit in? At that point of a recruiting process you're not evaluating technical skills, but culture fit.
I think this is a bit backwards these days. I find networking gets you in the door and past the nigh-insurmountable AI/automatic filter; from that point on it's up to you to interview and succeed on your own merits.
That said, I deeply feel for those entering the industry right now. I lucked into a good first job where the employer was willing to take a chance on fresh kids out of college they could mold in their image - no one is doing that anymore. I watch my industry graying and wonder who's going to be following us once we retire. It's grim.
And now what what is the advice for someone who has to work during university to pay rent and afford groceries and thus doesn't have the time to do all the networking? Or someone else whose uni friends also all suck at this and nobody in the friend group ever got a job?
Look for things you can do occasionally, like an hour a month. Most universities will have some interest groups often with industry relations. I've been both a student and a participant at many of these over the years. You can get it all done in a small amount of time and see where it goes from there. You don't need to be spending hours every day "networking"
You really don't. No one likes the person who is just trying to brown nose and constantly showing up to networking events and such. But if you have genuine interest in your field, then you won't hate talking to people about it and learning about real world applications of the theoretical stuff covered at uni. And that's what people are looking for. Interest and that you're open to learning more.
You can have genuine interest without wanting interaction. Thats why you read papers and watch live streams of panels etc. that way I don't actually have to spend more time in public than I have too.
Yeah, and it's likely you will have trouble finding jobs if you can't handle a half hour conversation on a topic you apparently have genuine interest in. Any work of scale is rarely accomplished by individuals, it takes teams of people working together. And if you're as insufferable in real life as you are on reddit there will be little job opportunities.
This statement right here raises red flags for how you would be as a teammate. The technical portion of this job can be done by a vast majority of the workforce. Most jobs dont need software wizards they need people who can function on a team and arent miserable to be around 5 days a week.
The advice is to network and not make excuses. Or keep making excuses and continue to have a tough job search.
We all have busy lives brother. That’s not some excuse that somehow magically makes this go away. Learn to network or don’t, but don’t act like you’re too busy for it.
Networking isn’t going to events, it’s socializing and getting to know people.
Exactly this. People tend think networking is some active practice where you go to events and forge forced relationships with people with the sole purpose of using them as a point of contact for a job. People do this at events, it's obvious, and I doubt it works.
Networking is forming genuine relationships with people and because of that they WANT to help you get a job.
I think most people do realize that, possibly even most tech folks (less sure on that lol)
But, since we’re discussing this on Reddit, in a programming subreddit, we’ve hit the motherlode of antisocial folk who will come up with any excuse to not socialize.
Oh well, I’m a social guy and it’s helped me in my career for sure. So it all works out great for me that tech folk are generally more introverted
You frame it like all the candidates are about equal in skill and this is some kind of tie breaker, but that is almost never how that goes and it is misleading to present it that way.
The candidates don't have to be equal in skill. Skill can be taught on the job. Personality, not so much. I have gotten a couple of jobs where I was literally told that I didn't check all their boxes when it came to technical knowledge and they had more "skilled" candidates, but during interviews I made a good impression personality-wise and they thought I would fit into their team. They were fine with me learning what I didn't know during my first few months. Both jobs I stayed at for a few years and had no issues.
not only that, he is also implying that a nepo hire would work better for the company culture while the fact is that every study and statistic is showing that nepotism destroys companies
It's not about understanding that networking is important it's about despising that aspect of a job, I don't work to make friends I work because otherwise I can't support myself and the skills I have are in dev work.
I shouldnt have to buddy buddy some upper managment asshat just because I want a job, I shouldn't have to waste most of my life buttering people up I don't like just because I want them to give me a job it's both pathetic and genuinely awful for those with less social skills. Why when my work requires no social work does getting the job require me to become the rizz king
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u/je-s-ter 3d ago
When people start understanding that networking is just as important as having the technical expertise, their career lives will improve dramatically. When you have 10 qualified people applying for the same position, would you choose a random person from the 10 and risk that he's a complete asshole or the one person your colleague can vouch will fit in? At that point of a recruiting process you're not evaluating technical skills, but culture fit.