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Ask HN: How to fix recruiting from your known groups?

7 points by vsergiu ↗ HN
I got a call yesterday from a friend asking me if I am available for work. I was not and I ended up calling some of my developer friends to ask them if they are available to take on the tasks. They were not, but they said they will ask around. I find this problem often and I am amazed that no one fixed it. I do not always know when my friends are available for work or if they look for someone to help them with tasks and just looking at their Linkedin profile doesn't always mention this. So how to make this process easier? Is there an app that lets you share between your groups that you are looking for a developer or that you are available for work ( does not include searching for people you don't know or not in your area).

12 comments

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dozzie
Yes, there is. It's called LinkedIn.
vsergiu
How does LinkedIn fix my problem in having to call all my friends when I am looking for a developer to help with some tasks? How do I know only based on his LinkedIn profile that he is available part time for work or not unless he keeps updating his status.
webmaven
Because you can send messages in LinkedIn, or make an announcement post that is restricted to your contacts.
dozzie
And how do you expect the new solution to operate? Somebody has to keep people's statuses updated, it won't work magically.
pcbo
nope, it doesn't fix it.
hcho
I remember a few London startups trying to tackle that. Their names are eluding me at the moment.

I reckon the reason they didn't get successful is due to challenges in monetization.

JSeymourATL
Hardly a week goes by without the announcement of some promising, brand new, social-recruiting-app-platform. No one has built a killer app just yet.

Here's one announced just today> http://www.marketwatch.com/story/smartrecruiters-revolutioni...

> So how to make this process easier? The best method is still a bit Old School. On a regular basis, reach out to your network, actually talk to people live, catch up over beers. The accumulated personal insights will be deeper and more profound than a mere online connection.

vsergiu
That is the point...I only asked for an app that can tell me if X is available so I can call him and grab a beer and talk. The point is I want to know which of my friends or friends of my friends are available in order to talk him because I do not want to start calling everyone from my list and ask my friends to also ask their friends..and maybe I miss someone this way..also is time consuming and not fun having to call people just to bug them if they are available if they are not. Makes sense?
JSeymourATL
It's a brilliant idea, a location based hook-up app that uses GPS to locate potential hires. Build it now, Linkedin/Monster would pay a tidy sum.
Varlski
As someone who works specifically recruiting for Startups and i have worked with some pretty fast growing ones the main challenges any of these startups is helping recruiting "passive candidates". What i mean by passive candidates is someone who is not actively looking for a job.

I believe a platform will come that does cut out the middleman and i am actually working on a few ideas but the harsh reality good companies want the best talent and that talent isn't always looking for a job.

Referral apps are a great way to attack the problem but i do not believe will be the only angle.

Michael

pcbo
Until date no company was able to tackle that issue. There's some startups trying to solve that, for instance http://www.jobbox.io, but I think that problem will be solved with a mix of machine learning and referrals.

This problem is very difficult to fix because we're dealing w/ people and their careers, which bring confidentiality into the equation and that messes up a bit.

Also, this issue is exponentially horrible when it comes to tech recruitment. No one is f* available nowadays but there are plenty of passive tech workers.

vsergiu
Want to talk more about this problem? I think I will get a stab on it. My email is in my profile.