Ask HN: Has the British contract market dried up, or am I just unhireable?
This is my latest resume: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/1player/resume/master/resume.pdf
I have a ton of experience, also not pictured are 1000+ hours on Upwork on random short and long term projects. I can do backend, DevOps, systems administration, bespoke development. I know C, Go, Python, Elixir, Rust and the frontend tech.
Yet I get ghosted completely by recruiters. They set up a time to call and never call. I am lowering my rate down to very low levels for someone my experience (£600/d), and no call back whatsoever. The only requirement I have is fully remote work. Still, no answer whatsoever. Not even spam from the recruiters anymore. My resume lists half of the things I have worked on, but no point in making two pages long if no one even reads the first one. Even HN direct contacts have gone nowhere.
This is majorly impacting my self-confidence, and I am at a point that I will have to drop my 11+ year consulting career for full time employment. People keep saying there are more open jobs than engineers, but I call bullshit, I cannot see it.
What is going on? Is the British job market dead? Is it Brexit? Am I in some kind of black list? Is my CV just terrible? I am at a loss here.
20 comments
[ 2.8 ms ] story [ 56.7 ms ] threadI have freelanced for about 15 years, US companies only (they pay better). I have some free (no ads or subscriptions) articles on my site typicalprogrammer.com you may find helpful.
I have also connected with the agency that represents you after you have mentioned it to me on a similar post ages ago, and of course they give preference to their current client list first (understandable) before looking into prospective ones like myself. I hope this is a relationship that might pay off in the long term.
But right now I literally have gone through all the contacts I have made in the past 10 years, and the only opportunity I have now is cold calling and fighting it out on Upwork, which ain't fun.
I suggest focusing on business problems you can solve. A business may have a broken or slow web site, for example. They probably won't have a job opening specifically to fix that, but they still have the problem. Instead of calling around asking "Do you need another Python programmer?" ask "What problems would you like to get fixed that your staff don't have the skills or bandwidth to deal with?" No business ever had the requirement "I need 5,000 more lines of Javascript this month," so don't try to sell that to them.
Every company will hire (or contract) when someone comes along who can add value to the business.
This approach has worked for me many times. Reframing the gig-hunting process in terms of business value rather than my specific "skill set" made all the difference. Recruiters use databases full of yes-no and 0-5 rankings of keywords, they focus on moving interchangeable people around. They may also know about business problems their customers face but they make money putting bodies in chairs so don't expect too much out of them.
Think about the difference between someone knocking on your door asking if you need a person with a lawnmower for couple of hours, versus someone telling you they noticed your yard needs some care and they have the skill and tools to do it. You don't care about the brand of lawnmower they use. They identified a problem and offered a solution, one that doesn't require you make any decision beyond how much it will cost.
I have started a few long term relationships with clients by just basically asking them "what do you need fixed? Is there any way I can make your business more efficient?" but it's not the type of approach that works if your only remaining avenue is cold-calling and sending resumes.
This is certainly a fault of mine, I should have invested more in my "brand" to have the clients come to me organically (through my website or Twitter account) rather than having to knock at their door asking for a job.
1) your technical skills look great, and imply you want a technical job
2) I would separate your freelance work from you employment at Punters, to show you have experience as a contractor, not someone who just got laid off (made redundant), cannot find a job and now is trying to go contracting.
3) Punters Lounge - job title - oh so you are management type? Are you looking for a management contract job?
4) add a job title to GreatSway
5) So you are starting your own company, 'Combo Tech'. Good for you. So when you are working for me, and I am paying you, you will spend half your time on your pet project.
6) So you are starting your own company, 'Combo Tech'. Good for you. So when you strike it rich you will leave us.
7) Job titles are all great, but to not be tied to the title they gave you. Use a descriptive title.
Do you have an example of a good CV that clearly separates employment from freelance work? I have yet to see one.
To answer #3: I have management experience but I want a technical role, or to provide actual high-level consulting services if needed (improving processes, architecture review, etc.)
That said, thank you for the advice. My problem is that I never tried to fit into a single role, so it's hard to create a targeted CV when my foremost talent is learning on the job and wearing many hats. Recruiters tend to look for specialists on a specific piece of tech, while I have first hand knowledge that the more flexible you are, the more value you can provide your client, if you are able to get through the arbitrary restrictions the recruiter has placed on the job spec.
For each section in your work history, create a subtitle and just list the technologies used.
Eg:
2020 - 2021 Company A
Technologies used: Python, Django, MySQL
2021 - 2022 Company B
Technologies used: Kubernetes, MongoDB, C++, pandas
This will just help recruiters who'll be skimming through your CV to put you in the right category.
Thanks.
This is all excellent advice, but I doubt that's the only reason.
Whilst I'm a full stack dev, I found narrowing my CV, or creating multiple versions (one FE, one BE, one devops) helped sustain more interest/got me through more doors. Being a full stack dev puts you behind anyone that pitches themselves as a BE dev for BE roles, FE dev for FE roles, and so on. It's assumed that since they're 'specialised', they're better suited for the role.
Same goes for tech. Whilst everyone _here_ will appreciate the fact knowing/working/having experience in multiple languages will generally mean your the better programmer, it's not something HR seems to grok.
In short: If there's a Go contract, send a version of your CV that pitches you as a BE Go Dev and that only. Once you're through the door and speaking to the people that matter, you can open up about your other experience.
As for timing, generally now is a good time. Some companies will have budget to use before the end of the tax year. Some companies will have new budgets at the start of the next tax year.
There have been a lot of layoffs, so the market isn't quite as much in the favour of developers at the moment.
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Anyhow, that said, I've just taken a perm role again, just for another year or so whilst I learn some new tech and hopefully the contract market sorts itself out. It's only about £1k/month less. Worth it for the security, for now.
Considering that for every contract job there are 10 full time employment offers, real contractor work (i.e. outside IR35) is basically 10% of 10% = 1% of the entire job market. It is abysmal.
Obviously this technique is only useful to pass the recruiters/screeners. When I get to talk to engineers and managers, I take it more seriously.
Pretty big and active forum for UK contractors
The phenomenon that presently affects your job prospects is the tens of thousands of good developers being laid off from FAANG companies and suddenly competing with you for any open roles.
Recruiters within my employer (a mid size tech firm) are keenly hoovering up ex-FAANG engineers. In fact roles are being filled by ex-FAANGers referring FAANGers.